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<ul><li><strong>The new Time Machine filter lets you look younger or older in real-time.<br /><br /></strong></li><li><strong>The features rolls out today on iOS and Android versions.<br /><br /></strong></li><li><strong>The new Time Machine filter builds on the success of its baby filter. </strong></li></ul>You can now use <keyword id="8362797" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="snapchats-time-machine-filter">Snapchat’s Time Machine filter</keyword> to time travel. Sort of.<br /><br />Snapchat has introduced a new Augmented Reality filter that allows users to go from being a toddler to an old person. The filter has a slider that allows you to choose how much (or less) you want to age.<br /><br /><strong>How to use the Snapchat Time Machine filter<br /></strong><br />To fire up the Time Machine filter, tap on the viewfinder in the Snapchat app which will bring up all the lenses available. It should be the first filter on the bottom.<br /><br />Once you select the filter, there is a slider which lets you decide how old or young you want to appear – right from being a toddler to an old person. The filter’s efficacy depends on how you currently look – for example, in our tests, we couldn’t get rid of facial hair even after sliding all the way down.<br /><br /><strong>Snap’s hunt for a new viral filter<br /></strong><br />While Snap pays developers to come up with AR lenses for its app, the Time Machine filter is a Snap original that builds on the success of the baby filter that was launched in May this year. Snap’s 2019 second quarter earnings <a href="https://investor.snap.com/news-releases/2019/07-23-2019-211107490">report</a> claims that nearly 9 million new users were added to its platform due to its AR filters.<br /><br />The Time Machine filter works along the lines of <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/faceapp-most-download-on-ios-app-store-and-android-despite-privacy-concerns/articleshow/70286943.cms">FaceApp</a> that went viral earlier this year and sparked privacy concerns. It will be interesting to see if Snap’s latest attempt at this gives it another boost in the number of subscribers.<br /><br />Snap says that the Time Machine filter is rolling out globally for users on both iOS as well as Android. If you don’t see it on your phone yet, check if you have the latest Snapchat update installed.<br />
  <div type="Youtube" id="9ZTX302mNw4" title="Introducing Time Machine" thumbUrl="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/9ZTX302mNw4/mqdefault.jpg"></div>



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Snapchat's new Time Machine filter is similar to FaceApp which went viral

<p></p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div>Just imagine Beyoncé on Snapchat.<p>What would her favorite filter be?&#xa0;Does she use the bee filter with a crown sticker? (She should.)&#xa0;</p><p>It all seems impossible, but it actually might not be.</p><p>Tina Knowles Lawson, Beyoncé's mother, might have let slip that Queen Bey is a fan of Snapchat.</p><p>Lawson&#xa0;shared a video on her Instagram that shows Bey faceswaping with her as she sings part of "The Message" by Grandmaster Flash.</p><p>"My baby Beyonce sent me this," she captioned the short video. "It's really cool! I have to learn to do this, her face and my face together. Her voice coming out of my mouth. Or maybe it's her mouth! Hell I don't know."</p><p>She added, "Really weird. No Snapchat!! Seriously!!"</p><p>As in, that's a weird feature you have there, Snapchat?&#xa0;Probably, and that's amazing.</p><p><span>Watch Bey's faceswap below:</span></p><p><span><div>    </div></span></p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/brookies-cookies-cookie-art-2016-8">This baker takes icing cookies to the next level</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="p3anA1NTE659bmqtbYxsdbRaluTsRE4c" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

Beyonce may have a secret Snapchat

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image"><p class="source"><span>Tech Insider</span></p><p class="caption">Snapchat's new filters, which are called lenses, let you puke rainbows and have hearts pop out of your eyes.</p></div><p></p></div></div>In its early days, it was hard to figure out Snapchat. Unless you were a teen who was obsessed with the app, you might have thought it was<span class="s1"> </span><a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/snapchat-growth-sexting-2012-11">primarily used for sexting</a>.</p><p>Fast forward to 2015, and with 100 million daily users it's clear that Snapchat is on to something more.</p><p>Perhaps it's because many people find Snapchat an enjoyable way to communicate - more enjoyable than using Facebook, according to new research. </p><p><a href="http://ns.umich.edu/new/releases/23223-snap-decisions-more-happiness-gained-by-using-snapchat-than-facebook">A study by the </a><span><a href="http://ns.umich.edu/new/releases/23223-snap-decisions-more-happiness-gained-by-using-snapchat-than-facebook">University of Michigan</a> assessed how 154 college students used their smartphones and found that, next to face-to-face interactions with people, the most "rewarding" communication happened through Snapchat.</span></p><p><span><span>"On the surface, many people view Snapchat as the 'sexting app,'" Joseph Bayer, the study's lead author and a researcher at the University of Michigan, said in a statement. "But instead, we found that Snapchat is typically being used to communicate spontaneously with close friends in a new and often more enjoyable way."</span></span></p><p><span><span>The study, which is the first of its kind, asked participating students how they felt about using social media throughout the day, with questions like "</span></span>How pleasant or unpleasant was your most recent interaction?" and "How close are you to that person?"</p><p>Interactions on Snapchat were "<span>associated with more positive emotions than Facebook and other social technologies," according to the study. A reason for respondents choosing Snapchat over Facebook was the <span>"self-presentational" aspect of the latter social network.</span></span></p><p>"Since Facebook has become a space for sharing crafted big moments such as babies, graduations and birthdays, Snapchat seems to provide users with a distinct space for sharing the small moments," said Bayer.</p><p><span>The ephemeral nature of Snapchat aided in </span><span>the "emotional reward" students felt, University of Michigan researchers found. Because messages - called "snaps" - on Snapchat disappear forever after 10 seconds, study participants found that they spent more attention on messages in Snapchat than on Facebook content. </span></p><p>A <a href="http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2015-04/uoh-usl040615.php">study conducted by the University of Houston</a> earlier this year found that the amount of time people spend on Facebook can<span> be linked to depressive symptoms, and an experiment by Facebook last year <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014/07/02/facebook-news-feed-experiment-backlash/12078327/">was met with public backlash</a> after the News Feed was <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/adam-kramer-facebook-mood-manipulation-2014-6">tweaked to show more negative posts</a>.</span></p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/new-snapchat-selfie-filters-2015-9">Snapchat's new selfie filters are super trippy</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="V2czBrdzrc_HRfIAaBQ5gKkt2UyOPc6c" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

Snapchat makes you happier than Facebook, study finds

Here's what people are saying about what it's like to work with Snapchat right now

