Geek News

Now that Roku is a publicly traded company , it has to release quarterly updates about how things are going. Today in its first Q4 earnings release ( PDF ), the company said that revenue is up 28 percent from last year to $188 million, while the number of active accounts grew from 13.4 million to 19.3 million and those users streamed over 4.3 billion hours of video. While investors are concerned about lower estimates for Q1 2018, the report also reveals Roku's focus going forward. The Roku Entertainment Assistant with voice commands announced late last year is expected to roll out "this fall." The company said one in five smart TVs sold in the US last year ran Roku software, and that it plans to maintain its position as the largest licensor of a smart TV OS. That will be key to the other part of its business, which is advertising. A big part of what it's doing is taking over as viewers move from broadcast to internet video, which Roku sees as an opportunity to se...

Ford will have to adjust its technology strategy, and not for the right reasons. The automaker's North America President Raj Nair has left the company after an internal investigation determined that "inappropriate behavior" was out of line with the employee code of conduct. While the company wouldn't actually say what that was, it noted that it was committed to a "safe and respectful culture." Nair's departure took effect "immediately," and was abrupt enough that Ford doesn't have a replacement lined up. The exit comes right as scrutiny over sexual harassment is reaching a fever pitch in many industries . While it's not certain Nair left for that reason, zero-tolerance policies on harassment are increasingly commonplace -- companies don't want to be seen as tolerating harassment, regardless of a worker's position or experience. And in Ford's case, that experience played an important part in its technology decisions. Na...

American companies haven't always been forthright about disclosing data breaches in a responsible way, and regulators want to encourage better behavior. The Securities and Exchange Commission has issued "interpretive guidance" that it hopes will both promote clearer disclosures and fewer ethical conflicts. The guidance asks companies to share more information about cyberattacks and other risks, and warns executives against trading securities before they've publicly shared the details of a breach -- they shouldn't dump shares knowing a hack will tank the company's stock price. Whether or not this makes a difference is another story. Although Democrats at the SEC supported the guidance, they argued that the real solution would be tougher rules requiring better disclosures and improved security standards. The guidance may formalize SEC interpretations that haven't always been made public, but it doesn't change those laws to keep pace with modern cy...

Google's ubiquitous AdSense ads are already heavily automated by their nature (they're targeted based on a look at a site's content), but it's taking that hands-off approach one step further. The search firm has officially launched Auto Ads, a system that uses machine learning to not only determine the types of ads you see, but how they're placed. The AI technology will decide how many ads are appropriate for a page and where to put them. Advertisers have to give up control, but Google has bet that they won't mind the results. A long beta test saw publishers rake in an average of 10 percent more revenue. There is a concern that trusting AI could create problems. Beta testers complained about ads crowing their pages, and there's always the concern that it'll serve fake ads or other dodgy promotions. While this could give small ad publishers an easy way to reach a wide audience, it raises the possibility of inappropriate ads not only surfacing on a ...

Medium is taking its own steps in the fight against fake news and following a major reworking of its rules, has suspended the accounts of a handful of writers. As The Outline reports, the accounts of Mike Cernovich, Jack Posobiec and Laura Loomer now link to a largely blank page that says, "This page is unavailable." Earlier this month, Medium revamped its Rules page, saying at the time , "Beyond Medium itself, we recognize that we are also part of the larger internet ecosystem. Just as we rely on outside technology, systems and information to run Medium, we also consider off-platform signals when assessing potential rules violations. We have all seen an increase and evolution of online hate, abuse, harassment and disinformation, along with ever-evolving campaigns of fraud and spam. To continue to be good citizens of the internet, and provide our users with a trusted and safe environment to read, write and share new ideas, we have strengthened our policies aroun...

