Hover Camera: Selbstfliegende Kamera erkennt Personen und folgt ihnen

Das Startup Zero Zero hat sein Konzept eines autonom fliegenden Quadcopters vorgestellt, bezeichnet die Drohne aber lieber als “fliegende Kamera”. Hover Camera soll Personen erkennen und diesen eigenständig folgen – ohne dafür GPS zu benötigen. (Drohne, Digitalkamera)

Das Startup Zero Zero hat sein Konzept eines autonom fliegenden Quadcopters vorgestellt, bezeichnet die Drohne aber lieber als "fliegende Kamera". Hover Camera soll Personen erkennen und diesen eigenständig folgen - ohne dafür GPS zu benötigen. (Drohne, Digitalkamera)

Getty Files Google Image Piracy Complaint With EU

American stock photography giant Getty Images says it will file a complaint with the European Union’s antitrust commission this morning claiming that Google is engaged in piracy of its content. The complaint targets Google’s full-screen slideshow previews of high-resolution copyrighted images.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

google-waterSearch giant Google is facing massive copyright-related pressure in the United States on several fronts, not least the recent consultation on the efficacy of the DMCA and the FCC’s proposals to open up the set-top box market.

Over in Europe, Google faces other issues, including charges that it abused its web search dominance to push its own shopping products and its control of Android to corral users into using Google software. Piling on the pressure, Google is now set to face another European Commission grilling over alleged copyright infringement in Google Images.

This morning Washington-based Getty Images says it will file a complaint with the European Union’s antitrust commission over what it describes as Google’s piracy of its copyright content.

According to an FT report, Getty will accuse Google of undermining its business by harvesting Getty stock images in a manner that “siphons traffic” away from the company’s premium website.

The complaint says that pre-January 2013, Google displayed only low-resolution thumbnails of third party images in Google Image search. However, soon after the company switched to a large, high-resolution slideshow format. This, Getty says, was Google abusing its dominance of Internet image searches.

Getty general counsel Yoko Miyashita says Google’s reproduction of high-res images means that people searching for Getty content via Google have less reason to leave the search giant’s Images services, thus depriving Getty of legitimate traffic.

Google “promoted piracy,” Miyashita says, “resulting in widespread copyright infringement, turning users into accidental pirates.”

As evidence that it was Google’s decision, not outside factors, that caused the drop in traffic to Getty’s site, Miyashita says that traffic collapsed in 2013 immediately after Google made changes on its .com and .co.uk domains. However, Google did not immediately implement the features on its .FR and .DE variants from where traffic remained healthy.

Getty says that it reported its complaints to Google in 2013 but rather than make changes, Google told the company it could either live with the situation or completely opt out of its image search feature.

While offering a solution this is somewhat of a catch-22 situation. On the one hand Getty can accept Google’s use of its content in order to boost visibility on the web, or opt out altogether and face disappearing from search altogether.

In this instance Getty chose to stay on board with Google, describing a complete exit as not being “viable”. Today’s complaint envisions the EU leveling the playing field on Getty’s behalf.

“By standing in the way of a fair market place for images, Google is threatening innovation and jeopardizing artists’ ability to fund the creation of important future works,” Miyashita says.

In due course the European Commission will have to decide whether Google has broken competition rules. Google declined to comment on the case but denies any wrong-doing.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

Nintendo NX: Neue Plattform erscheint weltweit im März 2017

Das Datum steht fest: Im März 2017 will Nintendo seine neue Plattform NX veröffentlichen. Der Hersteller betont erneut, dass sie auf einem “brandneuen Konzept” basiere. (Nintendo NX, Nintendo)

Das Datum steht fest: Im März 2017 will Nintendo seine neue Plattform NX veröffentlichen. Der Hersteller betont erneut, dass sie auf einem "brandneuen Konzept" basiere. (Nintendo NX, Nintendo)

Lifeboat-Community: Minecraft-Spieler müssen sich neues Passwort craften

Die Nutzerdaten einer großen Minecraft-Community wurden kopiert, das Unternehmen dahinter hat sich entschieden, eher intransparent damit umzugehen. Angeblich seien die betroffenen Nutzer informiert – doch einige von ihnen widersprechen dem. (Minecraft, Server)

Die Nutzerdaten einer großen Minecraft-Community wurden kopiert, das Unternehmen dahinter hat sich entschieden, eher intransparent damit umzugehen. Angeblich seien die betroffenen Nutzer informiert - doch einige von ihnen widersprechen dem. (Minecraft, Server)

Nintendo announces March 2017 launch for Nintendo NX—and Zelda delay

New smartphone games announced, as well, but NX won’t debut at this year’s E3

Nintendo didn't make a formal statement about the Legend of Zelda's latest delay; instead, the company tucked that news into a game release-date list. (credit: Nintendo)

Nintendo's annual fiscal-year earnings release went live on Wednesday via an announcement from its Japanese arm, and with that release came a very modestly tucked bit of giant news: the firmest launch-window announcement yet for the company's next, still-unnamed game system.

"For our dedicated video game platform business, Nintendo is currently developing a gaming platform codenamed 'NX' with a brand-new concept," the report said in its "outlook" section. "NX will be launched in March 2017 globally." The earnings release did not offer any explanation or clarification about what that "brand-new concept" will be, in spite of recent, patent-related hints about twists such as a new controller.