<ul class="summary-list"><li>My daughter got a cell phone for Christmas last year, and she is attached to it.</li><li>Her school said no phones were allowed for their 7th grade dance, and she was fine with it. </li></ul><p>Parents, teachers, and school administrators know <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/adults-who-used-smartphones-younger-teens-report-more-distress-now-2024-2">teens are tethered to their phones</a>. After our middle school daughter received hers for Christmas last year, we saw only the top of her head for months.</p><p>That's why it was surprising to see her willingly, without hesitation, leave her beloved phone on the kitchen counter when she attended a middle school dance recently. But she knew <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/high-school-banned-phones-in-classroom-kids-actually-liked-it-2023-9">the school policy</a> — phones aren't allowed. And if she brought it, she'd have to hand it in upon entry anyway, so why bother? I knew the pickup time and she knew she could borrow an adult's phone or use the school phone to call me if need be.</p><p>So, dressed up in a baby blue summer dress with her favorite pearl earrings (and dressed down in Nike Blazers — because she's 13), my daughter bounced off excitedly to spend a couple of hours with her girlfriends, dancing and belting out lyrics to Taylor Swift and <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/mom-spent-1200-olivia-rodrigo-tickets-guts-world-tour-2024-4">Olivia Rodrigo hits</a>.</p><h2 id="d610b42e-8415-424b-9b4b-5772266135b0">She said it was the best night ever</h2><p>And she did. She <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/14-year-old-thought-heart-attack-was-butterflies-school-dance-2023-2">danced every song all night</a> and came home breathless and happy, declaring the dance "the best night ever."</p><p>Upon returning home, she immediately resumed normal activity and started texting and <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/tech/snapchat-streak">SnapChatting her friends</a>. But between 7 and 9 that night, there was just laughter, music, and dancing — and no one had phones in their hands.</p><p><a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/living-without-iphone-year-experiment-2022-10">No phones equals real, authentic fun</a> for kids</p><p>As a parent navigating a digital world that seems light-years away from the one we grew up in, I love this policy. I love that, for two hours, kids who chose to attend the dance were living in the moment, looking at each other's faces, and having real, authentic fun — not manufactured, filtered fun suitable for Snapchat or <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/senate-passes-tiktok-ban-2024-4">TikTok</a>.</p><p>I love that <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/teenager-wants-independence-feels-like-break-up-2024-4">my teenage</a> daughter had that feeling of magical joy that doesn't happen very often — the kind you feel in the deepest part of your chest, the kind you remember for a lifetime. I can remember having that kind of fun at 13, dancing with my friends, screaming and singing "I'm Every Woman" by Whitney Houston, never imagining a world where we'd each have a tiny computer in our hands.</p><h2 id="c364d3ed-8863-4feb-abe0-401d56e49dcc">She could still reach me if needed</h2><p>I shared about this policy on social media and was met with quite a bit of praise for our school administration. But the comments were also flooded with criticisms, specifically related to kids not being able to contact their parents if there was an <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/mom-sending-kids-private-school-keep-them-safe-from-shootings-2023-5">emergency like a shooter</a> or if they were being bullied, harassed, or felt sick and wanted to leave.</p><p>For the second set of critical comments, that's an easy solution. Kids who hand their phones in can ask for them back if they're leaving and then use them to call for a ride. They can also ask to borrow an adult's phone or use the school phone.</p><p>As for the gun violence issue, however, I see their point. I live in fear of my children facing an active shooter situation every single day.</p><p>It's a balancing act — raising kids in the digital world and also in a nation plagued with gun violence. I want my child to have these authentic, core memories — like I did as a kid. But I also know that our world isn't the same world I grew up in.</p><h2 id="dd0d6f9a-27e9-42ec-971e-958aeef15e17">An evening without phones is worth the risk</h2><p>I want my 13-year-old to enjoy being 13. I want her to feel free and untethered from a tiny computer in her hand. And sometimes, I want her to feel free and untethered from me.</p><p>That means sometimes she leaves her phone at home. And that she'll have to face whatever is going to happen around her without it, without me, for two hours so that she can lose herself in her favorite song. So that she can hold hands with her besties and sing "Getaway Car" at the top of her lungs. So that she can come home and tell me that she just had "the best night ever" — even if (or, perhaps especially because) none of her dance memories exist online, but instead, are just a memory in her mind and in her heart.</p>

My 13-year-old has been attached to her phone since she got it. I was surprised to see her happily leave it behind for a school dance. 

<ul class="summary-list"><li>A new mural of the late rapper Pop Smoke has gone viral for all the wrong reasons.</li><li>"Who that?" wrote one Twitter user, to which another replied: "Nobody."</li></ul><p>A new mural of the late Pop Smoke has gone viral for all the wrong reasons.</p><p>Photos of the mural circulated online this week, showing the rapper, <a href="https://www.insider.com/rapper-pop-smokes-crypt-found-vandalized-in-brooklyn-2021-9">who was killed in February 2020,</a> pulling a pose while donning his signature braids and a watch.</p><p>The location of the mural and the artist's identity are unclear, but that didn't stop Twitter from dragging the piece through the mud.</p><p>"Who that?" wrote one user, to which another replied: "Nobody."</p><p>"They put the Snapchat baby face filter on him smh…" read one tweet. Another said: "It's the thought that counts right ?"</p><p>Other users joked that rather than Pop Smoke, the artwork is instead of "Pop Fog" or "Soda Smoke."</p><p>"That's somebody's Pop…. But it ain't Pop Smoke," read one tweet.</p><p>The mural arrives shortly after one of the suspects in Pop Smoke's murder case was officially sentenced.</p><p>The "Got It On Me" rapper, real name Bashar Jackson<strong>, </strong>was shot dead during a home invasion in the Hollywood Hills in February 2020. He was 20.</p><p>According to the <a href="https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-04-06/man-pleads-guilty-in-rapper-pop-smokes-death-sentenced-to-four-years" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Los Angeles Times</a>, a 20-year-old man pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter and home invasion robbery in juvenile court on April 6, admitting he entered Pop Smoke's rented Hollywood Hills mansion as a teenager with the intention to rob him.</p><p>The unnamed defendant was sentenced to four years and two months in the Secure Youth Treatment Facility in Los Angeles, but could remain in juvenile custody until he's 25, reported the Times.</p><p>Others charged in Pop Smoke's death include Corey Walker, who was 19 at the time, along with a 15-year-old and 17-year-old.</p>

A new mural of the late rapper Pop Smoke has gone viral for all the wrong reasons: 'Who that?'

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>baby tracy/Twitter; Antonio Guillem/Shutterstock; Complex/YouTube</span></p></div><p></p></div></div></p><ul class="summary-list"><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/category/facebook">Facebook</a> is quietly building a platform for discovering memes, TechCrunch reports.</li><li>The platform is called LOL, and will consist of "funny videos and GIF-like clips" that users can vote on and share.</li><li>However, LOL was described as "cringey" to TechCrunch, and the platform is said to be out of touch with the wants of meme-obsessed teens.</li></ul><p>In its latest effort to stave off the steady flow of teens leaving its platform, Facebook has been building a dedicated space for users to discover memes and viral content.</p><p>The new platform, called LOL, is designed as a "special feed of funny videos and GIF-like clips" using content "<span>pulled from News Feed posts by top meme Pages on Facebook," according to <a href="https://techcrunch.com/2019/01/18/facebook-lol/">a new report from TechCrunch.</a> </span><span>Under each meme that appears in LOL, users can choose three reactions for the post: "Funny," "Alright," or "Not Funny."</span><span></span><span></span></p><p><span>LOL is currently in private beta and is being tested out by 100 high school students who got parental consent to participate and also signed non-disclosure agreements with Facebook, according to TechCrunch.</span></p><p><span>A Facebook spokesperson confirmed in an email to Business Insider that it is working on the platform, saying: "We are running a small scale test and the concept is in the early stages right now." </span></p><p><span>However, those who have seen LOL told TechCrunch the design is "cringey" and misses the mark. LOL is apparently featuring content that is weeks old, and that has surely already been seen before by the meme-obsessed users who would actually use the platform.</span></p><p><span><em><strong>Read more:</strong> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/internal-note-tbh-facebook-psychological-trick-teen-users-2018-8">An internal email shows how Facebook learned of a 'psychological trick' to get teens to try a new product</a></em></span></p><p>From TechCrunch's screen grabs, LOL's design and features draw comparisons to Snapchat's Discover feed. Facebook's LOL includes section for themed content collections called "Dailies," which look pretty similar to curated clips Snapchat compiles for Discover. LOL also lets you filter your feed by category, including "Fails," "Pranks," "Savage," "Wait for It," "Celebs," and a personalized "For You" tab.</p><p><span>As it stands, LOL reportedly acts as a replacement for Facebook's Watch tab. But Facebook has yet to decide whether LOL will exist as a standalone app, or as a feature within the existing app, TechCrunch reports. </span></p><p><span><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/generation-z-facebook-2018-1">Facebook's increasing unpopularity among Generation Z</a> has been well-documented, and experts say Facebook has been <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/generation-z-things-gen-z-are-killing-facebook-ralph-lauren-2018-5">taken over by parents</a>. Only 5% of teens chose Facebook as their preferred social media platform in a <a href="http://www.piperjaffray.com/3col.aspx?id=5383">Piper Jaffray survey from Fall 2018</a>, and almost 80% of surveyed teens chose either Instagram or Snapchat instead. </span></p><p><span>In response to its dwindling presence in teens' lives, Facebook has attempted to grow several features and spinoff apps. <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-launched-tiktok-competitor-called-lasso-2018-11">Facebook launched a standalone app</a> in November called Lasso that's drawn comparisons to TikTok (and the late video app Vine), but the app has yet to take off like its competitors. Facebook also acquired the anonymous app tbh, which was popular among teens in late 2017, but <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-shutting-down-tbh-moves-hello-apps-low-usage-2018-7">closed down the app</a> just eight months later. Other ventures include <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/r-facebook-starts-testing-mobile-calling-app-hello-2015-4">Hello</a>, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-kills-slingshot-rooms-riff-2015-12">Slingshot</a>, and <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-poke-app-2012-12">Poke</a>, but all have either shuttered or faded into virtual non-existence.</span></p><p class="tagline"><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/intelligence/stories-slide-deck?IR=T&amp;utm_source=businessinsider&amp;utm_medium=ctgr&amp;utm_term=ctgr_leadgen&amp;utm_content=dmedia_ctgr_leadgen&amp;utm_campaign=dmedia_ctgr_leadgen_stories_deck"></a></p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/apple-airpods-review-vs-xiaomi-airdots-2019-1">We compared Apple's $159 AirPods to Xiaomi's $30 AirDots and the winner was clear</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div>

Facebook is working on a new platform specifically for meme-obsessed teens that's already being described as 'cringey'

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Business Insider</span></p><p class="caption">Salesforce SVP of Philanthropy &amp; Engagement Ebony Frelix</p></div><p></p></div></div>Salesforce's huge customer conference Dreamforce is one of the oddest tech conferences around.</p><p>Most companies invite their customers to their conferences to tell them about the new products and services they will offer them, sprinkled with customer testimonials and a nod to the company's charitable efforts.</p><p>Salesforce prefers to talk about its philanthropic efforts, sprinkling in its product demos around that.</p><p>To that end, Salesforce had its senior VP of Philanthropy &amp; Engagement, Ebony Frelix, do a huge presentation on how a non-profit <a href="https://red.org/about/">organization called (Red)</a> is trying to end AIDS. (Red) is was founded by rocker <span>Bono and Bobby Shriver and is run by former <span>EMI/Capitol Records exec Deborah Dugan. </span></span></p><p>(Red) has helped bring medicine to AIDS-stricken villages in Africa and helped to reduce the number of babies born with the deadly disease. In 2005, more than 1,200 babies were born every day with HIV, it says.</p><p>Today that number is 400. In addition, the 20-person organization has saved more than 350 lives of people, some of them orphans, who were stricken with the illness. It taps wealthy corporations and foundations to pay for aids medication these people could not otherwise afford.</p><p>Frelix also showed how (Red) was using Salesforce's products to do its work, and talked about the organization's mission.</p><h2>Enter Bill and Melinda Gates</h2><p>Then she announced a big fundraising effort at Dreamforce.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Business Insider</span></p><p class="caption">(Red) CEO Deborah Dugan</p></div><p></p></div></div>For every dollar that Dreamforce attendees raise up to $1 million, Bill and Melinda Gates have promised to double match, she said. In addition Marc and Lynne Benioff have also offered to donate $1 million, no strings attached. </p><p>(Red) has a big relationship with the Gates Foundation and has used it with other tech companies. It was the first nonprofit to launch a Global Filter on Snapchat in partnership with the foundation, raising $3 million in one day, <a href="https://www.one.org/us/person/deb-dugan/">it says.</a></p><p>This time, thanks to the Gates Foundation, it can possibility raise $4 million for the organization at Dreamforce. (And the show has already helped raise about $10 million for Benioff's main charitable effort, the Bay Area children's hospitals he's funded.)</p><p>But the involvement of the Gates with Salesforce is especially interesting. The two companies were traditionally pretty hostile. They got briefly friendly but now the relationship between Salesforce and the company Bill Gates founded, Microsoft, <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-to-salesforce-we-never-said-we-werent-going-to-compete-2016-10">is getting increasingly tense.</a></p><p>However, when it comes to philanthropy and social change, Salesforce, the Benioffs and the Gateses seem to see eye-to-eye. In fact. Melinda Gates will be speaking on Wednesday evening at the Dreamforce conference, interviewed by Good Morning America's Robin Roberts.</p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/hair-surgeon-explains-donald-trump-hair-2016-9">A hair surgeon explains what's going on with Donald Trump's hair</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="N4M2pleTqshFojtAM7PDyhnn3kvHa-h-" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

Marc Benioff and Bill and Melinda Gates are all trying to raise money for Bono's charity to end AIDS

