Innholdsfortegnelse for #292 i Techlife News

Covfefe (cuv-fey-fey) noun: A sure sign that President Donald Trump has regained control of his Twitter account. For more than a week, the tweets from @ realDonaldTrump were, well, boring. Throughout his first big foreign trip last week, Trump’s tweets had the vibe of a garden-variety politician: statements of solidarity with world leaders, retweets of his wife’s visits with students and sick children, video clips from arrival statements and formal ceremonies, photos of official dinners. Yawn. Well, Twitterverse, he’s back. Starting with a wee-hours tweet that contained the mystifying nonword “covfefe,”Trump on Wednesday unleashed a string of tweets that showed the president was holding nothing back, on matters both trivial and consequential. He lashed out at the government’s Russia investigation as a “Witch Hunt!” He scolded celebrity Kathy Griffin for…

Google is expanding its paid carpool service throughout California, building on an effort to get more traffic-weary drivers to share their rides to work - and to collect data that could be useful for future transportation services. The Wednesday move by Google’s Waze unit, best known for its navigation and traffic monitoring app, extends the year-old carpooling service outside its initial markets of northern California and Israel. Waze will now be pairing up drivers and passengers across a wider expanse that includes heavily congested highways in Los Angeles and other parts of southern California. HOW IT WORKS Waze connects drivers and riders with similar commutes based on their home and work addresses. Riders request carpool rides in advance, but aren’t guaranteed matches. Drivers can only pick up one rider; they…

Despite wielding the golden lasso and deflecting bullets with her bracelets on the big screen for more than a year, “Wonder Woman “ star Gal Gadot still doesn’t see herself as a superhero. “I’m not there yet,” the 32-year-old actress said in a recent interview. “When I look on playback or I look at the monitor, it’s not there yet. I know it’s me. I understand everything, but I still don’t get that I’m doing this iconic character... It’s crazy.” Gadot didn’t grow up with Wonder Woman and wasn’t a big superhero fan as a child. A former Miss Israel, she started her acting career there before making her American movie debut in 2009’s “Fast & Furious.” But she dug into stacks of comic books and the 1970s “Wonder Woman”TV…

Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly said he’s considering banning laptops from the passenger cabins of all international flights to and from the United States. That would dramatically expand a ban announced in March that affects about 50 flights per day from 10 cities, mostly in the Middle East. The current ban was put in place because of concerns about terrorist attacks. The ban prevents travelers from bringing laptops, tablets and certain other devices on board with them in their carry-on bags. All electronics bigger than a smartphone must be checked in. Kelly was asked on “Fox News Sunday” whether he would expand the ban to cover laptops on all international flights into and out of the U.S. His answer: “I might.” The current U.S. ban applies to nonstop U.S.-bound flights…

Johnny Depp is 53 years old but he doesn’t look a day over 26 in the new “Pirates of the Caribbean” movie - at least for a few moments. There was no plastic surgeon involved, heavy makeup or archival footage used to take the actor back to his boyish “Cry Baby” face, however. It’s all post-production visual effects, and after a decade of refining the process since Brad Pitt ran the gamut of time in “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” it’s becoming commonplace in major Hollywood movies. Depp is just the latest mega-star to get the drastic de-aging treatment on screen, joining the ranks of Robert Downey Jr. (in “Captain America: Civil War”), Michael Douglas (in “Ant-Man”), Kurt Russell (in “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2”) and scores of…

The Memorial Day weekend box office was as creaky as an old pirate ship, with the lowest total industry grosses since 1999. Disney’s “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales” topped the charts with $78.5 million for the holiday weekend, making it the second-lowest debut for the five-film franchise. Paramount’s big screen take on “Baywatch,” meanwhile, capsized with only $23.1 million across the four day weekend. The poorly reviewed Dwayne Johnson-starrer carried a hefty production price tag of nearly $70 million. “Baywatch” couldn’t even beat “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2,” which took second place in its fourth week in theaters with $27.2 million. Rounding out the top five were “Alien: Covenant,” with $13.4 million and “Everything, Everything” with $7.7 million. The top 20 movies at U.S. and…

A French designer has shown his humanoid DIY robot to the public for the first time. The life-size plastic model responded to English-language commands Friday, picking up and dropping a small ball and swiveling its head to follow people. Designer Gael Langevin unveiled the robot at a technology fair in Romania this week. The idea developed from a prosthetics hand he made in 2011, the first-ever made on a 3-D printer. The robot is made with a 3-D printer and micro-cameras. It is hoped the robot will be used to help children in schools and hospitals. If connected to the internet, it can answer a variety of questions taken from Wikipedia. Langevin admits his model, generically called InMoov, is not yet perfect. “This is a little bit like Geppetto building…

