Sunday, November 30, 2014
Solange's Honeymoon Looks Like A Pinterest Board IRL
*Pins everything to the “I Want To Go There” board*
When Solange Knowles and Alan Ferguson tied the knot in New Orleans earlier this month, both wore head-to-toe white.
Patriot Pics/SBMF/FAMEFLYNET PICTURES
But Solange just shared photos from their recent honeymoon in Brazil — and the gorgeous trip featured ~all of the colors~:
Hues on hues on hues:
Also worth noting?
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Saturday, November 29, 2014
Transparent Autumn (@ Gatineau ) by AlexsanderBB
Friday, November 28, 2014
Uber NYC General Manager Faced "Disciplinary Actions" For Privacy Violations
A BuzzFeed News report prompted Uber to investigate Josh Mohrer for accessing this reporter’s account without express permission.
Josh Mohrer, Uber NYC general manager, at a TLC public hearing earlier this year.
BuzzFeed News
An Uber spokesperson said the company has “taken disciplinary actions” against Josh Mohrer, the New York City general manager, after launching an investigation into two separate incidents and possible privacy violations 10 days ago.
Mohrer, as BuzzFeed News reported, accessed this reporter’s personal Uber account twice without express permission, including one occasion during which he tracked a ride in real time.
Only a day after the initial BuzzFeed News report about Mohrer’s actions and SVP Emil Michael’s comments suggesting the company hire opposition researchers to dig up dirt on journalists, Uber head of communications Nairi Hourdajian wrote and published the company’s privacy policy on the site for the first time. However, the policy itself, according to Hourdajian, has always been in place and in fact employees are notified of the policy multiple times including in writing.
"Violations of this policy do result in disciplinary action, including the possibility of termination and legal action," a previous statement from the company read.
As Slate first reported, Uber would not go into detail about what the disciplinary action would entail or whether these actions affect his role as general manager in Uber’s second largest market in the United States. As the incidents and Mohrer’s actions warranted disciplinary action, it’s clear the company found them in violation of its privacy policy.
BuzzFeed News reached out for more information, including who performed the investigation and exactly what action Mohrer faced, but Uber representative Natalia Montalvo said they were not providing any additional details.
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via Tumblr http://bit.ly/1FDKYUx
Uber NYC General Manager Faced "Disciplinary Actions" For Privacy Violations
A BuzzFeed News report prompted Uber to investigate Josh Mohrer for accessing this reporter’s account without express permission.
Josh Mohrer, Uber NYC general manager, at a TLC public hearing earlier this year.
BuzzFeed News
An Uber spokesperson said the company has "taken disciplinary actions" against Josh Mohrer, the New York City general manager, after launching an investigation into two separate incidents and possible privacy violations 10 days ago.
Mohrer, as BuzzFeed News reported, accessed this reporter's personal Uber account twice without express permission, including one occasion during which he tracked a ride in real time.
Only a day after the initial BuzzFeed News report about Mohrer's actions and SVP Emil Michael's comments suggesting the company hire opposition researchers to dig up dirt on journalists, Uber head of communications Nairi Hourdajian wrote and published the company's privacy policy on the site for the first time. However, the policy itself, according to Hourdajian, has always been in place and in fact employees are notified of the policy multiple times including in writing.
"Violations of this policy do result in disciplinary action, including the possibility of termination and legal action," a previous statement from the company read.
As Slate first reported, Uber would not go into detail about what the disciplinary action would entail or whether these actions affect his role as general manager in Uber's second largest market in the United States. As the incidents and Mohrer's actions warranted disciplinary action, it's clear the company found them in violation of its privacy policy.
BuzzFeed News reached out for more information, including who performed the investigation and exactly what action Mohrer faced, but Uber representative Natalia Montalvo said they were not providing any additional details.
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Thursday, November 27, 2014
Wednesday, November 26, 2014
Death Valley's Fiery Furnace by jimpattersonphotography
44 Body Horror Movies To Kill Your Appetite
Because nothing says “Thanksgiving” like being too grossed-out to eat. WARNING: Major gore ahead. Also, spoilers! Proceed at your own risk.
Body horror is defined as "a horror film genre in which the main feature is the graphically depicted destruction or degeneration of a human body or bodies." It is best enjoyed on an empty stomach. With that in mind, here are some of the finest, most cringe-inducing body horror films of all time — definitely not for the faint of heart.
