Search Results for "september 28"

Justin Robert Young, Darren Kitchen and Len Peralta fill in for Tom on vacation and talk about Apple Security.

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If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the headlines music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes

Today’s guest hosts: Justin Robert Young, Darren Kitchen and Len Peralta!

Buy Len’s great artprov “The Jawcracker” as drawn live on DTNS!  http://lenperaltastore.com/products/jawcracker-print

Apple CEO Tim Cook spoke to the Wall Street Journal today, promising additional steps to keep hackers out of user accounts, but said that none of the Apple ID’s and passwords obtained in the recent celebrity iCloud leaks were taken from the company’s servers. Cook said hackers obtained the nude photos of more than 100 women by either correctly guessing security questions to obtain passwords, or by obtaining the data from a phishing scam. Apple will launch new security measures in two weeks, alerting users via email and push notifications when someone tries to change an account password, restore iCloud data to a new device, or when a device logs into an account for the first time. Apple will also begin encouragin users to turn on two-factor authentication, and overall pay more attention to account security. We talk about this and more in a few with Darren.

Gigaom has the roundup of Thursday’s Motorola event in Chicago, where the company unveiled updated versions of its Moto X and Moto G smartphones and revealed its new Android Wear smartwatch, the Moto 360. As expected, the round smart watch was the star of the party. The Moto 360 pairs with any smartphone running Google Android 4.3 or above using Bluetooth and features wireless charging. Motorola says the wireless radio is powerful enough to allow a user to leave their paired phone several rooms away and still access apps on the watch. The 360 has a heart-rate monitor and pedometer and responds to touchscreen and Google Now voice commands. The watch weighs 1.72 ounces, features interchangeable bands, and costs $250 dollars. Oh also? it’s all sold out. But I’m pretty sure they’ll make some more.

We should probably tell you about those phones, too. The Moto X’s AMOLED screen grew from 4.7 inches to 5.2 inches, featuring full HD resolution. Motorola has contracted with a Chicago tannery called Horween (yeah, you heard me now let’s all say it together WHORE-WEEN) to custom-design leather back plates. The X will cost $100 WITH a contract from US carriers or $500 for the unlocked unsubsidized version. The Moto G, also got an ungrade to speaker, processor, camera and screen and will only be sold as an unsubsidized, unlocked phone for $180.

And one more Moto nugget to jab in your ear. The Verge reports that the company also unveiled a wireless earbud called The Hint, which is about the size of a peanut, and is intented to sit in your ear all day long. The hint has 3.3 hours of talk time, costs $149.99 dollars and will be available in the fall.

Reuters reports that an unknown hacker or hacker group broke into a test server supporting the US healthcare.gov site and uploaded malicious files. The first intrusion occurred on July 8th, when malware designed to launch a DDOS attack was uploaded. Healthcare officials told Congress no personal data was stolen.

Hoping to find DOTA 2 sharing the same schedule as Monday Night Football and SportsCenter? Don’t hold your breath. At Code/Media Series: New York, ESPN President John Skipper offered his opinion on eSports. “It’s not a sport — it’s a competition. Chess is a competition. Checkers is a competition, mostly I am interested in doing real sports.” In November of last year, Riot games claimed it had 8.2 Million concurrent TWITCH viewers for it’s League of Legends championship. Not to compare chip stacks, but ESPN reported a record 1.23 million total viewers for it’s live broadcast of the 2013 World Series of Poker final table.

Reuters reports that lawmakers in New Orleans have voted to allow online for-hire car companies like Uber to operate in the city. Under the new ordinance, Uber will be allowed to provide its Uber Black service, which enables passengers to connect with drivers of luxury cars via a smartphone app. The council did not vote on whether to authorize popular and less expensive ridesharing services like UberX and Lyft, which have been the focal point of legal challenges from taxi cab firms and regulators around the globe.

It’s that magic time, when all coffee is pumpkin coffee and the Full Corn Moon hangs heavy in the sky. It’s the silliest of seasons for Apple rumors in advance of their official announcement next week. So here are a few of the best. Brian X. Chen of the New York Times reports the new larger iPhones will have a one-handed mode that can be toggled on or off to make their large screens easier to use and furthermore, the rumored iWatch will be ANNOUNCED Tuesday but not available until 2015. What? You like your rumors more specious? How about this from SlashFilm editor Peter Sciretta who passed along a nugget on Twitter saying U2 ALLEGEDLY shot a commercial for an unnamed new Apple product in Ireland with legendary video director Mark Romanek. Or we can be boring and tell you the official announcement will be streamed to Safari Browsers and AppleTV’s at 1 pm ET / 10 am PT this Thursday September 9th LIVE from the Flint Center for the Performing Arts where near 30 years ago, Steve Jobs announced the original Macintosh.

