Geek News

The Boston public access station WGBH has partnered with PBS for another short series in its long-running Nova family of programs. Nova Wonder will follow three researchers exploring big scientific mysteries. The first of the miniseries' six episodes airs on PBS on Wednesday, April 28th, with a new one every week. Each episode tackles a different complex question: Do animals have a secret language? Which AI technologies could surpass human abilities? How ethical is it to grow life in a lab? The show will go deep in the sea and peer into outer space to find answers. But more notable is the refreshingly young and diverse trio of hosts who practice leading scientific methods and technologies. mathematician and statistician Talithia Williams uses data models to analyze environmental and human biological info, while computer scientist Rana el Kaliouby specializes in emotion recognition tech and neuroscientist André Fenton specializes in the biology of memory. "What is so uniq...

A nonprofit is bringing local broadcast television to the online masses for free, but who knows how long that will last. The organization, Sports Fans Coalition, launched the streaming site Locast.org on January 11th, letting anyone in New York City's five boroughs watch content from 15 local channels without paying a dime -- at least until the lawsuits start flying. That's because a similar service, Aereo, tried to snag over-the-air TV broadcasts and stream them as their own $8 per month subscription service. The Supreme Court deemed that illegal for violating copyright law back in 2014, and Aereo shut down. Locast may run afoul of that argument since it's technically live-broadcasting other channels' content without their approval. But it's otherwise different, only providing local channels to users in New York City, streaming content for free (though they encourage minimal donations to cover costs) and operating as a nonprofit. The Locast team believes the s...

Stylized fighting game Skullgirls came out for mobile in May of last year. It was developed by Autumn Games and initially published by Line. Now, the developer has decided to part ways with the publisher and go back to being independent. As a result of this transition, the developer launched a new version (basically Skullgirls 2.0 ) and shut down the old one (now called LINE Skullgirls ) on the App Store and Google Play. The title's relaunch brings a bunch of new updates, including extra Daily Log In loot, double fighters and moves for single gacha-style hero acquisitions, official ultra widescreen support for iPhone X and select Android phones like the Samsung S8, improved Relic coloring (so you know how rare a fighter is) and several bug fixes. In addition, the developer has promised a greater transparency around loot drop rates, along with a guaranteed random generation of loot itself. "While other games may 'cook the books' to create the illusion that loot r...

Twitter this evening released a new set of statistics related to its investigation on Russia propaganda efforts to influence the 2016 US presidential election, including that 677,775 people were exposed to social media posts from more than 50,000 automated accounts with links to the Russian government. Many of the new accounts uncovered have been traced back to an organization called the the Internet Research Agency, or IRA, with known ties to the Kremlin. The data was first presented in an incomplete form to the Senate Select Intelligence Committee last November, which held hearings to question Facebook, Google, and Twitter on the role the respective platforms and products played in the Russian effort to help elect President Donald... Continue reading… via The Verge - Tech Posts "http://ift.tt/2FWM7wN"

Fat Month Fat, I wish I knew how to quit you. One of my most vivid childhood memories revolves around willfully subjecting myself to stomach cramps and explosive diarrhea. via Popular Science "http://ift.tt/2DSeJqa"

Technology The video game company has a history of making consoles about more than just a controller. Nintendo's new STEM toy looks continues its tradition of trying to make console gaming more creative. via Popular Science "http://ift.tt/2FYYSH5"

Last week, Twitter missed the deadline Congress set to turn over information on Russia-backed meddling in the 2016 election. Today, the social media company posted a public update on their internal investigation. First, they found thousands of additional accounts associated with the Russian government-linked Internet Research Agency (IRA). But most importantly, Twitter is emailing notifications to everyone in the US who inadvertently followed one or retweeted or liked one of their messages -- which is some 677,775 people. In effect, that's a simple measure of the impact that the IRA's accounts had. Twitter identified 1,062 additional accounts, bringing the total to 3,814; In the ten-week period before the 2016 election that the company studied, those IRA accounts posted 175,993 tweets. Only 8.4% were related to the upcoming elections, but that's still a wide impact that the Twitter platform unwittingly amplified. Twitter also identified 13,512 more automated Russian-l...

If you had the chance to ask your favorite vlogger what they want in a camera, you’ll probably get a laundry list of feature requests. It should have the ability to record 4K video in a variety of framerates. It should be small and unobtrusive, so it can be carried around at arms length for hours at a time. It needs a display that flips around so they can see their framing when they are asking for their audience to smash that like button. And importantly, it needs an external microphone input so they can record clean, crisp audio to the same device they are filming with. Perhaps unsurprisingly, there aren’t really any cameras that fully fit this description. Even Sony’s super popular RX100 lineup lacks the microphone input that larger... Continue reading… via The Verge - Tech Posts "http://ift.tt/2EZp5Eh"