Eraserhead (1977)
Directed by: David Lynch
Written by: David Lynch
What it's about: Henry Spencer (Jack Nance) is abandoned by his girlfriend Mary X (Charlotte Stewart) and left to care for their child, an incessantly crying infant that may not be human.
Key body horror moment: Spencer removes his child's swaddling and realizes it has no skin. Without anything to hold them in, the child's organs spill out, and Spencer cuts them apart with scissors.
Criterion
Rabid (1977)
Directed by: David Cronenberg
Written by: David Cronenberg
What it's about: After a motorcycle accident, Rose (Marilyn Chambers) gets experimental skin grafting surgery. Soon she's hungering for human blood and turning all her victims into equally rabid zombies.
Key body horror moment: From the new orifice in Rose's armpit — which, it's worth noting, looks very much like a vagina — a phallic stinger emerges to drain blood from her victims.
Somerville House
The Incredible Melting Man (1977)
Directed by: William Sachs
Written by: William Sachs
What it's about: Doesn't the title say it all? Astronaut Steve West (Alex Rebar) returns from a trip to Saturn where his fellow astronauts were killed by a radiation blast. As Alex's skin begins melting away, he is forced to eat human flesh to survive.
Key body horror moment: Unable to go on any longer, West collapses and ultimately melts into a pile of goo, which a janitor mops up with little fanfare the next morning.
Shout! Factory
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"Horrible Bosses 2" Is The Kind Of Sequel That Makes You Forget You Liked The First Movie
Jennifer Aniston, Jason Bateman, Charlie Day, and Jason Sudeikis are back for a follow-up to their hit comedy that has none of the laughs of the original.
Chris Pine, Charlie Day, Jason Bateman, and Jason Sudeikis in Horrible Bosses 2.
John P. Johnson/Warner Bros.
In 2011, Horrible Bosses was a hit — and a big one, given the budget. And these days, that isn't just cause for celebration, it's a sign to set up a sequel (opening Nov. 26) to extract the maximum possible profit from an idea, even one as slender as the concept behind the first film: A trio of everyman schlubs come up with a plan to kill their abusive bosses, and do a generally terrible job of it.
Though Jason Bateman, Charlie Day, and Jason Sudeikis starred as the movie's idiotic threesome, the bosses gave the film its comic bite. Big stars Jennifer Aniston, Colin Farrell, and Kevin Spacey cut loose as the nymphomaniac dentist, incompetent cokehead, and corporate sadist terrorizing the main characters, respectively.
Directed by Seth Gordon (Identity Thief), Horrible Bosses was a tolerable comedy, and a little more interesting than the audience might have expected from the dark edge of its suburban setting. Its characters were so unimaginative and white bread, so ineffectual and set in their ways, that murder seemed to them a more likely bet than changing jobs, careers, or moving somewhere else.
And Horrible Bosses 2 feels unnecessary (as well as painful) not just because the initial movie left no story threads that needed to be taken up or characters that demanded to be revisited, but because it makes the first film feel worse in retrospect by stomping all over what made it work in the first place.
John P. Johnson/Warner Bros.
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Tuesday, November 25, 2014
Lyft's Silence On Uber
Lyft and Uber have been locked in a ruthless corporate dogfight for the past year… so why has the ride-sharing underdog been so quiet during Uber’s nightmare week?
Lyft
Last week, as Uber was facing wide public criticism for an executive's comments as well as reports that a New York employee used the company's internal tools to track a journalist, one voice has been all but absent: the transit giant's biggest rival, Lyft.
Lyft entered the marketplace in 2012 to compete with Uber and for the last year the companies' corporate dogfighting and controversial recruiting tactics have been well documented. This August CNN Money reported that Uber ordered and canceled roughly 5,000 Lyft rides in order to hurt driver availability during a recruiting push. That same week, an Uber representative alleged to the New York Times that Lyft was engaged in similarly ruthless behavior. "Lyft's claims against Uber are baseless and simply untrue. Furthermore, Lyft's own drivers and employees, including one of Lyft's founders, have canceled 12,900 trips on Uber," the spokesperson said.
One reason for Lyft's silence: They appear to have had one of the same problems as Uber — wide access for employees to customer data (though the company says it's never encountered or caught any employee mishandling user information). Lyft spokesman Erin Simpson told BuzzFeed News that the company has in the past week created tiers of access and permissions so that employees can only access the information they need in order to do their jobs. According to Simpson, the data isn't just restricted by teams or individuals but also by different tiers or layers of data.
Simpson said the public silence was simply a matter of policy — Lyft has historically only commented on issues with its biggest rival when it feels its own drivers have been affected by Uber policies or business practices. When asked why Lyft users weren't informed last week when the company changed its internal privacy policies, Simpson told BuzzFeed News that it has never previously made public statements about purely operational back-end technological changes.
That said, Lyft is quietly capitalizing on Uber's scandal. The past week's privacy concerns have moved some users to delete Uber's app (the app tracking site App Annie says that Uber's download rank has fallen from 24th to 41st since just last week) and consider moving to one of its seemingly more scrupulous rival services, like Lyft. And Simpson told BuzzFeed News that while they wouldn't share numbers, Lyft has seen a sizable influx of new users over the past seven days, making last week its best week ever.
But while Lyft has managed to avoid Uber levels of controversy, the rival service has previously butted heads with riders, drivers, and legislators just as Uber has.
In its attempt to enter the New York City market, Lyft clashed frequently with the NYC Taxi and Limousine Commission as well as New York State lawmakers. In July, the transit company tried to launch in New York City without full state approval, prompting the New York Attorney General's Chief of Staff Micah Lasher to slam Lyft's co-founder on Twitter for the company's business practices:
While it's been reported far less than Uber, Lyft has also clashed with its drivers. In September Lyft canceled its luxury service and lowered prices by 10% in Los Angeles, causing riders to protest. Vice reported last month that Lyft drivers were quitting in droves as a result of the cuts and, in some extreme instances, even burning their fuzzy pink Lyft mustaches. From the Vice report:
Gone are the smiling, friendly, and competent Lyft drivers of last summer. As these drivers have seen their compensation go from a guaranteed minimum of $18 per hour to a fare rate of $1.10 per mile and $0.21 per minute (when they can even get a fare; one of their complaints is that there's an overabundance of cars on the road), those with better moneymaking options have moved on to other work while the holdouts and new, completely unvetted hires are left to fight over scraps.
Similar to Uber, Lyft has also had documented legal troubles with drivers. In June, NBC San Francisco's investigative unit obtained video footage allegedly showing a Lyft driver assaulting a pedestrian while off-duty for Lyft. Valleywag reported in July that a Lyft driver asked for the number of a rider and allegedly stalked the rider incessantly.
While all of these events are concerning, they seem to represent the types of growing pains that large on-demand service apps have to go through while they navigate entry into new markets. Legislative battles, hiring untrustworthy employees, and clashes with drivers over fluctuating pricing models seem to be symptoms of having to scale a business fast — at times, perhaps recklessly so.
But then there is the issue of user privacy, which, according to Liz Gannes at Re/code, also bears similarties to Uber. In a post from last week, Gannes notes multiple instances where Lyft pulled up her trip logs without her permission:
For the record, Uber has never presented my personal data to me. But I can recall multiple times when an executive from Lyft, a rival service, punched up my trip log and told me about it. After my very first trip with Lyft, one executive told me the name of the driver who brought me to the cafe where we met.
Asked about the company's privacy protocol this week, a Lyft spokeswoman said she does have tools to access journalists' accounts, but she has never used them unless the person is present and has given permission. She said she would look into earlier policies, but has not yet replied to multiple follow-ups.
Last Tuesday, when BuzzFeed News asked Lyft if it had any privacy policies in place that regulate whether staffers can go into accounts of riders and if there were any specific policies regarding journalists a spokesperson told BuzzFeed News the company wasn't commenting on the issue.
Since, the company has responded by quietly changing its internal data access settings for employees. Simpson said that, while there has always been an internal privacy policy, the company has now created tiers of access and permissions so that employees can only access the information they need in order to do their jobs. According to Simpson, the data isn't just restricted by teams or individuals but also by different tiers or layers of data.
"One thing that's significantly different from [Gannes'] article is that as the leader of the comms team, I previously had access to user data, but now, with these changes, I now have no access to user data, since my role in comms doesn't require me to access user information," Simpson said.
While Simpson said to BuzzFeed News that the policy is a "proactive" approach to privacy as the company grows quickly, she also noted that it would be fair to say the decision to change internal policies stemmed from conversations that progressed based on the public reports on Uber from last week.
