What You Need to Know Today: February 5

Good afternoon, Early Risers!

Here’s what you need to know

TECH

“My bathroom mirror is smarter than yours.” “Sometime late last year I realized that I wanted my ordinary bathroom mirror to be more like the future we were promised in the movies,” says Max Braun. Instead of waiting for “the future” to come to Max; Max decided to bring the future to Max. Check this out. So cool.

How to watch Super Bowl 50 sans cable. Your guide.

Attention: cracked iPhone 5s and up, we have good news. The Enquirer-of-Apple-rumors, 9to5Mac, says Apple is launching a new broken iPhone upgrade. The Apple Store Reuse and Recycle iPhone trade-in program currently allows customers to bring in an older iPhone model and trade it in for credit toward the purchase of a new iPhone model. The caveat: if your iPhone display is cracked, or the phone is broken, the program does not apply to you. But that’s about to change…

Elon Musk’s next conquest. Hint: _____, Trains, and Automobiles… Full story.

CAREER

How this 23 year old makes a full time living from Kickstarter. Twenty-three-year-old Steven Elliot Ng has launched 10 successful projects on Kickstarter, crowdfunding over $1.5 million since 2012, says The Hustle. What I found most fascinating about Steven’s story is his qualifications (or lack thereof). With no knowledge in product design, business (very little), and marketing, Steven’s been able to crush Kickstarter and build some really cool products people want to buy. Definitely a “cool story, bro.” But how can YOU replicate Steven’s success? Steven’s been generous enough to share how he does it.

What you need to know about A/B split testing. We’ve talked about this before, but in case you missed it, here’s the cold — DiCaprio Revenant cold — truth about A/B split testing. Don’t do it. Simple as that. The old tale about testing the red and green button is wrong. Here’s why. Note: for all you old guys shaking your head at this… there are exceptions to every rule. Read on.

LIFESTYLE

A Farewell to Nudes. “What is Playboy without naked women?” asks The New York Times. “It sounds a little bit like Car and Driver magazine without cars or drivers.” March 1st, Playboy will publish its first nudeless issue of the magazine. The centerfold is Dree Hemingway, a great-granddaughter to Ernest Hemingway. The New York Times has an inside look.

Lucrative job opportunity for someone who can’t read. Buckle up because this is going to be your #longread this weekend. The New Yorker wrote an excellent piece on Yves Bouvier, an art-world insider who’s made a fortune by being discreet. From buying and selling art, to setting up offshore companies to keep his clients’ purchases hush-hush, there could easily be a movie made about Bouvier and his underground world. Here’s a job opportunity I’m sure still exists if you know the right people: “In sixteenth-century Venice, diplomats were instructed to employ illiterate valets, who would be unable to read any secret documents they were asked to carry. A transit agent [21st century valet] ‘should by default be a blind man,’” says Thomas Seydoux, a dealer and a former chairman of Impressionist and modern art at Christie’s.

Guess… how affluent millennials buy art?

#NOWYOUKNOW

How to Unlock Facebook Messenger’s Hidden Chess Game

BetaNews shares the instructions:

  1. During a conversation, type @fbchess play and a board will appear. Your friend will go first.

  2. Select a piece using K for king, Q for queen, B for bishop, N for knight, R for rook, or P for pawn.

  3. Then add the letter and number representing the space you want to move it on the board.

Try it.

Have a great weekend!

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