This week, NASA continued its spread into the social media sphere by announcing two new accounts — one on Giphy and one on Pinterest. Seeing as how I had forgotten of Pinterest’s existence, half of this announcement matters very little to me. But the other half is very critical to my interests!
It’s a brilliant move on NASA’s part, because sometimes astronauts, rockets, and artistic renderings of space are the only ways to truly express your feels. And as someone who writes about space and who communicates primarily with moving images that last just a few seconds in length, a NASA Giphy account is basically an entire dictionary for me. Plus, I haven’t yet mastered making my own GIFs with GIF Brewery, so this makes life a whole lot...
Google told us in May that it would eventually block Adobe Flash Player content on Chrome. And today, the company is making good on its promise. Google is slowly rolling HTML5 out to users over the next couple of months, starting with one percent of users on the current version of Chrome. Everyone should have an updated Chrome by February, when the most recent beta version goes stable.
This means that unless a website has an HTML5 content player, the Flash content won’t display. Users will have to enable it manually on a site-by-site basis. At first, the Flash permissions will only apply to sites that users are visiting for the first time, but by October, every site will require user permission to run Flash.
What if links to stories about someone’s past—stories about defrauding an international business or about medical tourism malpractice—were removed from Google search in your country, not because of your local laws but because someone was able to use the laws of another country. How would you feel about that?
That question may seem simplistic. But it goes to the heart of a very important debate that is taking place now in Europe, initially between some Data Protection Authorities and, next year, in court. At stake: whether Europe’s right to be forgotten—which allows people in EU countries to request removal of certain links from name search results—should reach beyond the borders of Europe and into countries which have different laws.
Google believes it should not. That’s why, for much of the last year, we’ve been defending the idea that each country should be able to balance freedom of expression and privacy in the way that it chooses, not in the way that another country chooses.
To be clear: we are not disputing that Google should comply with the right to be forgotten in Europe. We have worked diligently to give effect to the rights confirmed by the European Court of Justice. We have delisted approximately 780,000 URLs to date and have granted fast and effective responses to individuals who assert their rights.
We have also worked efficiently with Data Protection Authorities when they are asked to review (the small number of) cases that are appealed to them. Our approach to delisting takes into account the criteria set out by the European Court, as well as guidance from each country’s regulators and courts. And from the outset, we have delisted links on all European versions of Google Search simultaneously. So links would no longer appear on Google.de, Google.fr and Google.be, and so on.
But some Data Protection Authorities argued that people could still find delisted links by searching on a non-European version of Google such as Google.com. So in March 2016, in response to the concerns of a number of Data Protection Authorities, we made some changes. As a result, people using Google from the same country as the person who requested the removal can no longer find the delisted link, even on Google.com, Google.co.kr, or Google.com.mx.
But one Data Protection Authority, the French Commission Nationale de l'Informatique et des Libertés (the CNIL), has ordered Google to go much further, effectively instructing us to apply the French balance between privacy and free expression in every country by delisting French right to be forgotten removals for users everywhere. Ultimately, we might have to implement French standards on Google search sites from Australia (google.com.au) to Zambia (google.co.zm) and everywhere in between. And any such precedent would open the door to countries around the world, including non-democratic countries, to demand the same global power.
We agree with the CNIL that privacy is a fundamental right—but so too is the right to free expression. Any balance that is struck between those two rights must be accompanied by territorial limits, consistent with the basic principles of international law. Aside from anything else, it’s plain common sense that one country should not have the right to impose its rules on the citizens of another, especially not when it comes to lawful content.
The right to be forgotten can sometimes seem complex, and discussions about jurisdiction online certainly are complicated. But this issue is simple: should the balance between the right to free expression and the right to privacy be struck by each country—based on its culture, its traditions, its courts—or should one view apply for all?
Money management isn’t easy, but we do our best to break it down for you. Here are some of our best personal finance guides, primers, and explainers of 2016.