News From You: 

metalfreak passes along a PC World report on a Chinese man who is suing one of the country’s state telecommunication firms for disrupting access to Google after the government started blocking the company’s services in May. Wang Long, a legal practitioner, sued China Unicom, demanding that the company provide an explanation, and refund his Internet broadband and mobile charges from the past five months. One Chinese state-run publication said this is the first time a local resident has sued a company for failing to provide access to Google.

PTrevethan shares a TechCrunch report about a new Google indoor mapping backpack, which is not at all ominously named The Cartographer. The backpack uses a process called “simultaneous localization and mapping” (SLAM), which allows the user automatically generated a floor plan in real time, while using a tablet to map ‘points of interest’.

And ancrod2 has a Gizmodo report about the latest in wearable technology. Hint: It’s not a watch. Researchers at Hong Kong Polytechnic have created Fabric Circuit Boards--that’s fabric woven out of a mixture of copper and elastic threads using computerized knitting technologies. The stretchy fabric is bulletproof which has great potential for people who get shot; it can also carry a current and communicate, which means that someday your shirt can tell you that its dirty, and your yoga pants can inform you that they are, indeed, see-through.

Plug of the Day:  The Sword and Laser Anthology collects 20 amazing stories from new writers in the Sword and Laser book club audience. 10 SciFi and 10 fantasy stories with an introduction by Patrick Rothfuss. Get a copy at swordandlaser.com/store

Pick of the Day:  “What If” by Randall Munroe via Preston

Preston in only OK Silly-con Valley has our pick of the day: “I just wanted to throw in a pick of the day for Randall Munroe’s new book “What if?“. Although I haven’t read it yet I have read all his entries at his site what-if.xkcd.com and really enjoyed them all. Randall tackles absurd hypothetical questions such as “What if there was a robot apocalypse? How long would humanity last?” and “Has humanity produced enough paint to cover the entire land area of the Earth?” using science, logic and humor. Ever wonder if you could lift yourself in the air with guns Yosemite Sam style? The answer is in here. (The answer is yes, but don’t try it at home.)

Monday’s guest hosts: Scott Johnson, Brian Ibbott and Justin Robert Young!

Peter Wells is on the show and we’ll talk about Soundcloud’s new advertising-supported rev share plan for artists. Is Soundcloud becoming TOO YouTube-like?

MP3

Multiple versions (ogg, video etc.) from Archive.org.

Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.

A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the headlines music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes

Today’s guest: Peter Wells, of Reckoner, Australia

Headlines

The Verge has been chatting with sources familiar with Microsoft’s plans who say September 30th is tentatively when a press announcement of the next version of Windows is scheduled. The OS, codenamed Threshold is expected to come out as a technical preview sometime in September or October. What is guessed by many to end up being called Windows 9, will have a new mini start menu, get rid of the charms bar, and have a few other UI tweaks. We might even get a version of the Cortana virtual assistant. It’s possible we’ll get detail son the unification of Windows RT and Windows Phone as well. 

Reuters, citing subscription tech news site The Information, reports that EBay told potential candidates for the job of Paypal CEO about a possible spinoff of Paypal. Whether that would mean part or all of Paypal would be spun off, we don’t know. Ebay recently resisted demands by activist shareholder Carl Icahn to separate PayPal from its parent company.

Engadget reports Comcast will officially launch its TV service over the Internet on several college campuses this year, including Bridgewater College, Drexel University, Emerson College, Lasell College and the University of Delaware. The service comes included with room and board and can only be used on campus, although among the 80 channels are ESPN and HBO which can be accessed off campus through the WatchESPN and HBO Go apps. Comcast hopes to add other universities soon. A company called Philo provides similar service to Harvard, Stanford and Yale. 

GigaOm reports the class action lawsuit put forth by Max Schrems Europe v Facebook campaign is going forward in Austria. The Vienna Regional Court gave Facebook Ireland four weeks to respond to the claimants’ accusations of widespread breaches of data protection law.

