Many of us have no problem checking in on the status of our New Year’s resolutions to “walk more” or “sleep better,” and it’s all thanks to our trusty Fitbits, Apple Watches, and other wrist-sized fitness gadgets. At any moment of the day, you can look to your wrist and have access to your health data. And if you…
Source: LifeHacker – Is the ‘Nocebo Effect’ Hurting Your Health Goals?
Apple is considering pushing back the debut of its mixed-reality headset by at least a few months, potentially delaying its first major new product since the Apple Watch in 2015, Bloomberg News reported Friday, citing people familiar with the situation. From the report: The headset — a high-end device that blends virtual and augmented reality — was targeted for an unveiling at Apple’s annual Worldwide Developers Conference in June, followed by a release later in the year. But development challenges related to overheating, cameras and software have made it harder to stay on track, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the matter is private. That could push the announcement until the end of 2022 or later, with the product hitting shelves by 2023, the people said.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot – Apple’s New VR/AR Headset Risks Being Delayed Until 2023
Enlarge (credit: Thomas Trutschel/Photothek)
PayPal is facing a class-action lawsuit alleging that the digital payments company violated racketeering laws by freezing customer funds without offering an explanation.
When users contacted PayPal about the frozen funds, they were told they had violated the company’s “acceptable use policy” but weren’t told how that violation had occurred, the lawsuit says. What’s more, it alleges that in at least one instance, PayPal said that a user would “have to get a subpoena” to find out why.
“PayPal violates its own Agreement by failing to provide adequate notice to users whose accounts have had holds placed on them,” the lawsuit says. When PayPal does let users know it placed a hold on their funds, “it does not inform such users why such funds are being held, how they can obtain a release of the hold, and/or how they can avoid future holds being placed on their accounts.”
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Source: Ars Technica – PayPal stole users’ money after freezing, seizing funds, lawsuit alleges
Researchers analyzing insurance claims data estimate that U.S. insurers have paid tens of millions of dollars for ivermectin as a covid-19 treatment, despite little good evidence that ivermectin does anything to treat or prevent the viral illness. During a single week in August 2021, private and Medicare insurance…
Source: Gizmodo – U.S. Insurers Wasted Millions on Ivermectin for Covid-19, Study Finds
Calling all climate journalists: Your dream job awaits, courtesy of Chevron. The oil giant is looking to hire people with journalistic experience to build out a “newsroom”—quotes around that word included in the job posting—to help spread propaganda the good news about Chevron.
Source: Gizmodo – Chevron Is Hiring Journalists for Its ‘Newsroom’
Canopy beds can make your bedroom feel romantic, calm, and peaceful. But canopy beds themselves are, well, expensive. You can get the canopy look, though, but without the cost. Just make your own.
Source: LifeHacker – How to Make a Cheap DIY Canopy Bed
Hackers have hit around 70 Ukraine government department websites, forcing many of them offline. A message in Ukrainian, Russian and Polish on the country’s foreign ministry site reportedly read “Ukrainians! All your personal data has been uploaded to the public network. All data on the computer is destroyed, it is impossible to restore them.”
The page referenced “historical land” and featured crossed-out versions of Ukraine map and flag. “All information about you has become public, be afraid and wait for the worst. This is for you for your past, present and future,” the message is said to have read. Along with the foreign ministry site, the state emergency service, state treasury and the ministries of education, foreign affairs, sport, energy, agrarian policy, veterans and environment were reportedly targeted.
However, Ukraine’s security service told CNN that personal data was not affected. It noted that most services have been restored.
According to the Ukrainian Information Ministry, early indications suggest the Russian Federation carried out the attack. “This is not the first time or even the second time that Ukrainian Internet resources have been attacked since the beginning of the Russian military aggression,” the ministry said in a statement.
The Ministry of Culture and Information Policy suggested that references to Ukrainian ultra-nationalist groups in the message were an attempt by hackers to mask the “Russian footprint.” The ministry added that “It is obvious that this was done on purpose to cast a shadow over the hacker attack on Poland: Russia and its proxies have been working for a long time to create the quarrel between two friendly neighboring countries.”
Hackers believed to be from Russia have targeted other parts of Ukraine’s infrastructure in recent years. In 2015, an attack took out parts of the power grid. Since then, Russia was also blamed for attacks on Ukraine’s weapon supply and the Kiev airport. The NotPetya cyberattack, for which the US charged Russian hackers in 2020, impacted the Ukrainian government and banking system, a state power distributor and an airport, as well as entities in Russia and the US.
The latest attack took place as Russia mobilizes 100,000 troops to Ukraine’s border. Western allies fear Russia will again invade Ukraine, following its annexation of Crimea in 2014.
Attempts by the US, NATO and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe to de-escalate the situation in talks with Russia this week haven’t proven successful. Russia’s lead envoy said the discussions hit a dead end.
Although Russia has denied plans to attack Ukraine, it said it may take action if its demands aren’t met. Among those is an assurance that Ukraine and Georgia won’t join NATO.