Spend less than you earn, save your money, and—poof!—your financial problems are solved. If only it were this easy. Being broke sucks enough on its own, and then there are obstacles that make it extra hard for poor people to fight their way to financial security. For example, here are a few expenses that actually cost more for low-income individuals.
A bit of planning can save you a ton of money when it comes to buying throughout the year. Here’s your comprehensive, always up-to-date guide on the best times to buy everything this year.
After saving up for a long time, I recently bought a home, which caught some of my friends off guard. “I thought you were anti-homeownership,” they said, because I think renting is underrated. Even as a homeowner, I still think renting is underrated. That doesn’t mean buying is a bad decision. The rent vs. buy debate is just silly overall. It ignores the enormous grey area that exists between the two options.
Quite often, the “facts” that people tout when it comes to personal finance aren’t quite facts at all. Sometimes they’re just opinions stated with authority, or they’re based on incorrect information or assumptions. Is it any wonder there’s so much confusion when many finance principles are counter-intuitive?
Retirement is pretty far away for some of us. And it’s better to set smaller milestones for your savings now than to focus on the big, lump sum amount you’ll need to retire. However, it’s also interesting to look at the numbers, and this early retirement grid shows you how long it will take.
Quality clothes last longer for the money you spend, they’re more comfortable, and they make you look and feel pretty good while you wear them. Best of all, you can find quality anywhere. It comes down to buying less mediocre stuff and using that money on a few nice things that last forever.
It’s probably safe to assume no one’s ever gotten rich clipping coupons. That doesn’t mean saving money is a waste of time, though. Some money-saving habits are worthwhile and save you a heap of cash in the long run. Others just aren’t worth it. Here are some specific habits I’ve ditched because they aren’t worth my time and energy (or yours).
They say a sucker is born every minute, but shady businesses are good at convincing you you’re a genius, not a sucker, for giving them your money. Many of these outfits prey on people want to improve their finances, which adds insult to injury. You know to stay away from bogus IRS collectors and Nigerian princes, but there are some less obvious, perfectly legal scams people fall for all the time.
With peer-to-peer payment services like Square Cash, Venmo, and PayPal there’s no need to carry cash anymore. These mobile apps make splitting checks, paying friends back, and lending money to family members as easy as tapping your finger. Let’s look at them, and decide which one rises above the others.
I’m terrible at saving money, I hate studying personal finance, and I tend to have a “carpe diem” mentality when it comes to buying the things I want. Fortunately, a few automated savings apps gave me a stronger hold on my money by doing most of the hard stuff for me.
My Uncle Danny once helped me buy a new Corolla while I watched in awe. He was a relentless, negotiating beast. He threatened. He acted offended. He sat in silence and stared at the salesman. In the end, I paid nearly $5,000 less than I expected. Negotiating is powerful. As a timid person, it’s not something that comes easy for me, and it might not come easy for you. Here are some of the best ways to do it, even when you dread it.
From the day I got my first job as a cart pusher at Walmart, I spent years living from one paycheck to the next. I hovered around the poverty line, hoping that I would last until next month’s rent. At the time it felt normal. It wasn’t until after I started making more money that I realized the psychological scars that living the poor life left on me.
Instead of struggling with wrapping paper this holiday season, get yourself some cloth. The Japanese Furoshiki technique can wrap anything easily and make it look good.
Traditionally, Furoshiki is a type of cloth used to wrap items or transport goods. The wrapping techniques are so good-looking that you could use them for your holiday gift-wrapping. There are specific ways to wrap a flat object, a basic box, a bottle, a flower, a hand bag, or anything else, but there are some general folding and wrapping techniques you can put to use for any object as well. It’s especially useful to wrap oddly shaped gifts in cloth.
Furoshiki Techniques, linked below, can teach you all of these, categorized by the shape of the object you want to wrap. The “gifts” section is a little more difficult, so start with the basic wraps and only proceed to “gifts” if you feel confident.
As handy as it is to use your phone as your alarm clock, you may want to buy a real alarm clock and keep your phone away from your bed, especially if you can’t resist using it before bed You’ll be much better rested in the morning.
Digital lifestyle blogger Carley K. experimented with this setup. She found four major changes once she moved her phone from her bedside:
She fell asleep faster
She slept better
She had less headaches
She talked to her husband more
Yes, you’ll have to resist the temptation to check your social networks before falling asleep. But in the long term, isn’t a better night’s sleep worth it?
by Shep McAllister on Deals, shared by Shep McAllister to Lifehacker
As seen on Shark Tank, the Fizzics Waytap beer dispenser takes any standard can or bottle of beer, agitates it with sound waves, and dispenses it with just the right amount of “micro-foam” to simulate beer straight from the tap. There are no gasses or chemicals at work here; just sound waves powered by AA batteries.
It sounds too good to be true, but the older, larger model has a solid 4 star review average, so there’s definitely something there. The new Waytap model normally retails for $130, but Amazon’s marked it down to $100, while supplies last. It’s already somewhat backordered, so order up.
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Visteon makes high-definition dashboard displays for instrument clusters, navigation panels, and entertainment systems. They also know the future is autonomous driving, and to help anxious customers get a sense of the technological possibilities, they are developing driving simulators that demonstrate manual vs. autonomous driving conditions. (more…)
Actions are the tools developers need to integrate their products into Assistant on your Google Home.
Google has opened up the Actions on Google program today, and developers can now start building their own tools and conversational bots for Google Home.
First seen at Google I/O 2016, the Actions SDK brings everything developers need to integrate their services into Google Assistant the same way Pandora or Google Cast is. Once implemented — there is nothing to install and all the integration with services is done through Google's cloud servers — we can tell Google Home that we want to talk to or about a service and the new conversations are ready to take what we say and provide the appropriate response.
Google's Wayne Piekarski walks through a demo using a service they built called "Personal Chef" in the video below. (This will trigger your Pixel or Google Home. Several times.)
For developers: Google's Conversation Actions web documentation pages are where you'll get started building your services into Google Assistant. You can choose to transcribe and decipher a user's words yourself using the conversation API to process input and use the Actions SDK to process and build actions as intents.If you'd rather not process transcribed speech yourself, you can use api.ai which can build out the workflow of a conversation using Conversation Actions. Google also has integrated Gupshup to help build, test and deploy conversational bots and actions on Google Home.
For users: All of this is handled by the folks who built a service and there's nothing to install. You'll be able to tell Google Home you need a thing or want to talk to/about a thing and Assistant will automatically handoff to the correct service the same way things are done now when you tell Google to play a song or cast a video. Seamless integration is what makes Assistant seem "smart".
For now, the service is only available for Google Home but Google plans to bring Actions to Assistant on the Pixel and in Allo in the future. Google also is working on enabling support for purchases and bookings, and developers who are interested in creating actions using these upcoming features can register for the early access partner program.
Look, I know we’re approaching peak Star Wars, what with Rogue One coming out in just a week. But this video, first picked up by Sploid, is just too awesome to even fathom. YouTuber devinsupertramp (who we’ve highlighted before) managed to turn a fleet of Jetovators, or water-powered jet bikes, into the speeder bikes from Return of the Jedi ready for battle on the waterways of Endor.
This little short has everything. Lightsabers. Cute kids dressed as Ewoks. A Wilhelm scream. And of course lots of racing and crashing. I’m personally waiting for the full-length theatrical release.
Le Monde has published a new collection of documents from the whistleblower Edward Snowden, showing that the British spy agency GCHQ targeted the leaders of allied countries in Africa, as well as business executives and employees of telecommunications companies, whose accounts were a means to gaining access to communications infrastructure across the continent.