In even more surprising news, expectations that Nintendo would unveil the NX in time for June's Electronic Entertainment Expo were dashed by a statement from acting Nintendo CEO Tatsumi Kimishima, who confirmed in a Wednesday investor phone call (as reported by The Wall Street Journal's Tokyo bureau correspondent Takashi Mochizuki, that the system will not appear at this year's E3. Nintendo will instead focus its E3 attention "on the new Zelda," Mochizuki reports.

Read 4 remaining paragraphs | Comments

Microsoft: Bekenntnis zu Windows 10 Mobile

Durch stark einbrechende Smartphone-Verkaufszahlen sieht sich Microsoft dazu gedrängt, ein Bekenntnis zur eigenen Smartphone-Plattform abzugeben. In einer internen E-Mail versucht der zuständige Microsoft-Manager, das Vertrauen in Windows 10 Mobile zu stärken. (Windows 10 Mobile, Smartphone)

Durch stark einbrechende Smartphone-Verkaufszahlen sieht sich Microsoft dazu gedrängt, ein Bekenntnis zur eigenen Smartphone-Plattform abzugeben. In einer internen E-Mail versucht der zuständige Microsoft-Manager, das Vertrauen in Windows 10 Mobile zu stärken. (Windows 10 Mobile, Smartphone)

3D Cocooner: 3D-Drucken wie eine Raupe

Die Objekte, die der 3D-Drucker 3D Cocoon aufbaut, sehen zwar nicht so aus, als könnte ein Schmetterling daraus schlüpfen. Doch das Prinzip hat sich Festo von Raupen abgeschaut. (Hannover Messe 2016, Technologie)

Die Objekte, die der 3D-Drucker 3D Cocoon aufbaut, sehen zwar nicht so aus, als könnte ein Schmetterling daraus schlüpfen. Doch das Prinzip hat sich Festo von Raupen abgeschaut. (Hannover Messe 2016, Technologie)

Blu-ray, Ultra HD Blu-ray sales stats for the week ending 16th April 2016

The results and analysis for DVD, Blu-ray and Ultra HD Blu-ray sales for the week ending 16th April 2016 are in. Justice League vs. Teen Titans was the top selling new release for the week, but it failed to outsell last week’s number one (and…



The results and analysis for DVD, Blu-ray and Ultra HD Blu-ray sales for the week ending 16th April 2016 are in. Justice League vs. Teen Titans was the top selling new release for the week, but it failed to outsell last week's number one (and one of the best selling Blu-ray titles on record), Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

Read the rest of the stats and analysis to find out how DVD, Blu-ray, Ultra HD Blu-ray did.

Hacking group “PLATINUM” used Windows’ own patching system against it

Unknown group attacked South East Asian targets, sometimes for years at a time.

Platinum mass & well-formed crystals from Russia. (public display, Carnegie Museum of Natural History, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA) (credit: James St. John)

Microsoft's Windows Defender Advanced Threat Hunting team works to track down and identify hacking groups that perpetrate attacks. The focus is on the groups that are most selective about their targets and that work hardest to stay undetected. The company wrote today about one particular group that it has named PLATINUM.

The unknown group has been attacking targets in South East Asia since at least 2009, with Malaysia being its biggest victim with just over half the attacks, and Indonesia in second place. Almost half of the attacks were aimed at government organizations of some kind, including intelligence and defense agencies, and a further quarter of the attacks were aimed at ISPs. The goal of these attacks does not appear to have been immediate financial gain—these hackers weren't after credit cards and banking details—but rather broader economic espionage using stolen information.

Microsoft doesn't appear to know a great deal about the team doing the hacking. They have often used spear-phishing to initially penetrate target networks and seem to have taken great pains to hide their attacks. For example, they've used self-deleting malware to cover their tracks, customized malware to evade anti-virus detection, and malware that limits its network activity to only be active during business hours, so its traffic is harder to notice. Redmond suggests that the adversary is likely a government organization of some kind, due to its organization and the kinds of data it has sought to steal.

Read 6 remaining paragraphs | Comments

Turn a $35 Raspberry Pi into a Chromebox with Chromium OS for SBC

Turn a $35 Raspberry Pi into a Chromebox with Chromium OS for SBC

Google’s Chrome OS operating system may not exactly be open source, but it’s based on the open source Chromium OS. And if you know what you’re doing, you can adapt Chromium OS into an operating system that can run on all sorts of devices.

If you don’t know what you’re doing, you can let other developers do the heavy lifting, and just download and install their pre-compiled builds. For example, want to turn a Raspberry Pi into a Chromebox?

Continue reading Turn a $35 Raspberry Pi into a Chromebox with Chromium OS for SBC at Liliputing.

Turn a $35 Raspberry Pi into a Chromebox with Chromium OS for SBC

Google’s Chrome OS operating system may not exactly be open source, but it’s based on the open source Chromium OS. And if you know what you’re doing, you can adapt Chromium OS into an operating system that can run on all sorts of devices.

If you don’t know what you’re doing, you can let other developers do the heavy lifting, and just download and install their pre-compiled builds. For example, want to turn a Raspberry Pi into a Chromebox?

Continue reading Turn a $35 Raspberry Pi into a Chromebox with Chromium OS for SBC at Liliputing.