Month: May 2018

Enlarge / The ADT-2 Android TV dongle.

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.—That Android TV dongle that showed up at the FCC last month is real, but it's not for normal consumers. Google had a Chinese OEM build Android TV into a pretty awesome Chromecast form factor, but it's only going to be used as a developer device—sales to general consumers aren't going to happen.

The dongle has been drafted into service as the "ADT-2," a developer-only Chromecast device. The specs are similar to the Amazon Fire TV 4K dongle or the Xiaomi Mi Box. It has an AMLogic 905X, 2GB of RAM, and 8GB of storage. It's just enough to get Android TV running and rendering 4K HDR.

The death of the Nexus Player left Android TV without a developer device. Every good Android platform needs a device that gets day-one updates from Google so that when Google releases a new software update, developers can actually use it on a device and make apps that support the new features.

Enlarge / WASHINGTON, DC - JANUARY 09: Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) (L) is flanked by Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) while speaking about a Congressional Review Act (CRA) resolution to preserve net neutrality rules. (credit: Getty Images | Mark Wilson )

Senate Democrats today filed a long-promised petition to prevent the repeal of net neutrality rules in a move that will force a vote of the full Senate by a deadline of June 12.

The Senate will have to vote on a Congressional Review Act (CRA) resolution of disapproval, which would nullify the Federal Communications Commission's December 2017 vote to repeal the nation's net neutrality rules. The CRA was filed in February, and Democrats today filed the discharge petition that will force the full Senate to vote on it.

This is the same mechanism that Congressional Republicans used to eliminate broadband privacy rules last year.

Enlarge (credit: Getty | UniveralImagesGroup)

Prostate cancer screening is now something to consider for men aged 55 to 69, according to the federal panel tasked with making recommendations for such preventative care options. In a finalized recommendation released Tuesday, the US Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) revealed that it has officially warmed to the screening—ever so slightly.

Back in 2012, the task force famously recommended against the then-common blood screening for elevated levels of PSA protein, which can indicate prostate cancer as well as other conditions. But, given new data from large, randomized clinical trials showing that routine screening can save a small number of lives, the USPSTF now says the scales have tipped in screening’s favor.

The USPSTF doesn’t offer an emphatic endorsement, but rather, a cautious consideration:

Enlarge (credit: United Soybean Board)

Genetically modified foods have been used for decades with no major safety issues; more than 90 percent of the soybeans and all of the sugar beets grown in the US are now GMO. Yet the technology remains controversial, with worries about the crops cutting across the entire political spectrum.

One controversial solution to societal unease has been the call to place labels on foods that contain GMOs. While these have been considered on local and state levels, a relatively obscure 2016 federal law mandated that labels be applied nationwide. The task of devising the labeling system was given to the Department of Agriculture. Last week, the USDA finally got around to proposing some possible solutions and is now asking for public comment on them.

Labels and the law

There's nothing inherently unsafe about genetically engineering crops or agricultural animals. None of the genetic material survives digestion to enter human cells (otherwise our cells would be awash in the DNA of gut bacteria). And, so far at least, careful design and testing has ensured that the proteins made by the altered DNA don't cause health problems such as allergic reactions. But the public has been consistently uneasy about the technology, with polls showing that only slightly more than a third of the general public thinks eating GMO foods is safe.

(credit: Ars Technica/Aurich Lawson)

New statements from Electronic Arts suggest that Sony's PlayStation 4 has sold 2.5 times as many consoles as Microsoft's Xbox One through the end of 2017, with Sony now controlling over 70 percent of the "two-console" market worldwide.

As Variety noticed this morning, the numbers can be derived from a recent EA investor conference call, where CEO Andrew Wilson mentions "sales of current-generation consoles from Microsoft and Sony" totaling 103 million at the end of 2017. Combine that with Sony's own reports of 73.6 million consoles sold through the end of 2017, and you get a rough estimate of 29.4 million Xbox One consoles on the market. That amounts to just under 40 percent of the PS4's reported sales.

Even with a bit of wiggle room to account for EA's market-size estimation methods, that's an extremely tepid result for Microsoft's console. The last time public estimates of the Xbox One's installed base leaked out at the beginning of 2017, they fell in the 25 million to 30 million unit range, suggesting Microsoft sold less than five million systems in the 2017 calendar year. The PlayStation 4, meanwhile sold roughly 20 million consoles in 2017, expanding its already sizable lead in overall installed base.