According to CNET, Google Chrome is now available for Cubans to download at google.co.cu. Google executives reportedly visited Cuba in June to push for greater Internet access. US sanctions make it difficult for US businesses to do anything in Cuba and Google hinted as much in their G+ post about the launch but hope to figure out how to make more tools available in sanctioned countries. This will surely be highly anticipated by the five percent of Cubans that US NGO Freedom House estimates have regular access to the Internet in Cuba.

The New York Times reports Soundcloud will begin to incorporate advertising in its audio streaming service, starting with Red Bull, Jaguar and Comedy Central. The revenue will mostly go to artists and labels. A new program called On Soundcloud Premier will let select organizations and indie artists join a revenue sharing plan. Big publishers like BMG all the way own to indies like rapper GoldLink are part of the first group in the Premier program. Soundcloud said they also plan to provide a subscription service that would allow listeners to pay to make the ads go away.

The Next Web reports iBeacon-based company Estimote is promoting something they call “nearables” as opposed to wearables. Estimote stickers have integrated accelerometer and temperature sensors and can work with more than just iBeacon. A developer kit is being unveiled today with 10 Estimote Stickers for $99. 

News From You

tm204 submitted the MIT News post about a paper describing how to take discarded car batteries and recycles materials from them into longer-lasting solar panels. The panels use a compound called perovskite which requires lead. Rather than produce the lead from raw ore, the researchers can take the lead from one car battery and make enough solar panels to power 30 households. The paper will appear in in Energy and Environemental Science by professors Angela M. Belcher and Paula T. Hammond, graduate student Po-Yen Chen, and three others.

bmbuffalo posted the imgur gallery showing how a fully fucntional 1 Kilobyte hard drive was made by a user called smelly string in Minecraft. A second, larger unit created by The0JJ can store 4KB of data. The devices use Redstone to power pistons that represent binary values by pushing a solid or clear block in front of the redstone signal. Solid blocks are used as ones and clear blocks as zeroes.

funkaround sends along a Wired.com article with the depressing news that Apple’s iMesssage is being taken over by spammers, specifically those hawking fake luxury goods. According to one security analyst, iMessage is a “spammers dream” because it spans the entire Apple ecosystem and Apple scripts can churn out masses of messages. You can report spam to Apple in a tedious process involving taking screenshots or just turn off iMessage until Apple gets the hint.

tekkyn00b pointed out the Android Central article that T-Mobile is heating up the US mobile wars offering a free year of unlimited LTE service if a customer can get someone to switch from Sprint, Verizon or AT&T to T-Mobile. That means the referrer and the new customer both get the free year. Sprint for its part has offered an unlimited talk, text and data plan for $60 a month. 

Discussion Links: 

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/21/business/media/popular-and-free-soundcloud-is-now-ready-for-ads.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/21/business/media/popular-and-free-soundcloud-is-now-ready-for-ads.html

http://blog.soundcloud.com/2014/08/21/introducing-on-soundcloud/

http://thisisadynasty.tumblr.com/post/87945465547/brb-deleting-soundcloud

http://thenextweb.com/apps/2014/08/21/soundcloud-introduces-ads-first-time-brings-revenue-sharing-creators/

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/aug/21/soundcloud-ads-musicians-major-labels

Plug of the Day:

Like tech history? I’ve teamed up with Scott Johnson to put out monthly looks at what happened in history this month. For 99 cents you get what happened on each day of the month that helped make the tech we sue today, plus illustrations from Scott Johnson. The latest book covering things that happened in September, JUST hit the store today! Check it out for 99 cents each at tommerrittbooks.com or just search Amazon.

Pick of the Day: You Need A Budget via Mike Reed

I would like to suggestion YNAB (You Need a Budget) as a pick. This is a great piece of software, and set of basic rules to assist you in managing your finances. Their software is not cheap at $60, but it is very much worth it. There is a Windows and Mac version for the desktop, and iOS, Android, and Kindle Fire for mobile. The killer feature is Dropbox synchronization. I can be at the grocery store, make my purchase and as I walk out of the store, input the transaction into my mobile device. It immediately updates through Dropbox to any other client, and shows me what the budget for that category was, and what it is now. The company is extremely supportive with numerous live classes to learn the process and software, and a great and helpful online community. I recommend this software to people who need help, and people who don’t. It is a great way to stay on top of your finances, and set great goals for the future.

Friday’s Guest: Darren Kitchen of hak5.org and Len Peralta of all the arts!

Adam Curry joins us to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the launch of the Daily Source Code show and podcasting as we know it.

