Picture this. You’re frolicking the sands of a deserted beach at night, playing the horizontal greased-weasel tango with a lucky lady (or lad) who you find particularly ravishing. Only one problem: That person isn’t your lover, it’s a friend.Flings with friends is pretty rampant these days and we’re not entirely surprised. It can be exciting – involving deception, secrecy and the forbidden, especially if you’re already in a relationship. Despite the thrill, these little detours can end pretty harshly if you’re not at your wits.We’ve put together a small list of guidelines in case your secret fun with the side-chick has taken a turn for the worse and you need to get out of dodge with your limbs, soul, and integrity intact.This is how to tell your friends with benefits it’s over for good.

Pick Your Battles Carefully

So you’ve decided to do the righteous thing and end the ‘thing’ before it carves a bloody mess through your personal life, leaving you with no sex, no relationship and no friendship. Good on you.But there’s a time and a place. Are you about to go on a flash tropical holiday with your ‘main’ chick and the in-laws? Got a big time job interview next week that might be the job? Grand final weekend? There might be no ‘ideal’ time to break off a fling, but there are definitely bad times.Channel a bit of Sun Tzu and strategise the hell out of the situation. Find a time where you can afford to allocate the emotional and mental gumption required to have your arse ripped into for being a cheeky bastard who wants to right the terms for the better.Putting it off for a less stressful time is no crime. If it coincides with important life milestones, you’ll need to ration your energy and focus. No one succeeds at half-arsing the trickiest of shits.

Don’t Play The Blame Game

It takes two to tango, but you’re a big boy that had every opportunity to say ‘no thank you’. As fun and exciting as the extracurricular rutting was, there’s got to be a bit of recognition that you played a part in the friendship going beyond its usual call of duty.Owning your indiscretions can improve the confidence other people have in you. It shows you are to a degree responsible, and can critically assess your decisions.Even if the fling ends on the wrong side of scandalous, you can still own it with your head held high(ish). Remember, there are no positive stories written about the guy who hides from his mistakes.

Leave Your Mates Out Of It

Your mates are an important bastion of emotional support through the highs and lows of relationships – even the illicit ones that let you eat the forbidden fruit. Unfortunately, this one isn’t their battle. Even if you need some emotional backup, there’s good reasons for some tactical silence.Blood oaths or not, your most seemingly vault-like best buds can be impulsive chatterboxes who make unauthorised disclosures like they’re paid talk-show host.Blokes love to booze and talk and a manageable crisis can easily spiral into a public spectacle that involves distant acquaintances, family, and Barry the local bartender. They might spot you at the gym, but this one is your hurdle to overcome.

Do The Deed In Person

Social media is pervasive, and it’s only getting worse. But the fling you might have built through friendship or the digital aether doesn’t need to end on the same medium. Burying the hatchet via message can have some nasty consequences if you’re unlucky.First, it hurts like a cricket ball in the nuts. Don’t like getting fired over the phone? This isn’t much different. Your side chick or friends with benefits might be absolutely mental, but she doesn’t deserve decapitation-by-sliding-into-DMs.It’s impersonal and detached and creates the impression you don’t respect their humanity. It also affirms the impression that you’re weak when it comes to confronting something you can’t handle.Integrity aside, we’re telling you this for your own self-interest. A digital papertrail can immortalise your tail-chasing and create a permanent reminder for everyone that you have made some suspect decisions.This kind of thing can follow you into relationships and careers. People have lost jobs, or found it difficult to find them, once their profligacy bubbles to the surface.

What To Actually Say

Once you’ve decided on a time and place and had a moment to think things through, it’s best to nut out a quick plan. In essence, there’s no right way to talk yourself out of a fling that was never to be.A long, dreary essay-like speech is as ineffective as a brusque and indifferent ‘smell ya later’. Try to sit somewhere in the middle. Not too long, not too short.What are the magic words? You’re on your own for that one – context is everything. But it’ll be helpful to cover where things stand, a balanced perspective on why it should end, and most importantly, what you mutually stand to gain from ending the pants-off party.The most important thing to bring to the final talk is a bit of empathy and a willingness to avoid dumping criticism on your (soon to be former) side chick. No finger waving self-righteousness, and no antagonism. Don’t fall for the temptation to escalate if things get stroppy. There’s no dignity in carrying on like you should be featured on Jerry Springer.

Back For Seconds

We’re not ones to moralise. We certainly don’t believe that we’re sufficiently blameless to adjudicate the messy bits of your private life.Many people would tell you that flings and friends with benefits are exciting, and for most of us in today’s society it’s no longer a crime.  But sleep on it before you go at it again.Even the impossibly debonair Don Drapers of the world don’t get away with it long-term. So, is it worth it? Only you can decide that, over the pyre of your relationships and doctors’ bills for STI checks.