Jens Stoltenberg, the secretary general of NATO, condemned the cyberattack on Ukraine. He said NATO has been working with the country for years to bolster its cyber defenses and that the two sides will sign an agreement on enhanced cyber cooperation in the coming days. As part of that, the country will gain access to NATO’s malware information sharing platform.
Source: Engadget – Cyberattack hits Ukraine government websites amid tensions with Russia
“Babylon’s Ashes” is not just The Expanse season six finale, it’s the series finale, and the episode is as bombastic and action-packed as you’d expect—but it’s also got quite a few quiet moments, and together they serve to remind us how much we’ll miss this remarkable show.
Source: Gizmodo – The Expanse’s Explosive Series Finale Made Us Even More Bummed the Show Is Over
In case you forgot, 343 Industries’ Halo Infinite doesn’t have co-op play in its campaign mode. Well, the fast-food burger company Wendy’s hasn’t forgotten, and decided to hit Twitter to roast the official Xbox account over the lack of inclusion of the mode at launch.
Source: Kotaku – Wendy’s Roasts Xbox Over Lack Of Halo Infinite Campaign Co-op
In the following tutorial, you will learn how to install MariaDB 10.7 on Fedora 35 Workstation or Server.
Source: LXer – How to Install MariaDB 10.7 on Fedora 35
The ongoing memory folio work has caused
ripples through much of the kernel and inspired a few side projects, one of
which was the removal of slab-specific
fields from struct page. That work has been pulled into the
mainline for the 5.17 kernel release; it is thus a good time to catch up
with the status of struct slab and why this work is important.
Source: LWN.net – [$] Struct slab comes to 5.17
This week brought deals on Apple devices, gaming gear and more. The Mac Mini M1 remains on sale for $600 while the 3rd-generation AirPods are back down to a record low of $140. Nintendo’s Ring Fit Adventure is back in stock and $25 off, while you can still get a one-year Switch Online family membership plus a microSD card for 50 percent off. Here are the best tech deals from this week that you can still get today.
The Ring Fit Adventure is back on sale for $55, or $25 off its normal price. It’s a good option for Switch owners who want to work out more in the new year but don’t want to go outside to do it. Joy-Cons strap to the included ring and leg strap so the game can record your movements as it has you doing things like squats and crunches to progress through a fantasy world, defeat enemies and more.
Buy Ring Fit Adventure at Amazon – $55
Apple’s latest AirPods are on sale for $140 right now, or 22 percent off their normal price. These are the company’s newest earbuds and we gave them a score of 88 for their improved design, better audio quality and long battery life.
Buy AirPods (3rd gen) at Amazon – $140
The 2020 MacBook Pro M1 remains $150 off, bringing the model with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage down to $1,150. It’s not the latest MacBook Pro with the higher-end CPUs that Apple recently came out with, but it’s still a viable option. We gave it a score of 84 for its speedy performance, lovely display and its long, 16.5-hour battery life.
Buy 2020 MacBook Pro M1 at Amazon – $1,150
The base Mac Mini M1 is $100 off thanks to a sale and an additional coupon, bringing it down to $600. This model runs on the M1 chipset along with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. This is Apple’s most affordable M1 machine, making it a good option if you’re in need of an upgraded desktop.
Amazon still has a bundle that includes a one-year Switch Online family membership and a 128GB SanDisk microSD card for $35. You’re essentially getting the microSD card for free here, and the family-plan subscription gives up to eight people access to online play, cloud data storage and a library of NES and SNES games to play whenever you want.
Buy Switch Online bundle at Amazon – $35
The Galaxy Buds 2 are down to $100 right now, or $50 off their normal price. We gave them a score of 84 for their improve sound quality, adjustable ambient sound mode, comfortable design and support for wireless charging.
Buy Galaxy Buds 2 at Woot – $100
Samsung’s latest smartphone, the Galaxy S21 FE, is officially available and starting to ship and Amazon throws in a $100 gift card if you order the handset through the online retailer. We briefly tested the FE at CES 2022 and called it “last year’s flagship without the frills,” and it includes a 5-nanometer processor, a 120HZ display, a 32-megapixel front-facing camera, a larger battery and more.
Buy Galaxy S21 FE bundle at Amazon – $700
The Nest Audio smart speaker is down to $75, which is $25 off its regular price. While not as good as its Black Friday price, it’s still a good discount on one of our favorite smart speakers. It earned a score of 87 from us for its excellent audio quality, stereo mode and minimalist design. You can also pick up the Nest Mini for only $25.
Buy Nest Audio at Best Buy – $75
The second-generation Nest Hub has been discounted to $60, or $40 off its normal price. That’s also only $10 more than it was during the holiday shopping season. We gave it a score of 89 for its nice 7-inch display, improved performance and audio quality plus its new sleep tracking feature.
Buy Nest Hub (2nd gen) at Best Buy – $60
Withings’ Body+ smart scale is 41 percent off for today only as part of a daily deal on Amazon that includes a number of other similar scales. Withings’ gadget connects to WiFi and tracks things like your weight change, body fat and water percentage, muscle and bone mass and more.