MP3

Multiple versions (ogg, video etc.) from Archive.org.

Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.

A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the headlines music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes
Today’s guest: The Podfather, Adam Curry of the No Agenda podcast and curry.com

Headlines

James Bamford, author of the Puzzle Palace and Shadow Factory published an account on Wired of his 3 days spent interviewing Edward Snowden in Moscow. Among the many revelations, Snowden cites two main discoveries that caused him to do what he did. On was the data center built in Blufdale, Utah to store intercepted data. For the other, he describes a tool called MonsterMind that would monitor all digital communications and ‘auto fire’ without human supervision if it detected an attack. Snowden also claims he was told the US caused the Internet outage in Syria in 2012 when covert software installation on an ISP went wrong. He also expresses disapproval of cyberattacks on China which he says target civilian institutions like universities and hospitals. 

Samsung announced the Galaxy Alpha, a 4.7-inch Android phone with a metal ring around it that causes many reporters to write the word ‘iPhone.’. The screen is 720p, runs on Samsung’s octa-core Exynos with 2 GB of RAM and 32GB of storage. The Alpha will come in five colors and be available at the beginning of September. No word yet on price.

The Next Web reports WeChat now has 438 million active users, up from 396 million last quarter and hot on the tail of Facebook’s WhatsApp with its 500 million users. The gains come in spite of the fact that 20 million Chinese WeChat accounts were closed last quarter due to a new law that requires public account owners in China to register real identities and receive permission to disseminate news. 

You may have heard that the Internet broke recently because of the 512K limit. The problem is that global routing tables, which must be stored on every border router, have grown to the maximum number of routes supported on some older hardware platforms. That number os 524,288 or 2^19. Jim Cowie at Renesys writes that the situation is more of an annoyance than a threat. All of the routers that operate core infrastructure have plenty of room and are unaffected. Affected routers may cause local connectivity problems but those can be quickly identified and hardware upgraded. Thx to CdrMarks.

News From You

spsheridan submitted the story of a murder suspect who allegedly asked Siri where to bury a body. Ars Technica reports Gainesville, Florida detective Matt Goeckel presented evidence in court Tuesday showing the suspect telling Siri, “I need to hide my roommate.” The Gainesvilel PD has clarified that the queries in the screenshot were not necessarily connected to the alleged murder.

KAPT_Kipper submitted an Engadget report that Amazon is stepping into the ring ‘em up fight with Square, unveiling Local Register, a credit-card reader and app for small businesses. The online retailer is offering a flat charge of 1.75 percent per payment until January 2016, compared to the 2.75 percent charged by Square and the 2.7 percent charged by Paypal. (The fee rises to 2.5 percent on Jan 2, 2016). The card reader costs $10 and is available for Android, iOS, and Fire devices, and a bundle that includes a Kindle Fire HDX 8.9 for $380.

Turns out Amazon v Square was just the undercard. KAPT_Kipper, our designated grudge match correspondent, also submits a Tech Crunch report thathttp://techcrunch.com/2014/08/12/uber-lyft-slap-fight/, compared to the 5,000 cancellations that Lyft alleges were generated by Uber. TechCrunch reached out to Uber to see how the company is getting that 13,000 number, but until then perhaps the two mobile-car hailing companies can settle this the old-fashioned way, with a drag race down main street at midnight. 

Discussion Links:
http://radio-weblogs.com/0001014/categories/dailySourceCode/2004/08/13.html

http://blog.curry.com/2014/01/15/theDailySourceCodeArchiveProject.html

http://arstechnica.com/business/2014/08/10-years-of-podcasting-code-comedy-and-patent-lawsuits/

http://radio-weblogs.com/0001014/2003/10/12.html#a4604

Plug of the day:  Alpha Geek Radio: mobile.alphageekradio.com

Pick of the Day:  Satechi Universal Smartphone Slot Mount via Artem Russakovskii

Hey Tom, I just listened to the episode where you mentioned the need to get a phone mount for your car. Just like you, I was into the concept of dash mounts for years, but none really worked the way I wanted them to, and I’ve tried many. Someone recommended a CD slot mounted… well, mount. And I have to tell you – it has fulfilled all my desires, for under $20. Nobody uses CDs anymore, so why not put the CD slot to good use instead? It’s located in a much more convenient place that’s both closer to you and doesn’t obstruct the view. It’s sturdy and doesn’t move unless you want it to (it does swivel every which way). The mount easily expands to fit a large phablet (my Note 3 and OnePlus One had no issues at all).
The mount is made by Satechi, a company with great history and track record: Just like it already did for many people, it will change your life. It changed mine, and everyone I’ve recommended it to loved it so far.

