Innholdsfortegnelse for #358 i Techlife News

When Stephen Dennis was raising his two sons in the 1980s, he never heard the phrase “screen time,” nor did he worry much about the hours his kids spent with technology. When he bought an Apple II Plus computer, he considered it an investment in their future and encouraged them to use it as much as possible. Boy, have things changed with his grandkids and their phones and their Snapchat, Instagram and Twitter. “It almost seems like an addiction,” said Dennis, a retired homebuilder who lives in Bellevue, Washington. “In the old days you had a computer and you had a TV and you had a phone but none of them were linked to the outside world but the phone. You didn’t have this omnipresence of technology.” Today’s grandparents may…

A chill, bearded and nose-ringed Jack Dorsey appeared unflappable as he faced hours of questioning from members of Congress Wednesday on issues as wide-ranging as political bias, hate speech, school safety and election manipulation. At 9:30 a.m., he began at the Senate intelligence committee, alongside Facebook’s practiced and polished chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg and an empty chair in place of the absent Google co-founder Larry Page. In the afternoon, a 1:30 hearing featured a solo Dorsey before the 54-member House Energy and Commerce Committee. Dorsey, who meditates regularly, live-tweeted his opening statement and answered questions in a low, measured tone. He repeatedly declined to rise to the bait offered by sometimes scathing legislators, instead holding forth as the nerdy and earnest CEO who just wants to improve his company…

Amazon on Tuesday became the second publicly traded company to reach $1 trillion in market value, hot on the heels of iPhone maker Apple. The milestone is another sign of Amazon’s swift rise from an online bookseller to a behemoth that sells toilet paper, TVs and just about anything. In its two decades, Amazon has expanded far beyond online shopping and into health care, advertising and cloud computing. Its growth has boosted the fortunes of its founder and CEO, Jeff Bezos. His 16 percent stake in Amazon is now worth more than $160 billion. Forbes magazine placed him at the top of its list of billionaires for the first time this year, surpassing Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and investor Warren Buffett. Amazon’s stock has increased almost 600 percent in the…

The sinister-sounding term “shadow banning” has been in play recently, mostly thanks to conservatives — including President Donald Trump — accusing Twitter and other technology companies of political bias. “Twitter ‘SHADOW BANNING’ prominent Republicans. Not good. We will look into this discriminatory and illegal practice at once! Many complaints,” the president tweeted on July 26. (His tweet was not accurate.) Here’s a look at shadow banning and why it’s now a political issue. HISTORY OF SHADOW BANNING Shadow bans started in the early days of online discussion groups and the tools used to police disruptive participants. Moderators could always just disable the accounts of spammers, harassers or those who were just too argumentative. But sometimes banned users came back with new accounts, prolonging the turmoil and creating a lengthy round…

Ocean’s 8 Having just been released from prison, Debbie Ocean (Sandra Bullock) meets up with her former criminal accomplice Lou (Cate Blanchett) to push for a sensational new heist at New York City’s yearly Met Gala. The two women assemble a team which aims to steal a necklace valued at over $150 million. FIVE FACTS: 1. This is the fourth installment of the Ocean’s film series which began with Ocean’s Eleven in 2001. 2. However, unlike the first three Ocean’s films, Ocean’s 8 has an all-female lead cast and is directed by Gary Ross rather than Steven Soderbergh. 3. The cast includes Anne Hathaway as Daphne Kluger, Helena Bonham Carter as Rose Weil and Mindy Kaling as Amita. 4. Ocean’s 8 had a lukewarm critical reception, which Kaling and Blanchettblamed…

A self-driving car that delivers your groceries seems like a great idea: a robot vehicle that uses artificial intelligence to replicate the service of yesteryear’s milkman and grocery store delivery kid. There are companies now working on the technology to make it a reality. But they still haven’t managed to get the robots to do all the work. There’s a human schlepping your food every step of the way. There’s even one behind the wheel. Tests of the technology in places like Scottsdale, Arizona, and San Jose, California, still feature human safety drivers who have to take over if the robotic one gets confused. So from picking and packing the groceries, to loading them in the car, to having the shopper come to the curb to unload them, people are…

Ever since he stepped into his role as CEO a year ago, Dara Khosrowshahi has had to deal with wave after wave of major scandals and bad press, much of which he inherited from his predecessor, Travis Kalanick. About two weeks after Khosrowshahi started his job, London’s transport regulator decided to revoke Uber’s license to operate, jeopardizing the regional business with 3.5 million passengers. A court eventually gave Uber a license, although much shorter than normal. Later that year Uber was forced to come clean about covering up a major computer attack that stole personal information about more than 57 million customers and drivers. In February, Uber agreed to pay $245 million to Google’s self-driving car spinoff to end a legal brawl that aired out allegations that Uber stole technology.…