Google CEO Sundar Pichai responded today to the firing of employee James Damore over his controversial memo on workplace diversity , stating that while he does not regret the decision, he regrets that people misunderstood it as a politically motivated event. Speaking in a live conversation with journalist and Recode co-founder Kara Swisher, MSNBC host Ari Melber, and YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki in San Francisco, Pichai said that the decision to fire Damore was about ensuring women at Google felt like the company was committed to creating a welcoming environment. “I regret that people misunderstand that we may have made this for a political belief one way or another,” Pichai said. “It’s important for the women at Google, and all the people... Continue reading… via The Verge - Tech Posts "http://ift.tt/2EXwdB4"

Google CEO Sundar Pichai, speaking at a taped television event hosted by MSNBC and The Verge ’s sister site Recode , said artificial intelligence is one of the most profound things that humanity is working on right now and compared it to basic utilities in terms of its importance. Speaking to Recode ’s Kara Swisher and MSNBC’s Ari Melber, Pichai said AI is “one of the most important things that humanity is working on. It’s more profound than, I don’t know, electricity or fire,” adding that people learned to harness fire for the benefits of humanity but also needed to overcome its downsides, too. Pichai also said that AI could be used to help solve climate change issues, or to cure cancer. The remarks from the chief executive of Google,... Continue reading… via The Verge - Tech Posts "http://ift.tt/2DPvdiS"

Last summer, Disney announced it was ending its licensing deal with Netflix , and it would be launching its own streaming service in 2019. Variety is now reporting that the company has hired Apple veteran Kevin Swint to build and run that new service. Swint will be the senior VP and general manager of the unnamed service, the report states. He’s no stranger to the world of content streaming: he was an early member of Walmart’s e-commerce team in the early 2000s, and helped launch its music downloads site in 2003, according to his employment history via LinkedIn . From there, he joined Apple’s iTunes team, where he helped expand the store internationally and launch its HD movies and iTunes Extras features. In 2013, Samsung also hired... Continue reading… via The Verge - Tech Posts "http://ift.tt/2mQwe28"

Blast Motion is known for making sports sensors aimed at improving your golf, baseball or softball performance and now they've teamed up with TaylorMade on a putter that can analyze your putting strokes. The Spider Interactive Powered by Blast putter marries TaylorMade's most popular putter with Blast Motion's motion capture sensors and can measure and report your backstroke time, forward stroke time, tempo, impact stroke speed and face rotation. With the accompanying app, users will be able to track their progress, access training modules and view videos of their strokes. Other companies including Garmin and Zepp , the latter of which just agreed to stop selling one of its sensors in the US as part of a patent dispute settlement with Blast Motion , also offer golf swing sensors. But, like Blast Motion's Blast Golf setup, they're external sensors that attach to a golfer's glove or club. The Spider Interactive putter, however, houses the sensor within the gr...

Last week Mark Zuckerberg kicked off his year of making sure your time on Facebook is "well spent" by announcing that feeds will refocus on items shared by friends , instead of news. Today the CEO followed up with an announcement that the site will try to identify and highlight "trusted sources" based on community feedback. While the combination of these changes is apparently only going to change the mix of news in feeds from five percent to four percent, its stated claim is to avoid " sensationalism, misinformation and polarization." Source: Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook) via Engadget RSS Feed "http://ift.tt/2DqovD9"

Technology The cables that keep information flowing through the Big Apple are undergoing a transformation, from aging copper to strong and fast fiber. The cables that keep information flowing through the Big Apple are undergoing a transformation, from aging copper to strong and fast fiber. via Popular Science "http://ift.tt/2DT31eU"

We spend a lot of time trying to eke out a few more minutes from our smart phones. Apple is offering cheap battery replacements and apologizing for iPhone slowdowns , while Android may update to show you which apps drain your battery the most. It's not too surprising, then, that a developer might take a darkly humorous approach to the impending loss of battery power. Called Die With Me , this new app offers users a chat room when their phone has less than 5 percent battery left. As Motherboard reports, the app was developed by Dries Depoorter and David Surprenant, Belgium-based app developers. "We wanted to do something positive with a low battery," he told the site. "And now we see people happy with a low battery having low battery conversations. We had so much fun creating this." The app has been in development since 2016, says Motherboard, and is now available (after some delays on the iOS side due to Apple's struggle with it's own battery issu...

Netflix has snagged several former show hosts to head their own programs, from Chelsea Handler to David Letterman. Next on the list is Joel McHale, who notably starred in the priceless sitcom Community but got big helming E! channel's unscripted pop culture-gouging talk show The Soup . For Netflix, he'll host The Joel McHale Show Starring Joel McHale ...an unscripted pop culture-gouging talk show. Hey @Netflix : I think you misunderstood when I demanded "a lot of green" for my new show. #JoelMcHaleShow pic.twitter.com/SICdubeL1m — Joel McHale (@joelmchale) January 19, 2018 In fact, Netflix's other star-hosted shows are similarly patterned after the programs that got them famous: Letterman interviewed President Obama on his show's first episode with a list of high-profile celebrities to follow, while Chelsea Handler helmed her own talk show for two seasons. Like The Soup , which McHale hosted from 2004 to 2015, his new show will feature him talkin...

