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Find out why this TV serial is gripping viewers on their phones

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I stumbled upon my homeless billionaire husband for Christmas, the quarterback by my side, XXL’s wife’s revenge, and my secret agent husband.

These may seem like whimsical fantasies, but they are actually part of a genre known as “vertical drama.” This innovative format for episodic television has captured the attention of millions of people worldwide.

Originating from China, the genre, often referred to as “Tiktok generation television,” consists of short episodes designed for viewing on smartphones. By 2027, the market for vertical drama is expected to reach a value of $14 billion (£11 billion).

“The growth of this genre signifies a demand among audiences that is not being met by the current media landscape,” explains Zhou Yuan, the founder of content Republic, a Beijing-based vertical film production company, as reported in a recent interview with a Hong Kong cinema.

Micro-dramas, known as Duanjus in Chinese, have made a significant impact on the Chinese audiovisual market before expanding globally, transforming the industry. Chinese companies are collaborating with foreign production firms to export this format, supported by a range of new streaming apps such as Reelshort, ShorttV, Dramapops, and FlextV.

In November of last year, California-based Reel Short, backed by Chinese investors, surpassed Tiktok as the most popular entertainment product in the Apple App Store in the US.

“Some skeptics questioned the willingness of audiences to pay for this content,” remarked Joey Jia, the CEO of Crazy Maple Studio, the company behind Reelshort, in an interview with the Washington Post.

Romantic soap opera posters feature titles like “Love is Sin” and “I’m Going to Hell.” Photo: Reel Short

Viewers are captivated by the familiar tropes found in Booktok readings, such as secret billionaires, forbidden love, and supernatural enemies. They are hooked by catchy titles, suspenseful cliffhangers, and dramatic moments. Typically, these apps offer a few free episodes before requiring a paid subscription. Similar to video games, Reelshort allows users to purchase “Coins” to access additional episodes.

Jen Cooper, the UK-based founder of Vertical Drama Love, has a passion for romantic films and comedies, which drew her to this format.

“Last April, during a challenging personal time, I found it difficult to focus on full-length dramas,” Cooper shared. “One day, I stumbled upon a vertical drama ad on Tiktok that piqued my interest.”

She delved into her first vertical drama, a captivating tale of a woman torn between her ex and uncle, titled “You Belong With Me.” “It embodies classic themes but at its core, it’s a beautiful love story with genuinely entertaining moments,” she remarked.

Cooper fell down the rabbit hole, creating an Instagram account to share reviews, connecting with industry insiders, and fostering a community of enthusiasts. The response was overwhelming, with over 16,000 votes from around the globe within a week of launching a fan award.

She discovered that many individuals turned to vertical dramas during challenging periods in their lives. “I’ve heard stories from family members, fans battling serious health issues or caring for loved ones. The audience ranges from women in their early 20s to their 60s. I’ve spoken to a Pakistani student, an elderly Italian woman bedridden, and a mother who lost her husband while doing household chores,” she shared.

The universal appeal lies in escapism, offering a quick dose of dopamine when life becomes overwhelming. “People yearn for satisfying outcomes, and let’s be honest, who doesn’t enjoy seeing incredibly attractive individuals fall in love?

Defne Turan, a production manager at London’s Seastar Productions, believes that vertical drama is the way forward.

She noted a surge in interest from filmmakers and actors eager to be part of this burgeoning genre. “It’s a new frontier, and we must approach it with the same level of care as traditional productions. Just because it’s different and fast-paced doesn’t mean we compromise on quality,” she emphasized. “We utilize industry-standard equipment, and many experienced production crews and makeup artists from major productions are involved.”

For many actors like Teig Sadana, vertical dramas offer a lifeline in a competitive industry. They provide consistent work amidst strikes and cutbacks. Verticals are typically shot in just 7-10 days, with two cameras capturing scenes in a single take.

Australian and British actor Teig Sadana credits the format for providing him with steady work opportunities. Photo: Jennifer Cooper

Teig Sadana, a 29-year-old Australian British actor based in New York, transitioned to vertical dramas after completing his studies at Stella Adler Studios.

