http://ift.tt/2sdNJPi
4 Analog Smartwatches Reviewed: Nokia, Mondaine, Fossil, Timex http://ift.tt/2tS0nRf Smartwatches have outshipped Swiss watches for several years. Before an uptick in March, the Federation of Swiss Watches had posted a 20-month-straight decline in exports, part of a disastrous downward sales trend. If the numbers continue on their current trajectory, these digitally enabled wearable computers may take the lead in actual sales dollars by 2020. The mechanical watch world has been slow to respond to this pressure, despite plenty of prodding from consumers and industry retailers. But now, a handful of Swiss watchmakers have produced some passable smartwatches. Well, kind of. Whether these watches are actually "smart" depends on who you ask. The industry calls them "hybrid smartwatches" since they tell time analog-style, with hands instead of a screen. But they also connect to an app on your phone, where they log simple tracking data for your steps, your sleep, and, in some cases, your heart rate. That simplicity has its advantages. With no third-party apps, no visual notifications, and no backlit screen, they can often be powered by a coin-cell battery that lasts months, rather than a lithium ion cell that needs recharging every day or two. So while you don't get texting apps, detailed fitness analysis, or NFC-enabled mobile payments from these hybrid smartwatches, you do get something good-looking enough to be worn at a wedding that can also track the calories you burn on the dance floor. Nokia Steel HRFrench manufacturer Withings beat many traditional watchmakers to the connected-watch market with its Activité tracker in late 2014. The brand was acquired by Nokia last year and has dropped the Withings name, but it's still out in front of the pack. The new Steel HR improves on the successful design of the previous smartwatch, the Activité Steel, by adding a small digital readout on the face. This tiny E-Ink screen provides real-time feedback on heart rate, distance traveled, and battery life while remaining discreet enough to maintain the watch's analog look. It's the only watch among the group to attempt the trickery of a screen, and it (mostly) works. The Swiss-made Steel HR is a sharp, minimalist watch. With muted grey markings, a black face (it also comes in white), and sleek, polished stick hands, it looks like something Apple might create if it attempted an analog watch. In addition to the little screen, there's also a 0-100 "activity scale." This smaller dial shows your progress (in percentage completed) toward completing your daily step goal, and is a common sight on analog smartwatches like this one. The Steel HR comes in two sizes, 36mm and 40mm. I wore the 40mm size, which was still significantly smaller than the other watches I tested—slimmer, too. It feels extremely light on the wrist, and its velvety rubber strap was the best I tested for working out. It could also blend in amid a more formal setting if it had to. Pushing the crown brings the E-Ink screen to life, showing date, time (redundantly), heart rate, steps, distance traveled, alarm setting, battery life, and calories burned. These are all displayed in more detail in the companion app. The watch syncs automatically to the app—you'd think this would be standard, but as the other watches proved, it was not. I had a few gripes: it takes a several seconds for the heart rate to register, and the battery seems to last two weeks during heavy use rather than the promised 25 days. Otherwise, it was by far the most useful watch of the bunch, and for the very competitive price of $180. $180 for the 36mm, $200 for the 40mm. Rating: 8 Mondaine Helvetica 1 SmartThe Helvetica 1 Smart is one of three connected watches developed by the Swiss company Manufacture Modules Technologies, or MMT. The most expensive, from Frederique Constant, comes in gold; the least expensive, from Alpina, is rugged-looking and sporty. The Helvetica sits between the two. If you've ever been in a Swiss railway station, you've seen the inspiration for Mondaine, whose line of watches and clocks use stark clarity to aid in readability. The company's iconic designs are even sold in the MoMA store. Which is all to say, the Mondaine Helvetica Smart is a hell of a nice-looking watch, with stark black hands and numerals on a white dial with raised hour and minute markers. The deeply bevelled steel case is a large and hefty 44mm, leaving plenty of room for activity and sleep tracking meters. These are set in a nifty dual-concentric circle subdial with two hands at 6 o'clock. When I needed to dress more formally, this is the watch I wore. As a smartwatch, though, the Mondaine falters a bit. Syncing to MMT's "MotionX" app must be done manually, by pushing down the watch's crown. It's finicky too—I quickly learned the best order of operations was setting my phone flat on the table and holding the watch directly over it, just inches away, to get it to sync. The app's sleep tracking was just as detailed as the Withings' app, minus the heart rate, which the Mondaine doesn't record. The Mondaine's "activity" graph delivers only vagueness, and the app's "coach tips" ranged from odd to creepy. ("Sleep insight: We can only dream about faces we have already seen, whether we actively remember them or not.") The other thing about those bulky good looks and a fancy leather strap: they don't necessarily translate into an ideal workout or sleeping companion. Its weight and bulk didn't bother me while running or playing a game of pick-up soccer, but the sweat-soaked leather strap did. On the other hand, it runs for 2 years before you have to swap the battery, which cuts recharging entirely out of the equation. The last sticking point is the price: it costs $950, and the other watches on this list are all under $200. What you're buying is a sharp-looking analog watch first, and a handy, if not all that effective, fitness and sleep tracker second. But I will say this: It's the only hybrid smartwatch that earned me compliments. $950. Rating: 7 Fossil Q CrewmasterThe Fossil Q Crewmaster is the Arnold Schwarzenegger of watches: enormous, fun, and a little absurd. It has the bulky toothiness of a dive watch, the complexity of a chronograph, and a color scheme that brings to mind the flag of a far-off nation. The most common comment I got while wearing it was, "What is that thing?" Which, if you're into wearing something that gets attention, is great. Despite its enormous 46mm diameter, it's about as thin as the other watches I tested. Its comfortable to wear when working out, where the big rubber strap is well-suited. The bezel can be turned like a real dive watch, and the Crewmaster feels ready to be worn on a sea adventure—it's also the only watch I wasn't terrified to wear in the shower. Unfortunately, the Fossil is undermined by the limitations of its companion app. The Q App tracks both sleep and activity only in a circle graph that you either complete or don't, based on your set goals. You can't see when you worked out, for example, or how much a specific workout during the day played into your total calories burned. And it's hard to trust sleep tracking that bluntly declares your total hours of sleep without graphical evidence, then lists in small footnotes-style time spent awake or in "light" or "restful" sleep. More "smart" than the watch's tracking functions are the extra touches of utility in the controls. Pushing the crown toggles between various time modes and shows the status of your alarm. Above and below the crown, there are two buttons that look like the pushers on a chronograph. The one on top brings up the date (though I couldn't get that to work), and the second one can be customized to accomplish various tasks like making your phone ring, controlling your music, and snapping a picture—though that last one just turned my phone's ringtone volume up. $155. Rating: 6 Timex IQ+ MoveAh, Timex, the old standby. Even watch geeks can't resist the allure of a $36 Weekender as a wear-it-anywhere, beat-it-up watch. And yes, Timex's IQ+ is the cheapest watch on this list at $149. But it's not cheap enough to make up for its shortcomings. It's a fine-looking watch, with a very traditional case shape, crown, and lugs. The "activity" bar that tracks your steps stretches between 3 and 6 o'clock, which fills out the face nicely. It's also the only watch on this list that has a second hand, which ticks away doing its normal job until you tell it otherwise (more on that in a... second). Things degrade from there. The reflective hour markers are hard to read unless the light hits them just so, making it hard to read the time. The leather strap is stiff, a little ugly, and not all that comfortable, and is not good for working out. (The watch does come in a version with a rubber strap, which I recommend.) The app is even more disappointing. Of all the watches I tested, the Timex was the hardest to sync. You have to first press a sync button on the app, then hold down the watch's crown for five seconds, then wait another ten seconds or so as it syncs. After all that, the app lacks any detailed statistics. Steps, distance, calories burned, and sleep are all displayed in that impotent circle-graph style. Clicking into them displays your week's stats in a bar graph that looks like it was made by a fifth-grader. You can set alarms and timers for the watch, and you can use the second hand to display the date (awkward) or activity (redundant) rather than just use it to count the seconds. None of these features are enough to make the IQ+ stand out. Stick to the Weekender. $149. Rating 4 Digital Trends via Wired https://www.wired.com June 27, 2017 at 11:15AM
0 Comments
http://ift.tt/2sef0Bv
Conversations with God: Orlando Jones on Being the Trickster Who Tells Hard Truths http://ift.tt/2sNvhMs One of the best things about the first season of American Gods was how its thematic ambitions came to life inside the cast’s stellar performances. Things often got weird and elliptical on the adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s 2001 novel, but you couldn’t stop watching because of the excellent acting on display. Here’s how some of the show’s players brought their characters to life. Last week, after the season finale ended with a shocking act of cosmic power, I talked to several actors who’ve been playing legendary beings on American Gods. We’ll be rolling these interviews out over the next couple of days, starting today with Orlando Jones talking about where Mr. Nancy’s voice came from, why Shadow Moon should listen to Mr. Nancy, and how Sleepy Hollow changed his thinking about fans. Along Came a SpiderOrlando Jones’ first scene on American Gods served as a lightning-bolt moment, a sign that this fantasy show about gods living amongst people wouldn’t be shying away from ugly moments of human history. Jones said that his approach to the character comes from both folklore and real-world happenings. Jones: I think I started the process really with just who Anansi really is. All the stories about Anansi, all over the globe, have always centered on this idea that he was the keeper of stories, that we was the spinner of tales, and that he was never beyond using trickery. Or conning you into getting what he wanted. He was very much Machiavellian in that his ends justify his means. And when I thought about bringing that character to life, I really felt like he has to suck all the energy out of the room and arrests what’s happening. The hope is that he captivates you, right? But, most importantly to me, it’s always felt as if there was a bit of an apology, in the way things were presented, throughout the history of stories that have contained aspects of race as a conversation. They always try to be magnanimous, and I really didn’t want Anansi to be that. I wanted him to be unapologetic about what it is and unapologetic about the means that he was going to use. For me, he has to believe at all times every word that he is saying. And he does not care, nor does he require your endorsement in any way, shape or form. He cannot be secondary, he cannot be a side individual in the conversation. It is this and that’s what it is, and if he decides to change his mind, good on him. If You See Odin Coming, Warn a BrotherJones says that Anansi’s scenes with Shadow Moon in the season finale were about trying to warn the ex-con about the old deity he’s been working for. Advertisement Advertisement Jones: In dealing with Wednesday, who is a God of War, I’m not daunted by [that title]. Whatever with that. [Mr. Nancy is] very much looking at Shadow like, “Why do you trust this dude? You don’t even know what’s going on here. This dude got you caught in his matrix. Like, idiot, you should be paying attention.” A lot of those scenes—the last one, in particular—he’s saying to Shadow, “wake up.” Pay attention. Look at what’s going on around you. Don’t be fooled. We have a history of being fooled. We have a history of resting on our laurels rather than attacking what we should. So, all of those things came into play. I didn’t really want to do the Scatman Crothers version of it. That felt like part of a different era to me. He’s as much politician as he is a Black Panther. And I think he’s humanitarian in the sense that he truly does believe that the disenfranchised got the wrong end of the stick. But he doesn’t believe that the disenfranchised now, you know, need to “We Shall Overcome” in order to get themselves back to where they belong. If he has to kill a bunch of y’all, that’s okay with Nancy. For me, the big thing to me is that if life—and this relates to a lot of the things that we’re experiencing today—if life is truly about bowing down and taking the high road at the expense of yourself and your children and your children’s children, that’s not life. Sacrifice, right now, because second-class citizenship? That’s not what you want. That’s what you’re standing up for if you go along with the status quo. Don’t sign up for that. To me, that’s a big part of Nancy. And for me, that’s his fun and his gift and his curse. SuperflyWhen it came time to bringing Nancy to life via performance, Jones reached back to a underworld figure he encountered as a child. Advertisement Jones: There was a guy that was friends with my father, a very well-known and powerful hustler on the Eastern seaboard. He was a very interesting guy who would literally rent a passenger van and would take the poor kids from the ghettos and black neighborhoods down to the sporting goods store and just spend money. Buy them whatever they want. Like, Christmas on a Tuesday out of nowhere. A guy who was out of that tradition very much, right? But he was the very definition of the Wrong Dude to Fuck With. And as much as he was benevolent, he was equally as dangerous if not more so. And one of the things that always struck me about him was the he had a very high-pitched voice. And I found his voice to be very funny. Like, I used to laugh when he’d say things. Just because of the register. And one of things obviously as an actor that I’m very aware of is that the notes, the tones are like music, right? Base tones often mean power. And higher tones often mean comedy. So, to me, as a performer, I know to say “fuck you” means one thing, and “fuuck yooou!” means something else just by virtue of the tone and intonation. So, I really wanted Nancy to have the ability to make you smile and then in a moment’s notice go completely the other way. “[It’s] very much wanting you pay attention in the shift. So he’s very intent on making sure his message is clear. And also the low register—with Anubis, it’s perfect—but, with Nancy, you’re not going to listen to something for the period of time that Nancy talks if it remains in that register. That sort of sounds like Charlie Brown’s teacher after awhile. Advertisement Advertisement They kept handing me these massive monologues, which is awesome, you know? So his register, to me, needed to have that lilt to it in order for you to pay attention. And he’s shifting a lot to the Middle Passage, the various places black people wound up off the slave ships out of Africa and various dialects we have. I wanted Nancy to lean toward his Guyanese history as much as a part of Barbados, and I wanted you to hear a bit of Jamaica...I wanted you to hear all of the islands in him. And the American that he is at this point, I guess, but never having divorced himself from his African roots. To me, that was really key because African-American culture is so incredibly diverse. I’m tired of cookie-cutter monolithic representation of black folks. I need people to see him to go, “Yes, I see me. I don’t just see this latest incarnation of what blackness is this year, or last year. I’ve seen the years gone past and I see the present.” So, a lot of the choices and just the way he moves and the way he talks and the way he shift are about the embodiment of the culture that is ours. Find Him on the InterwebsIf you’ve been following American Gods on social media, you’ve surely noticed the enthusiastic participation of the show’s stars and creators. Jones has been one of the most engaged folks and credits his experience on Sleepy Hollow as a turning point as to how he interacted with the fandoms around his projects: Jones: You gotta remember back in the days of Evolution and Time Machine and projects like that, there was no social media to engage this way. When I think back to MadTV back in the days, the same thing. I remember going to Comic-Con, no studio, no network, because I wanted to see Sergio Aragones and hang out at like, Artist’s Alley, and just see, you know, cool artists and shoot the bull. And nobody helped me! Nobody cared! There was no groundswell. You could park across the street and it was really not that hectic. Advertisement And so I guess Sleepy Hollow was like, “Whoa, I’m now doing another genre project—obviously a fan of this.” Been to Tarrytown as a kid, and I’ve read Washington Irving and Sleepy Hollow was really eye-opening to me. Sleepy Hollow was such an important show for me, because I’d never seen that level of representation on a show before and never seen tropes exploded that way. I mean, it had more black women than a Shonda Rhimes show. It had a black dude and an Asian dude and a Latin dude — even when you went back into time, we were represented in the past. Suddenly, the history of this country was being retold, redefined with all of these people as participants. And I thought that was tremendously exciting. And it made me engage in the show and engage in the fan base in a particular way. Sleepy Hollow was a huge learning curve for me and I really sort of just jumped both feet into fandom, and I felt really at home and was lucky to be welcomed.
Jones is trying to perpetuate that same feeling as a partner in a new digital venture called Cosmunity, aimed at letting fans share their passions directly with each other. Advertisement Jones: I remember well when the local news used to talk about the freaks that were dressing up down at the local convention center. And, as I found myself back in that game heavily around 2014, 2015 and 2016, it just struck me as strange that I was downloading all these different apps for each con I was going to, and then 72 hours later, the app disappeared. Yet, I was looking for ways to stay connected with the people that I met there. None of these shows or properties exist without fans. Most importantly, once the story has been told, once you broadcast it, once you put it out there — it’s not yours anymore. It belongs to everybody now. And it’s always been the most exciting part of fandom to see that play itself out. But fans are thought of as eyeballs and not as people. I understand it’s also been uncomfortable for studios and networks who don’t quite know what to do with a living, breathing community. A fandom might be excited by things that aren’t exciting to the creators. And so, I just wanted a way to sort of join that community, and power that community and hopefully being that community together. Like, if you’re a seller of fan art and costumes and games, we don’t charge any listing fees. You keep 100% of your sales. People—adults, particularly—have told me that they’re nervous about sharing their cosplay and the nerd/fan aspects of their lives on Instagram and Facebook, because those are places where you’re going to get bullied or shamed. When you go to a con, you don’t get that. You’re in a like-minded group of people. So, another huge aspect of Cosmunity was building it so you can go to a fandom, or create a fandom, and then ostensibly amass people who understand very much the same things that you do, and celebrate the same things that you do. Conversations with God continues on Thursday, with Pablo Scheiber talking about playing giant jerk leprechaun Mad Sweeney Digital Trends via Gizmodo http://gizmodo.com June 27, 2017 at 11:06AM
http://ift.tt/2tgVrIj
Yahoo Mail rolls out a rebuilt, redesigned service, including a new ad-free option http://ift.tt/2sdKJTq Following its Verizon acquisition, Yahoo today is rolling out a revamped and rebuilt Mail application for its 225 million monthly active users. The update includes a new design, feature set, and technology stack, as well as a new subscription plan for desktop and mobile called Yahoo Mail Pro. The news is part of several changes ahead for Yahoo, under its new corporate parent – Oath, the combination of Yahoo and AOL (which also owns TechCrunch) – all of which are now operated by Verizon. For example, earlier this week, Yahoo was found to be exiting a prior deal with AT&T, which had allowed customers with AT&T email addresses to log into Yahoo websites. However, despite Yahoo Mail’s technology overhaul and redesign – which does present a nicer-looking, better-functioning version of the product than we’ve seen in the past – it may be difficult for Yahoo to attract new users to its email service. The company was famously plagued by two massive security breaches affecting more than a billion users, which ended up knocking $350 million off the asking price for the Verizon/Yahoo deal that closed in June for $4.5 billion. Simply put, email is a product where users conduct their lives, businesses, and share personal and private information. Yahoo’s history doesn’t inspire trust, given its data breaches were some of the largest in internet history. That’s unfortunate, in a way, because Google deserves to have real competition for its dominating Gmail service, which crossed the 1 billion monthly active user mark last year. There are three main parts to the Yahoo Mail revamp, beginning with a rebuilt front-end tech stack, that now leverages open source technologies like React, Redux, Node.js, react-intl, and others. The goal, here, is to be able to deliver a Yahoo Mail service that’s faster to launch, and generally better for low-bandwidth and international users, in particular. Yahoo says its optimizations have been able to reduce its JavaScript and CSS footprint by 50 percent, compared with the earlier desktop product, which means the app will launch much faster. Search and reading messages is also faster, as a result. In addition, the new product reduces the memory used by the browser, is more reliable, more accessible, and is built in a way that will allow its developers to be more agile in terms of updates and other pushes. For Yahoo Mail users, however, these changes will be under-the-hood, and not necessarily noticed beyond an overall sense that the app seems quicker. More obvious will be the redesign and new feature set. The updated look of Yahoo Mail is one of a much cleaner, more modern app. It looks like something built in 2017 instead of old, legacy product that kept getting painted over throughout the years. It also reminds us a bit of Microsoft’s Outlook.com in terms of its interface, rather than Gmail’s highly functional, but not so pretty, inbox. Here’s the old product: And here’s the new one: Items in the new inbox have more spacing in between them, which makes it feel less cluttered, but is not ideal for those who receive a large number of emails. The app can now be personalized with new colorful themes, introduces stationary, and email writers can use the emoji set that Twitter open sourced in their messages. Yahoo has also taken inspiration from a number of newer email apps to make it easier for users to find certain kinds of messages. On the left-side navigation, Yahoo Mail will offer links to automatically created folders that collect your Photos and your Documents, for quick access. There are other little tweaks as well, such as rich previews that let you hover over attachments to see what they contain; a Search mode that reflects your personalized settings for how you prefer to view your emails; a redesigned settings screen where your changes instantly update the app; and accessibility improvements, including support for NVDA and VoiceOver screen readers, as well as options for light-sensitive and low-vision readers. The third major change is the introduction of Yahoo Mail Pro, an ad-free version of Yahoo Mail that includes customer support. This is an upgrade to Ad Free Mail, introduced a few years ago as an annual subscription. Yahoo Mail Pro discounts the ad-free product by $15 for annual subscribers to $34.99 per year, and introduces a monthly option of $3.49/month. You can also choose to subscribe to a mobile-only version of the product for $0.99/mo or $9.99/yr, which delivers ad-free service on Yahoo’s Mail Apps for iOS or Android. All subscriptions include priority support for desktop and mobile as well. Yahoo Mail Pro is available on desktop and mobile (via in-app purchase) for all U.S., English-language users today, and will reach other markets soon. The redesigned desktop app is also available today globally, in English, with other languages to follow. Digital Trends via TechCrunch https://techcrunch.com June 27, 2017 at 11:01AM
http://ift.tt/2sXoFt9
The Anatomy of a Motherboard http://ift.tt/2sdudmn It’s a crucial component in any laptop or desktop computer, but very few computer owners actually know what a motherboard is or what it does. There’s a motherboard (often called a logic board in smaller more mobile devices) sitting in every computer system: the processor, RAM, hard drives, graphics card, and other bits and pieces all plug straight into it. The motherboard makes sure all those components are speaking the same language and that the system all runs together properly, without any sparks or grating noises. Think of it like the nervous system or circulatory system of the computer. It’s complexity is further hindered by all the confusing terms and acronyms applied to its components. This can make understanding the motherboard really difficult, and it can make trying to purchase your own damn near impossible for someone new to computer building or repair. To help with that we’ve done our best to explain the major components of the motherboard, as well as the most common terms and biggest key features. Slots and connectorsCan you hook up a USB 3.0 external drive to your computer? Or slot in the fastest type of RAM available? It’s your motherboard that determines the answers to those questions and other ones like them, and if you open up your computer case them you’ll see a lot of slots, connectors and wiring keeping everything linked up. Advertisement The RAM slots are usually close to the CPU socket and will be some of the longest slots on the board. Slots for a graphics card (or two) are typically on the other side, allowing for the graphics card input and output ports to stick out the back of your computer case. Other similar slots handle extras like sound cards or dedicated video capture cards. Your motherboard will have a host of outward-facing input and output ports, like USB and HDMI, letting you hook up peripherals and displays and so on. Peer inside your computer and you’ll see some internal ones as well, such as the motherboard sockets linked to whatever hard drives you’ve got installed: when drives evolved from the older Parallel ATA (PATA) standard to the newer Serial ATA (SATA) standard, motherboards had to be redesigned and reconfigured to cope. It’s those sorts of changes that end users usually never think about, but which enable key features like being able to have a super-fast SSD inside your laptop. All of these electronics need to be powered too, and again your choice of motherboard determines your choice of power supply and just how much juice the system can handle at once as well as whether or not you can push the limits with some CPU overclocking. What makes motherboard specs potentially so confusing is that the technology behind all of these sockets—SATA for hard drives, PCI Express for graphics cards, DDR for RAM, and so on—is improving all the time. While there’s a lot of backwards compatibility involved, if you want the newest memory sticks or graphics card to offer the maximum performance for your system, you need a motherboard that can cope with the newest standards as well as the right kit to plug into it. Advertisement There are three generations and counting of SATA technology, for instance, affecting the maximum data transfer speeds, while the latest M.2 connector found on many a modern board is designed to take a new, faster, SSD drive or the even new 3D Xpoint-based Optane memory. As with the CPU and RAM sockets, it’s not the sockets themselves that affect the performance to any great extent, it’s the stuff you plug into them—so unless you’re building your own system you can focus on the main computer specs like CPU-type and RAM type rather than the motherboard. Key featuresThe headline feature of a motherboard is its CPU socket, indicating the type of processor that it’s compatible with. Motherboards are designed with their socket type in mind and if you’re building your own system then you need to look for this first. Certain sockets will usually be compatible with a group or family of processors. Advertisement For example, for almost all the newest Kaby Lake CPUs from Intel, you need an LGA 1151 socket motherboard; for the new Intel X-series you need a LGA 2066 socket; for the majority of the newest AMD Ryzen CPUs, meanwhile, you need an AM4 socket board. The socket is the square-ish bracket somewhere around the center of the board, filled with small pins or holes, and shouldn’t be too difficult to spot. Then there’s the motherboard chipset, the on-board electronics that give the component some brains of its own (though the CPU will be doing most of the thinking for your system). Essentially, the chipset handles communications to and from the CPU—controlling how many other components can talk to the CPU at once, and how quickly. Advertisement Traditionally the chipset has been split into a northbridge and a southbridge, responsible for communications with different components. The northbridge would handle the CPU, RAM and PCI slots (which you plug a GPU into) and the southbridge would handle...practically every other port. Yet the modern trend of the last few years is for the northbridge—handling the most important and fastest tasks—to be effectively built into the CPU architecture itself to improve efficiency across the board. That means a computer build is even more dependent on your CPU choice than ever before. While the choice of motherboard doesn’t have much of an effect on how fast or smoothly your computer runs when compared to the processor and RAM, it does determine which components you can connect up together and thus what type of a system you get at the other end. If the motherboard only has two sockets available for RAM you’ll be limited in how much you can install. Plus, if you think you might want to upgrade a component or two in the future, that future-proofing also depends on the specs of the board. Don’t by a Thunderbolt-less board now if you think you’ll want to embrace the protocol in the near future. Motherboard sizes and shapesMotherboards can be broadly split up into several shapes and sizes known as form factors. The six most common types are (from biggest to smallest) ATX, Micro-ATX, Flex-ATX, DTX, and Mini-ITX. Advertisement Advertisement All the size and shape of your board really dictates is how many extra cards and peripherals you can plug into it, and what shape of case can fit around it. ATX boards are suitable for big gaming rigs that need a lot of room, whereas Mini-ITX is better for a compact, home theater system that’s going under the TV. Laptops will have motherboards shaped and designed specifically for the computer they’re going in—the key features and specs are all the same, but the manufacturer builds them as one part of an overall whole,designed to keep power use and weight down and optimize communications between the other parts of the notebook. That’s partly why upgrading a laptop is a fiddly business that’s often not worth your time, apart from perhaps the RAM and hard drive. Upgrading the motherboard on a laptop is pretty much out of the question. Yet it can be done—with a lot of time and effort—on any desktop computer, if you’ve got the technical know-how. You’re basically unplugging everything that makes up your system, swapping out the main board, then plugging everything in again. Digital Trends via Gizmodo http://gizmodo.com June 27, 2017 at 10:54AM
http://ift.tt/2sWVB4U
Today's Best Deals: Anker RoboVac, T-Fal Cookware, 4K Monitor, and More http://ift.tt/2ue1WbK The most popular robotic vacuum, an affordable 4K monitor, and discounted cookware lead off Tuesday’s best deals from around the web. Bookmark Kinja Deals and follow us on Twitter to never miss a deal.
