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Nodes in Facebook's Terragraph wireless network. (credit: Facebook)

Facebook is building a wireless Internet service that uses 60GHz WiGig technology to deliver “ubiquitous gigabit citywide coverage” in densely populated urban areas. Facebook said it is testing the technology at its headquarters in Menlo Park, California, and preparing a larger trial for San Jose.

“So far, we have demonstrated 1.05Gbps bidirectional (2.1 Gbps total throughput per distribution node) in P2P mode, up to 250 meters away,” the company said in an announcement yesterday. “This means up to 8.4Gbps of total traffic per installation point assuming 4 sectors, and we think this number can be as high as 12.8Gbps in the future." Facebook also says it will make the technology "open and interoperable" in unlicensed spectrum, just like Wi-Fi.

The project faces technological hurdles related to the use of extremely high frequency spectrum. WiGig technology using 60GHz frequencies is generally aimed at home use, as it is great for high-speed transfers between two devices in a single room but nearly impossible to use in multiple rooms because the airwaves are easily blocked by walls.

Marina Lonina was indicted on accusations that she Periscoped her boyfriend, Raymond Gates, raping a minor girl. (credit: Franklin County Sheriff)

An Ohio woman has been indicted on accusations that she live-streamed the rape of a 17-year-old girl on Periscope, prosecutors said Wednesday.

Marina Alexeevna Lonina, 18, is accused of initiating the broadcast while her boyfriend, 29-year-old Raymond Boyd Gates, sexually assaulted the girl in February in Columbus, Ohio, according to Franklin County Prosecuting Attorney Ron O'Brien.

"The victim and the two defendants were socializing and at some point in the evening it is alleged that Gates forced sexual intercourse with the victim and Lonina started Periscoping (live-streaming in real time) the sexual assault," the prosecutor said. "Lonina had also photographed the victim in a state of nudity the night before at Lonina’s house located at 4146 Nafzger Drive in Columbus. A friend of Lonina’s in another state watched the Periscope live stream of the rape on the 27th and authorities were contacted."

(credit: Survey Monkey)

Now that Nintendo's plans for smartphone app development have gone from persistent rumor to actual reality, it's time to start thinking about whether mobile profits can help the company's flagging console business. Earlier this week, SurveyMonkey Intelligence gave us some early information on that score, providing download, user, and revenue estimates for Nintendo's recently launched Miitomo social networking app/game.

At first glance, the results look promising for Nintendo's mobile move. Miitomo has already attracted 4 million total monthly users, with about 1 million using the game on any given day. On average, a Miitomo user spends eight minutes with the app across two or three play sessions.

More importantly to Nintendo's bottom line, plenty of those users are also paying for cosmetic items in the otherwise free-to-play app. SurveyMonkey estimates that Miitomo is already bringing in $40,000 a day in revenue, mostly from iOS users. That's enough for the SurveyMonkey analysts to write that "King, Zynga, Storm8, EA and Glu should be worried... In a nutshell, Miitomo is crushing it and Nintendo seems to have a hit on its hands!"

The front of the HTC 10. There's no giant speakers or logo here, just sensible smartphone design.

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The last 12 months have been dark for HTC. Year over year, the company's revenue was cut in half. At one point, the stock price hit an all-time low of $1.25 a share. Last we heard, HTC's market share was hovering somewhere less than two percent of the market—it's hard to get up-to-date numbers when analysts only ever list the company under "other."

HTC is clawing back, though. The HTC Vive—a VR headset it made in conjunction with Valve—leapfrogged Oculus to be the best and most complete VR package out there. For the past year or two, the company has been searching for alternative revenue stream away from the smartphone market. And while the Vive is still an early-adopter product, it's a big bright spot in the company's line up.

So what about the smartphone division then? For 2016, HTC has the HTC 10, a $700 (£570) all-metal smartphone. The specs are your standard 2016 flagship levels: a 2.15 GHz Snapdragon 820 with 4GB of RAM and a 5.15-inch 1440p display. It's the design that is the big differentiator here, though. The 10 looks a lot like HTC's post-2013 flagships, but the new phone works like a "best of" collection of past HTC design decisions.

(credit: Google)

About a year ago, Google announced "Eddystone," an open source, cross-platform Bluetooth LE beacon format. The Internet of Things initiative is a competitor to Apple's iBeacon, but it ups the ante by working on both Android and iOS and offering a wider selection of data payloads. Eddystone has been primarily focused on business and the enterprise, but today Google is providing more details on the secure beacon mode that it hopes will find its way into consumer goods.

Eddystone has four different frame types. Like iBeacon, there's the Universally Unique Identifier (UUID) payload, a 128-bit value that uniquely identifies every beacon in the world. The value itself isn't of much value unless you have an app from the beacon owner that knows to look for that specific beacon and do something with it. Imagine a Starbucks beacon that gets picked up by the Starbucks app and identifies itself as being at that specific store location.

For something a little more independent, there's the URL payload. The beacon beams a URL to every device in earshot that users can tap on to load a webpage. This is great for "one time" transactions where using an app would cause too much friction, like viewing a bus stop schedule or beaming money to a vending machine from your phone.