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Yesterday morning, Matthias Kirschner opted out of the "voluntary" full-body scanners at Berlin's Schönefeld, and discovered that "voluntary" means that "if you don't do it, they will barrack you endlessly about your choice, punitively repeatedly perform the same searches over and over, and attempt to delay you so you almost miss your flight."
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Skier Mathieu Bijasson didn't think it was insane enough to ski down the steepest faces of the French Alps during the day, so he rigged up some skis and poles with LED lighting and did it at night. The result is visually beautiful and teeth-clenchingly terrifying all at once. (more…)
Version 55 of Chrome for Android is rolling out across the Google Play store, dramatically expanding the browser's downloading functionality. You can now download entire web pages, as well as media like videos or music, and save them for offline usage.
A new section lets you view these downloads and share them with other users. The features were first announced in September as part of a push by Google focused on the Indian market.
Microsoft is rumored to be preparing a HomeHub feature for Windows 10 to better compete with devices like Google’s Home and Amazon’s Echo. While that feature isn’t expected to debut until later next year, Microsoft is laying the hardware groundwork for new devices that will run Windows 10 in ways that are more like the Echo and Alexa.
Microsoft is partnering with Intel to allow device makers to create hardware that incorporates the latest artificial intelligence with Cortana, and the ability to support far-field speech communications and wake on voice. “Customers are device creators,” explains Microsoft’s Windows and devices chief Terry Myerson in an interview with The Verge. “There's a lot of enthusiasm for wake on voice, devices with...
Microsoft is finally bringing Cortana to Android and iOS devices in the UK, complete with an overhauled look and feel. Cortana will be available on Android today in the UK, and iOS “in a few weeks.” The new design includes quick actions like new reminders or weather information straight on the landing page of Cortana for iOS and Android, so you don’t have to use voice all the time.
Microsoft is also adding in full-page answers, and making the app quicker to use. The Cortana app for Android is updated and available today in the Google Play Store, and the iOS update is expected to hit the App Store in a few weeks.
Get ready for a bezel-less panel on the Galaxy S8.
Following on from rumors that Samsung is ditching the home button on the Galaxy S8 (as well as the 3.5mm jack), Bloomberg is now reporting that the phone will feature an "all-screen front" with a bezel-less display:
The bezel-less displays will provide more viewing real estate while a virtual home button will be buried in the glass in the the lower section, the people said, asking not to be identified because the details haven't been released. The new phones will only come with wraparound displays using organic light-emitting diode technology, the people said.
Samsung Display is said to have invested significant resources into creating a panel with a display area ratio exceeding 90%. The panel will feature a fingerprint sensor that's embedded within the glass, negating the need for a dedicated home button.
It looks like Samsung will also retain the 5.1-inch and 5.5-inch form factors with the Galaxy S8, and the company will stick to offering a combination of Qualcomm's Snapdragon 835 and its in-house Exynos SoC for various markets.
The Galaxy S8 won't be the first to feature a bezel-less panel. Xiaomi has that honor with its revolutionary Mi Mix, but the phone is sold in limited quantities in China. If Samsung decides to go bezel-less with the Galaxy S8, it will be the first company to do so at scale.
Next-gen Bluetooth will be rolling out in the coming months.
Bluetooth 5 was announced in June, and today the Bluetooth Special Interest Group revealed that the spec is now finalized, making it ready for adoption. The new standard offers double the bandwidth, four times the range, and eight times the broadcast message capacity of Bluetooth 4.2.
Increased bandwidth leads to lower latency, and more range means that the connection to a paired device won't cut out after five feet. The SIG claims that with Bluetooth 5, you'll get whole-home coverage, and far less interference with similar wireless technologies. You'll also be able to transmit more data using the protocol thanks to the increase in message capacity, all while consuming less power.
Commenting on the launch, the SIG's executive director Mark Powell talked about how Bluetooth 5 can benefit the nascent IoT market:
Bluetooth is revolutionizing how people experience the IoT. Bluetooth 5 continues to drive this revolution by delivering reliable IoT connections and mobilizing the adoption of beacons, which in turn will decrease connection barriers and enable a seamless IoT experience.
This means whole-home and building coverage, as well as new use cases for outdoor, industrial, and commercial applications will be a reality. With the launch of Bluetooth 5, we continue to evolve to meet the needs of IoT developers and consumers while staying true to what Bluetooth is at its core: the global wireless standard for simple, secure, connectivity.
While Bluetooth 5 offers tangible improvements to coverage and data transmission, there's no difference in sound quality for audio playback over Bluetooth 4.2. The first consumer products with Bluetooth 5 will make their debut early next year.
In the midst of looking back at its year, YouTube is under attack by the music industry, which believes the over $1 billion that it has been paid in royalties over the last 12 months isn’t enough. The IFPI, an organization that represents musicians worldwide, believes that Google ad revenue doesn’t make up for the huge number of people streaming music for free…
When you sign up for a Wells Fargo account, you're required to sign an arbitration "agreement" giving up your right to sue the company, and requiring you to have your case heard by an arbitrator paid for by -- and dependent on -- Wells Fargo instead.
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by Alex Cranz on Gizmodo, shared by Andy Orin to Lifehacker
Image: Gizmodo
Pebble, one of the best-known smartwatch brands, is dead. Rumors about the company’s demise have been swirling since The Information reported a potential Fitbit buyout last week. Today in a post on Kickstarter, Pebble confirmed that Fitbit was acquiring “key Pebble assets” and that Pebble would “no longer be operating as in independent company.”
This is completely in line with a Bloomberg report last night that claimed only chunks of Pebble were being sold to Fitbit, namely its intellectual property, software engineers, and testers. Designers and other staff will be let go and current products (and all other assets) are, according to Bloomberg, expected to be sold to pay the shuttering company’s debt.
And that leaves Pebble’s loyal customers out in the cold. While Pebble’s Kickstarter note ends on a happy note of gratitude to its many loyal customers, those customers are, in fact, royally screwed.
“One-to-one Pebble support is no longer available” and “any Pebble currently out in the wild is no longer covered by or eligible for warranty exchange.” This means, no matter when you purchased or received your Pebble device, you are on your own—and if your device dies, you’re simply out a device. Any warranty you might have been promised from Pebble directly is void. (If you didn’t purchase from Pebble, but from a site like Amazon, you may still be able to return the product for cash or store credit.) You can also expect to see zero software support (or updates) going forward, despite Fitbit’s acquisition.
If you took part in Pebble’s recent Kickstarter, which launched on May 24 and raked in nearly 12.8 million dollars, and you have not received your product, then you are, again, screwed. As of today Pebble will no longer be shipping devices. Pebble 2 backers who haven’t received a device won’t receive one. The Time 2, Core, and Time Round, originally intended to ship last month and later scheduled to ship in January 2017, are completely canceled.
Pebble promises those smartwatch-less backers will receive a refund, which is great! They deserve a refund! However those refunds will take place through the Kickstarter system and aren’t expected to be completed until March 2017, nearly a year after many backers dropped their cash on the project.
And that, more than the loss of cool tech and the the honoring of warranties, is the real kick in the pants. Pebble, essentially, bamboozled 12.8 million dollars out of its customers and then sat on that money for the last 6-7 months. Worse the company wasn’t up front about the rumors and its own reported demise, instead leaving backers twisting in the wind for the last week, surreptitiously updating the expected ship dates for products that it had good reason to know it might never be able to ship.
This isn’t just a major blow for the already dying smartwatch market, it’s a blow for crowdfunding in general. Pebble was one of crowdfunding’s most notable successes, and its continued reliance on crowdfunding for each product launch suggested that we were seeing the beginnings of a new kind of business plan, where companies could be supported by their fans rather than angel investors.
If Pebble, one of Kickstarter’s biggest success stories, can fail so spectacularly then why should a consumer put trust in any of the smaller crowdfunding campaigns out there? Just when it was looking like at least some crowdfunding could be trust, Pebble has proven that you jut can’t. Invest in the crowdfunding future at your own risk.
We reached out to Pebble for comment, and we’ll update if the company responds.
Several years back, we posted about the wonderful site youarelistening.to, a strangely soothing mix of ambient music and police radio chatter (!) from various cities. Youarelistening.to isn't the only source of lovely and relaxing field recordings and ambient noise though. Here are a few of DIGG's favorites:
If your cup of coffee isn't giving you the kick you need, flipping on Coffitivity might be a good next step. Coffivity provides the cozy and comforting sounds of a cafe (which can help you focus according to scientific research) in six flavors, including Paris Paradise, Texas Teahouse, and Brazil Bistro.
Mimicking the sounds of the room in the house where everyone does their best thinking, Virtual Shower also boasts a temperature setting that changes the color of the page. You can't hear it, but you'll know it's there.
Blazing Logs
Another simple one. Flip this year-round-yule log on to hear the crackle of a fire and not much else.
In much of the world, copyright ends 50 years after the creator's death, in some of the rest of the world, it ends 70 years after the creator's death; in the USA, things have stopped going into the public domain until 2019 (unless America decides to retroactively extend copyright...again!).
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VSCO, the folks behind that app that’s basically Instagram but for people who know how to take pictures, is releasing a new membership pass that’ll give mobile photographers access to exclusive filters, including an interactive set that you can manipulate within live capture.
Film X is an attempt to recreate film photography by offering users more control
Called VSCO X, the invite-only membership grants paid users the entire library of currently available presets and a new genre called Film X. Like many other VSCO filters, Film X is an attempt to recreate film photography by offering users more control as they are taking a photo. But rather than editing a photo with a filter after you’ve shot the image, you can adjust warmth, character,...
Adrien Mauduit captured these noctilucent clouds above Denmark on not just one night, but two consecutive nights. He explains how he documented the unusual weather phenomenon: (more…)
Spectrograms of dolphin calls are closer to written English than the signatures I'm able to scrawl on credit card machines in grocery stores. We really should stop messing with these people—who knows what they might be up to?
Android developers have been able to use Google Drive to back up and restore app and game data for their users for a couple of years now. Android devices too have been able to back up some data like installed apps, device settings, call history, and more to Google Drive and restore it to the same device after a hard reset or to a new one when you switch over.
However, these backups remained mostly hidden in Google Drive.
Seems Alexa’s made her way into everything these days. Between Amazon’s own Echo offerings and an ever-growing array of third-party participation, the steady home automation takeover of the company’s AI assistant appears to be going about as well as could be expected. Between Alexa connected washing machines and a detergent ordering Dash-enabled dishwasher, GE’s… Read More
Sony has announced that sales of the PlayStation 4 have surpassed 50 million units as of this week. The console, which launched in November 2013, hit the 40 million mark back in May of this year. The sales milestone includes sales of the original PS4 hardware, the newly introduced slim redesign of the console, and the higher-end PS4 Pro, which launched last month. Sony says that the sales surge was helped in part by “the best ever Black Friday week” for a PlayStation device.
It’s unclear exactly how this compares to sales of the Xbox One, the PS4’s most direct competition, as Microsoft hasn’t released sales data for the console. According to the NPD group, the Xbox One was outselling the PS4 in recent months, due in large part to the...
Seems Alexa’s made her way into everything these days. Between Amazon’s own Echo offerings and an ever-growing array of third-party participation, the steady home automation takeover of the company’s AI assistant appears to be going about as well as could be expected. Between Alexa connected washing machines and a detergent ordering Dash-enabled dishwasher, GE’s… 