Top Tech DealsNeckbud-style Bluetooth headphones certainly aren’t everyone’s cup of tea, but some people swear by them for their battery life and exercise-friendly design, and both of Anker’s models are on sale today. As you probably know by now, Anker’s original SoundBuds are our readers’ favorite Bluetooth earbuds, so the SoundBuds Lite and Life have a good pedigree. The SoundBuds Lite run for 10 hours on a charge, while the Lifes have upgraded drivers and a whopping 20 hours of battery. Just be sure to note the appropriate promo codes below before you buy. Assuming your computer can handle it, a 4K monitor is one of the best upgrades you can make to your computing experience, and it’s never been cheaper than it is today on Amazon. For one day only (or until sold out), you can get a refurbished Samsung 28" 4K display for just $270. That’s one of the first times we’ve seen a 60Hz 4K display drop below $300. The same monitor is currently listed for $400 new, and while the refurb only includes a 90 day warranty, you can add three years of protection for about $20 (look above the buy button on Amazon). If you missed out on yesterday’s $130 Amazon Echo deal, you can still get it, but with one big catch: You’ll have to buy two of them. Just add two to your cart and use code ECHO2PACK to save $100. Now that all Echo devices work as in-home intercom systems, owning two might make more sense than it used to. Multi-port USB charging hubs belong on every desk and nightstand, and you can get a Quick Charge 3.0-compatible 6-port model for just $25 on Amazon today. Of course, you’ll need some cables to go with that, and we’ve got you covered with microUSB and USB-C 5-pack deals. If they don’t keep your office cool enough in the summer, you can at least ease your own suffering a bit with a desk fan. These two models from SIMBR are small, adjustable, and most importantly, USB-powered. Just plug it into your computer, and enjoy the breeze. VPNs are in the news these days, and with good reason. So if you’re curious to sign up and start protecting your browsing history and personal data (or, you know, getting around websites’ geoblocks), PureVPN is running some pretty stellar discounts right now. If you sign up for a six month membership and use promo code 6M31, you’ll get it for $7.20 per month rather than the listed $9, and if you commit to two years, your price will drop all the way to $2.51 per month with code 2Y77, down from $2.95. That’s less than you spend during a trip to Starbucks. Anker’s PowerPort Speed 1 is basically Anker’s take on Apple’s 29W USB-C charger that comes bundled with the 12" MacBook. They’re both small bricks with a single USB-C port, power throughput is almost identical (the Anker ekes out one extra watt), and they’ll both (obviously) charge that 12" MacBook at full speed. You probably see where I’m going with this, but there is one big difference: Price! The Apple charger will set you back $49, while the Anker is on sale for just $19 with code ANKR7214. If you own a 12" MacBook, this is a great chance to pick up an extra charger for your travel bag, or to keep plugged in full-time at your desk, so you don’t have to keep constantly moving it. Anker’s PowerLine+ USB-C cable is also on sale, if you need an spare. Update 6/26: This code is still valid, but an on-screen clippable $20 coupon will bring it down to $180. That’s just $60 per router! Advertisement Advertisement TP-Link just came out with their answer to the mesh networking trend, and you can get three Deco M5 routers for just $200 today with promo code 50RADIO. By virtue of being new, these don’t have as many reviews as, say, Eero routers, but $200 for a 3-pack (enough to cover a 4500 square foot home, according to TP-Link) is a pretty stunning price compared to similar products on the market. I was actually sent a demo unit of the three-pack to try out, and while I couldn’t really test the range in my 700 square foot apartment, I found them to be very easy to set up. Sennheiser’s HD 650 open back headphones are widely considered some of the best-sounding cans you can buy for under $1000, and the best chance to get them is when MassDrop drops a new shipment of the legendary HD 6XX. The 6XX is basically exactly the same as the 650, but with a 6' cable rather than the original’s 10', which is actually a better length, in my opinion. The 650s are currently listed for $316 on Amazon, and have never been cheaper than $287, but MassDrop has 7500 units of the 6XX available for $250, while supplies last. You probably own as many things that charge over USB as you do that plug into AC outlets, so this power strip is happy to oblige you with six of each. Fitbit’s Alta is one of the first fitness trackers that actually looks nice on your wrist, owing largely to its fashionable interchangeable bands, and you can pick one up on Amazon for $70 brand new right now. That’s by far the best price ever; it’s actually $15 cheaper than it was on Black Friday. Anker’s take on truly wireless earbuds is finally here, and you can save a lot by preordering through Kickstarter. Advertisement Advertisement Update: Anker added 3,000 additional $99 backer rewards to celebrate reaching $1,000,000, if you missed out last week. Needless to say, we don’t make a habit of covering crowdfunding campaigns, but given that we’ve personally used almost every product Anker has ever made, and our readers have purchased more than 200,000 of their products without issue, we’ll make an exception. Especially for this huge preorder discount. Even better, I checked out two engineering samples of the Liberty+ on a recent trip to Seattle. They were comfortable (using the only size of ear tips available with the samples), and sounded great both when streaming Spotify and playing a few minutes of some podcasts. Advertisement As you’d expect from Anker, the headline spec here is battery life. Liberty+ gets a competitive 3.5 hours of playtime from the earbuds, but a whopping 48 hours out of the charging case. They also have some waterproofing, use Bluetooth 5.0, and work with your favorite voice assistants. Just don’t expect to wear them underwater or find any built-in fitness tracking. I’ve been using wireless earbuds most days since mid-2016, and between our team we’ve tested more than ten different pairs. Anker’s Liberty+ are a steal at $89 (or $99 if you miss the early bird special), and while they will of course get discounted many times in the future from their $149 MSRP, we wouldn’t expect this price point again any time soon. Advertisement Expected shipping in October 2017. Top Home DealsThe RoboVac 11 from Eufy (a division of Anker) is one of your favorite robotic vacuums, and in my own testing, it’s every bit as good—and far quieter—than my Roomba. So if it’s been on your radar, our readers can save $20 today with promo code KINJA627. The final price of $200 isn’t the best deal we’ve seen on this (it went down to $150 for a few glorious hours in May), but it’s still $75 less than the comparable Roomba, so if it’s been on your shopping list for awhile, this is a solid chance to save. Gerber is one of the most trusted names in multitools, and Amazon’s bundling a few of their popular products into one (relatively) affordable deal. Advertisement Advertisement Today only, $100 gets you the highly rated Center-Drive multitool, the Impromptu tactical pen and glass breaker, and a sheath that holds them both. The multitool’s headlining feature is an interchangeable screwdriver head that’s positioned in the middle of the handle when deployed, meaning it’ll be balanced just like a “real” screwdriver. Purchased separately, the three items would set you back about $165, including $90 for the multitool alone, but today only, you can get them all for $100. Amazon wants to help you toss those gross non-stick pots and pans you’ve been hoarding since your college days with a pair of deals from T-fal and TECHEF. First, take advantage of options from T-fal, including a 12-piece set with $60 Thermo-Spot heat indication and a $19 12-inch cast iron skillet. Or, if you only needs a couple new additions to your cookware repertoire, grab a TECHEF 7-piece set for $96, or an 8-piece set for $130. While you can’t control these Schlage deadbolts with your smartphone, the ability to unlock your front door with a passcode is perfect for house sitters or overnight guests, or for just unlocking the door while you’re carrying groceries. $64 is the best price Amazon’s ever listed, but it’s only available on the satin nickel finish, unfortunately. This 58-piece screwdriver set is marketed as an electronic repair kit, but with a snake attachment and tons of bits (including pentalobes for Apple products), it could come in handy for all sorts of repairs in hard-to-reach places. Our readers have bought thousands of OxyLED’s motion-sensing T-02 lights, but the newest model ditches the motion detection for an on/off touch sensor, and we have an exclusive deal on them today. $15 (with code KINJAOXY) gets you two of the just-released lights, down from $23. I could see these being useful in cabinets or closets that get enough ambient light to disable the motion-sensing models, but they’re also