Each morning at around 11 o’clock my time (Pacific Standard), an email with my latest posts goes out to Makeup and Beauty Blog subscribers.

If you aren’t already subscribed, the daily emails can be a nice way to unwind over your lunch break. I try to keep things interesting, alternating makeup and beauty news with giveaways, product reviews, photo posts, tutorials and tips. I’ll never share your address with anyone for anything. You’ll get just one email per day, delivered fresh and hot out the kitchen (not really, but you know what I mean).

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Thank you for visiting, and I hope we get to chat in the comments soon.

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

P.S. If you’re completely swamped with email, you can also subscribe by RSS feed or follow me on twitter or facebook.

Before I signed up last week, I thought Twitter was just another glorified chat program, another time-wasting instant messenger filled with people tweeting their bathroom breaks and eating habits.

Truth be told, there is some of that on Twitter (and I do it too)…

But there are also tweets like these (from a search for “eyeshadow tips”):

And these (from my unfiltered stream today)…

It’s easy to find and follow the conversations of people who share your hobbies and interests, just as it’s easy to unfollow people who don’t. Follow only as many people as you want to (as many as you can handle), or download a free program like Tweetdeck, which adds the ability to group conversations and filter tweets by topic.

I’m still new to Twitter and figuring out the ropes, but I think I can already tell why it grew 1,928% over the past year.

It’s fresh and relevant, attracting people of all interests and walks of life. News spreads virally on Twitter faster than anywhere else, even TV! Professionals use it to share details on their latest products and services, and businesses use it to keep consumers up to date. It’s also widely used to share discounts, coupons and to get feedback from people in a flash.

One week in, and I’m already hooked!

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

P.S. Follow me on Twitter at karenmbb.:)

Imagine asking, “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who’s the fairest of them all?” and having the mirror actually answer. Someday soon it may — if the mirror contains computer chips programmed to run new software developed by Canadian university undergraduate student Joshua Chauvin.

Chauvin and fellow Canadian researches have found that a computer can be trained to rate human facial attractiveness the same way that people do.

To test their creation, the researchers asked a group of people to rate the attractiveness of other people in images, and then asked the computer to follow suit. Eighty-five percent of the time the computer’s ratings fell within one point of the human rating.

According to Chauvin…

“So what (the neural network is) doing is coming up with its own rating for those images based on some sort of understanding of what it thinks the population finds as attractive.”

source: CTV.ca

The technology isn’t ready to start replacing beauty pageant judges yet, but who knows? To his credit, Chauvin sees the potential for more practical uses for it, like one day using the software to corroborate a doctor’s diagnoses by identifying certain facial characteristics of some diseases.

Perhaps less altruistically, he also sees the software being used by marketing and advertising companies to assess how their target audience may respond to the models hired for different ad campaigns.

This young researcher’s name (Chauvin) sounded French to me, so I pulled up Yahoo! Babel Fish to check the translation.

What are the odds?

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

Click here to follow me on Twitter…

What is Twitter? — As far as I can tell so far (and I’m VERY late to the party), Twitter is at least two different things, the first of which is the reason I refrained from using it for so long.

The beauty of Twitter

1. It’s an instant messaging/chat service similar to the old AOL chat rooms, AIM or MSN, except that it makes it easier to carry on conversations with large groups of people (from one to potentially millions of people in the same conversation!) and archives each individual message (aka a Tweet) on the web.
2. Twitter’s also a great way to find and instantly communicate with people and businesses with similar interests (in my case cats, photography, blogging, writing, randomness, makeup and beauty).

How do I know this?

Because of something that happened last week…

It was early on Thursday morning. I was at my computer, drinking coffee in my pajamas and catching up on beauty news online. I saw a blurb in my feed reader for a blog post titled, “Illamasqua Coming to Sephora!!!!”

Holy shizz! Fo’ reals? I couldn’t believe my eyes, so I Googled for info and called Illamasqua to confirm.

It was true, and guess where the news first broke — where did it first appear?

You guessed it: Twitter.

Even though I’m afraid I’ll get sucked in, that I’ll need a Twitter intervention by Christmas, who cares? All of the big cosmetics and beauty companies are tweeting out coupon codes, announcing new products, events and sales on Twitter; I can no longer resist.

If you have any Twitter tips or just want to scold me for taking so long to join, let me know in the comments (or via Twitter, ha! Love the irony). I pledge to make up for my lateness with frequent Twittaway beauty giveaways and breaking beauty news.

Quick and easy

I was also really surprised by how easy it was to make a Twitter account. It’s free and easier than ordering a book on Amazon. The toughest part was choosing a username.

My first choice (mbb) was already taken. I’d wanted something short because of how people send messages on Twitter, and “makeupandbeautyblog” isn’t exactly short, right?

So, on Twitter I’m karenmbb. Tweet ya later.

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

P.S. Do you use Facebook? On Facebook I’m at facebook.com/makeupandbeautyblog. I have my Twitter and Facebook accounts linked, so you can reach me at either one.

Upstart British makeup brand Illamasqua will soon be crossing the pond.

I spoke with a contact at Illamasqua this morning and confirmed that in addition to the upcoming July 30th launch of their first counter at the new Sephora flagship store at 5 Times Square in New York, the line will also be available at 27 Sephora stores across the United States starting September 2009.

Rollout to be completed by Christmas 2009

The brand plans to launch at a select number of stores starting on September 15th, with plans to fully rollout counters to all 27 by Christmas.

Locations will include Sephora stores in Honolulu, Las Vegas, Miami, Seattle, Boston and San Francisco (Powell Street, WOOT!). I’m currently working on finding a full list of the stores and will update this post once I’ve tracked it down.

Select, best-selling items

Illamasqua plans to sell a limited range of 200 of their best-selling items. Included will be their entire range of nail varnishes, as well as select items for eyes, lips, cheeks, face and body. Prices will range from $18-30.

Online availability

If you don’t live near a Sephora — don’t fret. The brand will also soon be available at Sephora online. I’m still confirming the date of online availability but will let you know as soon as I know more.

Can I just say, YAY? What great news to wake up to on a Thursday morning!

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen