Month: September 2023

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The familiar Google Maps interface might start looking a bit different soon. 9to5Google reports that Google is testing a major redesign of the default map layer with a new color scheme.

The new color scheme looks a lot more like Apple Maps. Today, Google Maps has a gray background for land and white roads, but this new version has a nearly white background for land and darker gray roads, just like Apple Maps. This one change makes a lot of sense: Gray is a lot closer to the actual color of a road, and the darker color lets roads stand out more on the map. Pretty much every color has been tweaked, though—the blue water is much lighter. The green forest is darker. Major highways, instead of being bright yellow, are now a darker gray than the normal roads.

Navigation mode picks up the new color scheme, too, with a darker green for the header and a dark blue for your current route. Previously, navigation was sort of themed around the Google logo colors, with Google Green for the header, red for a location pin, and blue, yellow, or red for the route, depending on traffic. The new design is a lot more muted.

Enlarge / The now-ancient iTunes Movie Trailers app and website have rolled into Apple's TV app. (credit: Apple)

The iTunes Movie Trailers website (and later iPhone app) has been a staple for film buffs or anyone just wanting to know what's coming up for decades, but those days have ended; Apple has shuttered iTunes Movie Trailers and directed users who want to see future trailers to its TV app.

Throughout the 2000s, the website was the default destination for many folks. It was first launched as a sort of promotion for Apple's QuickTime architecture, and it was the best place to watch high-quality trailers before YouTube came along. The iPhone app launched in 2011, and that was also popular—at least initially.

If you visited the website in the past few years, though, you probably noticed that it was a time capsule for web designs and Apple aesthetics and branding of a bygone era. It was still getting new trailers regularly, but the design had not been updated in ages, and some features on the website (like the ability to track theater showtimes) gradually broke.

Enlarge (credit: Lenovo)

Few people would pick up the Steam Deck or Asus ROG Ally and think that what they lack is size. But Lenovo's entry into the field of portable gaming PCs is coming in with an 8.8-inch screen, and a lot of other big ideas attached, too.

The Lenovo Legion Go's QHD+ screen—2560×1600, 16:10 ratio, 144 Hz, and 500 nits—and its base module make it bigger than Apple's current iPad Mini. Add on detachable controllers, and the Legion Go is 11.8 inches wide by 5.5 inches tall, with a 1.6-inch depth. All that is 1.88 pounds, which is about half a pound heavier than the ROG Ally and 0.4 pounds more than the Steam Deck.

But Lenovo seems to have anticipated your tired arms, suggesting a few different ways to play the Legion Go. They start with a Switch-like detachment of the controllers and propping the Go up on a flat surface. Then, if you're playing a first-person shooter or other game that requires precise movements, you can use either of the controllers as a vertical mouse, complete with a mouse wheel. And then there's the optional Lenovo Legion Glasses, which can purportedly project a virtual 86-inch display onto your vision, augmented reality-style.

Enlarge (credit: Lenovo)

Few people would pick up the Steam Deck or Asus ROG Ally and think that what they lack is size. But Lenovo's entry into the field of portable gaming PCs is coming in with an 8.8-inch screen, and a lot of other big ideas attached, too.

The Lenovo Legion Go's QHD+ screen—2560×1600, 16:10 ratio, 144 Hz, and 500 nits—and its base module make it bigger than Apple's current iPad Mini. Add on detachable controllers, and the Legion Go is 11.8 inches wide by 5.5 inches tall, with a 1.6-inch depth. All that is 1.88 pounds, which is about half a pound heavier than the ROG Ally and 0.4 pounds more than the Steam Deck.

But Lenovo seems to have anticipated your tired arms, suggesting a few different ways to play the Legion Go. They start with a Switch-like detachment of the controllers and propping the Go up on a flat surface. Then, if you're playing a first-person shooter or other game that requires precise movements, you can use either of the controllers as a vertical mouse, complete with a mouse wheel. And then there's the optional Lenovo Legion Glasses, which can purportedly project a virtual 86-inch display onto your vision, augmented reality-style.

Enlarge / Competitors take part in "Tough Mudder" at the Glen Helen Raceway in San Bernardino, California, United States on April 2, 2023. (credit: Getty | Tayfun CoÅkun)

Hundreds of people who participated in a recent Tough Mudder event—a very muddy obstacle course race—held in Sonoma, California, have fallen ill with pustular rashes, lesions, fever, flu-like symptoms, nerve pain, and other symptoms, local health officials and media outlets report.

The cases could be caused by various infectious agents, including Staphylococcus bacteria, but the leading culprit is the relatively obscure Aeromonas bacteria—specifically A. hydrophila, according to the Sonoma County health department. In a statewide alert this week, the California Department of Public Health said it is considering it an Aeromonas outbreak, noting that multiple wound cultures have yielded the hardy bacterium.

A spokesperson for the Sonoma County health department told the Los Angeles Times on Thursday that, based on calls and emails the department had received, health officials estimate that the outbreak involves around 300 cases. Tough Mudder participants, meanwhile, have tallied as many as 489 cases in online forums.

Enlarge / Competitors take part in "Tough Mudder" at the Glen Helen Raceway in San Bernardino, California, United States on April 2, 2023. (credit: Getty | Tayfun CoÅkun)

Hundreds of people who participated in a recent Tough Mudder event—a very muddy obstacle course race—held in Sonoma, California, have fallen ill with pustular rashes, lesions, fever, flu-like symptoms, nerve pain, and other symptoms, local health officials and media outlets report.

The cases could be caused by various infectious agents, including Staphylococcus bacteria, but the leading culprit is the relatively obscure Aeromonas bacteria—specifically A. hydrophila, according to the Sonoma County health department. In a statewide alert this week, the California Department of Public Health said it is considering it an Aeromonas outbreak, noting that multiple wound cultures have yielded the hardy bacterium.

A spokesperson for the Sonoma County health department told the Los Angeles Times on Thursday that, based on calls and emails the department had received, health officials estimate that the outbreak involves around 300 cases. Tough Mudder participants, meanwhile, have tallied as many as 489 cases in online forums.

Enlarge (credit: Christopher Hopefitch | DigitalVision)

Courts have started blocking some US states' earliest attempts to age-gate the Internet. Yesterday, courts ordered preliminary injunctions blocking a Texas law requiring ID to access websites featuring adult entertainment, as well as an Arkansas law requiring ID to access some social media platforms. Both laws otherwise would've taken effect today.

While the Texas law was more narrowly aimed at restricting minors from accessing specific content that's not age-appropriate, Arkansas' law—the Social Media Safety Act—was much broader, stopping minors from creating accounts without parental permission on social media platforms that generate more than $100 million annually. It was also, according to the court, poorly researched, vaguely defined, and likely unconstitutional.

Bizarrely, Arkansas' Social Media Safety Act would apply to some obvious platforms, like Facebook or TikTok, but not to other more popular platforms for kids, like YouTube. Netchoice, a trade group representing platforms likely impacted by the law—including Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, Snapchat, Pinterest, and Nextdoor—sued to block the law, partly because the law was too vague. Some platforms, like Snapchat, weren't even sure if the law applied to them, Netchoice argued.

Enlarge (credit: Christopher Hopefitch | DigitalVision)

Courts have started blocking some US states' earliest attempts to age-gate the Internet. Yesterday, courts ordered preliminary injunctions blocking a Texas law requiring ID to access websites featuring adult entertainment, as well as an Arkansas law requiring ID to access some social media platforms. Both laws otherwise would've taken effect today.

While the Texas law was more narrowly aimed at restricting minors from accessing specific content that's not age-appropriate, Arkansas' law—the Social Media Safety Act—was much broader, stopping minors from creating accounts without parental permission on social media platforms that generate more than $100 million annually. It was also, according to the court, poorly researched, vaguely defined, and likely unconstitutional.

Bizarrely, Arkansas' Social Media Safety Act would apply to some obvious platforms, like Facebook or TikTok, but not to other more popular platforms for kids, like YouTube. Netchoice, a trade group representing platforms likely impacted by the law—including Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, Snapchat, Pinterest, and Nextdoor—sued to block the law, partly because the law was too vague. Some platforms, like Snapchat, weren't even sure if the law applied to them, Netchoice argued.

Enlarge / Vulcan's core stage is lifted into a processing facility at Cape Canaveral, Florida, in January 2023. (credit: United Launch Alliance)

Shareholders of a pension fund that includes Amazon stock have sued the company, its founder Jeff Bezos, and its board of directors for "breaching their fiduciary duty" as part of a contract to acquire launch services for the Project Kuiper megaconstellation.

The lawsuit, filed on Thursday and first reported by the Delaware Business Court Insider, alleges that in purchasing launches for Kuiper, Amazon failed to consider SpaceX and its Falcon 9 rocket. This was the only prudent choice that would have enabled Amazon to launch half of its constellation by a 2026 deadline, the lawsuit states.

The plaintiffs say that the Falcon 9 costs less than its competitors and has other advantages, such as being available now. Nevertheless, the lawsuit alleges, SpaceX was never considered due to an intense and personal rivalry between that launch company's founder, Elon Musk, and Bezos, who has a competing rocket company in Blue Origin.