Check out The Novelization Realization, a podcast by Rich in Lovely Cleveland

http://novelizationrealization.tumblr.com/

Thursday’s guest: Breki Tomasson

Michael Wolf is on the show to talk about how retailers hope to grab your loyalty for the Internet of Things. Is this going to be the worst format war yet?

MP3

Multiple versions (ogg, video etc.) from Archive.org.

Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.

A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes

Today’s guest: Michael Wolf of The Next Market podcast

Headlines

SamMobile reports Samsung’s virtual reality device, allegedly called “Gear VR” will be announced alongside the new Samsung Galaxy Note 4 at the IFA conference in Berlin. Sort of a higher tech version of Google’s Cardboard, Gear VR will connect to a Galaxy device by USB 3.0 and make use of the phone’s sensors to track head motion. IFA kicks off September 5th. 

Bloomberg has an article about how landing top talent is getting tough in Silicon Valley. So much so that firms like Facebook are flying High Schoolers out to meetings with CEO Mark Zuckerberg in order to win them over from a young age. A chart from GlassDoor shows interns earning more than $5,000 a month at places like Apple Google, NVidia and Amazon, and those companies don’t even pay the most. 

CNET reports Apple lost a patent case in China to Shanghai’s Zhizhen Internet Technology over a speech-recognition patent. Zhizhen claims their patent is violated by the way Siri recognizes and analyzes a person’s speech. Apple plans to appeal the decision. 

Recode reports LG introduced KizOn Tuesday, a wearable device designed to allow parents to track their preschool and elementary children. The wristband has a button to call a predefined number and can receive calls from parents. It’s set to debut July 10 in South Korea before eventually making its way to North America and Europe in the third quarter.

ZDNet passes on that NPD DisplaySearch’s report shows tablet PCs declined year over year for the first time ever, to 56 million units. NPD DisplaySearch has lowered its forecast for tablet PC shipments in 2014 to 285 million units. The fall comes mostly in the 7-7.9-inch tablets feeling pressure from larger phones in the 5-6 inch range. Replacement cycles for tablets are also lengthening.

The Next Web reports that time spent with apps on Xiaomi phones has surpassed iPhones in China according to mobile firm Flurry. A random sample of 23,000 devices in China throughout January 2014 found the average Xiaomi user spent 7 percent more time in apps compared to Apple. The average Samsung user spent 14 percent less time than an iPhone user, while a HTC consumer spent 27 percent less time.

The Next Web also has some good news for Facebook in the Philippines. A report from OnDevice research shows 80 percent of mobile users in the Phillipines are regular Facebook Messenger users. Second place at 27% is Skype and Viber. Normally popular apps in Asia like We Chat and Line are near the bottom of the list at 15% and 10% respectively. Also interesting to note 70 percent of the country’s 40 million Internet users are younger than 30.

Google posted on the Android blog that screen mirroring from Android devices to Chromecast is now enabled. To start mirroring, simply select “Cast Screen” from the navigation drawer in the Chromecast app and select your Chromecast device. On Nexus devices, this feature is also available through the quick settings menu. The feature is in beta and will roll out to various devices over the next few days. 

THIS JUST IN Matt Chapman told Jeff Rubin of the Jeff Rubin Show that the Chapman Brothers plan to start making more HomestarRunner cartoons. That April Fool’s Day thing was a test and we passed Internet, We passed. More StrongBad emails are coming. Soon. Maybe Strongbad’s Lappy will even be rocking a Pentium!

News From You

therobertonline posted the 9to5 Google story about security researchers from Avast showing that Android’s factory reinstall only cleans at the application layer, leaving loads of personal data behind. Using off the self drive imaging programs like FTK Imager on 20 smartphones purchased from eBay, Avast recovered more than 40,000 photos, 750 emails and text messages, and even a completed loan application. Coincidentally, Avast has a tool they say does a better job, but encrypting your data, and wiping a phone loading fake data and wiping again are also good suggestions.

MikePKennedy sent in the Next Web article pointing out Google has announced its remote access plugin fro Chrome now works for Linux users. That means remote access from Chrome now works acrtoss Windows OS X Android and Linux, although for that last you need to be running the Ubuntu or Debian distros for it to work.

