Month: November 2017

Ron Amadeo

After the launch of the flagship HTC U11 earlier this year, it's time for a cheaper entry in HTC's lineup. HTC's approach this year is to take the U11, cut the price and premium-ness by about 50 percent, and create the "HTC U11 Life." It's a cheap imitation of the U11, for just $349.

From a distance, you can barely tell the difference between the flagship U11 and the U11 Life. You get a similar design with the same ultra-shiny body coloring as the U11, the same massive bezels—which are much more acceptable at this price point—and a few "flagship" features like IP67 dust and water resistance, always-on voice commands, and HTC's squeezable sides. So, why is the price so much lower? Of course the answer is that the specs are lower, and you're getting a cheaper body.

Enlarge (credit: David Butow | Getty Images)

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has called the company "a drama magnet" compared to SpaceX, The Boring Company, or any of Musk's other endeavors. Since the launch of the Model 3, the $35,000 vehicle in Tesla's battery-electric lineup, that's held true. Now in Q3, the company's financial statement reflects more of that drama, good and bad. Wednesday night, Tesla posted another loss, greater than the one before it, but with revenues and sales hitting record highs at the same time.

According to numbers released today (PDF), Tesla posted a $671 million loss on total revenues of nearly $3 billion in the third quarter of 2017.

Compare that to 2017’s second quarter, where Tesla posted a loss of $401 million after total revenues of $2.7 billion.

A Utah nurse who was roughed up and arrested on July 26 by a Salt Lake City cop because she told the officer that he needed a warrant to draw blood from an unconscious patient has settled for a $500,000 payout.

Body cam footage from the scene shows University Hospital nurse Alex Wubbels calmly telling the officer, who was trained for the task of blood withdrawal, that he cannot take a blood sample because the patient, who was involved in a vehicle crash, had neither been arrested nor gave consent. Then the cop lunges and grabs the nurse as she was fearfully backing away. He rushes her outside the hospital, and handcuffs her. All the while, she's screaming that there's no reason for her detainment.

"Somebody help!"

Enlarge (credit: Getty Images | Priscila Zambotto)

TV piracy services are being used by about 6.5 percent of North American households with broadband access, potentially costing legitimate TV providers billions of dollars a year, a new analysis found. Pirate services that offer live TV channels are apparently responsible for more downstream traffic each night than torrent downloads.

Based on these figures, there may be 7 million US and Canadian subscribers to pirate TV services that generally cost about $10 a month, the report by Sandvine said. That amounts to $840 million of revenue a year.

We don't know how many people using pirate services would purchase a traditional cable or satellite TV package if the piracy option didn't exist. But if all of those people instead purchased a legal TV package for $50 per month, that would amount to another $4.2 billion revenue a year for North American pay-TV providers, the report said.