But quiet privacy changes aside, the company has done little to publicly distance itself from its rival's tactics, though Simpson told BuzzFeed News via email that "regarding the Uber news last week, it goes without saying that we're a very different company."
Still, unlike Gett, which denounced Uber and its business practices in a letter last week, Lyft has refused to pile on to its rival. There are multiple ways to interpret this kind of silence — that Lyft, a company that has marketed itself as the friendly, scrupulous alternative Uber, has decided to take the high road, benefitting from Uber's negative PR and staying out of the fray to foster goodwill and add new users. Or perhaps it's as Gannes suggests in the headline of her post from last week that: "It's Not Just Uber: Tech Companies Snooping on Users Is All Too Common."
Though Lyft presents itself as the anti-Uber ("maybe you're picking up your best friend," a quote from the Today show on Lyft's press page reads), the similarities between Uber's Uber X offering and Lyft are striking, down to the price points. Uber New York General Manager Josh Mohrer (who is currently under investigation by the company after reports that he tracked a BuzzFeed reporter) noted the similarities in an interview with BuzzFeed News.
"We've been at this for over three years. A new entrant which is doing something very similar to us is going to be at a disadvantage, especially that is priced exactly the same as us," he said. "The liquidity advantage we have is very large and those pickup times would be two minutes and they'll be reliable all the time; we hold the reliability value above all else."
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13 Things You’ve Always Wanted To Know About Hilary Duff
The queen chats all about Lizzie McGuire , AIM screen names, and being adored by Taylor Swift.
David J. Bertozzi / BuzzFeed
If you were a '90s kid, there was no bigger icon in the world than Hilary Duff. From being your favorite Disney Channel star, Lizzie McGuire, to singing the mega-hit "Come Clean," she was the ultimate fixture of your teen life.
When she made her official comeback this year — releasing a new single, "All About You," and signing up to star in the new TV Land series Younger — it was like everything in the world finally made sense again. So naturally, we were beyond excited to have Hilary stop by BuzzFeed NY — and after fangirling over seeing Lizzie IRL, we chatted with the star about everything you've always wanted to know.
David J. Bertozzi / BuzzFeed
Do you think she'd be married to Gordo?
Hilary Duff: I don't think she'd be married to Gordo. I don't know, I think she'd go off to college and potentially become a little cooler than she was, but still not bitchy at all. I think she's just the biggest-hearted girl ever.
Maybe she'd move to New York for a while, and her parents would probably follow her and rent an apartment secretly. I think she's pretty smart. I can imagine her being on a path to something really special and great, but I feel like she'd still be working her way through the office grind and she'd probably constantly embarrass herself — mishaps in the office all the time. And she'd probably still be wearing butterfly clips, bringing it back!
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Emma Stone Looks Flawless In The "Cabaret" Musical
Maybe this time… OMG WE ARE SO LUCKY AND BLESSED TO HAVE EMMA STONE ON BROADWAY.
Richard Phibbs / Cabaret
Richard Phibbs / Cabaret
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Valley of The Gods by christianadamimaging
If Hermione Granger Had Instagram
#TBT to that time I turned myself into a cat.
When she's reminiscing:
Warner Bros. Studios
When she's fangirling:
Warner Bros. Studios
When she's feeling sentimental:
Warner Bros. Pictures
And when she's sharing her style:
Warner Bros. Pictures
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Monday, November 24, 2014
Paul Rudd's Hair In The '80s Is A Thing Of Unexpected Beauty
Majestic.
Behold this photo uploaded by redditor SmoothBread of a younger Paul Rudd in the University of Kansas yearbook and some truly, wonderful, wonderful hair.
Really, really, really wonderful.
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"Wonder Woman" Movie Lands "Breaking Bad" Director Michelle MacLaren
MacLaren, who has also directed episodes of Game of Thrones and The Walking Dead , will be the first female director of a DC Comics superhero movie.
Michelle MacLaren
John Sciulli / Getty Images
Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman
Warner Bros.
She is also developing the screenplay with producers Charles Roven, Zack Snyder, and Deborah Snyder, with Gal Gadot playing the title superhero after first appearing as Wonder Woman in 2016's Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. This film has a planned release date of June 23, 2017. (The Hollywood Reporter first broke the news.)