KAPT_Kipper posted the Engadget story that Google engineer Michele Spagnuolo discovered a critical security flaw in Adobe Flash. The so-called “Rosetta Flash” is a proof of concept, but could allow hackers to steal your cookies and other data using malicious Flash .SWF files. Many companies have patched their sites, but not all, so you’ll want to get the fix from Adobe in the latest version of Flash 10.0.0.145 and if you use Adobe AIR update that to 14.0.0.137 too. 

Finally tm204 submitted a National Journal posting about the Senate Intelligence Committee approving legislation Tuesday to make it easier for companies to share information regarding cyberthreats with each other and the US Government. The Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act or CISA is meant to remove legal barriers to cooperation against cyberattacks, while still protecting user privacy by stripping out personally identifiable information of known Americans. Sens. Ron Wyden and Mark Udall voted against the legislation, saying in a statement that it “lacks adequate protections for the privacy rights of law-abiding Americans, and that it will not materially improve cybersecurity.” Sen. Saxby Chambliss, said the bill is a carefully crafted compromise between business groups and privacy advocates.

Discussion Section: 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelwolf/2014/07/01/heres-why-retailers-are-betting-big-on-internet-of-things/?utm_content=buffera190a&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer

http://www.cepro.com/article/staples_connect_hub_slashed_to_49_newer_model_adds_bluetooth_zigbee/

http://www.cepro.com/article/staples_connect_vs_lowes_iris_home_automation_smackdown_at_ces_2014/

http://blog.nextmarket.co/post/87623736094/first-impressions-of-homekit-apples-first-step-into

http://www.zonoff.com/

http://revolv.com/faq/

 Pick of the Day: My Tracks via Vance McAlister

(As you might expect from me, another Google app, this time one very few seem to know about, I just discovered it myself!)

I wanted to point everyone to an almost unknown little app from Google called My Tracks. It most closely resembles apps like Runkeeper which track your walking, running or biking. It has large, friendly buttons for Start, Pause and Stop during your workout and then gives you the standard stats afterwards, including a map. A few fun features are that you can follow your progress on the map while you are moving, it will give you a “fly-over” movie of your movement on a 3D Google Map, and it will keep a copy of each workout map saved in a special folder in Google Drive. Super simple to use, and dead easy, but maybe not as full-featured as Runkeeper or Runtastic. Definitely worth trying out since it is free.

Thursday’s guest: Todd Whitehead of Alpha Geek Radio

Eric Olander is on to chat about Huawei, Xiaomi, and the coming disruption in smartphones that has Samsung and Apple in its sites. Also how Microsoft is fighting the US government.

MP3

Multiple versions (ogg, video etc.) from Archive.org.

Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.

A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes
Today’s guests:  Eric Olander co-host of the weekly China in Africa podcast

Headlines

The Verge reports Samsung announced two new tablets Thursday, an 8.4-inch and 10.5-inch Galaxy Tab S. The tablets are similar to the Tab Pro and Tab 4 lines but thinner at 6.6mm and sporting Super AMOLED screens. Samsung emphasized the screens not only have 2560 x 1600 resolution but a wider color range for more natural colors. Both devices will be available beginning July 4 in Europe, and sometime in July in the US. The 16GB 8.4-inch WiFi-only tablet will run €399/$399/£349 and the 10.5-inch version €499/$499/£449. Models with LTE will follow and run about €100 more.

Forbes reports Google plans to launch a health service called Google Fit, which would aggregate data from popular fitness trackers and apps. Similar to Apple’s Healthkit, the service would use an open API to allow apps to share information with the new Google Fit ecosystem. Forbes sources say the service will launch at Google I/O June 25-26. 

The Verge reports Apple announced a replacement program for European iPhone adapters sold between October 2009 and September 2012. The adapter is at risk of overheating. The affected adapter, Model A1300, was packaged in with European sales of the iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, and iPhone 4S, and was also sold separately. Customers should book an appointment at an Apple store or authorized service provider, or contact Apple Technical Support to make the exchange.

CNET reports Facebook has updated its Messenger app for iOS and Android. Version 6.0 includes the ability to record and send video clips without leaving the app, though there’s a limit of 15 seconds. Another new feature lets you press and hold the like button longer to register a “Big Like”. 