“I responded to a rather standard acting job ad on a website, not fully comprehending what ‘vertical’ entailed. I needed the paycheck,” he admitted. After a brief conversation with the supervisor, he found himself on set a few days later filming “Glory of Pennsylvania’s Revenge.”

“Since then, I’ve worked on 10 films across various major vertical platforms, collaborating with talented professionals and experiencing the joy and stability of consistent work,” Sadana shared.

Initially challenged by the format’s constraints on character development, Sadana learned to embrace its unique style, preventing him from “overindulging.”

Nick Westway, a former star of the Australian soap opera “Home and Away,” currently stars in “The Double Life of Hitmaster President.”

According to Zhou, Content Republic plans to produce 400 vertical dramas annually, with 200 intended for the domestic Chinese market and 200 for international audiences.

While it remains to be seen if the novelty of the genre will fade (some platforms have ceased operations within six months), even established media companies are taking note of the trend and striving to engage younger audiences. In 2023, Paramount Pictures released a series of 23 snippets from “Mean Girls” on Tiktok.

“This is a space that resonates with audiences and offers valuable insights into how creators and viewers embrace it,” remarked Sacha Kari, Channel 4’s digital commissioning manager.

Source: www.theguardian.com

The dinosaur with two fingers used its massive claws to devour leaves

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Illustration of Duonychus Tsogtbaatari, a Cretaceous theropod dinosaur

Masato Hatri

A new species of dinosaur found on the Mongolian building site has the largest fully preserved claws ever discovered. The bipedal herbivores only had two fingers in each hand, so they may have been used to grab a branch and pull it towards their mouth.

The 90 million-year-old fossil containing parts of the pelvis, arms and hands, and parts of numerous vertebrae was discovered in 2012 near Kambogd in the Gobi Desert, but is now properly studied and given a scientific name. Duonychus tsogtbaatari. The genus name means “two claws” and the species name honors Mongolian paleontologists Kishigjav tsogtbaatar.

Duonychus It's a small relative of Tericinosaurusthe features of the movie Jurassic World Dominion. Yoshitug Kobayashi In Hokkaido, Japan, his colleague estimates that the dinosaurs were about 3 meters long and weighed about 270 kilograms.

“Discovery Duonychus tsogtbaatari It's a big deal because it's the first known tericinosaurus with only two fingers,” says Kobayashi.

Overall, five groups of theropods have evolved to have only two fingers. Tyrannosaurus.

DuonychusThe nails are nearly 30 centimeters. Unusually, the nail sheath is made of keratin, the same material as the nail – is preserved.

“Keratin usually doesn't become fossilized. It fades long before bones do it,” says Kobayashi. “Most of the time, when we find dinosaur claws, we just look at the nucleus of the bone. But in life, the actual claws are covered in thick keratin sheaths, which are longer and curved.”

Team Members Darla Zelenitsky At the University of Calgary, Canada, finding a two-fingered Tericinosaurus was very surprising.

Duonychus Tsogtbaatari nails

Kobayashi et al.

“This is the largest 3D dinosaur claw that is completely preserved. “This claw is not preserved as the outline of the rock surrounding the bone. This is quite typical for fossils where the true claw is preserved. This claw is actually three-dimensional and forms a sheath around the underlying phalanx, similar to what is found on dog and cat's paws.”

Researchers believe that the nails are adaptations for grabbing and pulling down vegetation. Less fingers can make each one stronger, more flexible, narrower, and more controlled grips possible, Kobayashi says.

“The curved claws and extreme flexion suggest that they can be more easily connected to leaf branches and clusters,” he says. “Three fingers may have just got in the way, but two provided a more accurate and efficient grasp.”

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Source: www.newscientist.com

Street lights can cause tree leaves to become more durable, making them less palatable for insects to consume.

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Artificial lighting at night can affect tree leaves

Shutterstock/Patrick Kosmider

Urban trees lit by streetlights tend to have tougher leaves and be less eaten by insects than those that spend the dark nights, a pattern the researchers say could disrupt the flow of energy up the food chain and have negative effects on urban biodiversity.

Zhang Shuang Zhang and his colleagues at the Chinese Academy of Sciences studied the Japanese five-story pagoda (Styphnolobium japonicum) and Green Ash (AshBeijing’s street trees appear to be relatively free of insect damage compared to other trees in the city.

The researchers collected around 5,500 leaves from 180 trees at 30 locations in Beijing, including near the distinctive orange glow of sodium streetlights and in dark areas at night, and measured the leaves’ size, firmness, moisture content, and nutrient levels. They also recorded any evidence of insect damage.

Leaves taken from under streetlights were stronger and less affected by insects: for Chinese sophora trees, 2.1% of leaves were damaged in the lit areas and 5.3% in the dark, while for ash trees, 2% of leaves were damaged near streetlights and 4.1% in the dark.

The researchers couldn’t answer that question, but they did say in their paper that with fewer leaves for insects to eat, less energy flows up the food chain to insects and birds, which could have a knock-on effect of further reducing biodiversity.

The researchers acknowledge that the mechanisms by which leaf damage is reduced are still unclear and require further investigation — for example, increased light could make insects more visible to predators, reducing their numbers and their impact on trees.

Owen Lewis The Oxford University researcher says the study is intriguing but doesn’t prove causation, and he suggests future studies should take plants from areas with and without street lighting, place them in a controlled environment, and observe the insects’ behavior to see whether they prefer trees that grow in dark conditions.

Lewis also notes that measuring herbivores is complicated. Heavy damage can mean leaves are less nutritious, forcing insects to eat more of them. Holes caused by insect damage can also get bigger as leaves get bigger, he says.

“My intuition is that this may be a fairly subtle effect,” he says. “In central Beijing, the impact of light pollution on insect feeding will be more pronounced as urbanization progresses.” [the area is]”It’s probably trivial how much pollution there is, how much semi-natural habitat there is, etc. It’s important, but it’s probably not the main threat to insect diversity and ecosystem function.”

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Source: www.newscientist.com

Broadband provider leaves blind father without panic button

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My father, who is 101 years old, was left without a landline or panic button when BT switched his phone service from analogue to digital without warning. BT told me his contract was ending and to contact them about renewing it. I did, but was not informed to contact the panic button provider or that I needed an adapter for his analogue phone to work with the new service. After spending 4 hours on the phone with BT, they finally told me I needed a digital adapter for the phone to function. However, 4 days later, the adapter had not arrived and BT could not expedite delivery. My father, who is blind and has limited hearing, was unable to use his panic button for 5 days until the Careline team helped him.tuberculosis, Birmingham

This incident highlights the difficulties faced by vulnerable individuals when analogue phone lines are transitioned to digital services. Since September, customers renewing or starting contracts have been moved to digital voice, which requires a broadband router. However, digital landlines do not work during power outages and some panic buttons are incompatible, posing risks to vulnerable users.

Critics have raised concerns about the slow rollout of this service, originally set to complete by the end of next year. Following reports of “serious incidents” due to faulty panic buttons, the government has urged providers to extend the deadline. BT has pledged not to switch panic button users unless their equipment is compatible and to provide battery back-up solutions for power outages.

Despite these assurances, your father’s situation suggests that these promises were not fulfilled, potentially putting him at risk. You had to be by his side for five days in case of an emergency.

The Observer contacted BT about your father’s case and, although he was not eligible for their priority repair scheme, they expressed regret for the situation and offered a goodwill gesture to acknowledge his experience.

Email us at your.problems@observer.co.uk including your address and phone number. All submissions and publications are subject to our terms and conditions.

Source: www.theguardian.com

Bizarre White Dwarf Leaves Metallic Marks Following Consumption of Planet

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Artist’s impression of WD 0816-310. Astronomers have discovered scars imprinted on the surface left when a star swallows a planet.

ESO/L. Calzada

Astronomers have discovered a white dwarf star with strange metallic scars on its surface. The scar likely formed when the star tore apart and ate a small planet in its orbit.

Researchers often find white dwarfs with traces of metal in their atmospheres that came from planets that fell into the star. It has long been thought that metals should be evenly distributed across the surfaces of these so-called contaminated white dwarfs; Jay Farihi Researchers at University College London have discovered a strange concentration of metal debris.

