#reggietechtips

#ReggieTechTips Even if players had to deal with some tax work from an odd job or a deal with an esports organization, having to pay back a significant amount of winnings can feel brutal. When Bugha won the Fortnite World Cup he won a well-publicized prize of $3,000,000. But that prize falls under the American tax system’s highest tax bracket of 37%. That means that every dollar he earned over 500,000 was taxed at 37%. Here’s a simple breakdown of American tax brackets, for simplicity sake we are going to say his entire prize was taxed at the top bracket. In reality, he will have about $30,000 extra after taxes. After Uncle Sam collects, Bugha will be down to $1,890,000. A big drop, but not the worst thing in the world. But taxes aren’t done yet, because the tournament was held in New York, the richest state in the nation, they have one of the highest tax rates at 8.82%. That takes off another $275,000. Now he’s down to $1,615,000. Hey at least it’s still over half. Fortnite World Cup runner-up Psalm was on Fox Business Network to talk about how he is dealing with the taxes that cut his $1.8 million to just over $900,000. But now lets go back to Bugha, because people arent done coming for his cash. Next up: Sentinels. Bugha was a relatively unknown player coming in to the event, he didn’t have any big finishes at the time of the signing and Sentinels signed him before he had even qualified for the Fortnite World Cup. So when signing a deal, Bugha was probably happy to trade a percentage of future prize winnings for a steady salary. According to reports in the community, Bugha’s deal signs over 20% of his winnings to the organization. It isn’t clear if that percentage is taken out pre-tax or post-tax so we can calculate both. Total winnings if Sentinels percentage comes pre-tax: $1,015,000 Total winnings is Sentinels percentage comes post-tax: $1,292,000 It’s a brutal wake-up call for the young star. even if you win the biggest individual prize pool in esports history, you still need to keep the government happy. SOURCES: FortniteIntel.com #Fornite #videogames #videogaming #gaming #esports #bugha https://www.instagram.com/p/B00_ri4hem-/?igshid=17m2vfcbzxk3z

#REGGIETECHTIPS Meet Dr. Phillip Emeagali, The Nigerian Computer Scientist who invented the Internet. Growing up in an oil-rich nation and understanding how oil is drilled, Emeagwali decided to use this problem as the subject of his doctoral dissertation in 1987. Borrowing an idea from a science fiction story about predicting the weather, Emeagwali decided that rather than using 8 expensive supercomputers he would employ thousands of microprocessors to do the computation. Through research, he found a machine called the Connection Machine at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, which had sat unused after scientists had given up on figuring out how to make it simulate nuclear explosions. The machine was designed to run 65,536 interconnected microprocessors. In 1987, he applied for and was given permission to use the machine, and remotely from his Ann Arbor, Michigan, location he set the parameters and ran his program. In addition to correctly computing the amount of oil in the simulated reservoir, the machine was able to perform 3.1 billion calculations per second. The brilliance of the discovery was that Emeagwali had programmed each of the microprocessors to talk to six neighboring microprocessors at the same time. The success of this record-breaking experiment meant that there was now a practical and inexpensive way to use machines like this to speak to each other all over the world. Within a few years, the oil industry had seized upon this idea, then called the Hyperball International Network creating a virtual world wide web of ultra fast digital communication. The discovery earned him the Institute of Electronics and Electrical Engineers' Gordon Bell Prize in 1989, considered the Nobel Prize of computing, and he was later hailed as one of the fathers of the Internet. Since then, he has won more than 100 prizes for his work and Apple computer has used his microprocessor technology in their Power Mac G4 model. SOURCES: Time Magazine, Wikipedia, MyBlackHistory.Net https://www.instagram.com/p/B0OZlFbh4ni/?igshid=ugssghhwtir7

