Innholdsfortegnelse for #278 i Techlife News

“Pokemon Go” monsters can roam virtually wherever they please, but they’ll need a permit to get into Milwaukee County parks. At the height of the game’s popularity last summer, the large crowds it attracted to one Milwaukee park left county officials at a loss for how to deal with the sudden influx of players and the trash they left behind. With more augmented-reality games in development, the permitting process Milwaukee County set up puts it at the forefront of an emerging challenge for government officials who want to regulate them. “We’re prepared for all of them now,” said County Supervisor Sheldon Wasserman, who wrote the proposal setting up a permitting process that County Executive Chris Abele signed on Feb. 10. Other places where officials are looking at how to handle…

The Associated Press and two other news organizations asked a judge Monday to force the federal government to reveal how much it paid for a tool to unlock an iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino, California, shooters. The news organizations said in a court filing there was “no adequate justification” for the FBI to continue to withhold information on the cost of the tool or the identity of the vendor that sold it. They said their requests were narrowly tailored and, contrary to the arguments of the FBI and Justice Department, did not seek information that would jeopardize national security or be exploited by America’s enemies. “While it is undisputed that the vendor developed the iPhone access tool, the government has identified no rational reason why knowing the…

Dancing on the roof, microphone in hand as he lip-synched to “Twist and Shout,” Benny the Bull was putting on quite a performance as his tricked-out black van rolled through downtown Chicago. It was not quite “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” and it won’t be coming to a theater near you. But as spoofs go, “Benny’s Day Off” is quite a production. The story starring the Chicago Bulls’ mascot played out almost in real time on social media on a recent Monday, with scenes posted on Snapchat right after they were recorded throughout the day. The team also tweeted the effort while the crew headed to the next location, fans tuning in to see what Benny would do next. “You’re only limited by your imagination,” Bulls digital content manager Luka Dukich…

A New Zealand judge upheld an earlier court ruling that flamboyant internet entrepreneur Kim Dotcom and three of his colleagues can be extradited to the U.S. to face criminal charges. The decision comes five years after U.S. authorities shut down Dotcom’s file-sharing website Megaupload and filed charges of conspiracy, racketeering and money laundering against the men. If found guilty, they could face decades in prison. Dotcom, who lives in New Zealand, has been fighting extradition in a case which has moved with glacial slowness at times. And Monday’s decision won’t be the last, with the case likely to be appealed up to New Zealand’s Supreme Court, a process that could take another year or two. U.S. prosecutors say that Megaupload raked in at least $175 million, mainly from people using…

Right-wing provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos’ publisher has cancelled his planned book, “Dangerous.” Simon & Schuster and its Threshold Editions imprint announced that “after careful consideration” they had pulled the book, which had been high on Amazon.com’s best-seller lists and was the subject of intense controversy. The announcement came hours after the Breitbart editor was disinvited to this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference because of past comments about relationships between boys and men. He has said remarks he made that could be construed as favoring men and boys having sex were edited wrongly. “Dangerous” was originally scheduled to come out in March. But Yiannopoulos had pushed back the release to June so he could write about the uprisings during his recent campus tour. At the time of his publisher’s announcement, it ranked…

Under Stars (Deluxe) Amy Macdonald This deluxe version of the fourth album from multiplatinum-selling singer-songwriter Amy Macdonald features eight acoustic tracks including a cover of Bruce Springsteen’s ‘I’m on Fire’. FIVE FACTS: 1. Amy taught herself how to play the guitar via “how to play guitar” tutorials on the internet 2. She cites one of her main influences as Travis, who she saw perform at T in the Park festival as a teen. Other influences include The Killers and The Libertines 3. Her first album This Is the Life sold 3 million copies and reached No.1 in the UK, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Denmark 4. Macdonald is a supporter of Rangers football club and is currently engaged to former Rangers player Richard Foster 5. In December 2008, she was voted…

Jay Z will become the first rapper ever inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame when he enters the prestigious organization in June. The Songwriters Hall announced Wednesday that songwriting heavyweights in the industry, including Kenneth “Babyface” Edmonds, Max Martin and Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis will also be part of its 2017 class. The organization’s 48th Annual Induction and Awards Dinner takes place June 15 in New York. Three members of Chicago - Robert Lamm, James Pankow and Peter Cetera - as well as Motown founder Berry Gordy, who deferred his induction in 2016, will also be inducted. Jay Z is the first rapper to be nominated for the Songwriters Hall. Songwriters are eligible for induction after writing hit songs for at least 20 years. Jay Z, who released…

