Reddit has been slowly rolling out two-factor authentication for beta testers, moderators and third-party app developers for a while now before making it available to everyone over the past few days.
Source: LifeHacker – Secure Your Reddit Account Using Two-Factor Authentication
MRI machines use a powerful magnetic field to produce internal images of the human body. The magnetic fields are so powerful that hospitals take great care to ensure no iron-containing metals come near the machines while they are in use. In rare cases, however, mistakes happen. This past weekend, an Indian man…
Source: Gizmodo – Man Carrying Oxygen Tank Dies After Being Sucked Into MRI Machine
A U.S. Navy EP-3 surveillance plane, flying over international waters, was harassed by a Russian Su-27 Flanker fighter jet yesterday. The Russian fighter jet flew within five feet of the American aircraft, in what Navy officials told CNN was an “unsafe intercept.”
Source: Gizmodo – A Russian Fighter Jet Just Came Screaming Within Five Feet Of An American Navy Spy Plane
It looks like iOS 12 won’t be as flashy or fun as Apple originally wanted it to be. Following months of embarrassing bugs and performance issues, the company is reportedly pushing some features originally slated for this year’s iOS 12 update back to 2019. Engineers will be focusing on quality and reliability instead.
Source: Gizmodo – iOS 11 Is So Broken That Apple Is Reportedly Delaying Features in iOS 12
Enlarge / The id Software family tree finally comes together. (credit: id Software)
Of all the innovations id Software delivered to the video game industry in the ’90s, plot certainly wasn’t one of them. Still, the company managed to create a few iconic heroes in its PC-action heyday, and decades after their creation, the company’s former bigwigs let loose a fun bit of trivia on Tuesday: many of id’s biggest heroes are all related.
As spotted by ResetERA, a Twitter conversation unfolded on Tuesday that had been set into motion weeks earlier. A seeming throwaway December post from former id Software designer John Romero included an interesting note: that the long-running Wolfenstein series’ hero, BJ Blazkowicz, was “based on” the company’s early side-scrolling action series Commander Keen. A fan picked up on this and sent a question to id co-founder Tom Hall: are these two characters related, and is Doom’s “Doomguy” hero also part of a genetic lineage?
Hall minced no words in his Tuesday reply: “The lineage isn’t a theory. Fact.” Longtime id fans might have already suspected this, based on information in a long-ago Wolfenstein hint manual, but this is the first time someone from id has gone to the trouble of confirming that idea. What’s more, Romero piped up to clarify the exact makeup of the Blazkowicz clan: the Wolfenstein hero is Commander Keen’s grandfather, while Keen is Doomguy’s dad. The duo had a bit of a back-and-forth joke chain from there, asking why there was a missing generational badass between Wolfenstein and Keen. Hall claimed that Keen’s father was “an awesome, heroic… newscaster” with the stage name of “Blaze,” which is where Keen’s legal name of “Billy Blaze” came from.
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Source: Ars Technica – id Software co-founders confirm that its biggest games’ heroes are all related
In a report today, Apple is changing it’s 2018 strategy for iOS in order to focus on performance and quality issues. Software head Craig Federighi announced the revised plan to employees at a meeting earlier this month, planning to make iPhones more responsive and less prone to issues. The features reportedly getting delayed until 2019 are a home screen refresh, changes to the in-car user interface, improvements to core apps such as Mail, and updates to the camera, photo-editing and sharing features.
While I completely agree focusing on performance and security is paramount, the planned features that are getting delayed are fairly important as well. One would assume that Apple has enough staff to do both and not put off feature updates for a year.
Discussion
Source: [H]ardOCP – Apple Delays New iOS Features to Focus On Stability
As the FBI’s investigation into Russian election interference reaches a fever pitch, Facebook rolled out a new News Feed alert Monday night. The bulletin told users who followed pages created by Russian trolls that those pages have been removed. And some of the affected users did not like this.
Source: Gizmodo – Facebook Users Cry ‘Censorship’ After Being Told Which Russian Troll Pages They Liked
Hotels across the country are rushing to introduce robots with the promise of enhancing the guest experience and increasing efficiency. From a report: The automated companions can do everything from make and pick up deliveries to help guests find their way around. Aloft Cupertino in the Silicon Valley (rates from $150) was the first hotel in the United States to debut Savioke’s Relay robot in 2014. The three foot tall autonomous robot, nicknamed Botlr, weighs 90 pounds and makes deliveries throughout the hotel using multiple sensors, 3D cameras and Wi-Fi to operate the elevators. Marriott has since begun mobile robot service at four other Aloft properties. Other hotels are following suit. H Hotel Los Angeles’s Relay robot, named Hannah, made 610 front desk deliveries and 42 room service deliveries, traveling a total of 50 miles, in the first three months since the hotel opened last October (rates from $249).
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot – The Next Time You Order Room Service, It May Come by Robot
Today is National Plan for Vacation Day, so bust out your calendar and start thumbing through those travel guides. You don’t want to let those precious vacation days go to waste just because you got too busy before you organized some much deserved R and R.
Source: LifeHacker – Reminder: Start Planning Your Vacation Right Now
Ever since Facebook finally admitted to having a fake news problem, it’s been trying to fix it. It hired thousands of people to help block fake ads, pledged to work with third-party fact-checking organizations and is busy building algorithms to detec…
Source: Engadget – Fake porn is the new fake news, and the internet isn’t ready
A screenshot taken by Hawaiian citizen Alison Teal shows the screen of her mobile phone with an alert text message sent to all Hawaiian citizens on January 13, 2018. / AFP PHOTO / Alison TEAL (credit: Getty Images)
A preliminary report released on Tuesday from the Federal Communications Commission details the events leading up to a false missile alert sent to mobile phones and television and radio broadcast stations in the state of Hawaii earlier this month. The report (PDF) suggests that the employee who sent the alert did not hear a recording notifying staff that an announcement regarding an incoming missile was simply a test. Instead, the employee apparently thought it was the real thing, according to the FCC.
The missile alert was not corrected for 38 minutes, sending residents of Hawaii into a panic. After the situation was rectified, Hawaii officials, including Governor David Ige and Hawaii Emergency Management Agency (HI-EMA) Administrator Vern Miyagi, attributed the mistake to “human error,” saying that the employee knew the missile alert was supposed to be a test but had designated that the alert was supposed to be an “event” rather than a “test” by accident.
The employee did not agree to be interviewed by the FCC but instead issued a written statement to the federal commission. The letter said that, contrary to explanations made by Hawaii officials, the employee didn’t issue an alert warning by fumbling through a software menu by accident. Instead, the employee meant to send the warning, believing the internal announcement about an inbound threat was real.
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Source: Ars Technica – Hawaii officer who sent false missile alert believed attack imminent, FCC says
(credit: Flickr)
SAN FRANCISCO—Less than a week before a contentious trade secrets trial is set to begin, lawyers from Waymo and Uber squared off one final time in court on Tuesday morning.
US District Judge William Alsup told Waymo that its lawyers could not present projected financial figures for the self-driving car market, lest they influence the jury improperly. Rather, he wants the case to remain focused on the eight specific trade secrets at issue.
“So if we put big numbers out there, there’s a risk that the jury will fall for the big numbers,” he said, comparing it to patent cases. Such a ruling is potentially a large win for Uber if the company is ultimately found liable in the case.
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Source: Ars Technica – Waymo can’t use its self-driving forecasts, but it can use Uber’s, judge rules
In December, Apple admitted to slowing older models of iPhones, saying the practice kept older phones with aging batteries from suddenly rebooting. Apple is now facing multiple lawsuits in the US and abroad as well as an investigation in France. And…
Source: Engadget – Justice Dept and SEC are reportedly reviewing Apple’s iPhone slowdowns
In the iOS 11.3 beta, parents and other “family organizers” are now able to approve purchases through iOS’ “Ask to Buy” feature using Face ID on the iPhone X. This addresses a prior complaint from users who upgraded from Touch ID iPhones to the iPhone X with Face ID.
Previously, iPhone X users had to manually enter their passwords via the iPhone X’s keyboard to approve any request from a child to download an app or make an in-app purchase, whereas other iPhone owners could use Touch ID. It might not seem like a major inconvenience to some, but some parents with several children, all of whom have iOS devices and are playing games that involve frequent, small in-app purchases, went to Apple’s forums to complain about the constant hassle.