Monstrous cyclones are churning over Jupiter’s poles, until now a largely unexplored region that is more turbulent than scientists expected. NASA’s Juno spacecraft spotted the chaotic weather at the top and bottom of Jupiter once it began skimming the cloud tops last year, surprising researchers who assumed the giant gas planet would be relatively boring and uniform down low. “What we’re finding is anything but that is the truth. It’s very different, very complex,” Juno’s chief scientist Scott Bolton of the Southwest Research Institute said. With dozens of cyclones hundreds of miles across - alongside unidentifiable weather systems stretching thousands of miles - the poles look nothing like Jupiter’s equatorial region, instantly recognizable by its stripes and Great Red Spot, a raging hurricane-like storm. “That’s the Jupiter we’ve all known…

It began with a simple, black-and-white highlights show on the venerable “Wide World of Sports,” grew into a proving ground for broadcast innovations, and is now one of the longest-running relationships between a sports event and television network. ABC and the Indianapolis 500, a marriage going back more than five decades. It’s been one of comfort, too, not only for the parties involved but for race fans who tune in every Memorial Day weekend. Those familiar voices of Jim McKay and Chris Schenkel, Brent Musburger and Marty Reid, have beckoned viewers to settle into a recliner, grab a cold lemonade and become engrossed in the colors, sounds and pageantry of “The Greatest Spectacle in Racing.” Yet the rapidly changing sports media landscape has left a hazy cloud of uncertainty over…

A Berlin court has denied a mother access to her deceased daughter’s Facebook data, ruling German privacy laws outweigh her parental rights. The mother sued for access to her daughter’s Facebook account after the 15-year-old died after being hit by a subway train in 2012 to try and determine if it was an accident or if she took her own life. The regional court said Wednesday that the mother’s wish was understandable, but that granting it would set a dangerous precedent. Facebook welcomed the decision, but says it will try to find a solution “that helps the family and at the same time protects the privacy of third parties.” The mother can appeal.…

President Donald Trump has been handing out his cellphone number to world leaders and urging them to call him directly, an unusual invitation that breaks diplomatic protocol and is raising concerns about the security and secrecy of the U.S. commander in chief’s communications. Trump has urged leaders of Canada and Mexico to reach him on his cellphone, according to former and current U.S. officials with direct knowledge of the practice. Of the two, only Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has taken advantage of the offer so far, the officials said. Trump also exchanged numbers with French President Emmanuel Macron when the two spoke immediately following Macron’s victory earlier this month, according to a French official, who would not comment on whether Macron intended to use the line. All the officials…

When General Motors CEO Mary Barra introduced the Chevrolet Bolt at the CES gadget show last year, she took a shot at Tesla. Buyers can be confident because Chevy has 3,000 U.S. dealers to service the new electric vehicle, she said. The implication was that Tesla, with just 69 service centers nationwide, can make no such promise. The uncharacteristic insult from Barra was designed to highlight the difference between 108-year-old GM and Tesla, a disruptive teenager. It also acknowledged a budding rivalry that could help determine whether Detroit or Silicon Valley sets the course for the future of the auto industry. The tale of the tape favors GM. It has made billions in profits since returning to the public markets in 2010. GM got the Bolt, a $36,000 car that…

WWDC IS JUST AROUND THE CORNER Once a year, Apple brings together thousands of talented developers from around the globe for a celebration of software, sales and for an unveiling of its latest iOS and macOS software. This year’s WWDC, which is also known as the Worldwide Developer Conference, is no different – thousands of people will get together at the McEnery Convention Center in San Jose, California for a five-day event that’s packed with keynotes, sessions, consultations and guest speakers. It’s fair to say that WWDC is one of the biggest events in the technology calendar. This year’s event kicks off on June 5, where Tim Cook and co will grace the stage and deliver a keynote speech on the year ahead. iOS, macOS, tvOS, and watchOS are all…

Boarding passes could someday become quaint relics for air travelers. JetBlue Airways plans to test facial-recognition check-in for a few flights beginning later this month, and Delta Air Lines plans to let some passengers board with their fingerprints instead of a boarding pass. The once-ubiquitous paper boarding pass is already shunned by many travelers who prefer to use mobile boarding passes on their phones. Now pilot programs could render those obsolete too, as airlines aim to increase convenience for customers, and government agencies look to increase security. JetBlue and U.S. Customs and Border Protection will test facial recognition for passengers boarding flights from Boston’s Logan Airport to Aruba starting later this month. Volunteers will be photographed and their images will be searched against a Customs database of passport and other…

The Shack Based on the New York Times best-selling novel, The Shack tells the story of a father’s uplifting spiritual journey after suffering a family tragedy. Questioning his innermost beliefs and facing a crisis of faith, Mack (Sam Worthington) receives a mysterious letter that urges him to an abandoned shack in the Oregon wilderness. Despite doubts, he travels there and encounters an enigmatic trio of strangers who lead him to important truths that change his life forever. FIVE FACTS: 1. Forest Whitaker was to direct this movie originally but dropped out. 2. The movie is based on the 2007 novel by the Canadian author William P. Young. 3. The large roadside duck sign which marks the entrance to the Oregon skate park is the actual entrance sign for Cultus Lake…