The Justice Department is preparing to announce criminal charges in connection with the hack of Sony Pictures Entertainment in 2014, a U.S. government official familiar with the case said Thursday. Authorities are charging a North Korean who is believed to have operated out of China, according to the official, who wasn’t authorized to publicly discuss the matter before the department’s announcement and spoke on condition of anonymity. A Sony spokeswoman declined comment. The U.S. government has previously said that North Korea was responsible for the cyberattack, which resulted in the disclosure of tens of thousands of leaked emails and other materials. The FBI has said it had detected communications between computer internet addresses known to be operated by North Korea and hacking tools left behind at the crime scene, which…

French children who are going back to school Monday after summer vacation will have to do so without their mobile phones. The government passed a law banning phone use in all primary and middle schools for the entire day, including during breaks —with exceptions in cases of emergency and for disabled children. Pupils are requested to shut down their mobiles or put them in a locker. High schools can also voluntarily implement the measure. Education Minister Jean-Michel Blanquer said it aims to help children focus on lessons, better socialize and reduce social media use. The ban is also designed to fight online bullying, and prevent thefts and violence in school. The law allows teachers to confiscate phones until the end of the day in cases of non-compliance.…

The passenger boat arrives at the bottom of Veidileysufjordur, a short inlet with a long name, to drop off backpackers for a multi-day trek. A weather-beaten group that’s completed the trip waits to board, eager to get back to a part of Iceland where they can reconnect with the world via Wi-Fi. By boat, that will take about a half-hour. No roads lead to the Nordic country’s northernmost peninsula, a rugged glacial horn that reaches for the Arctic Circle. Making a phone call requires walking up a mountain for a cell signal so weak, clouds seem capable of blocking it. But internet service soon could be reaching the Hornstrandir Nature Reserve, one of the last digital-free frontiers in what might be the world’s most-wired nation. The possibility has most hikers,…

RUNNING LIKE CLOCKWORK As Apple are about to unveil the fourth generation of the Apple Watch, we at Apple Magazine are going to consider what Apple’s broader strategy for the device is going to be – why all the health and wellbeing apps and sensors are working together to produce a truly holistic snapshot for the individual user and what Apple’s ultimate vision for this information can be. From 2002 to 2004 , Apple Design Chief Jonathan Ive and other members of the design team were ordering lots of high-end Nike sports watches. At first Nike thought they appreciated great design and were flattered that the best in breed technology company was taking a similar approach to sports watches. Nobody realized that these were the first concrete steps towards the…

A recently solved drive-by shooting case in South Salt Lake highlights the effectiveness of a newly formed center that provides investigators with improved ballistics testing, according to Utah authorities. Investigators using the National Integrated Ballistic Information Network traced a stolen Glock 26 9-mm handgun to Rory Curtis Cordova, who authorities said is a 50-year-old Ogden Trece gang member, the Deseret News reported. Cordova now faces federal firearms charges that could result in 10 years behind bars. Federal, state and local law enforcement leaders said the arrest is a good example of the role the ballistics network and the Crime Gun Intelligence Center play in piecing together violent crimes. Utah U.S. Attorney John Huber said police wouldn’t have solved the South Salt Lake case and two others in Herriman and Ogden…

NASA is anxious to hear from its dust-silenced Mars rover, Opportunity, as the planet’s red skies clear. Flight controllers have been on the alert for a message from Opportunity ever since a dust storm enveloped Mars in June and contact was lost. The storm has finally diminished. That means the sky is now clear enough for Opportunity’s solar panels to receive sunlight and fire back up. But NASA this week warned it may never hear from Opportunity again. If there’s no word back in the next couple of months, NASA said it will cut back on its listening effort. Even if a message does get through, that may be the most the rover — mute since June 10 — can muster. Even before the dust storm, the 15-year-old rover was…

From new top-selling pickup trucks to an essential range extension for an electric car to the most popular SUV in the country, the 2019 model year for new vehicles has something for everyone. Fiat Chrysler’s Ram brand and General Motors’ Chevrolet will go at each other and rival Ford with tough-looking new full-size pickup trucks, while Nissan is stretching the range of the electric Leaf to beyond 200 miles on a single charge. A revamped Toyota RAV4, the top-selling vehicle in the U.S. that isn’t a pickup truck, is on sale. And there’s even a new super-fast and luxurious $300,000 Aston Martin sports car. Here are five new models to watch for the coming model year: RAM PICKUP The 2019 Ram keeps the current look of a semi cab, but…