In a nod to its past as well as its future, WhatsApp is adding a “status” feature that lets users tell their contacts what they are up to. It’s not a new idea - WhatsApp started out as a way for people to let their friends know what they are up to - at work or available, for example. Messaging, now the app’s main function, was added later. But it’s also a sign that the Facebook-owned app is expanding the amount of features it has, just as Instagram, another Facebook subsidiary, has been doing over the years. Users will be able to post photos or videos as status updates. WhatsApp says the status posts will be end-to-end encrypted , just as its messages are. That means only the parties who…

Instrument-laden aircraft are surveying the Colorado high country this month as scientists search for better ways to measure how much water is locked up in the world’s mountain snows - water that sustains a substantial share of the global population. A NASA-led experiment called SnowEx is using five aircraft to test 10 sensors that might one day be used to monitor snow from satellites. The goal: Find the ideal combination to overcome multiple obstacles, including how to analyze snow hidden beneath forest canopies. “It would be, I would say, a monumental leap in our ability to forecast water supply if we had this kind of information,” said Noah Molotch, a member of the science team for the experiment. One-sixth of the world’s population gets most of its fresh water from…

A new supercomputer in the top coal-mining state has begun critical climate-change research with support from even some global warming doubters, but scientists worry President Donald Trump could cut funding for such programs. The $30 million, house-sized supercomputer named Cheyenne belongs to a federally funded research center. It got to work a few weeks ago crunching numbers for several ambitious projects, from modeling air currents at wind farms to figuring out how to better predict weather months to years in advance. It’s the fastest computer in the Rocky Mountain West - three times faster than the 4-year-old supercomputer named Yellowstone it is replacing and 20th-fastest in the world. Capable of 5.34 quadrillion calculations per second, Cheyenne is 240,000 times faster than a new, high-end laptop. Located in a windy business…

Yahoo is taking a $350 million hit on its previously announced $4.8 billion sale to Verizon in a concession for security lapses that exposed personal information stored in more than 1 billion Yahoo user accounts. The revised agreement, announced Tuesday, eases investor worries that Verizon Communications Inc. would demand a discount of at least $1 billion or cancel the deal entirely. The hacking bombshells, disclosed after the two companies agreed on a sale, represent the two biggest security breaches in internet history. The breaches raised concerns that people might decrease their use of Yahoo email and other digital services that Verizon is buying. A smaller audience makes Yahoo’s services less valuable because it reduces the opportunities to show ads - the main reason that Verizon struck the deal seven months…

The Supreme Court on Wednesday sided with California-based Life Technologies Corp. in a patent infringement case that limits the international reach of U.S. patent laws. The justices ruled unanimously that the company’s shipment of a single part of a patented invention for assembly in another country did not violate patent laws. Life Technologies supplied an enzyme used in DNA analysis kits to a plant in London and combined it with several other components to make kits sold worldwide. Wisconsin-based Promega Corp. sued, arguing that the kits infringed a U.S. patent. A jury awarded $52 million in damages to Promega. A federal judge set aside the verdict and said the law did not cover export of a single component. The federal appeals specializing in patent cases reversed and reinstated the verdict.…

Apple has announced that its new headquarters will open for employees in the spring and will include a theater named for its late co-founder, Steve Jobs. Apple says in a news release on its website that the process of moving its 12,000 employees from its old digs in Cupertino, California, to the new Apple Park nearby will begin in April and will take more than six months to complete. The 175-acre campus includes a 2.8 million-square-foot main building in the shape of a giant ring. Apple says the building will run entirely on renewable energy. The campus will also include a 1,000-seat auditorium called the Steve Jobs Theater. Jobs famously unveiled new Apple products at theater events. He died in 2011 at 56 following a battle with cancer.…

Mark Zuckerberg helped create the modern world by connecting nearly a quarter of its citizens to Facebook and giving them a platform to share, well, everything - baby pictures and Pepe memes, social updates and abusive bullying, helpful how-to videos and live-streamed violence. Now he wants to remake it, too, in a way that counters isolationism, promotes global connections and addresses social ills - while also cementing Facebook’s central role as a builder of online “community” for its nearly 2 billion users. The Facebook founder laid out his thoughts in a sweeping 5,800-word manifesto that hews closer to utopian social guide than business plan. Are we, he asked in the document, “building the world we all want?” In a phone interview, Zuckerberg stressed that he wasn’t motivated by the recent…

Alden Ehrenreich has taken control of the Millennium Falcon. The Han Solo “Star Wars” spin-off has begun production. The Walt Disney Co. announced Tuesday that shooting began at London’s Pinewood Studios on Monday. To kick off the untitled Han Solo movie, the studio released a photo of the cast at the controls of the Millennium Falcon. Ehrenreich, who plays a younger version of Harrison Ford’s iconic smuggler, is seated amid cast members including Woody Harrelson, Emilia Clarke and Donald Glover, who plays Lando Calrissian. The film is directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, who helmed “The Lego Movie.” In a statement they said, “We can’t think of anything funny to say, because we just feel really moved, and really lucky.” Disney will release the film in May 2018.…