Researchers monitored the star, called WD 0816-310, for two months using the Very Large Telescope in Chile. They discovered that the white dwarf had an opaque piece of metal on top of one of its magnetic poles, blocking some of the star’s light as it rotated. This position indicates that material may have been funneled into the star by its magnetic field. “This is the same process that causes auroras on Earth: charged particles follow magnetic fields to the surface,” Farihi said.

The planet that WD 0816-310 destroyed was small, probably about the same size as the solar system’s asteroid Vesta, which is about 525 kilometers in diameter. Its interior is now prominently displayed on its host star, which could make it relatively easy to study what its geochemistry was like before it was engulfed. Such studies may even be one of the best ways to observe small worlds outside our solar system, even after they disappear.

And there may be many other stars that have been similarly damaged. “When we find something outlandish, it’s often because they all looked that way and we just weren’t asking the right questions,” Farihi says. “This is the first, but it probably won’t be the last.” In fact, researchers have already discovered two white dwarfs that appear to have similar scars. If we go back and observe similar stars over and over again, we may discover even more stars.

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Source: www.newscientist.com

Cruise reduces self-driving workforce by 25%, another electric scooter startup leaves market, and a special year-end message

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The Station is a weekly newsletter dedicated to all things transportation. Just sign up here and click on “The Station” to have our newsletter delivered to your inbox every weekend. Subscribe for free. Welcome to the station. It is the central hub for all past, present, and future means of moving people and goods from point A to point B. Hello! And goodbye! Well, at least until 2024. The station will be closed for a while until the end of this year. I would like to thank everyone who reads our weekly newsletter and sends me suggestions, tips, and criticism. Yes, I appreciate the thoughtful backlash. This year has seen new startups emerge (so many electric boat and RV companies, right?), more EVs on the roads, and numerous commercial milestones achieved in the self-driving vehicle industry. It was a year of lots of movement. Of course, there were dark moments and even shocking moments. Many startups went bankrupt, including a number of mobility SPACs, and layoffs remained widespread into the final months of the year. Two of the most surprising stories involve the self-driving car industry. Argo AI It made a comeback with a new AV startup funded by Softbank, but cruise. Cruise’s story continues to unfold and will likely play out until 2024. Last week was a tough week for Cruise, albeit as expected. As a result, the Cruise board, and by extension the GM board, are doing a housecleaning to restore years of technological advances. As part of that mission, nine top leaders were removed and 900 workers were laid off. We will continue to follow Cruise’s story next year. But that’s not our only focus. The TechCrunch team cares about the future of transportation, from new EV and battery technologies to electric and hydrogen aviation, self-driving cars, micromobility, and in-vehicle technology. It’s not just about highlighting the next new new thing. Instead, we strive to explain why it’s important and who it affects. In other words, we’re the kind of people who take unlikely exits and side streets to explore what others might avoid. Please join us. See you in the new year! Want to contact us with a tip, comment, or complaint? Email Kirsten at kirsten.karasec@techcrunch.com. Send your notes to tips@techcrunch.com. If you wish to remain anonymous, Click here to contact usthis includes SecureDrop (instructions here) and various encrypted messaging apps. micromobin The big talking point in Scooterville was the “seemingly” sudden decision. super pedestrian Just 18 months after raising $125 million, the company is closing its U.S. operations and beginning to consider selling its European operations. I don’t want to say I saw this coming, but given that in late November Superpedestrian began laying off several European executives responsible for global development and operations, Let’s just say I wasn’t shocked by the news. Superpedestrian’s Link scooters are available in about 60 cities in 11 countries, but are scheduled to be withdrawn from most markets by the end of 2023. The startup positioned itself as a partner for safe cities and invested in advanced passenger assistance technology by acquiring Navmatic in July 2021. That’s where Pedestrian Protection was born, Superpedestrian’s GPS-based safety system that could detect and correct unsafe rider behavior in real time. However, the system was competing with other camera-based computer vision systems popularized by Drover AI and Luna. Lime, the only big scooter company likely to survive, introduced its own version of rider-assistance technology on its scooters in July 2022, around the same time that Superpedestrian began cutting jobs. As the balance sheets of public companies Bird and MicroMobility.com (formerly Helbiz) demonstrate, shared micromobility is a difficult business to run properly. Bird has recently been kicked off the stock market, announced several layoffs and is likely close to filing for bankruptcy. MicroMobility.com has undergone not one but two reverse stock splits this year, and its stock price remains depressed. And after several failed acquisition talks, Tier Mobility also announced layoffs in November. Oh, and let’s not forget Boruto’s mysterious disappearance. My question now is who will be next to fly off to the great beyond? — Rebecca Beran This week’s sale We have lots of great deals this week! dimensional energy, a New York-based startup that develops sustainable aviation fuel from carbon dioxide emissions and water, has raised $20 million in a Series A round led by Envisioning Partners. Strategic investors include United Airlines Sustainable Flight Fund, Microsoft Climate Innovation Fund, Rock Creek Smart Aviation Futures Fund, DSC Investments, Derek US, and New York Ventures, as well as Elemental Excelerator and Chloe Capital. Existing investors also participated. summer timea Chinese new energy vehicle fleet management company, has completed an $80 million funding round to fuel R&D investment and real-time computational analysis. exponential energyThe Indian EV charging startup has raised $26.4 million in Series B led by Eight Road Ventures and TDK Ventures. This funding will help Exponent expand its 15-minute charging solution to five major cities in India in FY2024 and enter the intercity e-bus segment. The company plans to deploy 1,000 charging stations and equip 25,000 EVs with Exponent by 2025. Ric the mobility-as-a-service startup has raised €1.4 million ($1.53 million) from Habert Dassault Finance, AfriMobility (Akwa Group), angel investors, and banks including Bpifrance, Crédit Mutuel, and Caisse d’Épargne. meta fuela sustainable jet fuel startup, has raised $8 million in a round led by Energy Impact Partners and Contrarian Ventures. Vanmo, a São Paulo-based startup looking to expand electric motorcycle battery swapping in Latin America, has raised $30 million in a Series A round to capitalize on the growing popularity of bikes across the region. The equity and debt round was led by Monasees, with participation from Climate Technology Fund 2150 and Maniv Mobility.