just less expensive, if you want to stock up on affordable lighting. If your tires are about due for a replacement, Discount Tire Direct is offering up to $100 in Visa gift card rebates (in addition to any manufacturer rebates) when you order four new tires, plus an additional $100 if you order wheels as well, plus an extra $60 on each if you use a Discount Tire credit card. Just enter your make and model, click the options to see tires on promotion, and you’ll see the rebate amount (either $25, $75, or $100) on the right hand side. If you own one of those popular essential oil diffusers, you can try out eight different oil scents with this $13 gift set. Top Lifestyle DealsLet’s say you’ve already upgraded to a good toothbrush; what’s the next step for cleaner teeth? Judging by the excellent user reviews, this 14-count box of Crest 3D Whitestrips is a great place to start. Just be sure to clip the $15 coupon before you check out to get the best price we’ve ever seen. Smartwool may be best known for their socks (since they’re also your favorite), but they make a plethora of clothing options that you should take advantage off. Right now, take 25% off men’s and women’s clothing, which unfortunately doesn’t include socks, no code needed. Pick up merino layering pieces that will take you season-to-season. Amazon sample boxes are one of the only good things to come out of 2016, and they’re back at it again with a $10 box full of men’s grooming gear, plus a $10 credit to spend on over 130 select men’s grooming products on your next order. Assuming you use the credit, that basically means you got eight or more name-brand products for free. You deserve a massage. No, you deserve massages any time you damn well please. So do yourself a solid and score a deal on one of Naipo’s top-selling electric massage products. Just note the promo codes below, and take a load off (your wallet). Bar none, Sport-Brella is the ultimate beach umbrella, and Amazon’s discounting the blue model for just $40 today, if you’re willing to wait out a backorder. Unlike a regular umbrella, Sport-Brella leans backwards and attaches to the sand with stakes, creating a kind of semi-private cocoon with enough space for a couple of chairs and a cooler. Best of all, it sets up in about five minutes (once you know what you’re doing), and can provide a full day’s worth of privacy and sun protection. Today’s price isn’t the best we’ve ever seen, but it’s a solid deal if you have a beach trip on the horizon. Top Media DealsWant to jog your memory about the Jason Bourne series? The Ultimate Collection Blu-ray is down to $35 today on Amazon, which gets you three great films, a disc full of special features, and also Jason Bourne and The Bourne Legacy spin-off. Even if you aren’t a horror movie person, you should watch Get Out. Buy it digitally for $10 from Amazon, for a limited time. Top Gaming DealsIf your PlayStation Plus membership is due to expire soon (or not), grab another year for $48 today, which is about as low as it gets since Sony jacked up the price by $10. The 2017 Steam Summer Sale is live, with deals on hundreds of titles including Hollow Knight, Rocket League, Telltale’s Guardians of the Galaxy, and a lot (a lot!) more. TechStoragePower
Audio
Home TheaterComputers & Accessories
PC PartsMobile Devices
PhotographyHome
Kitchen
Tools & Auto
LifestyleApparel
Beauty & Grooming
Camping & Outdoors
MediaMovies & TV
Books
GamingPlayStation 4
Xbox OneToys
Digital Trends via Gizmodo http://gizmodo.com June 27, 2017 at 10:54AM
http://ift.tt/2uedNXq
Watch this Star Wars: The Last Jedi trailer made entirely on a 1984 Apple IIc http://ift.tt/2tS6DZk Sometimes I see something that makes me wish we’d never evolved our technological graphics capabilities beyond where they were at in the 1980s. This shot-by-shot trailer remake of the Star Wars: The Last Jedi trailer is such a thing. Created by Twitter user Wahyu Ichwandardi, this was created using a vintage Apple IIc computer from 1984, using Dazzle Draw, a bitmap paint program from the same year. The projects was stored on 48 floppy disks, and ended up at 6MB, which for the time was a crushing amount of data. For comparison, here’s the original trailer for Star Wars Episode VIII, but spoiler alert – Ichwandardi nails it: VIDEOIt only took him three weeks to create this very short clip, with a process that involved actually holding up transparent plastic sheets against the monitor. Someone start a Kickstarter or something to fund him doing the same thing for the entire film saga – should only take decades of work. Digital Trends via TechCrunch https://techcrunch.com June 27, 2017 at 10:52AM
http://ift.tt/2rY7Dd6
Amazon adds new Alcatel, Nokia, and Motorola devices to Prime Exclusive Phones http://ift.tt/2udTHwj Amazon’s Prime Exclusive Phones program is a real steal — with a catch. If you’re a member of the retailer’s $100-a-year Prime program and agree to let Amazon stick advertisements on your smartphone’s lockscreen, you can nab a device for a discount. Now, just about a year after the Prime Phones’ launch, Amazon is adding five new devices to the bargain bin lineup: The Nokia 6, the Alcatel Idol 5S, the Alcatel A50, the Alcatel A30 Plus, and the Motorola Moto. The discounts are nothing to shake a stick at. Here’s what is heading to Amazon Prime Exclusive Phones this month:
A word of warning before you pull the trigger, though: You’ll have to acquiesce to Amazon’s advertisements. The retailer reserves the right to put “personalized” offers and ads — including deals and product recommendations — on Prime Exclusive Phones’ lockscreens. That said, Amazon’s devices aren’t without little conveniences. They ship automatically signed into Amazon’s services an apps, including (but not limited to) Prime Video, Prime Music, Amazon’s cloud storage service Prime Photos, and e-book lending program Prime Reading. And they come with Prime’s other benefits, including one free e-book every month, two-day shipping on 50 million items, one-day shipping and same-day shipping in more than 5,000 cities and towns, and more. It’s not exactly surprising, then, that Prime Exclusive Phones have been a resounding success. According to Amazon, the discounted devices have been “constantly featured” in the top 5 best-selling unlocked phones list on Amazon and among the “top rated” unlocked smartphones on Amazon.com.
Digital Trends via Digital Trends http://ift.tt/2p4eJdC June 27, 2017 at 10:36AM
http://ift.tt/2tgXzQ8
9 games we wish were on the SNES Classic Edition http://ift.tt/2sN2doa Nintendo didn’t really surprise anyone by announcing the SNES Classic Edition, a 16-bit sequel to the massively successful plug-and-play NES Classic Edition emulator box, would be coming out this fall. The news sure got us excited to revisit some of our childhood favorites, though. The device’s roster of 21 games is loaded with beloved classics, but feels a bit light relative to the nearly 800 games released for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System from 1991 to 1998. We’ve highlighted nine more titles for the SNES that we really wish would round it up to an even 30, like its older brother, the NES Classic. Chrono TriggerTruly a classic of the 16-bit era, this 1995 Squaresoft RPG sprang from the so-called RPG “dream team” of Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi, Dragon Quest creator Yuji Horii, and Dragon Ball creator Akira Toriyama. Chrono Trigger tells a thrilling, twisty tale of time travel, unlikely friendships, and saving the world that still feels remarkably fresh. It also introduced a few conventions found in RPGs (and other games) to this day, including a “New Game Plus” feature, letting players loop through the story again after completing it to explore its many alternate endings. This was only really possible because, notably among its JRPG peers, Chrono Trigger doesn’t waste your time at all with tedious grinding. Regardless of platform, many fans still hold it up as one of the greatest games of all time. Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy Kong’s QuestRare’s original Donkey Kong Country will be available on the SNES Classic Edition, but we’d be lying if we said we wouldn’t rather be playing its sequel. Released in November, 1995, just a year after its predecessor, Diddy Kong’s Quest took everything we loved about the first game and made it better. Its backgrounds are livelier and more detailed, its charming, faux 3D character animations are smoother, its levels are longer, and its secrets are more satisfying. Released about six months prior to Nintendo redefining platforming once again with Super Mario 64, Donkey Kong Country 2 may have been the pinnacle of 2D platforming at the genre’s heyday. Mortal Kombat IIWhile Street Fighter 2, which did make the cut, may be the most influential fighting game ever, Mortal Kombat II‘s cultural footprint can’t be understated. Its rotoscoped animations — made using live actors — and gory “Fatality” finishing moves meant that the Mortal Kombat series had the most realistic and disturbing violence that video games had yet seen — so much so that Senator Joe Lieberman held it up as en example of how dangerous games were becoming for impressionable youths. The resulting controversy led to the creation of the ESRB rating system for games, ultimately (and ironically) securing the medium’s ability to explore mature themes and imagery. Street Fighter 2 is fun, but the system really needs MKII to give a complete sense of mid-90s fighting games. Seiken Densetsu 3Like early Final Fantasy games, SquareSoft’s Secret of Mana series’ numbering got a bit thrown off as the series was only partially ported to the west. What English-speaking gamers know as Secret of Mana was actually released as Seiken Densetsu 2 in Japan. At the time, many of us didn’t know even about its sequel, Seiken Densetsu 3, which launched two years later in Japan, but never made its way west outside of unofficial fan-translated ROMs. Like its predecessor, Seiken Densetsu 3 is an action RPG that can be played either solo or in 2-player co-op. Players choose three out of six possible playable characters, setting one as the protagonist and the other two as party members to subsequently pick up. Each character had their own story to follow, giving the game a huge amount of replay value. Other systemic improvements over the last game include character classes, and a day/night cycle and calendar system tied to elemental magic. This would have been a great opportunity to introduce a lost classic to a wider, English-speaking audience. Harvest MoonStardew Valley may be one of our favorite games of the last few years, but it couldn’t exist without the innovative gameplay model defined by the original Harvest Moon. Like its many sequels and copycats, Harvest Moon casts you as a young man who has inherited a family farm in disrepair. By cleaning up the land, raising crops and livestock, taking part in local community festivals, and finding a wife, the player lives out a pastoral fantasy that still resonates with a lot of gamers. Developer Natsume is still releasing entries in the series, with a new title coming to PC and Switch in 2018, but they’ve done very little to improve upon the charming original, which makes its absence on the Classic a disappointment. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles IV: Turtles in TimeFrom Streets of Rage to Golden Axe, the side-scrolling beat-em-up was a defining genre of the 90s. They were born in arcades, allowing for a great co-op experience, but the release of 16-bit home consoles meant that gamers could take these experiences home as well. In Turtles in Time, Leonardo, Donatello, et al. team up to take down Shredder and associates across various time periods, sending goons hurtling across the screen. Though originally released in arcades, the SNES version became the definitive version for many players thanks to new levels, a time trial, and a versus mode. The arcade version still has one major advantage — four-player co-op. Both the Ninja Turtles and sidescrolling beat-em-ups are particularly iconic of 90s pop culture, so Turtles in Time would have brought some serious retro cache to the Classic Edition’s line-up. Tetris AttackTetris is one of the most iconic games of all time, coming, in some form, to basically every platform since 1984. Tetris Attack (first released as Panel de Pon) has almost nothing to do with that other than being a matching block puzzler. The Tetris Company’s Henk Rogers even said that he regretted allowing the license, since it diluted the Tetris brand. Whatever you want to call it, though, Tetris Attack is an undeniably great game, and one of our favorite competitive titles from the SNES. Like Tetris, rows of colored blocks gradually fill a vertical shaft until it hits the top and the player loses, but this time they join from the bottom. Swapping two blocks horizontally at a time, the player reconfigures the field until lines of three or more matching blocks are cleared. Scoring chains and combos causes garbage blocks to dump down onto your opponent’s screen, keeping the competition spicy and engaged. NBA JamWhere most early sports games were a bit dry and abstract, NBA Jam showed how to embrace the unreality of sports video games, and it was wildly successful as a result. Published by Midway in 1993, it featured 2-on-2 basketball with real life contemporary players from the 1993-94 NBA season. (Fun fact: It’s also one of the first games include the digitized likenesses of active pro athletes). The gameplay was most notable for its exaggerated style, with tremendous dunks and iconic one-liners that defined sports and games ever since. Mario PaintOne of the console’s strangest releases, Mario Paint was a creation toolkit that allowed users to create static images, simple animations, and MIDI music, utilizing images and sound effects from Nintendo’s Mario franchise. Well before widespread online content creation tools and connected consoles, Mario Paint was perhaps decades ahead of its time in empowering player creativity before we had the infrastructure to easily share it, and its echoes can be felt in the fantastic Super Mario Maker. We can understand leaving this one out, since it was released alongside the little-used SNES Mouse peripheral, but it’s a real shame that we won’t be able to go back to this classically quirky Nintendo title.
Digital Trends via Digital Trends http://ift.tt/2p4eJdC June 27, 2017 at 10:36AM
http://ift.tt/2tgRJOU
The Real Impact of Google's Big EU Fine http://ift.tt/2rYcw67 The European Union just fined Google $2.7 billion. And that might not even be the worst news for Mountain View. Today the EU's executive branch, the European Commission, also ordered Google to change the way it displays search results from its online shopping tool. When you search for a product, Google has long shown results from Google Shopping in a box that floats above its regular search results. The commission ruled that this preferential treatment of its own content is illegal and anti-competitive. The company has 90 days to begin ranking its own shopping comparison in the same way it lists those from competitors, or face additional fines of up to five percent of its average annual turnover. The order only applies to search results in the European Union. The big issue for Google isn't necessarily the fine, or even the change to its shopping listings in and of themselves. It's the mere fact that regulators are forcing it to change how it handles search. The company has been retooling its search results to be more than just a list of websites. As Google expands into new areas, such as voice-controlled virtual assistants, it seeks to provide people with what they're looking for directly, whether that's an answer to a question, the address of a restaurant, or a list of nearby movie showings. Today's order chips away at that idea by opening the door to more lawsuits. That's good news for competing shopping sites, which can now also sue Google in European civil court, and potentially for other companies as well. Yelp has long complained about the way Google lists its own restaurant reviews over those of competitors, and today's decision could be the first step towards changing that. Since Google can still appeal the case, it's still too early from those competitors to celebrate, though some hope it's a signal of changes to come. "This will be the most significant enforcement event in consumer tech antitrust in nearly 20 years," Yelp VP of policy Luther Lowe wrote on Twitter yesterday, citing the Justice Department's landmark ruling against Microsoft in 2000 as the last major event in tech antitrust history. But the potential impact is still far from certain. The Case Against (and For) GoogleToday's order was a long time coming. The EU began its investigation in 2010, after British price comparison site Foundem, French legal search engine eJustice.fr and Microsoft-owned Ciao from Bing complained that Google's practices put competitors at a disadvantage. But the regulators didn't formally accuse the Google of an antitrust violation until 2015. The commission analyzed the results of 1.7 billion real Google search queries–around 5.2 terabytes of data–and concluded that, on average, the company placed results from competing online shopping services only on the fourth page of its results. "Google has come up with many innovative products and services that have made a difference to our lives," EU Commissioner Margrethe Vestager said in a statement today. "That's a good thing. But Google's strategy for its comparison shopping service wasn't just about attracting customers by making its product better than those of its rivals. Instead, Google abused its market dominance as a search engine by promoting its own comparison shopping service in its search results, and demoting those of competitors." Barry Lynn, author of Cornered: The New Monopoly Capitalism and the Economics of Destruction and the head of the New America Foundation's Open Markets program, compares Google's behavior to a railroad that steers its riders to stores that the railroad company also owns. But Google has long argued that online shopping is more competitive than ever and that Amazon and eBay, not Google, are the truly dominant players in the market. “When you shop online, you want to find the products