Новости за 21.11.2017

Next month is gonna be a big one at the FCC. In addition to getting rid of net neutrality, the commission will also vote on a proposal to begin reconsidering the broadcast ownership cap. Depending on what the commission decides next year, the outcome could lead to far more consolidation of local TV stations, resulting in fewer independent voices.

New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman revealed today that his office has been investigating a flood of spam FCC comments that impersonated real people, and criticized the FCC for withholding useful information. In an open letter addressing FCC chairman Ajit Pai, Schneiderman writes that his office has spent six months investigating who submitted hundreds of thousands of identical anti-net neutrality comments under the names and addresses of unwitting Americans. But he says that the FCC has... Читать дальше...

Following a test this past summer and a wider rollout in late October that allowed Instagram friends to live stream together, the service today is adding the option for you to request to join a pal’s live stream, just in case you believe your presence is required.

The FTC is reportedly investigating TripAdvisor after the company censored reports of rape and sexual harassment at resorts around the world. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports that in a letter sent last week to Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), the FTC said:

After an appearance in David Ayer’s Suicide Squad last year, DC fan favorite Harley Quinn will be returning to her roots in her own 26-episode animated series.

One year after a ProPublica investigation found that Facebook lets housing advertisers exclude users by race, a separate follow-up investigation found that the social network has barely changed any of its practices. The new story, published today, details how ProPublica was able to purchase targeted housing ads that excluded groups like African-Americans, Jews, and Spanish speakers, among others. Such ad targeting for housing is a violation of the federal Fair Housing Act, because of long-standing... Читать дальше...

Facebook Messenger has gotten a bunch of upgrades over the past year, and now you can add the ability to send higher-resolution photos to the list. Starting today, Facebook is rolling out the ability to send “4K” photos on the Messenger app in the US, Canada, France, Australia, the UK, Singapore, Hong Kong, Japan, and South Korea. The company says it will also be introduced to additional countries in the coming weeks.

ProtonMail, a secure email service, is launching an encrypted contacts manager today for its users. The manager provides "zero access" to contacts, ProtonMail says, meaning the company can't view what users have saved. It also features a digital signature that should prevent anyone from compromising or tampering with contact details.

About 50 years ago, the sugar industry stopped funding research that began to show something they wanted to hide: that eating lots of sugar is linked to heart disease. A new study exposes the sugar industry’s decades-old effort to stifle that critical research.

Colorado has ordered Uber to pay a fine of $8.9 million for allowing individuals with disqualifying criminal or motor vehicle offenses, or without valid licenses, to drive for the company, Reuters reports. The company blamed an “error” in its background check process for the bad drivers.

Using DJI’s Osmo stabilizer with Moment’s modular system to attach better lenses to your smartphone seems like it would be a match made in heaven — except for one small problem. The weight of the Moment lenses combined with Apple’s larger phones, like the 6 Plus and 7 Plus are too heavy for the Osmo to work properly. And even with smaller models, like the iPhone 7 or iPhone X, the Osmo’s motors have to work harder to keep things leveled out, which in turn drains the battery faster.

Earlier this month, journalist James Bridle launched a wide-reaching debate on the “industrialized nightmare production” of YouTube Kids videos. These weren’t overtly violent, sexual, or scatological videos, but they felt viscerally wrong. They consist of inane, confusing, low-budget animation sequences with seemingly algorithm-chosen titles like "BURIED ALIVE Outdoor Playground Finger Family Song Nursery Rhymes Animation Education Learning Video,” spread across channels with names that range... Читать дальше...

Microsoft’s 15-inch Surface Book 2 laptop suffers from battery drain during heavy gaming or GPU usage, a problem The Verge first identified during our review of the device last week. While plugged into the supplied charger, the battery on the base of the device will drain during certain games if the power settings are set to max performance to fully utilize the power of the hardware.

The Federal Communications Commission will vote to put an end to its net neutrality rules next month, commission chairman Ajit Pai said today. The proposal will reverse the Title II classification of internet providers, which allows the agency to put strict limits on their behavior, and replace it with the old “information service” classification, which a federal court has ruled is less comprehensive, weakening any protections that might replace those currently in force.

A new company named Buoy Labs is trying to make it easy for homeowners to monitor and cut down on their water usage. The company is releasing its debut product today, a big buoy-shaped device named Buoy, that attaches to a home’s water line and measures how much water is going through it. Using that data, Buoy can tell homeowners how much water they’re using for showers, doing dishes, cleaning laundry, and flushing toilets. It can also tell if there’s a leak.

The Justice Department announced today that it has charged an Iranian man with this year’s hack of HBO, a high-profile security breach that led to the early release of TV episodes and scripts.

One of the bigger additions in Android Oreo was picture-in-picture support, but a new software feature is only as good as the applications that support it. And now, with the release of YouTube TV 1.11 on Android, you’ll be able to use Oreo’s picture-in-picture feature to keep watching shows — even while you’re doing other things that aren’t watching shows, via 9to5Google.

When it comes to Instagram engagement, it’s a dog-eat-dog world

Continue reading…

We've fantasized about holograms for decades only to watch the big tech companies bet mostly on VR or AR. Today, however, a startup called Looking Glass is officially unveiling its idea for a hologram viewing device: the HoloPlayer One. Looking Glass previously announced a different volumetric display, called Volume, but pivoted its efforts to HoloPlayer One when Volume didn't take off like the company hoped it would.

Foxconn has been employing students illegally to work overtime at its factories to assemble the iPhone X, reports the Financial Times. Six high school students told the publication they regularly work 11-hour days assembling the device, which is illegal for student interns under China’s laws. The students were between 17 to 19 years old, and said they were told they had to work at the factory for three months as a requirement to graduate. One student told the FT they were being forced to work there... Читать дальше...

Sonos today confirmed to The Verge that customers can now play music from Spotify on its speakers with Amazon's Alexa voice assistant. To enable Spotify, users must choose it as their preferred service inside the Alexa app. Once that's done, you can tell Alexa to play your full collection of Spotify playlists, artists, albums, and songs.

Since the colorful multiplayer shooter Splatoon 2 launched on the Nintendo Switch back in July, the game has maintained a fairly steady player base, according to producer Hisashi Nogami. There was some inevitable decline once the hype of the launch wore off, but since then he says that the community has remained consistent, due in large part to a steady stream of weekly updates that have added new modes, maps, weapons, and gameplay tweaks. Over the past five months, there’s only really been one... Читать дальше...

Leica is today announcing the latest camera in its portfolio, the APS-C class CL. The CL is a very similar camera to the TL2 released earlier this year, with the same image sensor and overall performance. But it has a more traditional design than the futuristic TL2 and should appeal to those wanting a classic style camera that’s smaller, lighter, and of course, significantly cheaper than Leica’s flagship M10 rangefinder.

Black Friday is upon us, which means it’s the perfect time to purchase a new TV. There are dozens of deals from dozens of outlets, but don’t fret: we’ve pulled together an exhaustive list of the best TV deals you’ll find this year.

Misfit launched a new hybrid smartwatch today called the Command. Similarly to its earlier hybrid watch, the Phase, it tracks steps and calories and can notify wearers of calls, texts, or whatever else is happening on their phone. It doesn't have an LCD display because it's hybrid, so instead, graphic icons light up to signify notifications.