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If you haven’t upgraded your home wireless network to 802.11ac yet today’s a pretty good day to do it. Best Buy is selling a Linksys AC1750 WiFi router for $50, which is just half its normal price. This router gets pretty strong reviews, supports 2.4 G…
If you haven’t upgraded your home wireless network to 802.11ac yet today’s a pretty good day to do it. Best Buy is selling a Linksys AC1750 WiFi router for $50, which is just half its normal price. This router gets pretty strong reviews, supports 2.4 GHz and 5GHz connections, and has 6 antennas. It should […]
The post Deals of the Day (3-26-2018) appeared first on Liliputing.
Episode 3 of “Every Generation Online” goes for the stories behind the nicks.
Video shot and edited by Justin Wolfson. Click here for transcript.
Identity online is a funny thing—it can be both mutable and permanent. The way you present yourself to different sites changes depending on those sites’ contexts and goals. You might be one person on a gaming discussion board, a second person on your neighborhood’s Facebook page, and a third on the Ars comment section. And because online communication is still primarily a written medium, that shifting presentation of self is encapsulated in the name one chooses to show to the world.
Call them screen names, nicks, handles, or something else, the pen names we employ are our online faces. A screen name is an identity you’ve chosen—a statement about yourself, represented in a handful of characters and often with a number tagged onto the end to make it unique (if Trinity, Morpheus, and Neo from this article's listing image were real-world Internet users, they'd probably have to be call themselves Trinity99, WokeMorpheus1987, and NEO_WEED_BONER_420XXX [NEB]).
The choices that lead to the selection of a name are as varied as the names themselves, but we all tend to become attached to our nicks regardless of how serious or silly they are—just as we become attached to anything that we feel represents our sense of self.
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Hearthstone meets Might & Magic in this distant descendant.
Enlarge (credit: inXile Entertainment)
SAN FRANCISCO—When it was published as Tales of the Unknown: Volume I in 1985, The Bard's Tale was the most popular PC RPG yet released. It spawned two sequels, but disputes over contracts and more prevented further development. The series went dormant for 30 years, apart from a comedy action RPG in the early 2000s that bore little resemblance to the original game.
Now, a Kickstarter has given life to The Bard's Tale IV: Barrows Deep. Developed by Interplay alum-founded inXile Entertainment (Wasteland 2, Torment: Tides of Numenera), it's the first game in decades to follow the basic mold of the original series of RPGs, though it takes a few liberties of its own to modernize the franchise (most of them are welcome).
I played a work-in-progress version at the 2018 Game Developers Conference (GDC) in San Francisco, guided by lead designer David Rogers. While I had a few small complaints as a classic CRPG player, I walked away from the demo with the impression that inXile has struck a reasonable balance between the spirit of the hardcore originals and the new, more modern expectations of today's players.
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Die Carbanak-Gruppe hat seit 2013 durch Angriffe auf Banken über eine Milliarde Euro an Schaden verursacht. Bei einer koordinierten Polizeiaktion wurde der Gründer und “Mastermind” in Alicante festgenommen. (Phishing, Virus)
It was such a poor effort, the network apologized to fans.
Enlarge / Kevin Magnussen's retirement was a key moment of the race, and one you'd have missed here in the US, because ESPN chose to cut away from the broadcast for a commercial. (credit: Robert Cianflone/Getty Images)
The 2018 Formula 1 season got underway in Australia this past weekend. And now in its second year of ownership by Liberty Media, there have been a few significant changes to the sport over the off-season. All the cars today sport the Halo device—a metal and carbon fiber structure that should prevent flying debris from hitting drivers in the head (despite looking for all the world like that bit on a flip-flop that keeps it on your foot). Pirelli now has seven different tire compounds to use throughout the year, from the orange "superhard" to the pink "hypersoft." And here in the US, the sport has a new home on ESPN.
And, oh boy, did that last initiative get screwed up.
As previously detailed, Liberty chose to give ESPN the contract to broadcast F1 races from 2018 onward because the series' previous home, NBC Sports, wouldn't stomach Liberty launching its own F1 streaming service. That service is due at some point this season, but we're not entirely sure when.
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Google has been adding touch-friendly features to Chrome OS for years, and a growing number of Chromebooks have featured touchscreen displays. But Acer is the first company to cut the keyboard. The new Acer Chromebook Tab 10 is a 9.7 inch tablet that r…
Google has been adding touch-friendly features to Chrome OS for years, and a growing number of Chromebooks have featured touchscreen displays. But Acer is the first company to cut the keyboard. The new Acer Chromebook Tab 10 is a 9.7 inch tablet that runs Google’s Chrome operating system, supports Android apps, and has no keyboard […]
The post Acer’s first Chrome OS tablet is coming in April for $329 appeared first on Liliputing.
Custom ROM users get a way out, but noobs with pirated apps will be out of luck.
Enlarge (credit: Google)
Google is apparently stepping up its efforts to crack down on illicit distribution of Google's Android apps. According to XDA Developers, Google logins on unlicensed devices will now fail at setup, and a warning message will pop up stating "Device is not certified by Google." This warning screen has appeared on and off in the past during a test phase, but XDA (and user reports) indicate it is now headed for a wider rollout.
