As the Nintendo Switch was gearing up to launch back in March, fans worried that it would go the way of the big N’s prior consoles: Spectacular first-party games with minimal third-party support. But after a tenuous few months when Zelda: Breath of t…
Source: Engadget – You wanted more Switch games, so you got ‘Monopoly’
Monthly Archives: October 2017
Dealmaster: Get a Dell laptop with a Core i5 chip for $550
Greetings, Arsians! Courtesy of our friends at TechBargains, we have a new round of deals to share. Today’s list is particularly heavy on laptop and TV deals, including a Dell Inspiron 14 with a Core i5 (7th-gen) chip and Nvidia GeForce GPU slashed down to $550.
You can take a peek at the full selection below.
Note: Ars Technica may earn compensation for sales from links on this post through affiliate programs.
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Source: Ars Technica – Dealmaster: Get a Dell laptop with a Core i5 chip for 0
Adequate Man There Is No Way Trump Knows The Lyrics To The National Anthem | Splinter That Weird Ana
Adequate Man There Is No Way Trump Knows The Lyrics To The National Anthem | Splinter That Weird Analogy About Beer and Tax Cuts Was Dumb as Hell | Jezebel Multiple People Dead After Driver Hits Pedestrians in New York City, Reports of Shots Fired [Updating] | The Root Why Some Black and Brown People Can’t Trust…
Source: LifeHacker – Adequate Man There Is No Way Trump Knows The Lyrics To The National Anthem | Splinter That Weird Ana
Watch Me Try to Break Face ID a Bunch of Different Ways
I’ve now had the iPhone X for just 24 hours—the majority of which have been spent trying to break Face ID. For the most part, Face ID has worked as described—opening my phone when I’m sitting in the dark, or wearing a variety of glasses. It works whether my hair is up, down, or in my face. But today, while shooting a…
Source: Gizmodo – Watch Me Try to Break Face ID a Bunch of Different Ways
The 10 Best Deals of October 31, 2017
We see a lot of deals around the web over on Kinja Deals, but these were our ten favorites from Halloween.
Source: LifeHacker – The 10 Best Deals of October 31, 2017
Impressive Super Mario Bros. Overworld & Underworld Themes Performed On Marimba By One Man With Four Mallets
This is a video of musician Aaron DeWayne performing the Super Mario Bros. overworld and underworld themes (transcribed note-for-note from the original game music composed by Koji Kondo, who pretty much composed all the Mario and Zelda games, along with a ton of others, typically all on his own — Ocarina Of Time being the last he did entirely by himself) on a marimba, with two mallets in each hand. He does a fantastic job, and it was very pleasant to listen to. Plus I admired his showmanship and flair. Flair is a thing I have an eye for. Butts and money on the ground are two others.
Keep going for the video, it’s worth a watch and listen. BONUS FACT: “The Nintendo Entertainment System was capable of producing only 4 sounds at a time: 3 tones + 1 noise channel. Here, Aaron plays the 3 pitched voices: melody, harmony, and bass.”
Source: Geekologie – Impressive Super Mario Bros. Overworld & Underworld Themes Performed On Marimba By One Man With Four Mallets
Microsoft pulls in LinkedIn details for Outlook.com users
It’s only been a day since Microsoft killed Outlook.com premium features like tougher email security and more storage and brought them to Office 365 members instead. Today, the company announced that it will bring LinkedIn integration to Outlook.com…
Source: Engadget – Microsoft pulls in LinkedIn details for Outlook.com users
Is My Boyfriend Secretly Using My Sex Toys?
You’ve got problems, I’ve got advice. This advice isn’t sugar-coated—in fact, it’s sugar-free, and may even be a little bitter. Welcome to Tough Love.
Source: LifeHacker – Is My Boyfriend Secretly Using My Sex Toys?
Apple hears AV geeks, will give Apple TV 4K owners more settings control
The next software update for the Apple TV 4K will give owners of the month-old set-top box a little more control over their video output settings.
As noted by MacRumors, a video released on Apple’s Developer site this week says that the Apple TV’s tvOS 11.2 update will allow the set-top box to automatically switch its display settings to match the native frame rate and dynamic range of a given video.
Currently, the Apple TV 4K takes a “one size fits all” approach to video output. The box reads what sort of refresh rate, resolution, and dynamic range your TV is capable of during setup and sets its video output to what it thinks will provide the best experience—but it doesn’t change that setting on its own afterward, regardless of what you watch.
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Source: Ars Technica – Apple hears AV geeks, will give Apple TV 4K owners more settings control
Vendor Tracks LinkedIn Profile Changes To Alert Client Employers
dcblogs shares a report from TechTarget: IT managers have long had the ability and right to monitor employee behavior on internal networks. Now, HR managers are getting similar capabilities thanks to cloud-based services — but for tracking employee activity outside of their employer’s network. A controversy and court fight is swelling over its potential impact on employee privacy. A San Francisco-based startup, hiQ Labs Inc., offers products based on its analysis of publicly available LinkedIn data. One is Keeper, which identifies employees at risk of being recruited away, and another is Skill Mapper, which analyzes employee skills. The profile data is collected by software bots. The clients of hiQ’s service may learn whether a LinkedIn member is a flight risk thanks to an individual risk score: high (red), medium (yellow) or low (green), according to court papers. LinkedIn is in court fighting this, but so far it’s losing. A federal judge recently took exception to the use of the CFAA in this case “to punish hiQ for accessing publicly available data.” The judge warned such an interpretation “could profoundly impact open access to the internet.”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot – Vendor Tracks LinkedIn Profile Changes To Alert Client Employers
Researchers warn state system to catch voter fraud has 99% false positive rate
Enlarge / Georgia voters at voting machines during the US presidential election at the Athens-Clarke County Fleet building in Athens, Georgia, on November 8, 2016. (credit: TAMI CHAPPELL/AFP/Getty Images)
A database system that will now be used by Indiana to automatically purge voter registrations that have duplicates in other states is 99 percent more likely to purge legitimate voters, according to a paper published last week by researchers from Stanford University, the University of Pennsylvania, Harvard, Yale, and Microsoft Research. Using the probability of matching birth dates for people with common first, middle, and last names and an audit of poll books from the 2012 US presidential election, the researchers concluded that the system would de-register “about 300 registrations used to cast a seemingly legitimate vote for every one registration used to cast a double vote.”
The Interstate Voter Registration Crosscheck Program is a system administered by the office of Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach—the vice-chair of President Donald Trump’s Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity. Crosscheck uses voter roll data from 27 states—pulled every January by election officials and uploaded to an FTP site—to check for duplicate records across states, based on full name and date of birth, as well as the last four digits of social security numbers where that data is collected by voter registration (which is not consistent from state to state).
Indiana has used Crosscheck as an advisory system for a number of years but not to automatically purge voters. A law passed in July now allows county election officials in Indiana to de-register voters when a duplicate registration is detected. The problem with that variation in data is that it can leave room for massive error, as Sharad Goel and Houshmand Shirani-Mehr of Stanford University, Marc Meredith of the University of Pennsylvania, Michael Morse of Harvard University and Yale Law School, and David Rothschild of Microsoft Research found.
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Source: Ars Technica – Researchers warn state system to catch voter fraud has 99% false positive rate
Amazon Prime Video is available on Xbox consoles worldwide
There’s more to the Xbox One X than just 4K gaming. Beyond playing UHD Blu-rays, the console will stream media from your provider of choice in 4K, too. That includes Amazon Prime Video, which is now available worldwide on Xbox consoles following its…
Source: Engadget – Amazon Prime Video is available on Xbox consoles worldwide
The EPA's Science Advisory Board Will Now Be Stocked By Industry Shills
The head of the Environmental Protection Agency announced today that the best scientists in the country won’t be able to advise the agency on environmental science.
Source: Gizmodo – The EPA’s Science Advisory Board Will Now Be Stocked By Industry Shills
Google lists all the devices Home supports for easy reference
The number of gadgets Google Home supports is getting pretty large these days. According to the company, more than 1,000 smart home devices from more than 150 brands play nice with its smart speakers to control things around your house. That’s quite…
Source: Engadget – Google lists all the devices Home supports for easy reference
Make Your Own Version of Taco Bell's Halloween Candy Quesadilla
Whether you chose to give out candy or take small people trick-or-treating, you will no doubt find yourself in possession of some amount of Halloween candy on November 1st. You could shovel it into your mouth mindlessly, dole out a piece each day and make it last until Christmas (my mom’s favorite), or you could take…
Source: LifeHacker – Make Your Own Version of Taco Bell’s Halloween Candy Quesadilla
New VibWrite System Uses Finger Vibrations To Authenticate Users
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bleeping Computer: Rutgers engineers have created a new authentication system called VibWrite. The system relies on placing an inexpensive vibration motor and receiver on a solid surface, such as wood, metal, plastic, glass, etc.. The motor sends vibrations to the receiver. When the user touches the surface with one of his fingers, the vibration waves are modified to create a unique signature per user and per finger. Rutgers researchers say that VibWrite is more secure when users are asked to draw a pattern or enter a code on a PIN pad drawn on the solid surface. This also generates a unique fingerprint, but far more complex than just touching the surface with one finger. During two tests, VibWrite verified users with a 95% accuracy and a 3% false positive rate. The only problem researchers encountered in the live trials was that some users had to draw the pattern or enter the PIN number several times before they passed the VibWrite authentication test. Besides improvements to the accuracy with which VibWrite can detect finger vibrations, researchers also plan to look into how VibWrite will behave in outdoor environments to account for varying temperatures, humidity, winds, wetness, dust, dirt, and other conditions. This new novel user authentication system is described in full in a research paper entitled “VibWrite: Towards Finger-input Authentication on Ubiquitous Surfaces via Physical Vibration.”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot – New VibWrite System Uses Finger Vibrations To Authenticate Users
Facebook, Google, Twitter tell Congress their platforms spread Russian-backed propaganda
Enlarge (credit: Aurich Lawson / Getty)
Top officials from Facebook, Google, and Twitter told a congressional panel Tuesday that their platforms hosted a disinformation campaign carried out over their networks by Russian state actors. The propaganda centered on the presidential election, immigration, gun rights, gay rights, and racial issues, the companies said. None of the three organizations said they supported proposed legislation requiring them to disclose who is buying political advertisements on their platforms, although these Web companies promised more public transparency about who is buying ads on their networks.
The hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee comes as Facebook conceded that as many as 126 million people were exposed to Russian operations on its site during the 2016 presidential election. Facebook said a “troll farm” tied to the Kremlin called the Internet Research Agency posted 80,000 times between 2015 and 2017, which resulted in 29 million direct appearances on Facebook news feeds. Thanks to real users liking, sharing, and commenting on these posts, the campaign scored between 87 and 126 million impressions, according to Facebook.
The campaign had real-world consequences. To sow discord, the propaganda sparked a New York street protest over President Donald Trump’s victory—prompting between 5,000 to 10,000 protesters to convene on Manhattan’s Union Square on November 12.
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Source: Ars Technica – Facebook, Google, Twitter tell Congress their platforms spread Russian-backed propaganda
Go Download Your 69 New iPhone Emoji Right Now
Remember earlier this year when we told you 69 new emoji were on the way? Well, they’ve finally arrived for the iPhone in the iOS 11.1 update. Just go to Settings > General > Software Update.
Source: Gizmodo – Go Download Your 69 New iPhone Emoji Right Now
Artificial Intelligence Detects Suicidal Tendencies in People Using Brain Scans
Recent scientific progress has allowed us to begin decoding the significance of many different patterns of activity in the brain. Researchers have begun to understand patterns associated with disorders such as depression, in hopes of correcting it. Other research has zeroed in on how language and speech is signaled in…
Source: Gizmodo – Artificial Intelligence Detects Suicidal Tendencies in People Using Brain Scans
Real Products That Exist: The Stranger Things Eleven Bleeding Nose Candle Holder
This is the Eleven Bleeding Nose Candle holder available from Firebox (~$40). You just burn a red candle (it comes with two) inside Eleven’s head and the red wax drips out here nose — just like blood when she uses her psychokinetic abilities in the show! It also comes with a “handy nose picker tool to remove blockages,” presumably because paperclips are hard to come by for some people. CHECK YOUR JUNK DRAWER. I actually needed a safety pin the other day and — I shit you not — my junk drawer failed me. “Shocking.” I was devastated. “Truly heartbreaking.” Thank God I go to therapy tomorrow so I can work through it. Or, I should say, thank God I’m supposed to go to therapy tomorrow before I call to cancel first thing in the morning because I Halloween’d too hard. You know how I roll. “In a golf cart on the sidewalk.” Lock your middle-age daughters up, moms, I’m a bad boy.
Keep going for a couple more shots.
Source: Geekologie – Real Products That Exist: The Stranger Things Eleven Bleeding Nose Candle Holder