Mayim Bialik plays smart on TV’s “The Big Bang Theory” and is smart in real life, with a Ph.D. in neuroscience as evidence. She joins her intelligence with experience in “Girling Up: How to be Strong, Smart and Spectacular,” a wide-ranging handbook on navigating the emotional and physical hurdles of growing up. It’s as forthright as Bialik herself is in conversation, with comic book-style graphics adding a lively touch. The book’s roots stem from “The Big Bang Theory” episode in which her character, Amy, and boyfriend, Sheldon (Jim Parsons), lose their virginity. That prompted Bialik to write an essay for her website, Grok Nation, on what it’s like to be a late bloomer and “how complicated intimacy can be on TV and in real life,” she said. Her discussion of…

Nest Labs is adding Google’s facial recognition technology to a high-resolution home-security camera, offering a glimpse of a future in which increasingly intelligent, internet-connected computers can see and understand what’s going on in people’s homes. The Nest Cam IQ, unveiled Wednesday, will be Nest’s first device to draw upon the same human-like skills that Google has been programming into its computers - for instance, to identify people in images via its widely used photo app. Facebook deploys similar technology to automatically recognize and recommend tags of people in photos posted on its social network. THE COST OF FACIAL RECOGNITION The new camera will set you back almost $300, and you’ll also have to pay $10 a month for a plan that includes facial recognition technology. The same plan will also…

A NASA spacecraft will aim straight for the sun next year and bear the name of the astrophysicist who predicted the existence of the solar wind nearly 60 years ago. The space agency announced that the red-hot mission would be named after Eugene Parker, professor emeritus at the University of Chicago. It’s the first NASA spacecraft to be named after a researcher who is still alive, noted the agency’s science mission chief, Thomas Zurbuchen. Scheduled to launch next summer from Cape Canaveral, the Parker Solar Probe will fly within 4 million miles of the sun’s surface - right into the solar atmosphere. That will be considerably closer than any other spacecraft, and subject the probe to brutal heat and radiation like no other man-made structure before. The materials weren’t available…

A Dutch tech startup and a construction company have unveiled a Hyperloop test facility, a 30-meter (100-foot) long white steel tube that will be used to help develop the futuristic high-speed transportation system. The tube, located at Delft Technical University, is a first step toward developing the system in the Netherlands, a key European transportation transport hub. Tim Houter, CEO of Hardt Global Mobility, said Thursday that the tube will be used to test safety and other elements of the system at low speeds before construction begins of a larger test tube for high speed testing. The Hyperloop was first proposed in 2013 by SpaceX and Tesla Motors co-founder Elon Musk to transport “pods” of people through a tube at speeds of roughly 700 mph (1126 kph).…

Ukraine’s intelligence agency is searching the offices of Yandex, a Russia-based Internet company best known for its search engine. Ukrainian authorities earlier this month blocked access to Yandex as well as to several major Russian social media websites. President Petro Poroshenko said the move was made in response to Russia’s annexation of the Crimean peninsula and continuing interference in eastern Ukraine. Most of the Internet and media companies banned by Ukraine, however, are privately owned and have grown over the past decades from startups into major international businesses. Olena Gitlyanska, spokeswoman for Ukrainian intelligence agency SBU, said this week that Yandex’s offices in Kiev and Odessa were searched as part of an investigation on treason charges. It was not immediately clear what the charges were related to.…

Doughnuts were delivered Wednesday by drone to Denver’s mayor and the city’s police and fire departments in an event that provided a glimpse into what companies hope will be a quick, inexpensive way to get merchandise to customers. Denver’s LaMar’s Donuts hired Austin, Texas-based company Drone Dispatch to deliver four boxes of doughnuts using piloted drones flown from parking lots within a block of the delivery targets. LaMar’s spokesman Tami Osifodunrin said Federal Aviation Administration regulations prohibit commercial drone pilots from losing sight of drones. Denver Mayor Michael Hancock was outside city hall when a drone delivered doughnuts. “This is exciting stuff and I think as we get ready for not only drones in the air, and get ready for autonomous vehicles, this is our future this is how we’re…

In a world of only women, there are no phallic structures. At least that’s how Patty Jenkins imagined the island home of the Amazons and their heroic princess Diana, who grows up to become Wonder Woman. “Like columns? They didn’t make that much sense to me,” Jenkins said in a recent interview. “They felt like an imposition on landscape, which didn’t feel like something that women are jonesing to do.” As the director of “Wonder Woman ,” Jenkins is creating new worlds for women both onscreen and off. Not only did she help dream up the look of the Amazon island and hire scores of actresses to serve as its resident warriors, she’s the first woman to direct a major superhero movie, and her success could pave the way for…

Amazon, the internet goliath that revolutionized the way much of the world buys books, toilet paper and TVs, hit a new milestone Tuesday. Its stock surpassed the $1,000 mark for the first time. That price put Amazon’s market value at about $478 billion, double that of the world’s biggest traditional retailer, Wal-Mart, and more than 15 times the size of Target. A $1,000 investment on Amazon’s first day of trading in 1997 would be worth more than $500,000 today. Not only has Amazon changed the retail landscape since it became a public company 20 years ago, it’s now part of a small cadre of high-flying stocks belonging to companies that have defied Wall Street and shunned stock splits. Those splits make the stock more affordable and generate brokerage fees. But…

The Pentagon scored an important success Tuesday in a test of its oft-criticized missile defense program, destroying a mock warhead over the Pacific Ocean with an interceptor that is key to protecting U.S. territory from a North Korean attack. Vice Adm. Jim Syring, director of the Pentagon agency in charge of developing the missile defense system, called the test result “an incredible accomplishment” and a critical milestone for a program hampered by setbacks over the years. “This system is vitally important to the defense of our homeland, and this test demonstrates that we have a capable, credible deterrent against a very real threat,” Syring said in a written statement announcing the test result. Despite the success, the $244 million test didn’t confirm that under wartime conditions the U.S. could intercept…

From a Room Chris Stapleton Leading on from the critical and commercial success of his first album Traveller, Chris Stapleton’s second album panders to the requirements of mainstream country radio with nine tracks that are focused both sonically and thematically. This is the first of two volumes, with the second due later this year. FIVE FACTS: 1. Chris has contributed music to the soundtracks of movies including Valentine’s Day and Cars 2. 2. Before fame, he fronted the Grammy-nominated band The Steel Drivers from 2008 to 2010. 3. He has also written more than 150 songs for other artists including “Never Wanted Nothing More” for Kenny Chesney and “Come Back Song” for Darius Rucker. 4. In 2015, Chris’ debut album Traveller peaked at number two on the U.S. country charts.…

For all the changes in television over the past decade - how it is consumed and the explosion of new outlets and programs - CBS’ popularity with the masses remains unchallenged. The traditional television season ended last week and, for the ninth year in a row, CBS finished as the most popular network in prime time. CBS has won 14 of the last 15 years, the Nielsen company said. CBS’“NCIS” finished as the most-watched drama for the eighth year in a row, and “The Big Bang Theory” was the most popular comedy for the seventh straight year. With no reason to change, both series will be back next season, with “The Big Bang Theory” accompanied by a new prequel based on Sheldon’s character. Nielsen said CBS averaged 9.6 million viewers…

SpaceX is taking recycling to a whole new realm - all the way to orbit. On this week’s supply run to the International Space Station, SpaceX will launch a Dragon capsule that’s already traveled there. The milestone comes just two months after the launch of its first reused rocket booster for a satellite. “This whole notion of reuse is something that’s very, very important to the entire space industry,” NASA’s space station program manager Kirk Shireman said at a news conference Wednesday. While the concept is not new - the space shuttles, for instance, flew multiple times in orbit - it’s important for saving money as well as technical reasons, he noted. This particular Dragon flew to the station in 2014. SpaceX refurbished it for Thursday evening’s planned launch, providing…

Earth is likely to reach more dangerous levels of warming even sooner if the U.S. retreats from its pledge to cut carbon dioxide pollution, scientists said. That’s because America contributes so much to rising temperatures. President Donald Trump, who once proclaimed global warming a Chinese hoax, said in a tweet last Saturday that he would make his “final decision” this coming week on whether the United States stays in or leaves the 2015 Paris climate change accord in which nearly every nation agreed to curb its greenhouse gas emissions. Leaders of seven wealthy democracies, at a summit in Sicily, urged Trump to commit his administration to the agreement, but said in their closing statement that the U.S., for now, “is not in a position to join the consensus.” “I hope…

Taxi drivers across Spain set off firecrackers and threw objects at police Tuesday as they went on strike to protest the increase in cars run by private companies like Uber that offer cheaper, mobile ride-hailing services. Travelers arriving at Madrid’s or Barcelona’s airports and train stations found none of the usual lines of taxis waiting to pick them up. The strike was directed against the San Francisco-headquartered Uber and Madrid-based Cabify services. Unions claim these companies flout a law that stipulates there should be one private company vehicle for every 30 taxis and promote unfair competition. Thousands of taxi drivers staged a demonstration in central Madrid at noon, with some setting off firecrackers and hurling plastic bottles of water and eggs at police cordoning off access to Parliament. Some brief…