Pigeonholing holidays by age group throws up as many exceptions as it does stereotypes. A quick online search reveals plenty of websites recommending cruises for teens and skydiving courses for senior citizens.<br /><br />Nevertheless, here’s a list of <keyword id="6354692" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="Travel">travel</keyword> tips, trends and traditional tourist activities divided by decade:<br /><br /><h3 style="margin-bottom: 1.42857rem; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 300; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 1.71429rem; line-height: 2.35714rem; font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; display: inherit;">Under 10s</h3>Children love splashing about at beaches and swimming pools but they’re not so keen on long flights, so stick to short-haul holidays. Pre-schoolers are happy playing with other kids and won’t care whether they’re in Thailand or Tahiti. You will, though, after 17 hours in the air with a plane change in Auckland.<br /><br />Renting a villa with family or friends is a popular option but make sure the pool is properly fenced off or you’ll never be able to relax. <span class="text"><a href="https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/travel/article/3019895/seven-best-water-parks-world-bali-and-dubai" class="link-text">Water parks</a> </span>are more suitable for older children but those huge slides and water chutes look terrifying to a five-year-old. So while they’re playing it safe in the paddling pool, you’re left wondering why you paid those steep entrance fees when you could have gone to the beach.<br /><h3 style="margin-bottom: 1.42857rem; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 300; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 1.71429rem; line-height: 2.35714rem; font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; display: inherit;">Teens</h3><br /><sup>Water parks are great for older children and early teens. Photo: Shutterstock<br /></sup><br />Tiny tots love animals but an African safari is likely to overwhelm and exhaust them. Teenagers are better able to cope with hours spent bumping along dirt tracks and long gaps between wildlife sightings. Steer clear of hiking holidays, though; teens don’t really get scenery. Your encouraging oohs and aahs will be met with little more than a grunt or two. Ditto old buildings – even if they happen to be in Barcelona or Venice.<br /><br />You’re better off booking in at a youth hostel that has a rope swing across a river. For older teens, gap years often combine travel with volunteer tourism. A win-win if well organised – the youngsters learn about life in the developing world and their hosts get a new, if slightly wonky, school building.<br /><br /><h3 style="margin-bottom: 1.42857rem; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 300; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 1.71429rem; line-height: 2.35714rem; font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; display: inherit;">20s</h3>Having already been overseas on school trips and round-the-world jaunts, 20-somethings these days are far more worldly than previous generations. They’ve worked with street children in Africa or India and are unfazed by civil unrest, gang-related violence and the odd Ebola outbreak. Ticking off bucket-list destinations motivates these digital natives but they sometimes forget to enjoy the moment.<br /><br />As the sun sets over the Grand Canyon, the multitasking postmillennial next to you is likely to be simultaneously applying filters on Snapchat, live streaming on TikTok and messaging mum to send more money. Generation Zs rarely pass up the opportunity for a selfie and condense their adventures into a series of less-than-inspiring Instagram images (“Here I am hand washing my boxer shorts in the hostel sink.”)<br /><br /><h3 style="margin-bottom: 1.42857rem; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 300; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 1.71429rem; line-height: 2.35714rem; font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; display: inherit;">30s</h3><br />Millennial travel is all about the experience – for those in their 30s, meeting people is more important than splashing out on souvenirs. Photo: Shutterstock<br /><br />Millennials love disruption – in a travel sense at least. They convert their holiday money with peer-to-peer currency-exchange platform WeSwap and get around cities in an Uber vehicle, a Coco car or with Vespa ride-sharing app Scooterino. They’ll use an obscure minibus start-up (online bookings only) to see something of Slovenia and rely on carpooling service Bla Bla Car to reach a rock festival in Romania.<br /><br />Meeting people matters more than splashing out on souvenirs and, where possible, they aim to live like locals, or better still, with locals. About 60 per cent of all guests who have ever booked on Airbnb are millennials. Studies suggest that half of all 30-some­things value memories above possessions or pension plans and would rather save for a holiday than a house. They’re experiential travellers who prefer to explore the Himalayas on a motorbike or go shark-cage diving in South Africa than lie on a beach all day. And they’ll blog about every stage of the trip.<br /><br /><h3 style="margin-bottom: 1.42857rem; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 300; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 1.71429rem; line-height: 2.35714rem; font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; display: inherit;">40s</h3>Fully immersed in their careers, this age group are cash rich but time poor. They snatch luxury weekend city breaks when they can and splash out on fancy villas for the annual family holiday. Plenty of singles holidays are aimed at those who have reached an age when, according to some tour operators, “it can be tricky to find a travel buddy”.<br /><br />Then there are those who look back fondly on the carefree backpacking days of their youth without wanting to recreate the squalor. Forty-something “<a href="https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/travel-leisure/article/2127940/asias-luxury-hostels-flashpacker-generation-are-classy" class="link-text"><span class="text">flashpackers</span></a>” keep the overland traveller ethos alive but are prepared to spend more to insulate themselves from the flea-pit dorms and cockroach-infested restaurants they used to think were so cool.<br /><h3 style="margin-bottom: 1.42857rem; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 300; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 1.71429rem; line-height: 2.35714rem; font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; display: inherit;"><strong>50s</strong></h3><br />Once-in-a-lifetime trips drive cash-rich Gen Xers to explore. Photo: Shutterstock<br /><br />Now in their peak earning years, Generation Xers are able to push the boat out – that’s a speedboat, not a rowing boat, you understand. Some overworked executives hand over the logistics and legwork to bespoke travel designers who put together once-in-a-lifetime trips with no expense spared. A <a href="https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/travel-leisure/article/2135760/glamping-has-grown-tree-houses-yurts-wi-fi-luxury-camping" class="link-text"><span class="text">glamping</span></a><br /> (glamorous camping) expedition to the Gobi Desert, for example, staying in a luxury <em>ger</em> that bears little resemblance to the traditional round tent a Mongolian might live in.Some frazzled 50-somethings are tempted by a midlife gap year – especially if they missed out the first time around. Self-improvement tourism is all the rage among quinquagenarians – a photography workshop, an intensive language course or Mongolian throat singing classes in the sumptuous surroundings of your glamorous <em>ger</em>.<br /><strong><br /></strong><h3 style="margin-bottom: 1.42857rem; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 300; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 1.71429rem; line-height: 2.35714rem; font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; display: inherit;"><strong>60s</strong></h3>Their kids have grown up and flown the nest and cashed-up baby boomers are itching to make up for lost time. This group is responsible for 80 per cent of all luxury travel spending, whether it’s finally buying that motor home and setting off across North America, signing up for a Greek islands sailing holiday or a no-expense-spared African safari hosted by a celebrity wildlife photographer.<br /><br />Visiting friends and relations (VFR tourism) is popular with older travellers keen to catch up with family members living on the other side of the world, while genealogy tourism is on the rise among grey nomads wanting to trace their ancestors and fill gaps in family trees.<br /><br /><h3 style="margin-bottom: 1.42857rem; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 300; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 1.71429rem; line-height: 2.35714rem; font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; display: inherit;">70+</h3><br /><br />Septuagenarians still want to travel, and slow tourism is ideal for silver sojourners. Photo: Shutterstock<br /><br />Life in the fast lane might be over but silver surfers have no intention of slowing down completely. Cruises are the holiday of choice, along with extended winter sun escapes, especially to countries where pensions go further, the weather is warmer and there’s a culture of respect for the elderly.<br /><br />Slow tourism is tailor-made for old-timers. The travel trend prioritises the pleasures of immersing fully in a place and enjoying meaningful experiences, rather than trying to see and do as much as possible in a limited time. Then there’s medical tourism, which sees patients head to Bangkok for cheap cataract surgery, Hungary for inexpensive dental implants and Turkey for a half-price hip operation (necessitated by a bumpy landing while skydiving, perhaps).<br />

Holidays for all ages: post-millennial or silver sunseeker, these are the perfect trips for you