The Jamboxx , a hands-free wind MIDI controller, has relaunched and opened its store again after a year and a half-long hiatus off the market. The new version of the Jamboxx is retooled to include a specially developed optical sensor that should last longer and provide a better playing experience. The Jamboxx is pretty unusual for a musical instrument. It works by registering breath blown into the front of it via a mouthpiece, similar to a harmonica. How impactful the breath is changes the velocity of the note, and moving the mouthpiece from side to side changes what note is played. There is the option to adjust the breath control to set the amount of airflow needed to play notes. The face of the instrument also has tactile bumps, similar... Continue reading… via The Verge - Tech Posts "http://ift.tt/2BfwQ6D"

It's hard watching Facebook struggle. Like how for the past two years it's alternated between looking like it's doing something about fake news, and actually doing something about fake news. The company's latest stab at the problem is saying it will change what people see in their News Feeds. The goal is to show users less posts from companies or brands, and more shares (or posts) from friends, in particular ones its algorithm thinks will get you excited. They're not specifically saying this has anything to do with stopping the spread of fake news from virulent racists, politically active conspiracy theorists, or propaganda farms successfully goading our country into tearing itself apart. No, because that would indicate they've identified the problem. Instead, Facebook says this notable change to the News Feed -- its cash cow fed by your attention -- is to make Facebook feel more positive for users. To bring people closer together. Wink. At this stage,...

Health Opinions vary among medical professionals. Finding out you have cancer is a bell you can’t unring. As doctors increasingly have the tools to find cancers before they actually pose a problem, we’re going to have… via Popular Science "http://ift.tt/2BhRQda"

The list of streaming holdouts just got shorter. British rock outfit Def Leppard has made its catalog of older albums available on streaming services for the first time. Until now, only the band's more recent releases were on the likes of Spotify and others. In other words, the material from the band's glory days -- like Pyromania and Hysteria -- weren't included in music services' catalogs. Of course, it's also a nice bit of promotion ahead of the group's summer tour with Journey . Def Leppard's situation was unique compared to some other bands (or the people who owned the rights) who were just cautious to opt in. As Billboard notes , the band was at odds with its former label over licensing, so it was hesitant to even make its older music available for download -- let alone streaming. In fact, the rift led Joe Elliot & Co. to re-record some of its older material just to get it on iTunes. It would appear Def Leppard resolved its dispute with U...

Duncan Jones' next movie won't be coming to theaters -- it's going straight to streaming. The Moon and Warcraft director has revealed that his long-in-the-making sci-fi film noire, Mute , will premiere on Netflix February 23rd. The movie is set in a future Berlin where a mute bartender (played by Alexander Skarsgård) has to trust a pair of American surgeons (led by Paul Rudd) as he tracks down a disappeared woman. Justin Theroux also stars. There's no trailer yet, but in many ways the effort taken to release the movie is the hook -- Netflix is giving Jones a chance that might not have come up through conventional formats. As Jones noted , Mute is his " Don Quixote ." It was supposed to be his first movie (he had a first draft in 2003), but it got pushed back for a number of reasons. Sam Rockwell was supposed to play a role, but Jones' insistence on different casting led him to write Moon to give Rockwell a lead ( Mute is a sort of spiritual follo...

Amazon added voice commands to its Music and Shopping apps a while back, but if you wanted to use your phone as an Echo-style speaker, you were out of luck. Now, though, an Alexa app update adds support for Alexa voice interaction on your Android phone. Just like using an Echo or Echo Dot , you can use ask your phone's Alexa to find nearby restaurants, order gadgets from Best Buy or find out what movies are playing in your town. Better yet, the updated Alexa app can show responses on-screen, too, giving you visual details about the upcoming weather, sports updates, calendar appointments and more. The update should roll out to Android customers in the coming days; the company promises an iOS update "soon." via Engadget RSS Feed "http://ift.tt/2rmfchM"

The Lockheed Martin SR-71 Blackbird is one of the most recognizable aircraft designs in history. Few other planes have captured the public's attention and imagination in quite the same way as the SR-71 has since it was declassified in 1990 (nearly 30 years after it entered service). And though we're now two decades on from the Blackbird's retirement, America's need for supersonic, high-altitude surveillance has not diminished. That's why Lockheed's secretive Skunk Works team has been developing the SR-72, dubbed " Son of Blackbird ", since at least 2007. This next generation spy plane will reportedly exceed its predecessor in nearly every way. Rumored to be powered by an air-breathing scramjet engine, the SR-72 will conceivably be capable of topping Mach 6 (4,000MPH), granting the hypersonic aircraft an ability to streak through enemy air defenses before anyone knows it's even there. But drafting a design proposal and building an unmanned air...