Look, it's no secret that Spotify is out to make its own hardware. As of last April , Spotify was already looking for people to help craft "a category defining product akin to Pebble Watch, Amazon Echo and Snap Spectacles." (In hindsight, Spotify's HR team probably should've left that last thing off the list.) More recently, a new set of job listings for hardware production managers and operations manager suggest Spotify is finally gearing up to build... well, whatever these things are. Consider us skeptical. After all, this is a company with zero hardware and supply chain experience — the odds of striking it big with gadgets don't seem great. We can't be sure about what Spotify is actually trying to build in Stockholm, but its search for employees are in line with what you'd expect from a company trying to make a smart speaker. Last April, Spotify was looking for people with expertise in voice recognition and natural language processing. And more...

Not every child wants to be a coder or an engineer, which can make it hard to get them playing with STEM toys if they don't really care about making their own video games or building a cool robot . However, many kids are into role playing and telling stories, which is what Tech Will Save Us' newest set focuses on instead. The Electro Hero Kit asks children to build stuff to help out their favorite Marvel characters , while imparting some basic lessons about electricity in the process. Tech Will Save Us is probably best known for its Dough Universe kits, which ask kids to build all sorts of electricity-powered toys out of conductive dough. Each set comes with an assortment of electrical parts and a few tubs of colorful dough. It's very similar to Play-Doh , but with a higher salt content -- if you run out, Tech Will Save Us even provides recipes on its site for making more. The sets are basically a more tactile, squishier way to teach STEM skills. The Electro Hero Kit...

Security researchers at Appsecure found a way to access anyone's Tinder account via their phone number. The exploit took advantage of a software flaw in both the dating app's login process as well as the Facebook API that it's based on. The issues have been fixed since, but represent a pretty big security lapse. "Both the vulnerabilities were fixed by Tinder and Facebook quickly," wrote Appsecure's Anand Prakash on Medium . Facebook and Tinder rewarded the company $5000 and $1250, respectively, for its report. This isn't the first report of Tinder security flaws, either, like when the company failed to encrypt user photos and (back in 2014) exposed users' exact locations for months. When you login to Tinder, you have the option of using your phone number, which is then passed along to Facebook's Account Kit for authentication to Tinder. The Appsecure folks found that they could get a valid access token with an API request to Facebook's ...

It's no secret that Disney's upcoming streaming service will bank on familiar names , but we're now getting a clearer sense of what that means. Hollywood Reporter sources have claimed that Disney is working on a "reboot" of The Muppets , the short-lived ABC comedy that followed the lives of Kermit, Miss Piggy and crew. Other details aren't clear, but the series is reportedly in its earliest stages -- Disney hasn't even found a writer yet. The tipsters also said that Disney was exploring projects based on other recognizable names, including Honey, I Shrunk the Kids , Father of the Bride , The Mighty Ducks and The Parent Trap . In essence: if you have any positive memory associated with a Disney production, there's a chance (if just a chance) it's coming back as a streaming series. You probably won't hear about a definitive show roster until closer to the actual launch, which is currently expected in fall 2019. However, The Muppets and o...

In discussions of the ongoing battle over fake news, we often hear Facebook and Google criticized for playing a hand in spreading false information. And while both have made efforts recently to stem the spread of misinformation on their platforms, they've each had some major missteps. YouTube is talked about less often when it comes to fake news, though it isn't short of scandals itself. Last year, a number of companies and groups pulled their ads once it became known that they were appearing alongside extremist content and YouTube has also had to deal with predatory comments on children's videos , content falsely parading as being appropriate for kids and of course Logan Paul . But today, YouTube has stepped into the fake news spotlight. The number one trending video on the site earlier today was a video purporting to be evidence that David Hogg isn't a Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School student but instead an actor paid to speak out during crises . Hogg has b...

