In the Philippines, drones are used for news reporting and rescue operations

 General
Jan 222014
 
In the Philippines, drones are used for news reporting and rescue operations

Since last year we’ve been seeing how the purpose of drones has moved outside the confinements of the military. Some startups in Asia have created drones to take aerial photos and deliver food and other supplies. In the Philippines, UNTV, a broadcasting company, is going to use drones for news reporting. The network reports that it has already used the drones for a number of news reports, including providing aerial video footage of areas hit by typhoon Haiyan, and even in daily traffic reporting. UNTV CEO Daniel Razon says that using drones for news reporting is a trial for a greater purpose – rescue operations. The Philippines is often hit by natural disasters, so Razon says the network is acquiring drones that can carry life buoys and water to affected areas. It’s also looking into underwater drones to aid in some kinds of rescue operations. He claims that they are first to use drones in reporting in the Philippines. While UNTV is lagging behind broadcasting giants in the Philippines in terms of viewers, this hi-tech could bring in new viewers. Hopefully, it can also set the stage for more organizations in the country to consider using drones for disaster recovery measures. Yugatech reports that the network’s drones appear to be Phantom ones, made by Hong-Kong-headquartered DJI. (Source: Yugatech | Photo: UNTV Facebook Page)    VIDEO YOU MAY WANT TO WATCH The post In the Philippines, drones are used for news reporting and rescue operations appeared first on Tech in Asia.

Time out of mind

 Sports
Jan 212014
 
Time out of mind

Climb every mountain: Ben Stiller and Kristen Wiig explore Walter Mitty’s mind in The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. There are some great visuals in Ben Stiller’s new movie, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, like helicopter rides over Icelandic volcanoes and shots of the actor/director careening down a mountain road on a skateboard. But like the magazine which is the background subject of the movie, the movie is mostly a series of visuals meant to impart a sense of human wonder: it’s Life of Pi with more laughs, less depth. The Secret Life of Walter Mitty is based on a James Thurber short story from 1939, so naturally it needed a lot of padding (and major updating) to stretch it to a 90-minute movie. A lot of stretching, considering the movie itself is very slight: the title character (played by Stiller) checks negatives at Life magazine during its final days; when he can’t locate a crucial photo taken by adventurous photographer Sean O’Connell (Sean Penn), he decides to locate the negative by tracking down the rock star lensman. Meanwhile, he’s smitten with new Life employee Sheryl (Kristen Wiig) but is too shy to connect with her. Instead, he daydreams (“zones out”), imagining himself in heroic situations. Anyway, if you’ve seen the trailer, you already know the story. A similar situation — stretching a short story to a full-length movie — occurred with F. Scott Fitzgerald’s tale The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, which was padded out to epic schmaltz Read More …

Up to freezing Baguio on a hot Mirage G4

 Economy
Jan 212014
 
Up to freezing Baguio on a hot Mirage G4

Aside from the lure of being able to experience the much-publicized freezing temperatures of the country’s summer capital, members of the motoring media who joined last week’s Fuel Eco Run of Mitsubishi Motors Philippines Corporation (MMPC) were also curious to find out the fuel performance of their latest market offering—the Mirage G4. That includes me. A total of 34 motoring journalists representing 16 media outfits joined the Mirage G4 Fuel Eco Run, which was made up of 10 Mirage G4s, divided into 5 with Manual Transmission and the rest with CVTs or Continuously Variable Transmission. The equal representation of the variants was obviously designed to demonstrate each model’s fuel efficiency. The meeting place for breakfast and distribution of uniforms, route notes, junk food snacks etc., was at the Mitsubishi Balintawak dealership in EDSA. The route to Baguio made us traversed through the NLEX, SCTEX and into the newly opened but partially finished TPLEX, which when finally fully-completed would run through Tarlac, Pangasinan all the way to La Union. To ensure that the test run to determine fuel performance would closely approximate normal driving conditions, all the Mirage G4s, after being filled by gasoline fuel “up to brim,” all aircon switches were sealed to make sure air-conditioning was on all throughout the trip, a major factor in fuel consumption.    The journalists were divided into 10 teams with a Mirage G4 to drive for each team. Aside from determining the normally differing fuel performance of those with manual transmission from those with Read More …

New year, new regulation

 Economy
Jan 202014
 

AS WE usher in the New Year, some of us have set our new year’s resolutions or certain personal rules that we aim to follow throughout the year. Apparently, the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) had a similar idea when it issued a new regulation to be followed by the taxpayers.

‘Is there a husband who’d allow his wife to take a lover like I did?’

 General
Jan 202014
 
‘Is there a husband who’d allow his wife to take a lover like I did?’

DEAR MR. EPPY,  I don’t know how I got the nerve to send you this letter about me and my lovely wife of 14 years, but I finally sent it.  I don’t have the guts to tell this story to anyone else. I don’t know why, but you are the only one I can share this with even if I know you will publish this.    My wife and I were once very active sexually. I think my relationship with my wife is unique and no one else in the world has the same situation as ours. I have a wonderful and faithful wife. Now, we will be celebrating our 12th anniversary. We have four kids. My wife is younger than me by 25 years.  I feel she needs more sex than what she is getting, but I cannot provide it for her anymore because of my age.  After sex, I become too tired.  I realize it is unfair to her.  So I gave her freedom and told her to find sex outside our marital bed.  She got angry and didn’t speak to me for 10 days. I apologized to her and she accepted. She thought that I was tired of her and our family. But this is not the case. I felt sad that I could not provide the sexual happiness she deserved. I wanted her to be happy. But then I gave her rules on how she must go about this so our family would not be compromised. Read More …

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