you’re looking for quickly and easily," Google senior vice president and general counsel Kent Walker said in a statement today. "And advertisers want to promote those same products. That's why Google shows shopping ads, connecting our users with thousands of advertisers, large and small, in ways that are useful for both.” The EU's order comes amidst what appears to be a crack-down on US-based technology companies in Europe. France fined Facebook 150,000 euros for alleged privacy violations, and several other EU countries are investigating the company's privacy practices. Last year the EU's ordered Apple to pay 13 billion euros—about $14.5 billion at the time—plus interest in back taxes, saying that Ireland had given the company preferential tax treatment. And don't forget the right to be forgotten, a controversial EU regulation that forces Google and other companies to purge inaccurate or outdated personal information from their search results. The EU also filed a formal antitrust complaint against Google over its Android operating system last year, arguing that requiring handset makers to include Google's apps on Android phones was unfair to competitors. The EU has yet to issue a fine in that case. The View from AmericaGoogle has largely escaped similar scrutiny in the US. The Federal Trade Commission staffers recommended a lawsuit against Google over unfair business practices back in 2012, according to documents acquired by The Wall Street Journal in 2015. But, ultimately, FTC commissioners decided not to pursue a lawsuit after Google made a few changes, such as allowing companies like TripAdvisor Yelp and opt-out of having their content used in Google's own services. The agency was rumored to be investigating Google's Android policies last year, but the agency hasn't taken any action yet. President Trump has implied that his administration might not be as friendly to tech giants as the Obama administration was. Last year he said that Amazon has a huge antitrust problem. On the other hand, he spoke well of Monsanto and Bayer's proposed merger earlier this year, suggesting he's not overly concerned with antitrust issues. For his part, President Barack Obama called the EU's actions protectionism. "[Americans] have owned the Internet. Our companies have created it, expanded it, perfected it in ways that [European companies] can’t compete," Obama said in an interview with Recode in 2015. "And oftentimes what is portrayed as high-minded positions on issues sometimes is just designed to carve out some of their commercial interests." Others argue that antitrust simply isn't the right way to regulate internet companies. In the US, regulators generally only go after companies for antitrust violations when there is demonstrable harm to consumers, usually through rising prices. Online services are generally free. New America fellow and former employee of both Facebook and the Obama-era White House Dipayan Ghosh says that despite their size and popularity, companies like Google and Facebook don't really have monopolies, at least not in the way that, say, Amtrak does, or the way certain internet service providers do in many cities. There are several alternative search engines and social networks you can use instead of one of the larger players, and it's hard to say who the dominate players will be a few years down the line. "[Antitrust] doesn't seem to be the right manner of regulation, given the intricacies involved in delivering innovations over the internet," he says. "In fact, it almost seems arbitrary." Barry Lynn disagrees. In fact, he argues that previous antitrust cases paved the way for today's internet companies. Although the Department of Justice backed down from its original order for Microsoft to split into two companies after Microsoft appealed its case and the Bush administration reshuffled the agency, Lynn says the case did have an impact. "It was a real signal to other companies," says Lynn. "And it led Microsoft to change its behavior in a serious way. I would argue that case is what allows for companies like Google and Facebook to emerge." Had Microsoft simply been allowed to go on as it had, Lynn argues, it might have been able to quash today's internet giants long ago. Ideally, then, the EU's antitrust case would do much the same for the next generation of startups—in Europe, at least. The EU isn't splitting up Google. But it is sending a message. Digital Trends via Wired https://www.wired.com June 27, 2017 at 10:33AM
http://ift.tt/2tiI1Mg
Another Ransomware Attack Is Rapidly Spreading Across Europe http://ift.tt/2sXaeW9 Hackers hit Ukraine’s national bank, the state power provider, an airport, and a number of other agencies and companies with a ransomware attack on Tuesday. This left top-ranking Ukrainian officials unable to access computers and an untold number of citizens unable to access their money. The scariest part? The United States could be next. So far the ransomware attack appears to have affected over 80 companies in Ukraine, Russia, England, and India. Hackers are demanding $300 in bitcoin to unlock the affected computers. One representative of the power company Kyivenergo told the Interfax-Ukraine news agency that his company turned off all of their computers after the attack, and they were “waiting for permission from Ukraine’s Security Service to switch them back on.” Meanwhile, Anton Gerashchenko, an aide to the Interior Ministry, called the attack “the biggest in Ukraine’s history” in a Facebook post. He went on to claim that it’s “disguised as an extortion attempt” but actually aimed at “the destabilization of the economic situation and in the civic consciousness of Ukraine.” Which, in the context of recent cyber attacks targeting Ukraine, makes total sense.
Before we get into the geopolitical implications, though, let’s talk about the ransomware itself. The Swiss Reporting and Analysis Centre for Information Assurance (MELANI) has identified the ransomware as Petya, a cyber weapon that’s been spotted in the wild before. Although it appears to be targeting Ukraine primarily, the scale of this ransomware attack is already being compared to WannaCry, a massive assault that brought down computer systems around the world in May. This month, everyone from the Ukrainian government agencies to the Danish shipping company Maersk appear to be affected. The list of targets will likely grow in the coming hours and days. Advertisement Advertisement This latest, massive attack is one of thousands that have hit Ukraine in the past couple of years. However, after two consecutive attacks last year that brought down parts of the power grid in the country’s capital, Kiev, it’s clear that the hackers are escalating their efforts. The timing of Tuesday’s attack was particularly curious, too. The string of assaults came just a few hours after a top-ranking Ukrainian military intelligence officerwas killed in a Kiev car-bombing.
It’s too early to tell whether these incidents are linked, but the trend towards more extreme cyber warfare stemming from conflict in the region is undeniable. Advertisement Many, including Ukrainian president Petro Porshenko, believe that Russian state-sponsored hackers have targeted Ukraine in the past in an effort to undermine the country’s political processes, economic fortunes, and physical infrastructure. The spike in attacks dates back to 2014, when the Ukrainian Revolution removed Kremlin-backed President Viktor Yanukovych from power. Not long after that, a pro-Russian hacker group called CyberBerkut attempted to rig the Ukrainian elections. The same group has links to the hackers the infiltrated the Democratic National Committee (DNC) ahead of the 2016 US presidential elections. So you can see how all of this chaos is starting to seem like it might make its way stateside. As Wired’s Andy Greenberg explains in the magazine’s cover story this month, however, it already has. Greenberg reports:
The report goes on to link a Russian hacker group called Sandworm with BlackEnergy, a destructive breed of malware found not only on the computers of Ukrainian utility companies but also “on the networks of American power and water utilities.” Security researches at Dragos have also linked Sandworm hackers to CrashOverride, the ultra versatile cyber weapon used to cause in the 2016 Kiev blackout. If your head is starting to spin with the many disparate links from Ukrainian cyber chaos to the potential for a catastrophic attack on US infrastructure, that’s the point. This is all very scary stuff, pulled from a Hollywood hacker movie like Blackhat but 100 times more frightening since these cyber weapons are very real and very sophisticated. Advertisement Advertisement Again, we don’t yet know if Russian state-sponsored hackers are behind Tuesday’s string of attacks. Security researchers will surely be digging into the code and trying to unravel the web of connections between known entities and potentially new players. But for now the list of entities affected by this latest strain of rapidly spreading ransomware will only continue to grow. Digital Trends via Gizmodo http://gizmodo.com June 27, 2017 at 10:30AM |
Categories
All
Archives
October 2020
|