#ReggieTechTips Meet Anthony Edwards founder of "EatOkra" a mobile app that helps you find Black-Owned Restaurants & Cafes. " After his military service, Anthony Edwards was struck by a couple of things. Against the backdrop of escalating racial strife in America, he noticed that there was no immediate access to an index of the nation’s Black-owned restaurants. “The question I asked myself was not only ‘where do we eat,’ but ‘where do we eat safely’,” says Edwards. The solution was to build a smartphone application, except the endeavor took on a life of its own with every restaurant brought to his attention. “We started counting the number of Black and Diaspora restaurants in our neighborhood. There were a lot more than we anticipated, with even more opening.” The discovery led Edwards and his fiancé, Janique Bradley, to not only explore the other boroughs in their area, but to delve deeper into historically Black neighborhoods like Harlem in New York. The partners created a business model for the application, and along with a third associate, Justin Johnson, they are executing their vision: eatOkra. The first iteration of eatOkra was released in 2016, with a debugged relaunch in 2017. The pair chose to include okra in the title of the app because of the vegetable’s history. As a crop brought over with enslaved Africans, okra gives a nod to its inclusion in many African Diasporic food recipes. To date, eatOkra has 800-plus restaurants, coffee houses, and food-related events – such as pop-ups and food trucks – in its growing database. SOURCES: The Ark Republic, FORBES, CuisineNoir Be sure to follow them @eatOkratheapp @edwardsdevelopit @superbasednique @mugenthemadking EatOkra is available for download on IOS/Android be sure to get it!! #EatOkra #tech #technology #apple #ios #android #MobileApp #mobileapps #technews #technologynews #smartphone#smartphones #BlacksInTech #blackintech #AfroTech #melaninintech #melanintech #tech #technews #technology #technologynews #technologyhistory #BlackProfessional #BlackExcellence https://www.instagram.com/p/B0Gr35VhtcM/?igshid=w6obc2x6b20

#ReggieTechTips ***PLEASE READ ENTIRE POST*** FaceApp is a mobile application for iOS & Android developed by Russian company Wireless Lab which uses neural network technology to automatically generate highly realistic transformations of faces in photographs. The app can transform a face to make it smile, look younger, look older, or even change gender. A "hot" transformation was previously available in FaceApp, but following criticism and accusations of "racism" that it lightened the skin color of black people and made them look more European, was briefly renamed "spark" and then removed. The terms & conditions of the Russian-owned app have led to a number of warnings about what it could actually be doing with your photos. When users submit a photo to the app to change how it looks, it makes its way onto FaceApp’s servers. And it is not entirely clear what is happening when it does. FaceApp has to select and upload the users’ photo to ensure that it can be altered. The changes use FaceApp’s artificial intelligence tools, which run on its servers, and so the photo must make be given over to the app. But you might be giving over more than you realise. Numerous people have pointed to the fact that those photos can be used by FaceApp – and not just to make you look different. The terms give the app the ability to use those photos in just about any way, without giving anything back to the users who first created them, the app makes clear. “You grant FaceApp a perpetual, irrevocable, nonexclusive, royalty-free, worldwide, fully-paid, transferable sub-licensable license to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, translate, create derivative works from, distribute, publicly perform and display your User Content and any name, username or likeness provided in connection with your User Content in all media formats and channels now known or later developed, without compensation to you,” its terms read. In practice that means that the photos you upload into the app might seem initially private, but that they could be used in very public ways later on. Similarly, the company’s privacy policy makes clear that it is able to collect and store information from your phone https://www.instagram.com/p/B0BYhPth_Rm/?igshid=1xy30vb5mwzdj

#ReggieTechTips Meet Silas Adekunle. He is a Nigerian Inventor/Robotics Engineer that currently the FOUNDER/CEO of Reach Robotics, a company developing the world's first gaming robots. Silas was born in Nigeria and moved to the UK at about 11 years old. He spent much of his childhood obsessed with science and technology, playing with Lego robot kits and watching YouTube videos to get ideas for simple robots he could build himself at home. Now at age 27 he was able to found a robotics company that has raised $10 Million in funding. Apple Inc. were impressed enough to sign Silas' company Reach Robotics to an exclusive distribution deal. Apple now sells the robots at $250 a pop. The initial launch of Mekamon Gaming Robots sold 500 bots, generating $7.5 million. Make sure to follow him @silasadekunle SilasAdekunle's Robotics Company @reachrobotics https://www.instagram.com/p/Bz_AFM7BaDg/?igshid=1el7v36qpv4lx

