Month: September 2017

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Eine erste Alexa-Brille könnte noch in diesem Jahr vorgestellt werden. Das Amazon-Konzept unterscheidet sich dabei grundlegend von dem Ansatz der Google Glass. Zudem ist eine Smart-Home-Kamera bei Amazon in der Mache. (Smartglass, Amazon)

Early 2017, China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said that due to Internet technologies and services expanding in a “disorderly” fashion, regulation would be needed to restore order.

Announcing measures to strengthen network information security management, the government said it would begin a “nationwide Internet network access services clean-up.”

Months later, it became evident that authorities were taking an even more aggressive stance towards Virtual Private Networks, since these allow citizens to evade the so-called Great Firewall of China. The government said that in future, operating such a service without a corresponding telecommunications license would constitute an offense.

Now, according to local news reports, a citizen who apparently failed to heed the government’s warnings has fallen foul of the new rules.

The Nanjinger reports that a software developer, named as Mr. Zhao from Nanjing, was arrested August 21 for contravening the new laws on VPN licensing.

Zhao reportedly told authorities he’d initially set up the VPN for his own use in order to access content hosted abroad, which presumably involved circumventing China’s firewall. However, once he recognized there was a demand, the developer decided to let others use the service for a small fee.

The prices he asked were indeed small – just $1.50 per month or around $18 for two years’ service. Based on reported total revenues of just $164 for the entire business, it’s possible he had around 100 customers, or indeed far fewer.

What will happen to the man isn’t clear but he’ll be keen to avoid the fate of Deng Jiewei, who previously ran a small website through which he’d sold around $2,100 worth of VPN software.

Early September it was reported that the 26-year-old had been sentenced to nine months in prison for offering tools that enable people to “visit foreign websites that cannot be accessed via a domestic (mainland) IP address.”

These cases are part of an emerging pattern in China centered around the supply and sale of VPN products and services. Back in July, Apple began banning VPN applications from its iOS store in China. The company reported that the apps contained content that is illegal locally, thereby violating the company’s policies.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

The results and analysis for DVD, Blu-ray and Ultra HD Blu-ray sales for the week ending September 9, 2017 are in. A quiet week again in which the top selling new release, Megan Leavey, only managed a 4th place finish.

Read the rest of the stats and analysis to find out how DVD, Blu-ray, Ultra HD Blu-ray did.

Stift, Touchscreen, 360-Grad-Scharnier: Das Pixelbook ist kein neues Surface-Gerät, sondern wird wohl das neue High-End-Chromebook werden. Google lässt sich trotzdem von der Konkurrenz inspirieren, sogar beim hohen Preis. (Chromebook, Google)

Die Förderung für Glasfaser soll auch an die Bürger gehen, die sich für die Zukunftstechnologie entscheiden. Der Breko fordert eine Prämie für FTTH. (Internet, DSL)

Vor der Veröffentlichung der neuen Google-Geräte am 4. Oktober 2017 ist offenbar weitgehend bekannt, was Google zeigen wird: Neben dem neuen Pixel 2 und Pixel 2 XL sollen auch ein neues Daydream-Headset und ein Google Home Mini kommen. Auch die mutmaßlichen Preise sind bekannt. (Google, Smartphone)

A game developer has come up with a novel way to prevent the piracy of their new game - give it away for free!

Game bundle sales site IndieGala has recently branched into game development, and their upcoming game, Die Young, has received some unfortunately attention from game pirates. When IndieGala discovered a pirated version of the game, with the Steam copy protection cracked, being made available on piracy sites, the developer took action.

Via a blog post, IndieGala addressed the piracy issue and offered a novel solution by giving away a DRM-free copy of the game for all who were tempted by the pirated version.

"If you don’t have enough money but you want to play the game, or if you simply want to check if your hardware is able to run it smoothly, we’re providing safe, DRM-free access to Die Young (Version 0.4.37.18) on IndieGala until December 31st 2017," the blog post read.

IndieGala says they're doing this because they don't want gamers to access the pirated version due to potential cybersecurity threats and they also want to ensure even pirates are part of the gaming conversation, and not "alienated" from developers. By having a legit free copy floating around, IndieGala says they can still get valuable feedback from gamers, even if they did not choose to pay for a copy.

The game itself is also available via Steam's Early Access, with gamers getting access to frequently updated beta versions of the game prior to its full release. The free version will only be a static release, meaning it won't be updated, but it is a relatively recent (as at the time of this story) version (version 0.4.37.18).

The free version is available to download here (free login required).

[via IndieGala, PCGamesN]

ARMs Cortex-A75 und die eigenen Cannon Lake: Intel hat zwei Wafer mit 10-nm-Chips präsentiert und erneut die technologische Führung propagiert. Daran scheinen aber nicht mehr alle bisherigen Foundry-Partner zu glauben. (Cannonlake, Prozessor)

Amazons Echo Dot könnte bald Konkurrenz von Google bekommen. In Kürze wird ein smarter Minilautsprecher namens Google Home Mini erwartet. Die kleine Version des Google Home arbeitet ebenfalls mit dem Google Assistant. (Google Home Mini, Google)