Holdovers “The Lego Batman Movie” and “Fifty Shades Darker” led the North American box office for a second week, while Matt Damon’s “The Great Wall” - a hit in China, where it was made - struggled in its domestic debut. Warner Bros.’“The Lego Batman Movie” was No.1 again, selling $42.7 million in tickets over the four-day holiday weekend, according to final figures Tuesday from comScore. Universal’s “Fifty Shades Darker,” which led overseas business, earned $22.7 million Friday through Monday. But Universal’s critically panned action epic “The Great Wall,” the most expensive film ever made in China with a budget of $150 million, failed to make as much of an impact as it did on the other side of the world. After racking up $171 million in China earlier this year,…

South Korea was taken by surprise last Friday with the arrest of the scion of the country’s richest family and de-facto leader at Samsung over his alleged involvement in a massive corruption scandal that engulfed the president and riveted the nation. Prosecutors believe Lee Jae-yong, 48, a vice chairman at Samsung Electronics and the only son of the ailing Samsung chairman, gave bribes worth $36 million to President Park Geun-hye and her close friend to help win government support for a smooth company leadership transition, including a contentious merger of two Samsung companies. A look at how his arrest affects the electronics giant: LITTLE IMPACT ON PHONE, TV BUSINESSES Some conservative commentators are worried that Lee’s arrest could hurt Samsung’s businesses and therefore the economy, which relies on such companies…

With states seizing the initiative on shaping the future of self-driving cars, General Motors is trying to persuade legislators across the country to approve rules that would benefit the automaker while potentially keeping its competitors off the road. The carmaker denies trying to freeze out other brands, but legislators in four states say GM lobbyists asked them to sponsor bills that the company’s competitors contend would do just that. The bills set a blueprint for the introduction of fully self-driving cars that are part of on-demand, ride-sharing fleets, but they must be owned by an automaker. Competitors working on self-driving technology like Uber and Alphabet’s Waymo fear the measures could shut out their companies because they don’t manufacture cars. And some automakers that are developing autonomous cars say they could…

For the first time, astronomers have discovered seven Earth-size planets orbiting a single nearby star - and these new worlds could hold life. This cluster of planets is less than 40 light-years away in the constellation Aquarius, according to NASA and the Belgian-led research team who announced the discovery Wednesday. The planets circle tightly around a dim dwarf star called Trappist-1, barely the size of Jupiter. Three are in the so-called habitable zone, the area around a star where water and, possibly life, might exist. The others are right on the doorstep. Scientists said they need to study the atmospheres before determining whether these rocky, terrestrial planets could support some sort of life. But it already shows just how many Earth-size planets could be out there - especially in a…

Thousands of Italian taxi drivers protesting legislation they say will favor Uber clashed with riot police Tuesday, intensifying a weeklong cab strike that has crippled transportation in Rome, Milan and Turin. The cabbies marched through Rome and protested in front of parliament, at the headquarters of the ruling Democratic Party and finally at the infrastructure ministry, where officials were meeting with union representatives to try to work out a settlement. The six-day strike has stranded tourists at Italy’s main airports and train stations, complicated daily commutes and raised alarms about Wednesday’s start of Milan Fashion Week, when cabs are in high demand to shuttle fashionistas from show to show. The drivers say the legislation would ease Uber’s “irregular” inroads into Italy’s rigidly regulated taxi industry, where drivers pay huge fees…

Amazon is resisting an effort by Arkansas prosecutors to obtain potential recordings from a slaying suspect’s Amazon Echo smart speaker, saying authorities haven’t established that their investigation is more important than a customer’s privacy rights. The issue comes in the investigation into the death of Victor Collins, who was found floating face-up in a hot tub in a friend’s Bentonville home in November 2015. The friend, James Andrew Bates, has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder. Benton County prosecutors asked a court to force Amazon to provide data that Bates’ Echo may have collected. Echo devices “listen” for a user’s voice and respond to commands. In a response filed Friday, Amazon said prosecutors hadn’t established the need for Amazon to violate its customers’ constitutional rights. Amazon said prosecutors must prove…

Watchdog groups that keep tabs on digital privacy rights are concerned that U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents are searching the phones and other digital devices of international travelers at border checkpoints in U.S. airports. The issue gained attention recently after at least three travelers, including a Canadian journalist, spoke out publicly about their experiences. The episodes have gained notice amid an outcry over President Donald Trump’s travel ban and complaints of mistreatment of foreign travelers, but the government insists there has been no policy change in the new administration. Border Protection says searches increased fivefold in the final fiscal year of the Obama presidency, but still amounted to less than one-hundredth of 1 percent of all international arrivals. Here are some things to know about the searches and your…

