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Saturday, July 2, 2022

Saturday Morning Technology News and More...

 Technology News and More...






FCC Spacex Starlink•
7KGizmodo / 13h
Starlink just got the green light to expand on land, air and sea. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) authorized SpaceX to provide Starlink wifi to vehicles in motion, including semitrucks and RVs, planes, and boats. Read more...



Tesla Model Ingenext•
6KMashable / 22h
If you thought Tesla Model S Plaid was fast at its official top speed of 175 miles per hour, you haven't seen anything yet. A man called Guillaume André sat behind the wheel of a white Tesla Model S Plaid at the Trois-Rivières airport in Québec, Canada, stepped on the accelerator pedal, and didn't let go until the Tesla reached a top speed of 216 miles per hour, the fastest publicly reported spee



3KWired / 20h
Scientists are getting closer to understanding the neurology behind the memory problems and cognitive fuzziness that an infection can trigger.

YESTERDAY



Combined search for free website builders and free web hosting is at its highest in almost two years as people come to terms with the cost-of-living crisis and wider economic downturn. From May to June 2022 alone, the search volume for free web hosting doubled, with there also being a sharp increase in the number of people looking for free website builder services. This is reflected in the number



TL;DR: A lifetime subscription to Dollar Flight Club Premium Plus+ is on sale for £81.55, saving you 94% on list price. Hunting for the best travel deals can be exhausting. You have to constantly be attached to a screen, scouring every site you can think of to compare costs. It’s a lot for someone who isn’t a professional deal hunter. That’s why you should leave it up to Dollar Flight Club instea



Boutique high-end PC vendor Velocity Micro has the cheapest workstation PC based on the ThreadRipper Pro 5995WX , selling for a mere $11,774 at the time of writing, but customers will have to wait till mid August 2022 for delivery. The ProMagix HD150 workstation features an Asrock WRX80 Creator motherboard, a PNY Nvidia Quadro T400 workstation video card (with 4GB of RAM), 32GB of DDR4 memory (ju



Today Wordle Answer July•
New day, new Wordle , y'all. While it's always the most fun to nail it down yourself, sometimes you just get stuck — and that's where we come in. The answer to the July 2 Wordle can be found at the end of this article, with the spoiler clearly signposted, or you can make your way down in a more leisurely fashion for a few tips, gentle hints, and strategies to help you every day. Who made Wordle ?



In an internal meeting this week, Mr. Zuckerberg said the tech giant was facing one of the “worst downturns that we’ve seen in recent history.”



Google Delete Data•
Under pressure from employees and supporters of reproductive rights, the company announced privacy changes for the post-Roe era.



As the FBI adds Ruja Ignatova to its most wanted list, new findings suggest she amassed billions in Bitcoin.



45Gizmodo / 7h
There’s a timelessness to Steven Spielberg’s E.T: The Extra-Terrestrial —which is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year—that can’t be denied. It encompasses movie magic on a level that transcends the screen through its music and its story of a friendship between a boy and an alien that defies the odds. It’s set to … Read more...



Vegan meal kit startup Daily Harvest has been hit with two lawsuits by customers alleging they needed gallbladder removals after eating one of the company's products, reported CNN . Last month the company issued a voluntary recall of its “French Lentil + Leek Crumbles” dish following multiple claims of gastrointestinal and liver from consumers. The first lawsuit was filed by Carol Ann Ready, an O



So far, the podcasting craze from the past few years is proving stronger than ever in 2022. Based on popularity trends observed in 2021, consumer data company Statista even predicts that the industry will see tens of millions more podcast listeners in the years to come , forecasting approximately 160 million by 2023. But with so many new releases clamoring to meet that growing demand, you'll also



Google Location Abortion•
In the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s decision to strip federal abortion rights in the U.S., many people are questioning how the apps they use every day might suddenly be turned against them . As concerns mount over the endless well of data that tech companies built an entire industry around, Google is taking at least one step to mitigate some potential harm related to location tracking. The co



Three Chapter 15 AC•
200+TechCrunch / 8h
Crypto hedge fund Three Arrows Capital (3AC) has filed for Chapter 15 bankruptcy in New York, according to a report in Bloomberg . The mega fund, founded by Credit Suisse traders Zhu Su and Kyle Davies, at one time managed an estimated $10 billion in assets and was a linchpin among crypto finance players. Its insolvency has forced major industry players to reshuffle operations and limit customer



Welcome back to Toy Aisle, io9's regular round up of the latest and greatest nerdy toy news. This week wraps up Obi-Wan Wednesdays with two more Hasbro figures, Super7 heads back to Springfield and beyond for even more Simpsons Ultimates, and: do you dare to bop Darth Vader ? Check it out! Read more...



100+Futurism / 8h
Robo Buddy More than 800 new robot buddies are headed to their new homes as companions for New York's senior citizens. Smithsonian Magazine reported last week that the bots, called ElliQ, and were designed to assist people 65 and older who live alone. Much like Siri and Alexa, ElliQ can answer questions, make small talk, set reminders and more. "Many features attracted us to ElliQ — that it is a



In an internal meeting this week, Mr. Zuckerberg said the tech giant was facing one of the “worst downturns that we’ve seen in recent history.”



Google Location Abortion•
Amid data privacy concerns raised by the Supreme Court's overturning of Roe v. Wade , Google says it will remove abortion clinics and other facilities from users’ location history. Since the ruling, Google and other tech giants had largely remained silent about how they would handle requests for data about users in abortion-related investigations. Privacy experts have flagged the vast amounts of



This week’s Star Trek: Strange New Worlds delivered what might just be the closest Star Trek has ever gotten to an episode of genuine horror. Jump scares, tension, blood, gore, and lots of screaming, it had it all—but it’s far from the first time Trek ’s trended terrifying. Here’s a few more of our creepy favorites. Read more...



