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When you’ve got 1,200 games to sift though, you’re bound to find a few peculiarities.
Welcome to Ars Cardboard, our weekend look at tabletop games. Check out our complete board gaming coverage at cardboard.arstechnica.com.
At the recent Essen board game fair—the hobby's biggest event—we saw 1,000+ new titles. That meant we also saw our fair share of amazing new games. We also saw plenty of titles that were strange, unusual, and/or poop-focused. These are those games.
Don't let anyone tell you that this isn't board gaming's "Golden Age."
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Is a true Android Wear sports watch worth $330?
Video shot/edited by Jennifer Hahn. (video link)
There's no shortage of Android Wear watches to choose from. Companies including Huawei, LG, Casio, and Fossil all have smartwatches that run on Google's wearable operating system, and all of them can use Google Fit's activity tracking. Now, the fitness company Polar is getting into the mix with the M600 Android Wear-based fitness watch, which is the first device that integrates Polar's existing exercise software with Android Wear.
The M600 wants to appeal to a specific kind of user: one who is into fitness and wants a heart rate monitor and onboard GPS in their tracker, but who also cares about getting wrist notifications and using wearable apps. But at $329, Polar's device is right up there with the Apple Watch in price, and that might be too steep for some consumers, considering the experience it offers is much different.
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Hormone injections lowered sperm counts, but also caused acne and mood swings.
Enlarge (credit: Getty | Dmitry Rogulin )
Routine hormone injections into the buttocks of 320 men dramatically shrunk their sperm counts and prevented pregnancies during a year-long, early-phase trial, researchers reported Thursday.
The findings suggest that a future hormonal male contraceptive may one day be possible. However, the data also revealed high rates of side effects, such as acne and mood swings, suggesting much more work is needed before such a birth control method is realized.
"A male hormonal contraceptive is possible," lead author Mario Festin, a medical officer with the department of reproductive health and research at the World Health Organization, told the Chicago Tribune. "We have to continue searching for or investigating the right drugs, and their combinations, with the highest efficacy and safety, and acceptability, with the least side effects."
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An educational system helped pioneer sports games, in-game chat, and simultaneous play.
In the days of mainframe computing, one system stood miles ahead of the rest. PLATO (Programmed Logic for Automatic Teaching Operations) wasn't special for its power or speed or graphical prowess, though. It was remarkable for the ideas that drove its development and for the breadth of its impact—starting in the 1960s and accelerating through the '70s and '80s, PLATO terminals became omnipresent throughout schools, universities, and offices around the world.
The PLATO system was designed for education. It had a programming language called TUTOR that was simple enough for non-technical people to use for writing software; it also notably offered a social environment. It was an online community as much as it was a computing platform, and in this capacity it envisaged much of the future of communication. PLATO had chat rooms, message boards, touch panels built into the (flat, plasma) screens, emoticons, animations, virtual economies, and more.
But PLATO also had a less heralded but equally influential component. And even if history has glossed over this detail and neglected to celebrate it, PLATO's gaming archives remain unforgettable for anyone who was there to experience the platform. These "lessons" infuriated administrators, delighted students, and, importantly, pushed the system to its limits.
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The developers behind CyanogenMod have scrapped plans to nightly builds of their Android 7.0-based operating system… because they’ve begun development of a version based on Android 7.1 instead.
In other words, the next version of the operating system will be called CyanogenMod 14.1 rather than CyanogenMod 7. It’ll incorporate the latest updates to Google’s operating system for phones, tablets, and other devices.
The reason nightly builds haven’t been released yet has to do with a change on Google’s side: in an effort to improve security, the company made it a bit more difficult for CyanogenMod’s developers to ensure that cameras work in all of the devices the team wants to support.
The developers behind CyanogenMod have scrapped plans to nightly builds of their Android 7.0-based operating system… because they’ve begun development of a version based on Android 7.1 instead.
In other words, the next version of the operating system will be called CyanogenMod 14.1 rather than CyanogenMod 7. It’ll incorporate the latest updates to Google’s operating system for phones, tablets, and other devices.
The reason nightly builds haven’t been released yet has to do with a change on Google’s side: in an effort to improve security, the company made it a bit more difficult for CyanogenMod’s developers to ensure that cameras work in all of the devices the team wants to support.
Aus Entwicklerkreisen kommt die Aussage, die Nintendo Switch nutze einen 6,2-Zoll-Bildschirm mit Multitouch. Bedingt durch die Auflösung ist die Pixeldichte aber kaum höher als bei der PS Vita. (Nintendo Switch, Multitouch)
Aus Entwicklerkreisen kommt die Aussage, die Nintendo Switch nutze einen 6,2-Zoll-Bildschirm mit Multitouch. Bedingt durch die Auflösung ist die Pixeldichte aber kaum höher als bei der PS Vita. (Nintendo Switch, Multitouch) Modified Kodi and other IPTV devices allow users to access valuable content for free. Members of Parliament and industry players say they want to clamp down on such devices, by closing loopholes in copyright law to target sellers. This week, however, their suggestions to change the law in the UK were withdrawn.
Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.
Over the course of the past decade-and-a-half, the number of BitTorrent users has grown from a handful to a couple of hundred million. Usage is still massive but it’s now streaming that’s making strides.