The post Friends With Benefits: How To Tell If It’s Over appeared first on DMARGE Australia.

When a carmaker claws its way to the top of Formula One rankings and stays there to dominate year on year, there’s only one way to celebrate – build the world’s fastest hypercar.

The Mercedes-AMG Project One has been teasing for months now and at the IAA last night it finally broke cover as a Formula One car for the road, a 1,000hp (740kW) stunner which features advanced aerodynamic appointments and engineering smarts directly carried over from the motorsport – that includes a demanding engine and drivetrain service life of every 50,000km to make sure the car is in peak condition.

Looking at the figures of the Project One we have a mid-mounted 1.6-litre (like your Corolla but not really) which delivers the aforementioned 1,000hp from a single turbo V6 which can easily hit 11,000rpm without blowing up.

Like the winning Mercedes-AMG F1 car, this petrol engine is paired with four electric motors – a 120kW electric motor on the turbo, one on the crankshaft and two smaller electric motors driving the front wheels.

When paired with the petrol motor, an AMG Performance 4Matic+ all-wheel drive system and an eight-speed gearbox, the Silver Arrows have a car that is capable of some insane lap times.

Mercedes-AMG Chairman Tobias Moers told Autoblog at the launch that “the Hypercar is the most ambitious project we’ve ever made.”

“This marks another highlight of the successful strategic development of Mercedes-AMG as a performance and sports-car brand.”

“The Project One is the hottest and coolest car we have ever designed,” Daimler’s chief design officer Gorden Wagener added.

“It combines our design philosophy of Sensual Purity with the performance of our Formula One racing cars and is the perfect embodiment of Performance Luxury.”

“This hypercar’s extreme design marks a milestone in design ‑ there are no lines, and the interior is stripped down to the essentials.”

Those keen on acquiring one for their garage will need to part ways with a serious sum of $US2.54 million or $4 million Australian pesos.

The post Mercedes-AMG Unleash Their Latest Hypercar On The World appeared first on DMARGE Australia.

We can’t all be George Clooney or Daniel Craig, somehow getting cooler and better looking with every passing year. In fact, according to a recent study, most of us are doomed to reach our peak of adventurousness and charisma before we’ve even left our thirties.

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Goodbye dreams of being a sexy silver fox. Hello dadbod and yelling at kids to get off your lawn.

The research comes from Airbnb, which surveyed 2,000 people to determine the optimum ages for boredom and excitement. The survey found that most men reach their boring peak at age 39, by which time they have already had many of the experiences we consider exciting. For women, the peak of dullness is even earlier: 35.

On the flip side, the survey found that people are the most exciting at age 27. The late twenties are something of a sweet spot between youthful idiocy and the responsibilities of the thirties, when we’re most likely to trek across a desert, dance on bar counters, or take up base jumping.

According to those polled, things that make you a fun and interesting person include:

1. Staying out until the early hours on a weekday
2. Trying a new hobby
3. Going out of the way to make a new friend
4. Booking a spontaneous holiday
5. Learning a new skill
6. Visiting a friend unannounced
7. Changing jobs
8. Going on a spontaneous shopping trip
9. Asking someone out
10. Trying a new sport

But don’t panic about your grim future of nights in, early bird specials, and existential dread. There’s a light at the end of the tunnel. It turns out people get exciting again after age 50, when they suddenly become open to new experiences again.

Worst case scenario, you can always join the Dull Men’s Club. Yes, that’s a real thing.

Read Next

• How To Age Ungracefully And Look Awesome Doing It
• Australia’s ‘Brotox’ Boom Shows How Men Are Struggling In The Workplace

The post Once Men Turn 39, They’re Officially ‘Too Boring’, Study Suggests appeared first on DMARGE Australia.

He may be the fastest man on four wheels at the moment but make no mistake, Lewis Hamilton is also continuing to build his profile as one of the world’s most eclectic celebrity dressers.

His latest message to the world? “I’m in New York and I don’t give a f*ck!”

Okay, whilst he didn’t actually say that, his latest wardrobe antics certainly do as they tread the fine line between fashion pioneer, cashed-up pimp and Freddy Mercury.

You want white tracksuit pants with rainbow stripes and gold chains? Hamilton has that as he was snapped on the streets of New York in his own rendition of streetwear.

How about a metallic pink bomber jacket complete with satin print shirt, a gold snake buckle and round sunglasses (at night)? He sure did.

And finally we have Hamilton in a pair of trousers which straddles the line between art and ‘I vomited on my pants and let it dry there’.