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Instagram; Samantha Lee/Business Insider</span></p><p class="caption">Instagram's new TV service, IGTV.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><ul class="summary-list"><li><strong>Exclusive: Instagram's new TV service, IGTV, recommended videos of what appeared to be child exploitation and genital mutilation, a Business Insider investigation has found.</strong><strong> </strong></li><li><strong>BI monitored IGTV over a three-week period and found its algorithm recommended disturbing and potentially illegal videos.</strong></li><li><strong>Two of the videos, featuring suggestive footage of young girls, were reported to the police by a leading children's charity over concerns they broke the law.</strong></li><li><strong>Instagram took five days to remove the videos, and apologised to users who saw them. The Facebook-owned app said it wants IGTV to be a "safe place for young people."</strong></li><li>British lawmaker Damian Collins, who led the inquiry into Facebook's Cambridge Analytica data breach, described BI's findings as "very disturbing."</li><li>Readers should be warned that some of the details in this report may be upsetting.</li></ul><p>Instagram's new TV service recommended a crop of graphic and disturbing videos, including what appeared to be child exploitation and genital mutilation.</p><p>That's the finding of a Business Insider investigation into IGTV, <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/instagram-igtv-video-youtube-snapchat-2018-6" target="_blank" rel="noopener">which launched in June as Instagram attempts to muscle in on rivals like YouTube and Snapchat.</a></p><p>BI spent nearly three weeks monitoring the Facebook-owned video service, during which time IGTV's algorithm recommended questionable content, including sexually suggestive footage of young girls and an explicit video of a mutilated penis.</p><p>Two of the videos discovered by BI were reported to the police by the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC), a British children's charity, and were eventually removed by Instagram five days after BI reported them through the app's official reporting channel.</p><p>Instagram apologised to users who saw the videos and said it wants to make IGTV a safe space for young people.</p><p>The findings come at a time when Facebook is under extraordinary scrutiny over inappropriate content on its platforms. Facebook and Instagram share a community operations team, and Mark Zuckerberg's company has hired an army of 7,500 moderators and is using AI to snuff out posts that break its guidelines.</p><p>Earlier this year, former <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/sarah-katz-what-like-to-work-as-a-facebook-moderator-2018-7" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Facebook moderator Sarah Katz told Business Insider that she had to review 8,000 posts a day and it made her numb to child abuse.</a> But despite the intense oversight, and resources Facebook is ploughing into policing its platforms, disturbing content appears to be slipping the net - and, as in the case of IGTV, even being suggested to users.</p><h2>IGTV's content recommendation machine</h2><p><a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/instagram-igtv-video-youtube-snapchat-2018-6" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Instagram launched IGTV in June</a>, and was viewed by many as Facebook moving in on YouTube's territory. It allows users to set up their own channels and upload video of up to an hour in length. Anyone with an Instagram account can make a channel, and users swipe through them much like flicking through channels on a television.</p><p>IGTV recommends content in three ways: A "For You" tab, which plays videos as soon as you open IGTV; a "Popular" section; and a "Following" menu, which offers videos from people you follow.</p><p>Instagram did not answer Business Insider's questions on how IGTV's algorithm recommends certain videos and why videos were suggested that appeared to be child exploitation. But it appears that the For You section recommends things users will like, possibly based on past activity. The Popular tab seems to gather trending content from across IGTV.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>IGTV</span></p><p class="caption">IGTV's For You and  Popular tabs.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>Users can scroll through the recommended videos by swiping left, or IGTV will automatically play the next video. It is clearly designed to encourage scrolling and continued viewing, in much the same way that the YouTube algorithm recommends content through its Up Next bar.</p><h2>Disturbing videos of young girls</h2><p>Business Insider monitored the For You and Popular tabs for almost three weeks to establish what kinds of content IGTV's algorithm was serving up for users.</p><p>We did so in two ways: Firstly through the account of this author and other BI journalists, and secondly an anonymous login set up as a child's account. This second account had no activity history on Instagram and a user age set to 13, which is the earliest people can officially sign up on the app.</p><p>Within days of monitoring IGTV through Business Insider accounts, a video appeared in the For You section, titled "Hot Girl Follow Me." It showed a young girl, we speculate to have been 11 or 12, in a bathroom. She glanced around her before going to take her top off. Just as she's about to remove her clothing, the video ends.</p><p>The video, uploaded by a user Business Insider is not naming for legal reasons, also appeared under the Popular tab on IGTV. It was also one of the first videos recommended under the For You section to the child account set up by BI, which had no prior history of activity on Instagram.</p><p>The same user that uploaded the "Hot Girl Follow Me" video posted another video, titled "Patli Kamar follow me guys plzz," which was also recommended to our child Instagram account under the For You section. It featured another clearly underage girl, exposing her belly and pouting for the camera.</p><p>The same two videos were separately uploaded by a different user, who again Business Insider has chosen not to identify. The video named "Hot Girl Follow Me" was called "Follow me guys" by this second user, and was also circulating on IGTV's suggested posts.</p><p>Comments on the videos show they were being recommended to other IGTV users. They were also being interpreted by other users as sexually suggestive.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container float_right"><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Instagram</span></p><p class="caption">Comments on the&#xa0;"Hot Girl Follow Me" video.</p></div><p></p></div>Some condemned the videos and questioned why they had been suggested. "BRO SHE'S LIKE FUCKING 10 WHY THE FUCK IS THIS IN MY INSTAGRAM RECOMMENDED," said one user, commenting on the "Hot Girl Follow Me" video.</p><p>Others were more predatory in tone. "Superb," one user commented on the "Patli Kamar follow me guys plzz" video. "Sexy grl," another added.</p><p>The NSPCC, which is frequently involved in law enforcement activities around child abuse, reviewed the videos and reported them to the police. It was concerned that they could constitute illegal indecent images under UK law because they appeared to feature footage of erotic posing.</p><p>"This is yet another example of Instagram falling short by failing to remove content that breaches its own guidelines," an NSPCC spokeswoman said.</p><p>Business Insider reported the videos through Instagram's official reporting function. Because there was no obvious criteria for alerting the company to potential child exploitation, they were logged as "nudity or pornography."</p><p>The videos remained online for five days. It was only after Business Insider contacted Instagram's press office that the content was removed. By this time, the two videos - and other versions uploaded by the second user - had racked up more than 1 million views.</p><p>Instagram left the accounts that posted the videos active, however. Business Insider asked why the accounts were left up, as Instagram has a "zero tolerance policy" on child abuse. Instagram said the policy applies to the content itself and not to the account that uploads it.</p><p>"Instagram's zero tolerance policy towards child abuse content is the right one, and it must make sure its policy is enforced in practice," an NSPCC spokeswoman said. "Where Instagram has removed child abuse content from an account, we would expect that account to be reviewed by a moderator to establish whether the account should also be suspended."</p><p>As of this week, the two accounts remain active. They continue to post sexually suggestive content, but not of the same nature as the "Hot Girl Follow Me" and "Patli Kamar follow me guys plzz" videos.</p><h2>A graphic video of genital mutilation</h2><p>Potential child exploitation is not the only questionable content being recommended by IGTV's algorithm.</p><p>One of the first videos recommended to Business Insider's anonymous account, registered to a user aged 13, was graphic footage of a penis undergoing an operation involving a motorized saw.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Instagram</span></p><p class="caption">Instagram cofounder Kevin Systrom.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>The penis appeared to have a metal lug nut affixed around its middle, above which it was extremely swollen and dark red in colour. The bolt was being removed with a round electric saw by what appeared to be a medic.</p><p>It was quickly wiped from IGTV after being reported by Business Insider as nudity, although the account that uploaded it remained live.</p><p>Another recommended video showed a baby lying on the floor, wailing inconsolably, with a monkey standing over and touching it. Adults were stood around in a circle, shouting and filming the scene on their phones while the monkey occasionally lashed out at them.</p><p>Instagram found that the video was not in breach of guidelines, but discovered the account that uploaded it was linked to a different account that had previously been taken down for breaching community guidelines. For this reason, Instagram took the account down.</p><h2>"Very disturbing"</h2><p>There was a multitude of other questionable recommendations being pushed by IGTV's algorithm. Examples included a video in which a group of men deceived a sex worker into thinking she was going to be arrested, a video of a woman pulling something long and bloody out of her nose, and various sexually suggestive scenes.</p><p>Business Insider presented its investigation to MP Damian Collins, the British lawmaker who is leading an inquiry into fake news and Facebook's data breach involving Cambridge Analytica. He described the findings as "very disturbing," and said big tech companies need to sink more investment into enforcing their own rules.</p><p>"It's a question of the responsibility of the companies to monitor the content that's on their platforms. A lot of the problematic content is already in breach of the community guidelines of these services, but what it shows is that there's not effective enforcement," he said.</p><p>An Instagram spokeswoman said: "We care deeply about keeping all of Instagram - including IGTV - a safe place for young people to get closer to the people and interests they care about.</p><p>"We have Community Guidelines in place to protect everyone using Instagram and have zero tolerance for anyone sharing explicit images or images of child abuse. We have removed the videos reported to us and apologise to anyone who may have seen them.</p><p>"We take measures to proactively monitor potential violations of our Community Guidelines and just like on the rest of Instagram, we encourage our community to report content that concerns them. We have a trained team of reviewers who work 24/7 to remove anything which violates our terms."</p><h2>"It's not so different from where YouTube was 10 years ago"</h2><p>It's no secret that social media has a problem with disturbing and illegal material, and tech giants like Facebook have come under fire recently for failing to effectively moderate content at scale. For IGTV, however, the problem isn't just that this material exists, but rather it's being actively suggested by the algorithm.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Tristan Fewings/Getty Images for Foundation For Sports Integrity</span></p><p class="caption">Damian Collins.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>Mike Henry, CEO of video analytics firm OpenSlate, which works with Facebook, said IGTV is still a young service. "While Instagram is relatively mature, IGTV is a brand new social video platform and will need time to develop its policies and technology. It's not so different from where YouTube was 10 years ago," he said.</p><p><a href="https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/2801999?hl=en">YouTube's child safety policy</a> is broader than Instagram's, for example. Instagram's report function is limited to child nudity, while YouTube's endangerment policy bans "sexualization of minors," which allows scope for reporting images users suspect might be child exploitation.</p><p>Henry also said Instagram will have to figure out how to better filter its new platform if it hopes to monetize it, especially considering IGTV was <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/instagram-igtv-video-youtube-snapchat-2018-6">touted as a space for influencers</a>.</p><p>"Influencers make great video producers with compelling economics and, at scale, a viable canvas for video ad dollars. With the right policies and infrastructure, IGTV has the potential to become a major player," he said.</p><p>For Collins, IGTV's early missteps are evidence that governments need to do more to regulate tech firms.</p><p>"These companies are ad services, they make money out of understanding every single thing you could ever want to know about your users so you can target them with <keyword id="35666" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="advertising">advertising</keyword>. That same technology should surely very easily be able to root out harmful content as well," he said.</p><p>"They don't do it because there's not been a commercial incentive for them to do it, so they've just not bothered. But what we have to do through regulation is create that incentive, to say 'you've actually got an obligation to do it and if you don't do it then there will be costs for you for not complying, so you need to invest in doing this now.'"</p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/samsung-foldable-phone-galaxy-x-f-winner-2018-9">Everything we know about Samsung's foldable phone</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div>