Apple promoted Face ID as a complete replacement for Touch ID when the iPhone X launched. In fact, third-party apps that used Touch ID could authenticate with Face ID automatically, with no action required on the part of the developer in most cases. We found when reviewing the phone that Face ID could be used to make other kinds of purchases, so it was perplexing to users when this one feature—Ask to Buy—was not supported.
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Source: Ars Technica – You’ll finally be able to approve family purchases with Face ID in iOS update
This is the BooBuddy Ghost Hunting Interactive Bear, a $200 talking teddy bear that’s supposed to alert you to paranormal activity. But why is it a teddy bear? Presumably so it doesn’t scare away the ghosts. I ain’t afraid of no ghosts! “Is that true, GW?” No, they’re the only thing I’m afraid of.
BooBuddy is not just an EMF (electromagnetic field) bear but an interactive investigator that asks smart questions and reacts to changes in the environment just like a real investigator would.
BooBuddy’s investigates the paranormal with you promoting positive response as well as letting us know when the environment changes. BooBuddy loves asking EVP (electronic voice phenomenon) questions in order to promote a response. If the environment changes (EMF, temperature or motion) BooBuddy responds appropriately, to let you know that there may be a presence. Just sit BooBuddy down and turn it on to get to work. BooBuddy will do the rest starting with baseline readings. For best results and documentation set a recorder or cam by the bear to document any responses.
Kids will love it, but this is NOT a toy. Some theories suggest that using a trigger object familiar and attractive to an entity may entice them to interact. BooBuddy does that and so much MORE!
Unfortunately, I don’t have $200 to spend on a ghost hunting teddy bear so I had to hack my existing Teddy Ruxpin into one. “You taped a magnet and microphone to his paws.” Shhhhh, I think he’s picking up on something! “Well?!” False alarm, somebody flushing a toilet in the men’s room. It does smell like there was a recent death in there though.
Keep going for one more shot and a video.
Source: Geekologie – Real Products That Exist: A Paranormal Activity Detecting Teddy Bear
Source: Engadget – What Trump means when he talks nukes at the State of the Union
The FCC has published the preliminary findings of its investigation into Hawaii’s false missile alert, and it suggests that the story didn’t play out as you might have heard. Where initial reports claimed the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency office…
Source: Engadget – FCC: Officer behind Hawaii false missle alert thought it was real
U.S. regulators are scrutinizing one of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges as questions mount over a digital token linked to its backers, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday. From the report: The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission sent subpoenas last week to virtual-currency venue Bitfinex and Tether, a company that issues a widely traded coin and claims it’s pegged to the dollar, according to a person familiar with the matter. The firms share the same chief executive officer. Tether’s coins have become a popular substitute for dollars on cryptocurrency exchanges worldwide, with about $2.3 billion of the tokens outstanding as of Tuesday. While Tether has said all of its coins are backed by U.S. dollars held in reserve, the company has yet to provide conclusive evidence of its holdings to the public or have its accounts audited. Skeptics have questioned whether the money is really there.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot – US Regulators To Subpoena Crypto Exchange Bitfinex, Tether
In an article on IndieWire, director Steven Soderbergh, director of “sex, lies and videotape,” and “Oceans 11/12/13” states he is done directing “studio movies” and only wants to use iPhones for his upcoming projects. Soderbergh’s newest movie “Unsane” was shot completely on iPhones.
Photography is a passion of mine, and I will just say… no. Looking at the screen shots from “Unsane” it very much looks like it was shot on a phone. I can see it if used as a tool, say in a “found footage” style of movie, but other than that.. just no.
“People forget, this is a 4k capture,” said Soderbergh, who was long a passionate advocate for the high-end RED cameras. “I’ve seen it 40 feet tall. It looks like velvet. This is a gamechanger to me.”
Discussion
Source: [H]ardOCP – Steven Soderbergh Says He Only Wants to Use iPhones to Shoot Movies
I am not sure if this is good or bad. Hawaii officials have previously said that it was all a mistake, and folks pointed towards the system being hacked after this picture was uncovered with an official password stuck on a monitor with a sticky note. Seems as though now that the alert was fully intentional.
WASHINGTON — The state worker in Hawaii who sent a false wireless alert warning of an inbound ballistic missile on Jan. 13 issued the message intentionally, thinking the state faced an actual threat, the Federal Communications Commission said on Tuesday.
Discussion
Source: [H]ardOCP – False Hawaii Nuclear Alert Not a Mistake
