DC Takes 'Before Watchmen' to Times Square with Jumbotron Ad

In Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons; groundbreaking graphic novel, the story climaxes with the appearance of something unexpected in New York's Times Square. Here in the real world, something almost as surprising is showing up in the same location: A jumbotron ad for Before Watchmen, DC Entertainment's series of prequels to the 1985 classic.

The 30-second advertisement is the first time any comic book or graphic novel has been promoted on the Jumbotron, and after its broadcast to hundreds of unsuspecting New Yorkers starting July 16, it's going to go national; airing during commercial breaks on cable channels including IFC, TNT and TruTV according to a report in the New York Post.

RELATED: 'Watchmen,' 'Walking Dead' and '30 Days of Night' Creators Help Launch Black Mask Comics (Exclusive)

Showcasing art from Jae Lee, Adam Hughes, JG Jones, Amanda Conner, Andy Kubert, Darwyn Cooke and Lee Bemejo, the ad links the various Before Watchmen collections not only to the original comic, but also to Zack Snyder's 2009 movie adaptation, perhaps in light of his current Man of Steel success.

This isn't the first television commercial that DC Entertainment has created for its comic output; when the company relaunched its core superhero line in September 2011 as "The New 52," that launch was also promoted with television ads, along with radio spots and widespread mainstream media coverage.

PayPal boldly ponders what no payment processor has pondered before: space

PayPal, which claims more than 128 million active accounts in 193 markets and 25 currencies around the globe, is now looking at outer space.

 

As space tourism is expected to take off, PayPal is exploring what payment systems will be like in outer space.

 

The payments processor is launching Thursday with the SETI Institute and others an initiative called PayPal Galactic, which will bring together leaders in the space industry to discuss the issues surrounding the commercialization of space.

 

The need for a payment system beyond earth already exists, the payments processor said in a blog post on Wednesday. Astronauts on space stations need, for example, to pay for bills back on earth and for entertainment, like music and e-books, while in space, it added.



"Creating a secure and functional commerce system that can operate in space at scale will not be easy, but with the support of the scientific community, other technology companies and the public at large, we hope to find the solutions to address these challenges," PayPal wrote in the blog post.

 

The eBay unit admits that it is just at the beginning.

 

Some of the issues to be addressed by PayPal Galactic in tandem with scientists and researchers are how will standard currency look like in a "truly cash-free interplanetary society," how will banking systems have to adapt, how customer support needs to develop, regulations in the new environment, and developing risk and fraud management systems.

 

The initiative brings together scientists and space industry leaders from SETI in Mountain View, California and Space Tourism Society in Los Angeles, and former astronaut Buzz Aldrin.

 

A number of companies have been set up to offer space tourism. Virgin Galactic, for example, said in May that it is on track to be the world's first "commercial spaceline." Some companies plan to set up space hotels, according to reports.

 

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Don't forget to back up your PC before trying Windows 8.1

Release previews are never for the faint of heart. Trial software is prone to dealing out all sorts of bumps and bruises, and if something goes really, truly rotten, you could wind up with a complete (and inadvertent) system wipe on your hands.

 

Now, the Windows 8.1 preview seems remarkably stable as far as these things go, but that doesn’t mean you should throw caution to the wind before you install the software. In case Microsoft’s stern THIS MAY GO SO BAD THAT YOU MIGHT NEED TO CONTACT YOUR PC MANUFACTURER warnings when you try to install the update wasn’t alarming enough, we’ve heard several reports of people running into repeated Windows 8.1 installation problems. Heck, we’ve run into installation failures on multiple machines.

 

@bradchacos I’d be happier if I could actually install it. Failing on 5 machines. Three unique error messages. #bldwin

— Patrick Moorhead (@PatrickMoorhead) June 27, 2013

 

None of them were disastrous, but why tempt fate? Get your proverbial ducks in a row before you try to run Windows 8.1. You know—just in case.

 

Of course, you want to back up all your important data before you go poking at your PC at the operating system level. Rather than rehash the past, I’ll point you to this excellent primer on the myriad ways you can back up your files.

 

That’s not all there is to do, though. A recovery drive can help you restore your Windows 8 installation if your Windows 8.1 adventure somehow goes horribly, horribly wrong. Fortunately, Windows 8 makes it easy to create just such a drive.

 

You’ll need a USB drive with a bit of space on it; just how much space depends on the size of your recovery partition, assuming your even have one of your computer. Windows will let you know how much space you need as part of the recovery drive creation process. Microsoft’s FAQ page says the standard recovery partition is 3GB to 6GB in size. If you don’t have a dedicated recovery partition and only want to create a recovery image to help troubleshoot, refresh, and restore a borked PC, that requires 256MB of space.

 

One you’ve gotten your hands on an appropriate drive, slap it in your PC. Be sure to save the data on the drive to your PC or another backup source. The process of creating a recovery drive wipes all the data on your memory stick.

(Click to enlarge.)

Got it? Good. Open the charms bar, select Search, and type Recovery, then click on the Settings filter in the right-hand charms menu. You’ll see a Create a Recovery Drive option; select it.

 

A wizard pops up and from here, the process is pretty straightforward. Just be sure to select the right drive when you’re asked for a location, as accidentally wiping the wrong storage device would be a major headache.

 

If you end up needing to restore your OS with the recovery drive, you'll need to have your Windows 8 installation disc or drive on hand, so make sure you know where that’s at, too. With your data stored in a safe place and a recovery image stored on a flash drive, you’re ready to try all the goodies in Windows 8.1 with nary a thing to sweat about. Check out our guide to installing the Windows 8.1 preview, which outlines the system requirements you need, the caveats you need to be aware of, and walks you through the entire process.

 

 

 

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New AOL Reader product teased just days before Google Reader's shutdown

Once-mighty America Online appears to be working on a new RSS reader product, with about a week to go before Google pulls the plug on its own Reader.

“All your favorite websites, in one place,” the product’s landing page proclaims. The reader is currently in private beta; people can either request an invitation online or enter a code to use the service.

AOL Reader will launch and become available to everyone on Monday, a spokeswoman said. On the AOL Twitter feed, a Vine video was posted Friday afternoon depicting the landing page on a computer monitor. A series of sticky notes were pasted on top of the screen. "Yes, the rumors are true," one of them said.

No other information about the product could be gleaned from the AOL site or obtained from the company.

Besides AOL, a number of other companies have been promoting their own RSS reader services since Google announced in March that it would be shutting down Reader and some other products by July 1.

In its announcement, the company said it needed to focus on new opportunities, rather than spread itself “too thin and lack impact.”

One of the other reader players is Feedly, which earlier this week switched on its own RSS API (application programming interface) to let users transfer over their existing feeds to Feedly’s own back end.

Digg is also working on a Google Reader replacement, which is slated to go live next week, according to a company blog post.

Google Reader launched in 2005 to help people stay on top of their favorite websites using RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds.