October 30, 2015
October wrapped up with a festive Halloween week – from crowdsourced costume contests to music video parodies. Here are some stories that I found most interesting:
- A Helping Hand for Halloween – Let’s face it – there’s nothing worse than meeting another person at a Halloween party with the exact same look. But never fear! Google is helping festive partygoers plan ahead this year after launching the Frightgeist – a crowdsourced statistics map of the most popular Halloween costumes by location. The tool has been a top trend all week, so expect some nice variation at your respective parties on Saturday! That being said…if you want to ditch that mummy outfit, you’d best get moving.
- It’s the Great Space Rock, Charlie Brown! – In more Halloween news, a giant asteroid (nearly 1,300 feet wide) will come zooming past the earth at 22 miles per second on the 31st. At 300,000 miles from Earth, it may be further away than the moon, but many people are rightfully wigging out. Happy Halloween, everyone!
- Speaker Up! – In one of the biggest stories of the week, Rep. Paul Ryan was officially sworn in on Thursday as the 54th Speaker of the House after he got the votes of 236 House of Representatives members. The news comes alongside the rolling out of a new budget deal, which passed in the Senate on Friday morning and may make Ryan’s job a bit easier.
- Almighty Trees and Happy Accidents – In order to capitalize on the millions of Bob Ross fans across the globe, streaming platform Twitch began streaming all 403 episodes of the PBS cult hit at 5 p.m. on Thursday. That’s over 200 hours, people. Make sure to tune in and watch magic hit the canvas.
- Hotline Bling-ed – Even if you’re not a fan of Drake, you’ve probably already seen some terrific parodies of his latest music video – Hotline Bling. My favorite? The Cosby Show.