Kamikaze Eminem Kamikaze is the legendary American rapper Eminem’s tenth studio album. Joyner Lucas, Jessie Reyez and Royce da 5’9” all make guest appearances in an album executive produced by Dr. Dre and Eminem himself. The album has a nostalgic tone, often comparing today’s hip-hop with that of the rapper’s own critical and commercial heyday. FIVE FACTS: 1. In the executive production credits, Eminem is referred to as Slim Shady. 2. The Slim Shady persona dates back to Eminem’s debut extended play Slim Shady EP in 1997. 3. In January, Eminem teased this album’s arrival by releasing a remix of an old song with new lyrics boasting that “I’ll be back”. 4. Though Justin Vernon has vocals on the song “Fall”, he is not credited for this contribution which he…

All summer, the small boat drifted steadily eastward across the churning North Atlantic until it neared the Irish coast, where it made history by becoming the first unmanned sailboat to cross the Atlantic. The SB Met, built by Norwegian company Offshore Sensing AS, reached the finish line of the Microtransat Challenge for robotic boats on Aug. 26, two and a half months after setting off from Newfoundland, according to preliminary data. It’s a milestone that shows the technology for unmanned boats is robust enough to carry out extended missions that can dramatically cut costs for ocean research, border security, and surveillance in rough or remote waters. They’re part of wider efforts to develop autonomous marine vessels such as robotic ferries and cargo and container ships that could be operating by…

UEFA plans to start using video review to help referees at next year’s Super Cup. The often-controversial technology is unlikely to be used for this season’s Champions League, UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin said. “For now, it doesn’t look as though it will happen,” Ceferin said a day after the Champions League draw. The Super Cup game between this season’s Champions League and Europa League winners will be played on Aug. 14, 2019, in Istanbul at the home stadium of Besiktas. UEFA could then use video assistant referees in next season’s Champions League, starting in the playoff round, and the Europa League from 2020. Ceferin has been a skeptic of the VAR system, promoted strongly by FIFA president Gianni Infantino, but said it worked better than expected at the World Cup…

The good news for football fans: It’s going to be much easier to watch NFL games online this year. The league is finally dropping a requirement that viewers sign in with a cable or satellite subscription, in hopes of expanding its online audience at a time when TV ratings are declining . Though there are restrictions — no free streaming on smart TVs, for instance — the move marks a significant departure for sports. Other major professional leagues still require TV subscriptions for hometown teams. The NFL regular season started Thursday (06). “We think people will still want to watch on the biggest screen possible,” said Brian Rolapp, the league’s chief business and media officer. But as more people drop cable or satellite subscriptions — or never sign up in…

Don’t judge by appearances. It’s an age-old piece of advice that is being roundly ignored by corporations, governments and law-enforcement agencies around the globe. British police use facial-recognition technology to scan crowds for suspects. Owners of the latest iPhones can unlock their phones with face ID. Whole Foods and other retailers are testing facial recognition as a way of eliminating check-out tills in stores. Modern technology means your face is both your identity and a commodity — but as an exhibition going on display in London shows, that technology is far from perfect. “Face Values,” the U.S. entry at the multinational London Design Biennale, explores how computers’ ability to read faces is changing the world, with implications for privacy and individuality that we still don’t fully understand. “We are on…

Gov. Jerry Brown will decide whether California should have the nation’s strongest protections for net neutrality rules intended to ensure a level playing field on the internet after the measure cleared the final legislative hurdle last Friday. The state Senate approved the bill over stiff opposition from internet service providers, opening another front in the war between California and President Donald Trump. The milestone was celebrated by net neutrality advocates who hope it will help drive a national policy prohibiting internet companies from favoring certain websites over others. “The premise fundamentally of net neutrality is that we as individuals get to decide where we go on the internet as opposed to be told by internet service providers,” said Sen. Scott Wiener, a San Francisco Democrat who wrote the bill. The…

THE NEXT SPECIAL EVENT IS COMING For software developers, technology critics and Apple fans, September is considered a second Christmas. Apple has made it tradition to lift the lid on its latest hardware at the same time every year, hosting a Special Event to show off products and give developers a first-hand look before anyone else. Today, we take a look back at some of the most exciting Special Events of the past ten years and share the latest rumors on Apple’s upcoming Gather Round event, where the iPhone XS and the Apple Watch 4 are expected to be unveiled, alongside other innovative new technology. 2010: STEVE JOBS INTRODUCES THE iPAD The first major Special Event held by Apple was back in 2010 when the late Steve Jobs took to…

