Month: June 2018

Jeff Dunn

The NES Classic Edition is officially back in stores Friday morning.

Before we get into any background, and because time will likely be of the essence for those who want one of these things, let’s just lay out the US retailers that have confirmed to Ars that they will have the retro console in stock online on Friday. If you’re interested in picking one up, the links below should take you right to each store’s product listing:

Enlarge / Nothing like cartoony smiley faces to break down how smartphones, local networks, and TV devices could join forces to trigger microphones and listen to advertisements' audio. (credit: US Patent + Trademark Office)

As Facebook tries to get ahead of public pressure about what the service does and doesn't track about its users, a patent application has emerged which would enable something that the service's detractors have long theorized and feared: silently triggered microphones that keep tabs on Facebook users.

The patent, filed by Facebook in December 2016 and published on June 14 (PDF), emerged this week thanks to its discovery by UK publication Metro. The patent's language revolves specifically around advertisements—Facebook's biggest cash cow—and how a device with an installed app could be triggered by a vague "activation module" to turn on its microphone and listen to how those ads play out in an average home.

Proximity and “blockers”

How exactly would this work? We dove into the patent language to see that Facebook has, at least in this patent's described method, spelled out a specific mic-triggering scenario. Though the company mentions high-frequency sounds as part of the ambient-audio collection process, these sounds aren't what will activate this hypothetical Facebook app's recording feature. (Meaning, the patent doesn't appear to revolve around an always-on mic in your pocket.)

Enlarge / SpaceX launches NASA's TESS mission in April 2018. That booster may fly again Friday. (credit: SpaceX)

When SpaceX launches its 15th resupply mission to the International Space Station, possibly as early as Friday morning at 5:42am ET (09:42 UTC), the company plans to fly the Block 4 version of its Falcon 9 rocket for the final time.

The company's next two launches in July were already known to be flying on the latest and presumably final revision to the Falcon 9 rocket—the Block 5 variant. But during a news conference Thursday, the company's manager for the Dragon spacecraft program, Jessica Jensen, confirmed that there will be no more Block 4 flights after the impending space station launch.

The Block 5 version of the rocket, which has been optimized for reusability, has flown one time when it made a successful flight in May. Since then, SpaceX has been working through its inventory of previously flown rockets. The booster scheduled to fly Friday first launched just a little more than two months ago, on April 18, sending NASA's planet-hunting TESS spacecraft into a lunar resonant orbit. This 10-week turnaround was remarkably fast for a Block 4 booster, but SpaceX says its Block 5 should be able to fly much more rapidly.

Enlarge (credit: Getty Images | KrulUA)

California is on the verge of imposing a privacy law giving consumers more control over how their personal data is collected, used, and sold by corporations. Broadband providers, tech companies, and advertising groups had been fighting against a ballot initiative that contained consumer protections similar to what's in the new law.

The California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 was approved unanimously by the state Senate and Assembly today and is heading to Gov. Jerry Brown for his signature.

A legislative bill summary says the law will give Californians "the right to know what PI [personal information] is being collected about them and whether their PI is being sold and to whom; the right to access their PI; the right to delete PI collected from them; the right to opt-out or opt-in to the sale of their PI, depending on age of the consumer; and the right to equal service and price, even if they exercise such rights."

Enlarge / Schreier even got his hands on leaked concept art for Visceral's canceled Star Wars game, which was code-named "Ragtag." It would have starred a Han Solo-like character named Dodger. (credit: Kotaku/EA)

Official word about EA's most troubled Star Wars video game has dried up since a major October announcement, but its former director, game development legend and Uncharted series creator Amy Hennig, confirmed a few key pieces of news on Thursday—including her official departure from the game publisher.

Hennig took the stage at the Gamelab Conference in Barcelona for a Q&A, where she confirmed to Eurogamer critic and reporter Rob Purchese that she had "not worked at EA since January, technically, legally." In October, EA had claimed that the company was "in discussions" about where Hennig would land following the closure of her game studio, Visceral Games, and what would happen with the major reboot of the Star Wars game they'd been making.

EA officially confirmed in an October blog post that the untitled Star Wars game had not necessarily been canceled, but between a full studio's closure and "shifting the game to be a broader experience that allows for more variety and player agency," it would almost certainly not resemble Hennig and Visceral's original project, which EA had described as "a story-based, linear game." Soon after, Kotaku's Jason Schreier reported a lengthy story about that game's troubled development, citing anonymous reports of leadership clashes, shrinking staffs, and more.