From the circuit overalls to some of the boldest looks ever attempted by a race car driver, there’s no denying that Hamilton is in a league of his own when it comes to embracing the celebrity lifestyle and the aesthetics that come with it – including his interesting choice in hairstyle.

Don’t believe us? Check out some of his past looks which have helped define the Brit’s quirky off-track persona.

The post Lewis Hamilton Is Proof You Can Wear Whatever The F*ck You Want In NYC appeared first on DMARGE Australia.

There are many words we could use to describe Johnny Depp, but “restrained” would not be one of them. The eccentric Hollywood icon has already listed two properties in Los Angeles, both of which take a flamboyant more-is-more approach to interior design. So you can imagine our surprise when we saw this new listing.

The latest property Depp is looking to unload is a 41-acre horse farm in Kentucky with three barns, one guest house, a 6,000-foot main home, and interiors that could have been designed by your grandmother (if she was a bit of a film buff and admired Scandi kitchens). It’s a far cry from anything we’ve seen previously from the oddball actor.

Depp has had an on again, off again relationship with the farm, which he originally purchased in 1995 for US$950,000. He sold it in 2001 for US$1 million, then repurchased the place in 2005 for US$2 million. His mother lived on the property (which may explain the décor) until her death in May 2016.

Located in Lexington, two miles from the renowned Keeneland Race Course, the horse farm is fully operational. There are 15 stalls for your finest steeds, as well as 10 automatic watered paddocks and a guest house that functions as manager’s quarters.

The stately main house contains six bedrooms and six and a half bathrooms, plus a dining room, family room and sun room. Entertainers will love the wet bar, and will find plenty of party space by the pool and its adjacent compound area. A four-car garage serves as shelter for your fleet of A-list automobiles or farm equipment.

Depp’s southern ranch retreat isn’t without its charms. Much as we’re inclined to rag on its most dated features, it also boasts hardwood flooring, floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, and built-in fireplaces. Mercifully, the master suite and gourmet kitchen recently received upgrades, though someone has some ‘splaining to do about the carpet in kitchen. Let’s call it “cosy” and “vintage” to be polite.

A reserve price for the property has yet to be named, though it was listed for sale in December 2016 for US$2.9 million, which is likely an indicator of what the auction will have in store on September 15.

LISTING: Johnny Depp Kentucky Farm

The post Johnny Depp's Kentucky Horse Farm Is Not What You're Expecting appeared first on DMARGE Australia.

Advancing technology has always been a controversial topic of discussion and today it’s about to get even more heated.

A new study from the Stanford University has found that artificial intelligence can now guess whether a person is gay or straight based on photos of their faces with up to 91% accuracy, a claim that also puts the human ‘gaydar’ under serious threat.

Researchers from the university found that a computer algorithm could successfully distinguish between gay and straight men 81% of the time whilst it did the same for women with a 74% success rate. The issues stemming from this kind of technology is potentially dangerous when it comes to ethics and privacy, whereby facial recognition could be used to identify someone’s sexual orientation against their consent, making anti-LBGT abuse much easier.

The artificial intelligence itself was tested against a sample of over 35,000 facial images publicly uploaded to a US dating site. From there the technology extracted key features from the images by using “deep neural networks” (a complex mathematical model) to analyse the visuals across an extensive dataset.

The results? The artificial intelligence found that gay men and women tended to possess “gender-atypical” features, expressions and “grooming styles”. In other words gay men appeared more feminine whilst gay women were more masculine. On a more physical analysis, it determined that gay men tended to have narrower jaws, longer noses and larger foreheads when compared to straight men. Gay women were again the opposite with physical features consisting of larger jaws and smaller foreheads when compared to straight women.

These results were then tested against human judges who faired significantly worse than the algorithm with a 61% success rate for men and 54% for women. The machines weren’t done there though. When the chances were increased by allowing it to analyse five images per person, it had a guess success rate of 91% for men and 83% for women.

What the authors concluded from this was that “faces contain much more information about sexual orientation than can be perceived and interpreted by the human brain”. Delving even further, the paper suggested that the results showed strong support for the theory that sexual orientation originates from exposure to specific hormones before birth, meaning people are born gay and being queer is not a choice. The lower score for females also suggested that their sexual orientation tended to be more fluid.

Speaking of the underlying issues that this new technology brings was Nick Rule, an associate professor of psychology at the University of Toronto who has also published research on the science of gaydar.

“It’s certainly unsettling. Like any new tool, if it gets into the wrong hands, it can be used for ill purposes. If you can start profiling people based on their appearance, then identifying them and doing horrible things to them, that’s really bad.”

“What the authors have done here is to make a very bold statement about how powerful this can be. Now we know that we need protections.”