Offers of training and stock in their new employer weren’t enough to keep four out of his five staffers when Dennis Chow sold his information technology firm in 2016. Chow and the buyers learned one of the hard lessons of a business sale — despite their best efforts, some employees will leave. People departed from both companies when SCIS Security acquired Chow’s Houston-based Xtec Systems, most of them workers who didn’t like their new assignments. “We lost maybe 25 percent of the overall workforce,” Chow says. As the number of small business sales keeps rising, staff retention is a priority — especially since low unemployment makes it easy for many workers to find new jobs. Transactions tallied by online marketplace BizBuySell.com show more than 2,700 small businesses changed hands during…

The glitzy romance “Crazy Rich Asians” topped the North American box office over Labor Day weekend, its third consecutive weekend in the No. 1 spot. The Warner Bros. film added $28.6 million over the four-day weekend, bringing its domestic grosses to $117.3 million. The shark thriller “The Meg” landed in second place in its fourth weekend, with $13.8 million, while “Mission: Impossible — Fallout” slid into third place with an additional $9.3 million, bumping it past the $200 million mark in its sixth weekend in theaters. Newcomer “Operation Finale” debuted in fourth place with $7.8 million, while “Searching,” which expanded to 1,207 locations, snagged fifth place with $7.6 million. The top 20 movies at U.S. and Canadian theaters Friday through Monday, followed by distribution studio, gross, number of theater locations,…

Cable company Charter is launching its own wireless service as cable companies try to diversify to offset slowing traditional cable TV revenue. Charter and Comcast agreed last year to cooperate on back-end operations for mobile networks, including leasing Verizon’s cellular network, but they’re offering their services separately. Comcast launched its mobile plan called Xfinity Mobile in 2017; it costs $45 a month for unlimited data. Charter’s Spectrum Mobile will also cost $45 a month for unlimited data. Charter is also offering a plan that charges $14 per gigabyte of data; that’s enough for roughly one hour of video. Service is available only to those who have Charter’s internet service. Bigger rivals are Verizon and AT&T, which are able to offer TV, internet and home phone services, along with wireless.…

Britt’Nee Brower grew up in a largely Inupiat Eskimo town in Alaska’s far north, but English was the only language spoken at home. Today, she knows a smattering of Inupiaq from childhood language classes at school in the community of Utqiagvik. Brower even published an Inupiaq coloring book last year featuring the names of common animals of the region. But she hopes to someday speak fluently by practicing her ancestral language in a daily, modern setting. The 29-year-old Anchorage woman has started to do just that with a new Inupiaq language option that recently went live on Facebook for those who employ the social media giant’s community translation tool. Launched a decade ago, the tool has allowed users to translate bookmarks, action buttons and other functions in more than 100…

Wildfires in the U.S. have charred more than 10,000 square miles so far this year, an area larger than the state of Maryland, with large fires still burning in every Western state including many that are not fully contained. Whether sparked by lightning or humans, fire has long been a force shaping the landscape of the U.S. West. Hot, dry winds can whip flames into firestorms that leave behind charred wastelands prone to erosion and mudslides. Other fires clear out underbrush, open the forest floor to sunlight and stimulate growth. Government agencies in recent decades effectively upended that cycle of destruction and rebirth. Fire suppression policies allowed fuels to build up in many Western forests, making them more susceptible to major fires. Those influences are magnified as development creeps ever…

Nearly a year after Russian government hackers meddled in the 2016 U.S. election, researchers at cybersecurity firm Trend Micro zeroed in on a new sign of trouble: a group of suspect websites. The sites mimicked a portal used by U.S. senators and their staffs, with easy-to-miss discrepancies. Emails to Senate users urged them to reset their passwords — an apparent attempt to steal them. Once again, hackers on the outside of the American political system were probing for a way in. “Their attack methods continue to take advantage of human nature and when you get into an election cycle the targets are very public,” said Mark Nunnikhoven, vice president of cloud research at Trend Micro. Now the U.S. has entered a new election cycle. And the attempt to infiltrate the…

A rocket developed by Chinese company iSpace blasted into space Wednesday carrying three miniature satellites in another milestone for the country’s budding private spaceflight industry. Reports said the SQX-1Z rocket took off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwestern China and entered space at a suborbital level. Two of the satellites will be released into space for testing while the third will re-enter the atmosphere and parachute down to Earth. It was believed to be the first time a private Chinese company had carried satellites into space. Founded in 2016, iSpace is develops “high-quality, low-cost, fast-responding” commercial launchers to serve micro-satellite manufacturers, operators, research institutes and universities at home and abroad, according to a company statement. China’s space program has traditionally been run by the military, but a number…