THE iPHONE 8 RUMOR MILL The rumor mill continues to churn in regards to what we might see with the next iPhone release. The most recent hints suggest that a facial recognition feature that will propel Apple forward toward more advanced biometrics. After all, it has been widely speculated for some time now that Apple is ditching the home button in an attempt at a bezel-free design, and this would fit in well with the idea of a fully integrated facial recognition system. It makes sense that the Cupertino firm heads in this direction. Even if it doesn’t yet reach the dizzying heights of Jonathan Ive’s single sheet of glass design, we can still see a clear progression from the very first iPhone and its functionality. Reports now claim that…

Here’s a way to reach the top of the best-seller lists: Become the next national security adviser. Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster’s “Dereliction of Duty,” first published in 1997, was No. 1 on Amazon.com as of Wednesday morning. The book’s popularity soared after McMaster was chosen Monday by President Donald Trump to replace Michael Flynn, who departed amid questions about contacts he had with the Russian ambassador. Harper Perennial, a paperback imprint of HarperCollins, told The Associated Press that it has ordered a new printing of 25,000 copies. “Dereliction of Duty” is a highly regarded work about the failures of the Vietnam War that is sharply critical of both the military and political leadership.…

The Edge of Seventeen Growing up can have its awkward moments, and it certainly does for seventeen-year-old Nadine (Hailee Steinfeld) who has to learn to deal with her all-star older brother Darian (Blake Jenner) dating her best friend. With the help of a reluctant teacher (Woody Harrelson) and an unlikely friendship with a boy from school, she starts to realise that life doesn’t have to be so terrible. FIVE FACTS: 1. The working title for this movie was ‘Besties’ 2. This is Kelly Fremon Craig’s directorial debut 3. The film shares its title with a song of the same name by Stevie Nicks 4. Hayden Szeto who plays Erwin was the first actor to be cast and was actually 31 at the time of the film’s release. 5. Hailee Steinfeld…

More movies and cheaper options arrive online this week for movie fans still needing to catch up on Oscar-nominated flicks. Of the 62 full-length movies and shorts nominated for any category , 45 are available in some form online. That includes animated and live action shorts released by the cable channel Shorts HD. One more title, the best picture nominee “Fences,” comes out online this Friday, leaving just 16 that you can see only in theaters. Watching all 46 online will cost at least $173, assuming you already have subscriptions to Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime or HBO Now. Focusing on just best picture and the four acting categories will still cost you nearly $70, not including the monthly subscriptions. It’s the cost of improving your chances of winning the Oscar…

Technology glitches including Bluetooth phone pairing and misunderstood voice commands put a dent in car and truck reliability scores in a major survey of automobile owners. Lexus and Porsche tied for the top spot, leading all brands for dependability in the survey released Wednesday by the consulting firm J.D. Power. But electronic problems caused trouble across the industry, pushing the average up to 156 problems per 100 vehicles. That’s four problems higher than last year and the highest number since J.D. Power changed scoring methods in 2015. Toyota, Buick and Mercedes-Benz rounded out the top five most dependable brands, while Fiat, Jeep and Infiniti were the least reliable, according to the survey. The J.D. Power study, now in its 28th year, questioned 35,186 owners of 2014 model-year vehicles about issues…

A SpaceX rocket soared from NASA’s long-idled moonshot pad last Sunday (18), sending up space station supplies from the exact spot where astronauts embarked on the lunar landings nearly a half-century ago. It was the first flight from NASA’s legendary Launch Complex 39A since the shuttle program ended almost six years ago, and SpaceX’s first liftoff from Florida since a rocket explosion last summer. The crowds at Kennedy Space Center watched eagerly as the unmanned Falcon 9 rocket took flight with a cargo ship bound for the International Space Station. They got barely 10 seconds of viewing before clouds swallowed up the Falcon as it thundered skyward. As an extra special treat, SpaceX landed its leftover booster back at Cape Canaveral eight minutes after liftoff, a feat accomplished only twice…

Hundreds of scientists, environmental advocates and their supporters held a rally in Boston on Sunday (19) to protest what they see as increasing threats to science and research in the U.S. The scientists, some dressed in white lab coats, called on President Donald Trump’s administration to recognize evidence of climate change and take action on various environmental issues. Geoffrey Supran, a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who studies renewable energy solutions to climate change, said scientists are responding to the Trump administration’s “anti-science rhetoric.” “We’re really trying to send a message today to Mr. Trump that America runs on science, science is the backbone of our prosperity and progress,” Supran said. The “Rally to Stand Up for Science” in Boston’s Copley Square was held…