Source: techcrunch.com

Craft a compelling startup name that leaves a lasting impact, sparks reflection, and intimidates your rivals.

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david placek is the president and founder of lexicon branding. In developing category-changing names such as Sonos, Pentium, OnStar, Swiffer, Febreze, and BlackBerry, Lexicon is one of the world’s most influential brand agencies with more than 3,700 naming assignments in 22 countries. became.

while slowing down With the venture capital (VC) market in decline and funding for disruptive startups likely to decline, companies looking to attract capital need a strong brand now more than ever. A strong brand starts with its name. Nothing is used more often or for longer. Moreover, it’s the one thing your competitors can’t take away from you.

A brand name is the basis for an immediate impact on consumers and investors. In today’s digital and global economy, it can mean the difference between a brand being instantly remembered or completely forgotten.

A brand name is more than just a label or a clever description. They serve as powerful marketing tools for creating or changing consumer perceptions and as the first step in building entirely new markets.

Start-ups in particular need a name that indicates that the company and its products are about the future, not the past. You need a company name that creates a brand image, resonates with your target market, and supports your business plan.

A startup needs a name that indicates that the company and its products are about the future, not the past.

A brand name is usually the first thing a potential customer sees or hears about your software or other digital intangible product. In a brand new industry that is just emerging, brands need a distinct, breakthrough name to garner attention and generate early market share.

When we partner with a startup to develop a new name, we use an internal checklist to ask if our recommendations pass the test. Here are his five questions we ask ourselves to ensure the name we create for our startup is memorable, distinctive, and stands out from the crowd.

Was the name an original idea?

Don’t be fooled by the adage that a great brand name tells your story. It is impossible to do that with just one word. Instead, your brand name is the foundation on which your brand story is built. Do you want to build on a rock or sand foundation?

Source: techcrunch.com