Instagram's new TV service recommended videos of potential child abuse

<p class="p1"><span class="s1"><div class="KonaFilter image-container float_right"><div class="image on-image"><p class="source">Business Insider</p></div><p></p></div>The premise of the challenge was simple: Survive one week without using any mobile <keyword id="6354741" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="Apps">apps</keyword> whatsoever. Basically, I would willfully reduce my high-powered cellphone into husk of its former self, demote it to "dumbphone" status so I could only use it to text, make phone calls, and jolt myself into consciousness in the morning with an alarm. </span></p>
<p class="p2"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Despite being a tech lover, I'm not an app junkie by any means. I pretty much stick to the basics and my very low interest in games saves me from dropping dough on Candy Crush Sage or anything else. One week of deprivation couldn't be that hard. </span></p>
<p class="p2"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Ha. </span></p>
<h2 class="p2"><strong style="line-height: 1.5em;">Denial</strong></h2>
<p class="p2"><em style="line-height: 1.5em;">You don't realize how often you scroll through your Twitter feed until you can no longer scroll through your Twitter feed. </em></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">The morning of my first App-less Day was a whirlwind of little realizations. I couldn't wake up to a leisurely perusal of Tumblr, read the headlines of the top New York Times stories, or check the weather. Okay, sure, I technically could have done </span><em style="line-height: 1.5em;">all</em><span style="line-height: 1.5em;"> those things on my real computer, but the clunkier process deterred me. </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Then in my haste to leave my apartment, I also completely forgot to grab either a book or my iPod. Usually, before work, I catch up on the developments in the tech world by perusing a few Twitter lists and refreshing my Feedly on the train (I take the 7, so I have a solid 15 minutes above ground before descending into the connectionless bowels of the city). </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Today:  zip, zero, nothing. </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Sardined between the other sleepy commuters, I gazed coolly at their phones and MP3 players, feeling like a pseudo-martyr on a quest towards app-free enlightenment. Although I felt less prepared going into work, I congratulated myself for my restraint and for noticing all the crazy-cool graffiti that I didn't usually lift my eyes to see. </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">As the day got going, though, it didn't take me long to I discover my own nervous tic: I have a habit of clicking on my phone, jabbing the Twitter app, and refreshing it absent-mindedly, checking for mentions or replies. Now, all I was doing clicking my phone on, staring at the screen, and clicking it back off forlornly. </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Other withdrawal symptoms started manifesting themselves loud and clear, too: I would fiddle with my phone purposelessly, make weirdly prolonged eye contact, feel like that poor clueless kid in middle school who's always missing out on some inside joke. I also became a fairly manic texter, rekindling conversations that had fizzled out several days before because what the hell else was I supposed to do while waiting in line for my bagel?</span></p>
<h2 class="p1"><strong style="line-height: 1.5em;">Shock</strong></h2>
<p class="p1"><em style="line-height: 1.5em;">Get off your phones, you jerks. </em></p>
<p class="p1"><em style="line-height: 1.5em;"></em><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">When you have a smartphone, it's like you're never alone. Or bored. Boredom disappears because you always have something to read, or watch, or stare at blankly while avoiding conversation on the elevator. </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Without a smartphone, you realize how much alone time you really have. </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;"><div class="KonaFilter image-container float_right click-to-enlarge" style="width:400px"><div class="image on-image"><a title_source="Instagram" title_caption="Those tacos could have used my filtering skills. " class="zoomin" href="http://static1.businessinsider.com/image/5252be83ecad0470264e65be-960/insta-1.png"><span class="click-to-enlarge-icon" title="Click to enlarge"></span></a><p class="source">Instagram</p><p class="caption">Those tacos could have used my filtering skills. </p></div><p></p></div>That, and how much of your daily existence you usually feel the need to share with the world. Cutting off my normal regimen of Foursquare, Tumblr, Twitter, Snapchat, Instagram, and Facebook, I watched my communication levels plummet. It was like all my hilarious, pithy observations were going to waste inside my own brain! So many delicious meals unphotographed!</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Also, I started noticing other people's cell phone use with the same wrath as my mother. Whenever I was talking to someone and noticed their eyes flit towards their little screen, I'd be overwhelmed with a matronly indignation. </span><em style="line-height: 1.5em;">The nerve! </em></span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">I felt it the most when I entered the eerie quiet of a packed 7 train at 6 p.m. We were all doing our own thing, except I had no thing, so I was just staring at everyone else, especially the silent 20-somethings with their backs and necks hunched over their glowing devices. Hey, former self. </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Waiting feels so much more significant when you have nothing to do, and, fine, I'll admit it: Bathroom visits got a whole lot more boring. </span></p>
<h2 class="p1"><strong style="line-height: 1.5em;">Horror</strong></h2>
<p class="p1"><strong style="line-height: 1.5em;"></strong><em style="color: #222222; font-size: 15px; line-height: 1.5em;">One frustration after the next. </em></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">At the beginning of the week, I made a seminally bad decision in deciding not to turn off my app notifications. Meaning that every time I received a message, tweet, like, or reblog, I would have to willfully ignore it. Oh, the emails I forced myself to flick away! The Snapchats I had to ignore! </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;"></span><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Snapchat really did kill me, too. I'd get a snap from someone, want to tell them why I couldn't respond for a week, and then realize that I didn't actually have their number, just their Snap handle. Awkward.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Plus, I'm in a long-distance relationship, and sometimes you just need to send your boyfriend a cross-eyed selfie, ya know?</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">A particularly embarrassing app-free moment occurred at work when I saw on my phone that I'd been tagged in a picture on Facebook. I swiped away the notification and went to check it out on my real computer. LOL's commenced ... Until I realized that the hilariously fugly photo of me was not illuminated on my own, tiny, personal screen, but glowing brightly towards the entire half of the office sitting behind me. Checking your personal FB at work: not a thing without a phone. </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">In general, the glorious privacy of a smartphone allows you to search for the things you'd be embarrassed to have anyone else see-including the simple math equations that you should be able to do in your head (by God, did I miss my calculator app). </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Going app-abstinent also meant that I was constantly forgetting things. No ever-present to-do lists, no quickly typed reminders or long-reads saved for later. Instead of writing notes for this article on my phone, I had to bust out a good ol' fashioned pen and paper. The inconvenience of the extended elbows necessary for the physical writing process earned me more than a couple of glares on the train. Whoops. </span></p>
<h2 class="p1"><strong style="line-height: 1.5em;">Temptation</strong></h2>
<p class="p1"><strong style="line-height: 1.5em;"></strong><em style="color: #222222; font-size: 15px; line-height: 1.5em;">Lead us not into temptation, but help me find where the eff I am. </em></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">I found truth in my mother's other favorite mantra one evening after work: "You kids don't know how to get anywhere these days without your phones."</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;"><div class="KonaFilter image-container float_right click-to-enlarge" style="width:400px"><div class="image on-image"><a title_source="Screenshot" title_caption="" class="zoomin" href="http://static4.businessinsider.com/image/5252bf966bb3f7842ffdcbb4-960/help-1.png"><span class="click-to-enlarge-icon" title="Click to enlarge"></span></a><p class="source">Screenshot</p></div><p></p></div>I'd walked to a Happy Hour with a friend, but several hard ciders later, I peaced out alone. Slightly buzzed, I tried to make my way to the subway without my trusty Google Maps and I don't dramatize when I say that I quite literally walked in a circle. </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Then, the next day, I wanted to try out a new coffee shop to force myself to be productive, but I neither had any idea where I should go, or would have been able to find my where there without a map. I felt a surge of longing for my good pal Yelp.  </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Midway through the week, apps I don't usually even </span><em style="line-height: 1.5em;">use </em><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">began to tempt me and I felt the strain of having to be tethered to a computer to send updates or give warnings (like when you realize on the subway platform that, sorry boss, you're going to be about 40 minutes late for work). </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Probably the greatest temptation to my streak came Thursday night, when I had to wait a half hour with absolutely nothing to do for my friend to get into Port Authority. My finger hovered over that Tumblr icon nearly to the point of pain. </span></p>
<h2 class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;"></span><strong style="line-height: 1.5em;">(Semi)Acceptance </strong></h2>
<p class="p1"><em style="line-height: 1.5em;">I got a crash-course in my own thought process. </em></p>
<p class="p2"><span class="s1">Admittedly, there were some situations where it was almost nice not using apps: I felt like I had an excuse to be even lazier than I am usually. </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">"Um, you should find us a place to eat on Yelp!" </span></p>
<p class="p2"><span class="s1">"Will you just look up the directions on your phone, please?" </span></p>
<p class="p2"><span class="s1">"Someone else should take the picture, actually. I can't Instagram it!" </span></p>
<p class="p2"><span class="s1">"I don't know, why don't <em>you</em> Google it?" </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">I was like very bossy little kid, almost gleeful about the fact that I couldn't operate sufficiently on my own. </span></p>
<p class="p2"><span class="s1">I had a lot of one-on-one time with my brain, got to coo over way more adorable babies on the train that I would have if my eyes were glued to a screen, and forced myself into lots of small talk. </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">In a way, abstaining from apps came down to trust. I just had to trust that I didn't </span><em style="line-height: 1.5em;">need </em><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">to be connected 24/7. The world wouldn't spontaneously combust if I didn't read a tweet, send an email, respond to a snap. </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">No, I definitely couldn't give up my beloved apps on any <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/why-this-20-something-hasnt-owned-a-cell-phone-in-4-years-2013-10" target="_blank">permanent basis</a>, but it was nice to give myself a brief break from the constant connection. </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Now, see y'allz on Instagram. </span></p>