Accessible via a standard browser or dedicated hardware devices, pirate streams of the latest movies, TV shows, and sporting events are now watched by millions in the comfort of their own homes, or even on the move.
Copyright holders everywhere are worried but it’s perhaps most evident in the UK where police and Trading Standards officers are targeting sellers of Kodi-enabled devices that have been modified to receive pirate streams. This week, as part of the forming Digital Economy Bill, Members of Parliament have been discussing potential amendments to UK copyright law aimed at clamping down on the sale of such devices.
“Android-based IPTV boxes are being loaded with software linking thousands of streams of infringing entertainment, movie and sport content. The boxes are sold on mainstream marketplaces such as Amazon and eBay, and through Facebook,” said Labour MP Kevin Brennan.
“The Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 has yet to be updated to reflect the new technology. It offers no effective remedies to copyright owners, who at present can rely only on laws that are not particularly tailored to copyright infringement.”
Brennan said that police currently need to prosecute under the Fraud Act 2006, the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, and the Serious Crime Act 2015. By amending the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, bodies such as Trading Standards would have an easier time prosecuting offenders, the MP said.
“New clause 33 would amend section 107(1) of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (CDPA) to create the new offense of supply of devices primarily used to infringe copyright. It is entirely logical to amend that section, which is concerned with ‘criminal liability for…dealing with infringing articles’, but which currently focuses only on physical copies of work and on communication to the public,” Brennan explained.
“The new clause would bring trading standards offices into the picture, empowering them to make investigations and to enforce the rules on such devices under section 107(1) of the 1988 Act. To minimize the risk of new and uncertain legal tests, concepts or unintended consequences, the drafting adopts for the most part language used elsewhere in that Act.”
Support for the new clause came from the SNP’s Callum Kerr, who noted that people will continue to innovate when it comes to obtaining pirate content. Surprisingly, he also confessed that someone in Parliament actually encouraged him to buy a pirate box.
“Someone in [Parliament] recommended an IPTV box to me for my London flat because it is quite a cheap way of accessing content, but I did not follow that advice because I would not want to access any illegal content,” Kerr said.
“These boxes come pre-loaded, and there should be no pretense about it: they are designed to give people a way of avoiding paying for content that they know they should pay for. There is no excuse for that.”
Noting that the proposals for amendments to the CDPA have “a long list of supporters in the industry”, Brennan asked Matt Hancock, Minister for Digital and Culture, whether they could rely on his support too. Hancock said he understood the concerns but believes that current legislation (the Fraud Act 2006 and the Serious Crime Act 2015) can cope without having to modify the CDPA.
“This activity is already covered by criminal law under the Fraud Act 2006 and the Serious Crime Act 2015. The City of London police force is investigating cases. It seized over 500 set-top boxes earlier this year and arrested a man for fraud and IP offenses,” Hancock said.
“There is a danger in the digital world of legislating for a specific technology as opposed to legislating for the offense in a technology-neutral way. I strongly prefer the latter. As the law is already in existence in the two Acts that I mentioned, the best thing to do is to prosecute under the existing Acts, rather than try to chase a particular technology, which may well be out of date.”
Hancock told MPs that the government already has a strategy for tackling IP crime with a specific focus on dealing with the problem of IPTV and whatever technology eventually comes along to replace it. Sticking with existing legislation is the way forward, he said.
“The existing criminal offenses provide a legislative framework that is broad enough to protect our creative industries. However, I will of course keep this area under review,” he added, while asking for the new clause to be withdrawn. Brennan complied.
The fact that a request to amend the CDPA was rejected in this case raises questions over the current push to increase punishments for online copyright infringement offenses from two to ten years.
Many of the more serious online cases have also been successfully prosecuted under the Fraud Act, without any need to use the CDPA. Notably, these prosecutions were achieved without sucking in low-level offenders such as casual file-sharers.
Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.
Der neue Landwirtschaftssimulator bietet gar nicht so viel Neues – zumindest, wenn man den Vorgänger mit Community-Mods gespielt hat. Die Entwickler von Giants haben sich viel bei diesen abgeschaut. Und wissen, dass gerade die Modding-Bereitschaft ihr Spiel so besonders macht. (Landwirtschafts-Simulator, Steam)
Der neue Landwirtschaftssimulator bietet gar nicht so viel Neues - zumindest, wenn man den Vorgänger mit Community-Mods gespielt hat. Die Entwickler von Giants haben sich viel bei diesen abgeschaut. Und wissen, dass gerade die Modding-Bereitschaft ihr Spiel so besonders macht. (Landwirtschafts-Simulator, Steam) 
Eine Sicherheitslücke in Joomla bestand seit vielen Jahren, doch ein Bug verhinderte, dass man sie ausnutzen konnte. Dann wurde der Bug gefixt - ohne dass das Sicherheitsproblem entdeckt wurde. Absicht oder nicht? (
Bethesdas Remaster von Skyrim sieht zwar klasse aus, die Bildrate aber halbiert sich durch die zusätzlichen Effekte. Viel wichtiger ist künftig ohnehin die neue 64-Bit-Engine, Stichwort Mods. (
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