Buy Body+ smart scale at Amazon – $59
Engadget readers can get a total of two free audiobooks when signing up for Libro.fm, the audiobook subscription service that supports local bookstores. Similarly to Audible, a Libro.fm membership costs $15 per month and gives you one audiobook credit per month, plus 30 percent off any audiobooks you buy á la carte.
Subscribe to Libro.fm – $15/month
The second-generation Echo Show 5 is on sale for $45, or 47 percent off its normal price. Not much has changed from the first to the second generation, but that’s ok. We gave the latest model a score of 85 for its good sound quality, tap-to-snooze feature and quaint design.
Buy Echo Show 5 (2nd gen) at Amazon – $45
The Wyze Cam v3 with spotlight kit is 32 percent off, knocking it down to $36. This is one of the easiest smart home security cameras to use, and one of the most affordable, and the spotlight kit will make it more useful as an outside cam at night.
Buy Wyze Cam v3 at Amazon – $36
HBO Max is having a sale through January 25th that knocks 20 percent off its monthly plans. That means you can get the service with ads for $8 per month or the ad-free tier for $12 per month, with both discounted rates lasting for one year. Current HBO Max subscribers cannot take advantage of the deal, but if you recently cancelled and wanted to come back, you should be able to get the discount.
Subscribe to HBO Max starting at $8/month
Follow @EngadgetDeals on Twitter for the latest tech deals and buying advice.
Source: Engadget – Nintendo’s ‘Ring Fit Adventure’ falls to , plus the rest of the week’s best tech deals
It feels like cruel irony that around the time PC gaming began to experience a resurgence, the availability of graphics cards fell by the wayside. The pandemic combined with new product launches (including new generation consoles that essentially run on PC hardware) and a global shortage came in like a perfectly frustrating storm. Toss into
Source: Hot Hardware – NVIDIA Has Us Hopeful You Might Actually Be Able To Buy A Graphics Card This Year
It’s well known at this point that the company previously known as Facebook is spending billions of dollars in resources to transport as many of its users as possible out of the real world and plop them into an avatar-filled metaverse. What’s less talked about though are the ways Meta is simultaneously adding …
Source: Gizmodo – Facebook Patented a Mechanical Eyeball
Researchers have described a new species and genus of tarantula in Thailand. The jumbo spiders nest inside of bamboo stalks, in a behavior never documented before in tarantulas.
Source: Gizmodo – Newly Discovered Tarantula Lurks Inside Bamboo
The Messages app on your Mac has hidden keyboard shortcuts that make it a lot easier to text, once you learn them. One shortcut lets you open the contact card for the person you’re chatting with, another lets you send files faster, among so many more, so we’re going to dive into all the keyboard shortcuts you’ll ever…
Source: LifeHacker – 10 iMessage Shortcuts You Should Use on Your Mac
Microsoft Office now has a “wokeness” editor that will flag your writing if it contains insensitive phrases. Welcome to the dumb culture wars, Office settings.
Source: Gizmodo – Microsoft Office’s New ‘Woke’ Spellchecker Is Perfectly Fine and Will Cause Nobody to Freak Out
Space isn’t easy on humans. Some aspects are avoidable—the vacuum, of course, and the cold, as well as some of the radiation. Astronauts can also lose bone density, thanks to a lack of gravity. NASA has even created a fun acronym for the issues: RIDGE, which stands for space radiation, isolation and confinement, distance from Earth, gravity fields, and hostile and closed environments.
New research adds to the worries by describing how being in space destroys your blood. Or rather, something about space—and we don’t know what just yet—causes the human body to perform hemolysis at a higher rate than back on Earth.
This phenomenon, called space anemia, has been well-studied. It’s part of a suite of problems that astronauts face when they come back to terra firma, which is how Guy Trudel—one of the paper’s authors and a specialist in physical medicine and rehabilitation at The Ottawa Hospital—got involved. “[W]hen the astronauts return from space, they are very much like the patients we admit in rehab,” he told Ars.
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Source: Ars Technica – We don’t know why, but being in space causes us to destroy our blood
There are two kinds of mistakes that make your car look bad: Things you do because you don’t care, and things you do because you care too much but in the wrong way. This list covers both.
Source: LifeHacker – 16 Things That Make Your Car or Truck Look Cheap and Tacky
Enlarge / A Ukrainian Military Forces serviceman watches through a spyglass in a trench on the frontline with Russia-backed separatists near Avdiivka, southeastern Ukraine, on January 9, 2022. (credit: Anatolii Stepanov | Getty Images)
Ukraine said it was the target of a “massive cyber attack” after about 70 government websites ceased functioning.
On Friday morning targets included websites of the ministerial cabinet, the foreign, education, agriculture, emergency, energy, veterans affairs, and environment ministries. Also out of service were the websites of the state treasury and the Diia electronic public services platform, where vaccination certificates and electronic passports are stored.
“Ukrainians! All your personal data has been uploaded to the public network,” read a message temporarily posted on the foreign ministry’s website. “All data on your computer is being erased and won’t be recoverable. All information about you has become public, fear and expect the worst.”
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Source: Ars Technica – Ukraine says government websites hit by “massive cyber attack”