Living Without Apps: My Week in Hell

<p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div></span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">The first American born in the 2000s to qualify for the Olympics is a 16-year-old table tennis prodigy with a shadowy upper lip named Kanak Jha, and when I step up to the table across from him and warn him that I played junior-varsity tennis in high school, he does not laugh.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Instead, he bounces faintly on his toes, collects himself, and lowers his body so that his eyes hover just above the table, like a crocodile peering out of the water. Then he throws the ball high in the air.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Just before it lands, Kanak cuts a serve that slices across the net at me in the shape of question mark. I go to return it - ?with what would theoretically be considered a forehand? - ?only the ball, somehow, flies not back across the net as I have intended but pings perpendicularly off my paddle, whizzing so far away from the table that it nearly hits Kanak's mother, Karuna, who is watching several feet away.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">And now Kanak begins to chuckle.</span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">***</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Earlier that day, in mid-June, I had arrived by train at an unassuming and oppressively air-conditioned table tennis facility in Dunellen, New Jersey, where Kanak and his Team USA compatriots had been training for the week.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Walking through the doors, I was immediately taken aback by the speed.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">You have played Ping-Pong, almost certainly, and chances are you have stumbled upon a dumbfounding professional rally somewhere across the internet, but you are unlikely to have tweaked your neck trying to keep up with a rally in real time. In real time, watching table tennis is like watching a sport permanently in fast-forward, as if you have sped up your eyes using a filter on Snapchat. You can make out the blur of the ball, sure, but mostly you have no idea what is happening, much less how the players are doing it.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div></span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I had come to see all this, but mostly I had come to see Kanak. Because as the first athlete&#xa0;born in the current century to qualify for the Olympics (other Y2K babies have since qualified after him), Kanak represents an entirely new generation's arrival on the world athletic stage. He also, it should be noted, will be the youngest male player to ever compete in the Olympics in his sport. I wondered what that might feel like for him.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"I don't think about it so much," Kanak told me before we started to rally. "I just try my best to get prepared for the Olympics. I haven't thought that much about being the youngest, or being the first Olympian born in the 2000s."</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">He is modest, but think about this: Sydney was the first Olympics of Kanak's lifetime. When he was born, on June 19, 2000, the Britney Spears banger "Oops! I Did It Again" had recently debuted on the radio, oh baby baby, and a new reality show called "Survivor"</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">was less than a month into its first season. Y2K was the year of the Concorde crash, of Elián González.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Here's one for you: In April 2000, two months before Kanak was born, the New England Patriots used their sixth-round draft pick on a quarterback from Michigan.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">So, yes. Tom Brady has been in the NFL longer than Kanak Jha has been alive, but only one of them has ever qualified for the Olympics.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">***</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">After three more unreturnable serves that make me question physics and curse my own "hand-eye" "coordination," I ask Kanak if we can maybe just, you know, rally. He agrees, so I serve? - though by now I am thoroughly embarrassed to even call my dinky little maneuver a serve.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">For a few shots we exchange loopy backhands, Kanak looking vaguely bored. I decide to go for a winner, smash one as hard as I can, after which I will mic-drop my paddle and quit, victorious. Hitting what I consider to be a decent shot by my suburban basement standards of the sport, I watch across the net as Kanak, in one fluid motion, pivots his entire body 180 degrees, from backhand to forehand, and unleashes a down-the-line winner. Whereas my shots are all wrist, this is a gorgeous, full-body motion beginning all the way in his hips. When he finishes the run-around forehand, his feet hit the ground and the floor makes a thud. The ball goes flying all the way to the door.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"You are pretty good!" Kanak tells me after I retrieve it.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Mostly I am humiliated.</span></p><p style="text-align: center;">***</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_left"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Kanak grew up near San Jose, California, in the city of Milpitas, to parents who had emigrated from India. His father, Arun, works at Oracle, and his mother - visiting Kanak in New Jersey from northern California - worked at Sun Microsystems <span>before switching careers to&#xa0;specialize&#xa0;in hypnotherapy and reiki alternative-healing techniques.</span></span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Kanak began playing table tennis at age 6 because his older sister, Prachi, also played. At that time, he cared more about soccer. But table tennis came quickly.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"When he was 6 or 7 years old, he just had that knack," Arun told me over the phone from California. "Some kids have it, that inherent talent, the eye-hand coordination, the good footwork, which came from soccer. And that was really that."</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">As a junior table tennis player, Kanak has won just about every trophy imaginable. When he was 13, for example, he entered in every age category at the US Nationals. This audacious slate resulted, somehow, in 28 matches, and Kanak lost only one? - ?in a semifinal of the men'</span><span style="font-weight: 400;">s senior tournament.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"He won gold in under-15, under-18, under-21," Arun recalled. "In the men's singles he went all the way to the semifinals, which had never happened before in the history of US table tennis."</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">But the opportunities in this country for a burgeoning table tennis superstar are not, shall we say, overflowing. It'</span><span style="font-weight: 400;">s also not a cheap sport.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"In the US, opportunities are limited in the sense that it's more pay as you go, and it's extremely expensive," Arun said. "You pay $60 or $70 an hour, and if you really want to train 12 or 14 hours a week with two kids, you can imagine the financial burden."</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div></span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Since September, Kanak has lived with Prachi, who now 18,&#xa0;in Halmstad, Sweden?, about two hours by train from Copenhagen. The summer before they moved abroad, Prachi was accepted to the University of California at Berkeley, but she decided to defer for a year to train for the Olympics herself. (She failed to qualify and will start at Cal this fall.)</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">When in Halmstad, Kanak trains five hours a day, six days a week at a club filled with professional players. He travels throughout Europe and Asia competing in professional tournaments, and at night he takes high school classes online. He'll be a junior next fall, after the Olympics.&#xa0;</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I asked Kanak what it was like, being 15 and moving all the way from California to Sweden.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">He shrugged.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"Sometimes you miss home," he acknowledged. "But I traveled a lot, even before I moved. It helps that I have my sister, also, because I can't cook."</span></p><p><div><div style="width: 100%; height: 0px; position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.250%;"></div></div></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">***</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Of all the impressive moments in Kanak's young career? - and there have been many? - the most sensational came, unquestionably, in April at the Olympic qualifier.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Olympic table tennis features both singles play and a team tournament, which is akin to tennis' </span><span style="font-weight: 400;">Davis Cup. For Americans to qualify, they must first make the national team at the team trials. Only four men make it. For Team USA to then send its athletes to the Olympics, it needs to perform well at the North American Qualification Tournament, a three-day event that is effectively the US versus Canada. This year it took place in Toronto.