#ReggieTechTips Without Dr. West, rappers wouldn't be able to rock the mic. West, along with inventor Gerhard M. Sessler, helped develop the electroacoustic transducer electret microphone, for which they received a patent in 1962. Their invention was acoustically accurate, lightweight and cost-effective. Ninety percent of microphones in use today — including those in telephones, tape recorders and camcorders — are based on their original concept. West received a master's degree in Physics from Temple University in 1957. In 2001, West retired from Lucent Technologies after a distinguished 40-year career at Bell Laboratories where he received the organization's highest honor, being named a Bell Laboratories Fellow. West then joined the faculty of the Whiting School at Johns Hopkins University where he is currently a Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. In 2007, West received an honorary doctorate from NJIT. Dr. West has over 250 patents to his name. At age 87 in 2019, he is still an active inventor working on a device to detect pneumonia in infant lungs. SOURCES: Wikipedia, TheRoot.com blackinventors #BlacksInTech #blackintech #AfroTech #microphone #microphonefiend #electretmicrophone #melaninintech #melanintech #tech #technews #technology #technologynews #technologyhistory #BlackProfessional #BlackExcellence https://www.instagram.com/p/Bz8XuvbBOV5/?igshid=u2t573lqbvhr

#ReggieTechTips Meet Marques Brownlee, in the eyes of many he is the most influential Tech YouTuber in the world. Marques Brownlee is one of the most popular and straight forward gadget reviewers on the internet. His technology-based videos can be found on his YouTube channel ‘MKBHD’, which is also his stage name. He wasn’t the first to review the latest gadgets on YouTube, but he has found success by examining each product for the everyday consumer. He’ll go line-by-line comparing the latest Samsung phones to explain why the less expensive model is just an all-around better deal. Marques first joined YouTube on March 21, 2008. He first started uploading videos January 1, 2009, about new products, or reviews of products he already owned. He says his first videos were screen casting where he would post an image and just talk over it, then responded to requests from viewers of what they would like to watch. His first several hundred videos were primarily hardware tutorials, and freeware. He was later approached by companies to demonstrate their paid software and hardware, but only reviews products that would be of interest to his audience of technology enthusiasts. @MKBHD Currently at only age 25, Marques Brownlee has over 8.9 Million Subscribers on YouTube with over 1.3 Billion Total Views since he started his channel over 9 years ago. YES you read that right. Marques has produced over 1,000 video YouTube videos. His video now include tutorials, reviews, interviews, first impressions, and explainer videos. All this with the purpose of helping tech savvy and even not so tech savvy people navigate the constantly changing world of technology. Make sure to check out his videos at www.youtube.com/MKBHD SOURCES: Washington Post, NY Times, Wikipedia, YouTube, Business Insider https://www.instagram.com/p/BzyJQCPBO1f/?igshid=1p8kqw0lxvkcf

#ReggieTechTips Since yesterday was #NationalVideoGameDay I thought it was only appropriate to recognize the great inventor Gerald "Jerry" Lawson. Known for his work on the Fairchild Channel F and becoming the pioneer that invented the concept of a Video Game Cartridge. Before his work you would normally have to buy an entire console or machine to play one game. To him it made more sense to have one machine play multiple games. It was more cost effective and you would also from a business stand point be able to sell more consoles. His invention was the beginning of the modern video game console as we know it today. Salute to this Black Genius! S/O @ye_melanin for the pic ・・・ #videogames #videogaming #gaming #fairchildchannelf #geraldlawson #atari #nintendo #sony #microsoft #tech #blackinventors #retrogaming #retrogames #technology #AfroTech #blacksintech #melaninintech #videogamehistory #nationalvideogameday https://www.instagram.com/p/Bzs46hjBAeV/?igshid=143lt93mwaf15