PC World reports AT&T has joined Verizon in filing a friend of the court brief in support of Microsoft’s resistance to hand over email from a server in Dublin, Ireland, to a US Government investigation. Microsoft argues the investigators should get an Irish judge to issue the order through the Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty or MLAT process. The US argues the location of the company, in this case Microsoft, is what matters, not the location of the server. AT&T wrote “this practice rests on an understanding that when it comes to data storage and privacy protections, location matters.” And warned that if the US ignores MLAT, then other countries might too and take data from US servers. 

News From You

HobbitfromPA got a good number of upvotes on the Ars Technica story that Jonathan Daniel, the man who parodied Peoria Illinois mayor on Twitter is suing Peoria’s mayor and police for violating his civil rights. Daniel created a parody account called @peoriamayor using a picture of mayor Jim Ardis. In response Peoria’s mayor got Twitter to shut down the account, but also threatened to prosecute Daniel for impersonating a public official, and had police raid search and seize property. No charges of impersonation were filed, although police did charge Daniel’s roommate with felony possession of marijuana.

metalfreak posted the Network World story that Google has started an open-source project called PDFium to create a PDF software library which developers can incorporate into apps on a variety of platforms. Google intends to replace its current closed-source PDF reader with the project. The rendering engine for the project was developed by Foxit, a long-time maker of PDF-reading software. The code will carry a BSD-3 clause software license.

KAPT_Kipper posted the Ars Technica story that IPv4 addresses have just about run out from all major registries. Asia’s APNIC, Europe’s RIPE NCC and Latin America’s LACNIC will only allow operators to get one more block of 1024 addresses and then that’s it. ARIN, the North America registry just reached it’s last phase in April, so it’s still letting ISPs come back for more for now. Only Africa’s AfriNIC is continuing to supply IPv4 addresses as needed. So IPv6. You’re up.

spsheridan posted the CNET story that the US Marshals Service announced Thursday  will auction nearly 30,000 bitcoins seized from Silk Road last October. The auction will take place June 27. Interested bidders mist register by June 23 and make a $200,000 wire transfer to a government bank to hold their place. The US Marshals Service will carry out the auction by selling nine blocks of 3,000 bitcoins and a tenth block of 2,657 bitcoins.

And KAPT_Kipper pointed out the BBC story that Xbox One owners complain a new TV ad featuring Breaking Bad’s Aaron Paul messes with their Xbox. In the ad for the Xbox One, Paul says “XZbox On” which apparently activates some Xbox One’s voice command interface turning the console on. 

Discussion Section Links: Huawei

http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2014/06/13/huawei-renews-focus-on-europe/?mod=rss_Technology

http://www.engadget.com/2014/06/12/huawei-launches-an-online-store-to-sell-its-own-unlocked-phones/

http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-06-06/huawei-says-it-can-beat-xiaomi-in-race-to-be-chinas-top-smartphone-brand

http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-06-04/chinas-xiaomi-the-worlds-fastest-growing-phone-maker

http://www.cnet.com/pictures/xiaomi-mi3s-brings-style-to-android-pictures/

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2014/05/28/biden-name-one-innovative-product-from-china/

Pick of the day: Tripit & FlightAware via Tom 

Monday’s Guest:  Mike Schramm

Iyaz Akhtar and Sean Hollister are on the show. We’ve got news coming out of E3 from Microsoft who swears they love games so please forgive them. Also did a chatbot pass the Turing test? Sort of.

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Show Notes

Today’s guests:  Iyaz Akhtar, CNET and GFQ Network

Headlines

CNET reports Microsoft made its E3 announcements and focused on games and thanking fans. The star of the show was Halo. The Master Chief Collection will come to Xbox One November 11, allowing players to take on almost every Halo game including Halo 2 multiplayer. Purchasers also get a crack at the beta of Halo 5 Guardians which isn’t scheduled for release until sometime in 2015. Further hitching their hopes to Halo, Microsoft announced Halo Nightfall, a live-action weekly series directed by Sergio Mimica-Gezzan and produced by Ridley Scott. The series will be part of the Master Chief Collection.

Of course Microsoft had lots of other things to announce as well, but the focus was firmly on games. A sequel called Rise of Tomb Raider was announced coming in late 2015 as well as the announcement of a new Crackdown. Foul-mouthed squirrel Conker is coming to Project Spark. The hit mobile game Threes comes to the decidedly not mobile Xbox One this year. And Sunset Overdrive got a release date of October 28th. 

Engadget reports EA announced developer DICE is making Star Wars: Battlefront for a spring 2015 launch. Also the Sims 4 will come to PCs September 2nd. Sims will have “heart,” can die of laughter and can be imported into someone else’s game.