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"It was a three-day tournament, and every day was like a mini tournament with the winner qualifying for Rio," Kanak said. "Whoever wins gets an automatic spot. So on the first day, a Canadian qualified. On the second day an American qualified."</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Whoever won the tournament on the third day would not only qualify himself for the singles tournament but would also qualify his team, and a third teammate, for the team competition. On one side of the semifinal were two Americans. On the other side, Kanak versus a Canadian player named Pierre-Luc Theriault.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_left"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div>"I knew if I won the match, we were guaranteed a third spot," Kanak said. "If I lose, maybe the Canadian wins the final and nobody goes."</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Under the Olympic format, the match is best four games out of seven, each to 11 points. Against Theriault in the semi, it came all the way down to the seventh game. </span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Arun, watching anxiously in the stands, couldn't take it.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"There was a lot of audience participation - everyone wanted Canada to win, and we're being overpowered by Canada," he told me. "It was three to three, tied, and it was the critical game. The seventh game. And I literally walked away, I was so stressed.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"I walked away to the corner of the Pan Am center where I couldn't hear anybody cheering, because from the more cheering I hear I know Kanak is behind. At some point I said, OK, I don't care, I'm going to walk in, win or lose. And I walk in and the crowd was going crazy, and I saw the score and my heart sank because it was 0-5."</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">And then, well, maybe you should just watch the video yourself (start at the 1:48:42 mark):</span></p><p><div></div></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Kanak took 11 points in a row. Down love-five in the deciding game, in Canada against a Canadian with an Olympic bid on the line, 15-year-old Kanak won 11 consecutive points to win the match and guarantee an all-American final, ensuring that the US would send three table tennis players to Rio. Oh, and he went on to win the final - qualifying himself for the singles tournament, too.&#xa0;</span></p><p><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">Eleven. Straight. Points.</span></em></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"I was in utter shock and disbelief," Arun said over the phone, laughing.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"It was one of my best matches," Kanak said.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Have I mentioned he is modest?</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">How, </span><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">how, </span></em><span style="font-weight: 400;">down 0-5, did he not collapse?</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"At 5-0 we switch sides, so it was a little break there," Kanak said. "I tried to be a little more patient, just put the ball on the table and not go for as much. At 5-3 I knew I have a chance because I could see him getting very nervous.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"I knew he was very nervous. Table tennis is a sport that goes in breaks, where you win many points in a row. I tried to just stay focused."</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div>Here, I realize two things. First, I am reminded of why I never qualified for the Olympics. Second - and maybe this is obvious - it occurs to me that mental strength is perhaps just as much of a gift that certain people are just </span><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">born with </span></em><span style="font-weight: 400;">as is, say, wingspan.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">But unlike physical traits, which come along later, mental strength seems to always be there, even from a young age.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"When the chips are down, and when everybody is against you? - ?he's been like that forever," Arun said. "He was 11 and playing in France, and he was playing a French boy and no foreigner had ever won that [junior] tournament and Kanak was the first one to win it. It seems to me that he tunes everything out. There could be 500 people cheering against him. It seems to me that he is in a different zone. It's pretty remarkable."</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I ask Kanak where this mental toughness comes from, and here his mom? interjects to jokingly take credit.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"Me! Me!" she says, pointing at herself, giggling.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Kanak, next to her, laughs but shrugs again.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"I just try to stay focused."</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><strong><em>***</em></strong></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Next month, in Rio, Kanak will need to win two qualifying matches simply to make the main singles draw.&#xa0;</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Of all the excitement that comes with the Olympics? - ?the athlete village, the opening ceremony, the other events, and the world-famous athletes? - Kanak is most looking forward to trying to make the main draw.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"Even before the event starts I'm mostly just focused on the table tennis," he said. "The result is the most important thing. I think my main goal is just to reach the main draw. There are two preliminary rounds, and it's very tough. Every player is very good."</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Massimo Costantini, the Italian-born Team USA table tennis coach (imagine Martin Scorsese permanently in a sweatsuit), told me from Dunellen that if nothing else, Rio would be an excellent learning opportunity for Kanak.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"He's very young," Costantini said. "I keep repeating to him, it's an opportunity, but it's not the last opportunity. Go back home, and learn something from this to make your game better for the next time."</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Still, Costantini feels that Kanak has a shot at the main draw.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"I think he has potential to make it," he said. "Olympics is a relatively easy competition. As per the [International Table Tennis Federation] rules, only two players can compete. You can take two from China, two from Japan, so the quality overall is not good. But it depends on the draw, how lucky you are."</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">The real goal, though, the one in which Kanak could make even more history, is four years away - at the next Olympics.</span></p><p>"He will be ready by 2020," Costantini <a href="http://host.madison.com/sports/baseball/professional/at-californian-youngest-male-table-tennis-player-in-rio/article_90bb02f3-85b4-5c6a-8c1b-b31b6fa08e33.html">said</a>.</p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">In 2020, Kanak will be 20 years old. By then, Arun speculates, he could well be a top-50 player in the world. In four years, however, the question of college will also become an important one, though Arun and Kanak both stressed that they would cross that bridge when it comes.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"Education is the one thing he has to do," Arun said. "That's a mandate from us. Academics and education are really important to us. But we told him at the moment that he can just play."</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Because what else can you tell a 16-year-old who has just qualified for the Olympics?</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><div><div style="width: 100%; height: 0px; position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.250%;"></div></div></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">***</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">After Kanak and I finish rallying, he and some of his teammates begin to goof around on the table for a bit. Kanak has found a paddle smaller than the size of his hand, and he is laughing, throwing the ball hyperbolically high before the serve, lunging for big winners and fist-pumping furiously after he wins a point.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Eventually, Costantini waddles over and scolds Kanak, telling him he's going to throw out his back so close to the Olympics.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Kanak laughs and replaces the mini paddle for a regular one.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Costantini introduces a drill, and other members of the team disperse to different tables. When his partner is ready, Kanak lowers himself so that his eyes hover just above the table, like a crocodile peering out of the water. He stares at the ball, cupped in the palm of his left hand.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Then he throws it high in the air.</span></p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/examples-michael-jordan-insane-competitiveness-nba-basketball-2016-6">Examples of Michael Jordan's insane competitiveness</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="pvaGY0djpl8GPtv84BlabGDtHRN-8D4m" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

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