Philippe Matthews Show Guru Advice, Author Reviews, Tech Reviews, Entertainment News

Screenwriter-producer Melissa Rosenberg helped make Breaking Dawn a box office smash by staying faithful to the books. With her next project Earthseed, she ditches fan loyalty for high fidelity, by "sounding out" her script with f/x experts at ILM

It took science, faith, and a bit of magic (oh, and 10 years and a million bucks) to bring a lost version of a pioneering silent film classic back to colorful life. Here’s how it happened.

TicketLeap, a online ticket exchange, helps local haunts go hi-tech. In recent years, Halloween haunts have gotten the Hollywood-style treatment, trading up from fog machines and cardboard caskets to CGI and robotics. But there's also been a less glamorous technological boon for haunt proprietors that has helped drive sales: their back-end ticketing systems

Kate Maloney of Costume Craze finds success selling Halloween costumes. At start-ups, things don't always go according to plan. Take Costume Craze, an online costume retailer based in Pleasant Grove, Utah.

Facebook today just made it easier for media companies to help users discover new music, articles, and books by seeing what their friends are reading, watching, and listening too. As a result, some companies are putting versions of their products--called "canvas apps"--directly in Facebook, like music companies that will let people listen to their music right inside the social network. Yahoo, however, is taking a different tack

It was close to midnight, Pacific Standard Time, as one truck after another crept down a quiet, gated village road in the heart of Laguna Beach, one of the most beautiful oceanside communities in Southern California (as well as one of the most affluent and most expensive). Most of the ornate, sprawling stucco houses were in shadows, their owners asleep--with the exception of the very last house on the block. Considering the time of night, it was unusual to see one, let alone several, vehicles on the road

Mark Ruffalo, James Cameron, and Kevin Bacon want you. An exclusive look at Global Green USA's new one-minute video designed to get people concerned and taking action about rising oceans

By now you probably know that Netflix is splitting its business into two parts: its digital streaming business (retains the name Netflix) and its DVD mailing business, which was its original business (to be called Qwikster). If you haven't read Reed's explanation of this split make sure you read it (of course, after you're done with this post here . It's simply brilliant.

(PhysOrg.com) -- Used in Hollywood and the advertising industry to create exotic special effects, ferrofluids are seemingly magical materials that are both liquid and magnetic at once. In a study published today in Physical Review B, Yale electrical engineering professor Hur Koser and colleagues from the University of Georgia and Massachusetts Institute of Technology demonstrate for the first time an approach that allows ferrofluids to be pumped by magnetic fields alone. The invention could lead to new applications for this mysterious material.

There's a whole industry devoted to promulgating the myth that all an entrepreneur needs is perseverance, creative genius, and hard work. Ries learned the hard way this isn't true

Agencies: if you really want to emulate a tech startup, create utility, put skin in the game and ask, What Would Edison Do? The “Why ad agencies should act more like tech startups” meme has been making the rounds for some time in the form of provocative tweets, panel discussions and blog posts . The conversation tends to focus on social media strategy and incorporating tech talent into creative teams.

With a quarter of a million followers between them, the men and women behind a few of the better faux accounts show us how to create and maintain successful, character-driven Twitter feeds. All kinds of quippy characters populate my Twitter feed. There are the "newsies" intent on dishing out the latest info nuggets, the "media-obsessives" grappling with the state of our industry, those snark-laced counter-punchers I'll call "quipsters," and the "newbies" who, with only a handful of followers, are just beginning to find their way.

Many a brand, whether personal or business, would die a happy death to have a video go viral with over 500,000 views. Even better would be to speak with the creator of a video sensation that did just that in only 12 days since it was uploaded to YouTube. Jim Meskimen is an actor, comedian and impersonator with a tight and loyal fan base.

Neuroscientists have found how brainwaves can predict hit songs, but listen (below) to actual music made from neuro feedback, and you'll understand why experts think the pop charts will remain mindless for decades to come.

Quitting college at 18 to move to Silicon Valley and pursue your startup is the stuff of Hollywood dreams. Now add a billionaire benefactor bankrolling you, and the pressure to prove that entrepreneurship rivals Harvard as a path to success. The inaugural class of Thiel Fellows is blogging about their experiences for Fast Company.