The Next Web reports Microsoft has redesigned Skype for iOS from the ground to give it a consistent look and feel with Windows Phone and Android apps. Microsoft promises the app will be five times faster, with smoother scrolling and synced notifications. Users will also be able to start group chats from the main hub and send messages and photos to offline users. The new app will arrive in Apple’s App Store in about a week. 

Ars Technica reports Netflix released a new monthly speed index for May showing Verizon FiOS dropping two slots behind DSL providers Frontier and Windstream. Netflix reached an interconnection deal with Verizon that should improve performance but is still being set up. GigaOm reports Netflix also announced they will stop a test on June 16 that shows error messages claiming a particular ISP is “crowded” when connections suffer. 

TechCrunch reports Minecraft creator MArkus Persson AKA Notch has released his latest game called Cliffhorse in which you control a horse on a hilly green landscape as it pushes a ball. The game is free to download though users can choose to pay dogecoin or Bitcoins if they like and is available for Windows.

TechCrunch reports Facebook has launched a new app called Slingshot that lets you send annotated pictures and videos to friends, who can only see them if they send something back. Unlocked shots can be held to view later, but once swiped away they are not stored. The app is not available in all markets around the world.

News From You

KAPT_Kipper submitted the BBC story that Sony sold 18.7 million game consoles in its fiscal year that ended in March putting it in front of Nintendo which sold 163 million. That’s the first time Sony has passed Nintendo in 8 years. Nintendo fans may take solace int he fact that figures released for the last week of May, showed 19,312 Wii Us were bought in Japan compared to just 6,022 copies of the PS4.

melchizedek74 posted the CNET story about Amazon expanding their “Login and Pay” service to allow for recurring payments like subscriptions. Login and Pay lets customers use their Amazon account and its associated payment methods, to buy products on non-Amazon sites. Amazon has been testing the new subscription portion of the service with mobile phone service company Ting.

Our top story on the subreddit today, comes from tekkyn00b. The Verge reports developer Frederic Jacobs noticed that iOS 8 will randomize a phone’s MAC address when searching for WiFi hotspots, reducing the chances that your phone can be identified. Lots of businesses, especially at malls and shopping centers, gather the publicly broadcast MAC addresses in order to gather marketing data on shoppers. While shops promise they do not collect personally identifiable information, randomizing the MAC address broadcast to WiFi will make sure of it.

And Berke80 sent in the Engadget story that Elon Musk told folks at the UK launch of the Tesla Model S yesterday, that he wants to open the designs of the Supercharger system in order to make a standard that other car makers can adopt. Musk would require participating companies to include charging costs in the cost of the car and help pay to maintain the supercharger network.

Discussion Section Links

http://www.theverge.com/2014/6/9/5793642/halo-nightfall-digital-series-coming-to-xbox-from-producer-ridley-scott

http://www.engadget.com/2014/06/09/halo-master-chief-collection/?ncid=rss_truncated

http://www.cnet.com/news/lara-croft-plans-to-raid-the-xbox-holiday-2015/#ftag=CAD590a51e

http://thenextweb.com/media/2014/06/09/halo-nightfall-digital-series-headed-xbox-one-remastered-halo-compilation-november/?utm_source=social&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=profeed&utm_reader=feedly

http://www.cnet.com/news/halo-5-confirmed-for-2015-halo-master-chief-collection-out-in-november/#ftag=CAD590a51e

http://www.cnet.com/news/e3-2014-microsoft-xbox-one-focus-is-all-about-games/#ftag=CAD590a51e

http://recode.net/2014/06/09/an-ai-program-allegedly-passed-the-turing-test-so-what/

http://io9.com/why-the-turing-test-is-bullshit-1588051412
http://www.princetonai.com/

Pick of the day:  PC Perspective’s Hardware Leaderboard via Andy Welch

Andy Welch has our pick of the day: “For building a desktop, I’d like to recommend PC Perspective’s Hardware Leaderboard as a very useful reference. I don’t have time (or interest) in keeping up with the latest in pc hardware, but when I need a new desktop pc every few years, this is a great spot that I go to. They update it monthly to provide an updated list of major components based on current prices and technology. They show 4 different builds from about $500 low end, $1000, $1300, and $3000 top end. I’ve used it myself and recommend it to others all the time.”

Tuesday’s Guest: Raj Deut, of Reckoner Australia and 1,000 Words On