While the basic operating system code contained in the Android Open Source Project is free and open source, Google's apps that run on top of Android (like the Play Store, Gmail, Google Maps, etc.) and many others are not free. Google licenses these apps to device makers under a number of terms designed to give Google control over how the OS is used. Google's collection of default Android apps must all be bundled together, there are placement and default service requirements, and devices must pass an ever-growing list of compatibility requirements to ensure app compatibility.
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Earlier this month, Spotify began taking action against users abusing its free tier. After detecting their modified Android files, countless people were suspended or excluded from the service. Now Spotify has revealed that it had a staggering two million unauthorized users and data from Google shows that many flooded the search engine during March looking for a way back in.
Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and more. We also have VPN reviews, discounts, offers and coupons.
It is now common knowledge that Spotify launched its service more than a decade ago with the aim of attracting pirates.
With the disruption of The Pirate Bay ringing in the music industry’s ears, Spotify set out to capture the hearts and minds of music fans, particularly those with an aversion to paying.
Although it is yet to turn a profit, there can be little doubt that Spotify is a rampant success, at least as far as user numbers go. With premium and ad-supported free tiers available, the service is superbly accessible, no matter the depth of one’s pockets.
Naturally, those who pay get a better and smoother service so it’s no surprise that many free tier users aspire to that level of access. But while some pay the extra, others prefer to hack their way to music utopia.
How many people were accessing Spotify’s service using mainly hacked Android APK files has remained a mystery, but late last week, as part of the company’s IPO, Spotify dropped the bombshell.
“On March 21, 2018, we detected instances of approximately two million users as of December 31, 2017, who have been suppressing advertisements without payment,” Spotify wrote.
“We previously included such users in calculations for certain of our key performance indicators, including MAUs [Monthly Active Users], Ad-Supported Users, Content Hours, and Content Hours per MAU.”
Two million users is hardly an insignificant number and it appears Spotify felt the need to disclose them since up to January 1, 2017, the company had been including these users in its accounting. A couple of million users on the free tier is great, but not if they’re riding ad-free and therefore less likely to upgrade to premium, the suggestion goes.
Earlier this month, with its IPO process underway, Spotify clearly had these freeloading users on its mind. As previously reported, the company started to send out emails to people using hacked installation files, largely on Android, putting them on notice that their activities were not going unnoticed.
“We detected abnormal activity on the app you are using so we have disabled it. Don’t worry – your Spotify account is safe,” the email from Spotify said.
“To access your Spotify account, simply uninstall any unauthorized or modified version of Spotify and download and install the Spotify app from the official Google Play Store. If you need more help, please see our support article on Reinstalling Spotify.”
At the time it became apparent that this email had gone out to a large number of people, with significant volumes of users reporting problems with their accounts. It also seemed to target users fairly methodically, in that some countries’ users retained access while others suffered, only to be hit later on as more and more waves were sent out.
As the chart below from Google Trends shows, it appears that Spotify began taking action on March 1, which drove people to start searching for Spotify APK files that were still working.
By March 3, search volumes had doubled on the index and on March 7, Google searches for ‘Spotify APK’ reached a dramatic peak never before witnessed in the history of the search term. That’s quite an achievement given how many people use these pieces of software.
But after a flurry of activity, on March 22 search volumes were back down to March 3 levels, which is quite interesting in itself.
Although various modified APKs are still managing to evade Spotify’s ban, there doesn’t seem to be a dominant modified client proving popular enough to stop hundreds of thousands of people from continuing to search for an APK solution. So, presuming these ‘banned’ people still want the music offered by Spotify, where have they gone?
Aside from those using the APKs that have slipped through the net, reports suggest others have migrated to Deezer downloading solutions, which are also being targeted by Deezer. Others are using tools to convert their Spotify playlists to use with other pirate services or even YouTube.
The big question then is whether hitting the ban button to potentially eject up to two million users has resulted in a net positive for Spotify?
There’s no doubt it lowered the bandwidth bill for the growing company but how many former freeloaders traded the pirate high seas for an ad-supported account or even the premium service? Only Spotify has the numbers, and it won’t be sharing those yet – if ever.
Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and more. We also have VPN reviews, discounts, offers and coupons.
Im Festlandteil des Landkreises Vorpommern-Rügen hat die Telekom die Ausschreibung gewonnen. Mit staatlicher Förderung wird jetzt ein echtes Glasfaser-Netz errichtet. Für die Bürger fallen keine Anschlussgebühren an. (Glasfaser, Telekom)
Mit Cloud Armor bietet auch Google ab sofort einen kommerziellen Schutz vor DDoS-Angriffen an. Bislang hatte Alphabet einen solchen Dienst nur für Nachrichtenseiten und Menschenrechtler im Angebot. (Google, SQL)
Die Carbanak-Gruppe hat seit 2013 durch Angriffe auf Banken über eine Milliarde Euro an Schaden verursacht. Bei einer koordinierten Polizeiaktion wurde der Gründer und "Mastermind" in Alicante festgenommen. (
Im Festlandteil des Landkreises Vorpommern-Rügen hat die Telekom die Ausschreibung gewonnen. Mit staatlicher Förderung wird jetzt ein echtes Glasfaser-Netz errichtet. Für die Bürger fallen keine Anschlussgebühren an. (
Mit Cloud Armor bietet auch Google ab sofort einen kommerziellen Schutz vor DDoS-Angriffen an. Bislang hatte Alphabet einen solchen Dienst nur für Nachrichtenseiten und Menschenrechtler im Angebot. (
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