BitTorrent's peer-to-peer app and its lightweight uTorrent counterpart are susceptible to particularly nasty hijacking flaws. Google researcher Tavis Ormandy recently detailed a host of DNS rebinding exploits in Windows versions of the software that lets attackers resolve web domains to the user's computer, essentially giving the intruders the keys to the kingdom. They could execute remote code, download malware to Windows' startup folder (making it launch on the next reboot), grab downloaded files and look at your download history. The flaws touch on all unpatched versions, including uTorrent Web . Thankfully, fixes are either here or around the bend. Although Ormandy was concerned by the lack of communication after reporting the fix in December, BitTorrent engineering VP Dave Rees told Engadget that the flaws in the conventional client have been fixed in beta versions released last week. Those on the stable releases should see it this week. Ormandy was initially conce...

Facebook has dealt with some criticism over the unpaid use of licensed music in videos on the company's various platforms like Instagram. Back in September of last year, it was reported that the social network was paying out "hundreds of millions of dollars" to labels to clear songs for this kind of use. The company also made deals with Sony and Universal to let you use the publishers' respective catalogs within uploaded videos. Now, according to a report at TechCrunch , Facebook signed a deal with licensing group ICE Services to allow around 31 million musical works from the UK, Sweden and Germany to grace the home movies you share on Instagram, Facebook, Messenger and Oculus. The deal doesn't cover WhatsApp, as the licensing company thinks of it as a simple one-to-one app. "We understand that WhatsApp is currently used as a pure communication tool akin to private email / messaging," a spokesperson for ICE told TechCrunch . "This will be kep...

Netflix has acquired worldwide rights to the next four films from the Duplass Brothers, Jay and Mark. The indie filmmaker duo's credits include Creep and Jeff Who Lives at Home . The deal covers the brothers' upcoming untitled film starring Ray Romano, which will be released later this year, reports Variety . The Duplass Brothers' relationship with the streaming service goes back to their first film in 2005, The Puffy Chair . It was the first feature film acquired by Netflix, and Red Envelope Entertainment co-distributed the movie. "Turns out when you make films for Netflix, millions of people all over the world watch them. This is not a terrible thing for an independent filmmaker," the Duplass Brothers told Variety . "As Netflix continues to grow and develop new ways to reach viewers, we couldn't be more thrilled to grow our partnership." Source: Variety via Engadget RSS Feed "http://ift.tt/2EHrg3w"

The Overwatch League is blowing up and Twitch wants to make some extra money off its exclusive streaming partnership . To encourage viewership, you'll be able to earn Overwatch League Tokens (what you use to buy League skins). You'll pick up one token per live map finish, and a "percentage" of viewers of the "conclusion of the final map" during a live 'cast will randomly win 100 tokens. If you're keeping track at home, that's enough tokens to buy a single skin (around $5). So, you'll earn roughly 3 - 4 tokens per every hour you watch. If one team is getting its ass handed to it, the time investment will be much lower, of course. You'll have to link your Battle.net account with the Twitch, MLG or OverwatchLeague websites first, but regardless of where you play, console or PC, you'll be able to earn Tokens. Naturally, Twitch has special for-pay emotes ( Cheers and Bits ) on tap that will unlock time-exclusive skins and team-branded...

The Nest Cam IQ is the smartest camera in the company's security-oriented lineup, and now it's even smarter. Today, Nest announced that the Cam IQ natively supports Google Assistant, thanks to an over-the-air update. It's important to note, though, that this is only for the indoor version of the Cam IQ. Once devices have received the update, they can perform the same tasks as any other tech with Google Assistant on board. It can perform basic Google searches, tell you about the temperature and weather, add appointments to your calendar and more. Users can also control other Nest devices in their home through the Nest Cam IQ. Nest is also tweaking its subscription service tiers. Now, subscribers to Nest Aware will have the option of a $5/month plan for five days of cloud storage. Current plans include $10 for 10 days and $30 for 30 days of 24/7 cloud video recording. Nest also claims to have made its Nest Aware alerts more intelligent; the camera can now differentiate b...

With how popular cord-cutting is , you'd think more services would be keen to share their subscriber stats. Dish pulled back the curtain today and revealed that its Sling TV service has some 2.2 million folks paying for the service. That's compared to just over 11 million Dish satellite customers. Those numbers don't mean a ton on their own, but when you compare them to AT&T's DirecTV Now numbers you can get a sense of where each are at. Last October, the telco reported that its streaming service had 787,000 subscribers. Of course, Sling TV has been around around a year longer, so that's to be expected. As far as the rest of Dish's business goes, the company picked up an estimated 39,000 new subscribers in the fourth quarter -- an increase of around 11,000 versus last year. Those gains couldn't offset a slight decrease in annual revenue from subscribers ($14.26 billion versus $15.03 billion), or total revenue ($3.48 billion versus $3.75 billion). A...

A number of Twitter users are claiming the platform is purging itself of conservative viewpoints as some lost thousands of followers last night. Richard Spencer, writer Mark Pantano and Candace Owens of Turning Point USA were among those spreading the #TwitterLockOut hashtag campaign and claiming that only conservative accounts were being targeted. Did anyone get a "heads up" up from @Twitter @TwitterSupport prior to them purging followers? I'd give them benefit of doubt but they've been caught too many times censoring conservative accounts #TwitterLockOut https://t.co/Wi1q9KdAb7 — 🇺🇸MFLYNNJR🇺🇸 (@mflynnJR) February 21, 2018 I've lost close to 1,000 followers offer the past few hours. Major purge underway. — Richard 🐉 Spencer (@RichardBSpencer) February 21, 2018 Twitter is currently purging the followers on conservative accounts only. I just lost 3000 followers in one minute. Check out the trending hashtag to confirm that it is ONLY conse...

In the early days of computing, local storage and processing weren't actually a thing. Instead, your individual computer acted as a terminal, pulling data from a central processing server. Well, the French startup Blade likes it that way and has released a similar system but with a 21st-century twist. Its cloud-computing system, dubbed Shadow, can impart the performance of a $2,000 high-end gaming rig onto any internet-connected device with a screen. And now the company is bringing Shadow to California. The Shadow system has already found widespread adoption throughout France and most recently made its US debut at CES last month. The idea is relatively simple: instead of having to buy, maintain and upgrade your own hardware, you pay Blade a monthly subscription to use theirs. It's a concept similar to what NVIDIA did with its GeForce NOW cloud service, Parsec or HP's Omen PCs , save for the fact that those three are dedicated to gaming while Shadow enables users to run...

Netflix's Lost in Space remake has been a long, long time in coming (word broke of it back in 2015 ), but it's finally here... almost. The streaming service has revealed that the sci-fi show will debut on April 13th, 2018, and has offered a teaser trailer to whet your appetite. Not surprisingly, this promises to be a thoroughly modern retelling of the Robinsons' wayward mission. It appears to take a more serious tone, and reflects much of what we've learned about space in the roughly 50 years since the original TV series. The family is out to colonize Alpha Centauri , for starters. There are still plenty of secrets, such as what happens in the wake of the inevitable disaster. And sorry, folks, you still can't see Robbie the robot yet -- you hear him speak, but nothing more. The only certainty is that they'll have to face unknown threats (both from the planet and fellow humans), and that it's not going to be a cakewalk. It's too soon to say whether...

PlayStation is putting your user profile on the web. Head over to the PlayStation website today and you'll find a new tab in the upper right corner that says "My PlayStation." Click it and you'll see what looks like a classic Facebook profile page. Your photo is in the upper left, along with your trophy collection, friends list and who's online. You can also compare your trophy progress/collection against friends. Basically, it takes a lot of the functionality you'd need to turn your PS4 on or open a mobile app to get and puts it in your browser. There's a lot of empty white space, but compared to Xbox.com's overwhelmingly cluttered dashboard -- the US PS Blog isn't much better -- the minimalism is appreciated. It feels a little too barren at this point, though. There are still a few kinks. For example, your custom header image mirrors that of what's on your PS4 profile. So, if you haven't set one, it'll stay the default blue. M...