Authors of the Stanford Study also noted the potential for this new artificial intelligence to be used to link facial features to a host of other human traits and behaviours including political views, psychological conditions or personality.

Sound eerily familiar? You’ve probably watched Tom Cruise in Minority Report where people could be arrested for committing a crime they’ve yet to commit.

“AI can tell you anything about anyone with enough data,” said Brian Brackeen, CEO of Kairos, a face recognition company.

“The question is as a society, do we want to know?”

[via The Guardian]

The post This New Technology Can Determine If You're Gay Or Straight From A Photo appeared first on DMARGE Australia.

Get your party pants on because that’s what this week’s best dressed men all got up to.

Bills Skarsgard is the man of the hour in this edition with the arrival of ‘IT’ twenty seven years after the first film. The creepy clown suit was traded up for a black suit with contrasting patterned – a style move which has elevated a normally muted look.

Following him up is NBA star Russell Westbrook who went all out in a three-piece midnight blue tux sans the tie – a very slick move from the NBA’s most valuable player of 2017.

Elsewhere on the style circuit Baby Driver star Ansel Elgort went down the adventurous route with a metallic satin print with tropical vibes whilst Cameron Dallas, Timothee Chalamet and Mark Strong all flew the suit flagin their own unique way.

Rounding things out nicely is Adam Selman who shows us how to do double denim right and Eric Rutherford who equally proves that camo is still a worthy addition to a man’s wardrobe.

The post Bill Skarsgard, Russell Westbrook & Ansel Elgort Are This Week's Best Dressed Men appeared first on DMARGE Australia.

Lose the roof, keep the performance. Look tantalising whilst doing it. That’s what the new Aventador S Roadster is essentially about.

The Aventador S Coupe was already a formidable supercar when it arrived earlier in the year with an upgraded version of their 6.5-litre naturally-aspirated V12 which delivered 544kW of power and 690Nm of torque – a 34kW increase over the standard model. The droptop version will sport the same specs as the coupe to allow it to sprint to 100km/h in just 3.0s to make it 0.1s slower than the lighter coupe model (because people notice those things).

Nonetheless it’s seriously not a bad compromise given the droptop model adds a few extra kilos to the car. Drivers will also have the option of opening the rear window in order to experience the song of the twelve cylinders firing away.

There’s no Australian pricing information yet but expect it to land in the region of $795,000. See what the car is capable of in the coupe promo below.

The post Lamborghini Goes Topless For Latest Aventador S appeared first on DMARGE Australia.

The year is 2049 and the world left behind by Harrison Ford’s Rick Deckard thirty years ago isn’t as pretty as one had hoped. His successor in Ryan Gosling is a different story though because he rocks one hell of an epic coat in the reboot which simply begs to be explored. Yes, like an origins story – but for a damn fur coat.

For those who aren’t too familiar with the new Blade Runner world, 2049 is now a gritty urban jungle filled with nasty people and robots. Gosling’s leading man wardrobe therefore needed to reflect that environment and it does so with a hybrid fur coat which evokes a fascinating Western-military aesthetic.

What’s more intriguing though is the length which when completely closed (more on that in a moment), runs from the middle of Gosling’s face to his shins to form a piece which looks more like a piece of weathered armour.

Esquire, the people who first picked up on this cool garment design recently hit up the film’s costume designer, Renée April, to find out the inspiration behind it.

“He wanted the fur collar. That wasn’t there in the beginning.”

“It’s the same world, but it’s worse. It’s dirty, it’s slushy, it’s not a nice place to be,” says April. Gosling’s coat was directly inspired by the coat worn by Harrison Ford’s character in the 1982 film, albeit updated for the more unforgiving elements. The heavy-duster is constructed of cotton and features a utilitarian waterproof coating in army green which adds to the grimness of the film.

It’s also safe to assume that future has culled buttons or zippers. Gosling’s coat instead features a hidden magnetic closing mechanism which helps it to achieve a sleek futuristic look when paired with raised collar which forms a mask. April tells Esquire that this is a nod to the pollution levels in the future but also admits that she did it simply because “it looks cool”.

Of course it wouldn’t be a Gosling film without a personal touch of style from the photoshopped man himself. The fur lining on the coat? That was Gosling’s own input.

“He wanted the fur collar,” says April. “That wasn’t there in the beginning.”

Currently the coat is already starting to see knock-offs popping up online. Those keen on donning the real fashion of 2049 shouldn’t be too deterred though as the film’s costume department made15 of these jackets to account for wear and tear as well as stunt doubles.

If you do miraculously come across the real deal one day, don’t expect it to be in mint condition.

“I don’t want to tell you the whole thing, but by the end it’s full of holes and blood,” April adds.

[via Esquire]

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