With MacLaren officially taking the director's chair, Warner Bros.' upcoming slate of DC Comics superhero movies continues to break new ground in diversity both in front of and behind the camera. She will be the first female director of a DC Comics superhero movie ever, and Wonder Woman will be the first female-centric superhero movie of the current "golden age" of comic book films, which unofficially commenced with the launch of rival Marvel Studios in 2008. (Marvel Studios will release their own female-centric superhero film, Captain Marvel, in 2018.) Warner Bros. was also the first to announce a superhero film with an African American lead (Cyborg, in 2020), and the first to cast an out actor in a lead role (Ezra Miller for The Flash in 2018).
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This Lady's Instagram Has Earned Her Over $20,000 Because She Looks Like Rihanna
To be honest, this girl looks EXACTLY like Rihanna, though.
Andele Lara is a 22-year-old student from Boston, Massachusetts, and she looks exactly like Rihanna.
Lara is such a dead ringer for Rihanna that she's swarmed by fans and is paid thousands of dollars to endorse products for brands.
Lara told the Daily Mail that she earned over $20,000 worth of clothing contracts last year and her Instagram photos regularly go viral.
She currently has nearly 30,000 Instagram followers.
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The Definitive Ranking Of Every Episode Of "The Wonder Years"
“What would you do if I sang out of tune?”
"Kevin Delivers" (Season 6, Episode 8)
"Kevin Arnold: delivery boy" is a storyline no one asked for, but by Season 6 of The Wonder Years, the writers were really scraping the bottom of the barrel. And so we watch Kevin (Fred Savage) square off against an angry dog, get forced into conversation with a lonely old woman, and contemplate drag racing. The conclusion, in which Winnie (Danica McKellar) tricks Kevin into delivering food for their late-night date, might be sweet if it weren't such a slog getting there.
StarVista Entertainment
"Of Mastodons and Men" (Season 5, Episode 15)
The not-so-subtle subtext of this episode is that high school boys are boorish, sex-crazed cavemen, a theme that gets reiterated throughout Kevin Arnold's pubescence. But aside from being repetitive, the real problem with "Of Mastodons and Men" is the way it treats the female characters — Kevin's single-episode girlfriend Julie (Sandy Faison) is controlling, overbearing, and obsessed with the color pink. The backwards gender politics at play are straight out of the Stone Age.
StarVista Entertainment
"Who's Aunt Rose?" (Season 4, Episode 13)
Who is Aunt Rose? That question is never given a satisfying answer. It doesn't really matter, anyway: She's a distant relative who has died, and when a distant relative dies, the family gets together to mourn her. The problem is that because we've never heard of any of these characters, it all feels a little inconsequential. The Wonder Years is good at confronting mortality, as it did with Brian Cooper and Mr. Collins, but this particular morbid excursion is a thoughtless detour.
StarVista Entertainment
"Day One" (Season 5, Episode 2)
Of course Kevin would feel unsettled on his first day of 10th grade — especially with Paul (Josh Saviano) now at boarding school instead of by his side. But it's all a little too much, from Wayne (Jason Hervey) and Wart (Scott Menville) dipping Kev's head in the toilet to comically evil new teacher Mr. Bottner (Scott Jaeck). In trying to show how Kevin feels unsettled, the episode abandons any restraint. Even Kevin's triumphant rebellion at the end is too forced to take seriously.
StarVista Entertainment
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Hamnoy, Norway by inigocia #aurora,hamnoy,norway,nothern lights
13 People On The AMAs Red Carpet Act Out Their Favorite Emojis
We asked attendees of the American Music Awards to give us an impression of their favorite emoji, and here’s what happened.
Gigi Hadid:
Mary Lambert:
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19 Signs Your Best Friend Is Actually Your Soulmate
Night by mic2012
The House by cougartracy
Selective river by barenstaden
The House by cougartracy #abandoned,black and white,canon,clouds,creepy,house,kids,landscape,old,sky,spooky,tracyparker,trees
Sunday, November 23, 2014
Fashion At The 2014 American Music Awards
Check back for ongoing AMA red carpet coverage!
Kendall Jenner, Khloe Kardashian, and Kylie Jenner
Getty Images Jason Merritt
Charli XCX
Getty Images Jason Merritt
Jordin Sparks
Getty Images Jason Merritt
Fergie
Getty Images Jason Merritt
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