BMW is bringing self-driving technology to a select number of is 7-series cars for a trial beginning this month.



Google Location Abortion•
Under pressure from employees and supporters of reproductive rights, the company announced privacy changes for the post-Roe era.



To get a roundup of TechCrunch’s biggest and most important stories delivered to your inbox every day at 3 p.m. PDT, subscribe here . Happy Friday, everyone! If you are sitting around this weekend, catch up on your TechCrunch podcasts and check out what went on this week at TechCrunch+ . Just a reminder that there will not be a newsletter on Monday for the Fourth of July. I hope you have a safe h




Apple co-founder and former CEO Steve Jobs will be posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom on July 7.



100+Futurism / 9h
Ornamental in Nature Are Nazis hiding their paraphernalia under innocuous search terms, or is Google failing to respond to an algorithmic crisis? Either could be true based on today's tweetstorm about WWII-era paperweights and décor. The saga stared yesterday, when former Cracked editor and scifi author Jason Pargin asked followers if they, too, were getting tons of images of Nazi memorabilia whe



Thanks to the semiconductor chip shortage, GM has a massive inventory of vehicles that can't be sold yet.



Read more...



It seems that there might be an answer for the Intel Arc A380 desktop GPU’s rocky performance in previously leaked benchmarks if a new leak is accurate. According to a new series of leaked benchmarks from Twitter user 0x22h , and reported on by VideoCardz , the A380 has a hidden feature toggle called “Advanced Performance Optimizations,” (APO) which boosts GPU performance for tests like the 3DMar



FIFA 2022 World VAR•
FIFA World Cup 2022 will feature an updated VAR (video assistant referee) system known as semi-automated offside technology, the international soccer governing body announced today. SAOT will replace the old (and still controversial ) VAR system that FIFA first debuted at the 2018 World Cup in Russia. The new system features 12 stadium cameras that will track the positioning of both the ball and



FCC SpaceX Starlink•
SpaceX will now be able to offer Starlink satellite internet to vehicles in motion, following authorization by the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The move, originally reported by CNBC , should be big win for the Elon Musk-led company. It could also be great news for consumers, who may soon have consistent access to high-speed internet whether “driving an RV across the country, moving



A roundup of the most important stories of the day. I keep you up to date on the most interesting writings I find on other sites – the latest news and tips. Continue reading ...



Microsoft and Marvel forged an Xbox Series X console with a custom design for one gamer who, "if they be worthy, shall possess the power of Thor."



It’s a game of hotel brand musical chairs at a high-profile (albeit delayed) New York City real estate development. Accor — a lesser-known ( to Americans, anyway ) but still enormous hotel conglomerate based in Paris — is the apparent winner. A long-awaited Six Senses that was supposed to open in New York City appears to be a casualty of new ownership taking over the stalled XI mixed-use developm



The Time Traveler HBO•
HBO has canceled The Time Traveler's Wife after just one season. The show, which was an adaptation of Audrey Niffenegger's bestselling book, was only launched on May 15, but the network has clearly seen enough to call time after just six episodes. The Time Traveler's Wife followed Rose Leslie’s Clare and Theo James’ Henry, a couple whose relationship is made rather complicated by Henry’s conditio



Zuckerberg Facebook Meta•
3KFuturism / 10h
Cut the Fat In a further sign of tough times, Meta-formerly-Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is ready to root out the stragglers among his employees. During a Q&A session with Meta staff, Zuckerberg announced that he's "turning up the heat" over performance goals, according to recordings obtained by Reuters . He's hoping the pressure will make them leave, rather than having Meta's managers fire them.



Crypto June Bitcoin•
500+Futurism / 10h
Free Fallin' The blockchain blues continue. Bitcoin lost 38 percent of its value in June alone, making this past month the worst in crypto's 12 year history, CNBC reports . That's not all the bad news. Ethereum rang in at an astonishing 47 percent loss, and industry leaders crumbled across the board — major crypto hedge fund Three Arrows Capital has effectively imploded after failing to pay a $67



Microsoft Fraud Android•
Enlarge (credit: Aurich Lawson ) Android malware developers are stepping up their billing fraud game with apps that disable Wi-Fi connections, surreptitiously subscribe users to pricey wireless services, and intercept text messages, all in a bid to collect hefty fees from unsuspecting users, Microsoft said on Friday. This threat class has been a fact of life on the Android platform for years, as



Halo Infinite Co-Op•
Halo Infinite co-op beta starts soon, but the process for getting in the door isn't particularly simple. Once you're on board, a new sort of gameplay awaits.



The Lamborghini Huracán Tecnica is on its way, and from what we've seen, it looks like a groundbreaking display form the renowned automaker.



Samsung Xbox 2022 GN•
Samsung announced yesterday that it is bridging its hardware and software for a better gaming experience, bringing the Samsung Gaming Hub to its 2022 lineup of smart TVs and monitors. Game streaming content on the hub includes Xbox, NVIDIA GeForce Now, Google Stadia and Utomik, along with apps YouTube and Spotify. Twitch has also been added, and Amazon Luna will be available soon. The company is



My relationship with martinis can be traced back to the bar at Bern’s Steakhouse in Tampa, an iconic establishment that’s decorated like a French bordello. Desperate to be perceived as refined, I ordered a dirty martini with my shrimp cocktail and ribeye. Marco—the platonic ideal of an old-school bartender—asked if I… Read more...



retropopcult : circa 1900



Doom RPG Playable Windows•
A dedicated group of fans has excavated a Doom mobile game from the sands of time and made it playable again. You won't find 2005's Doom RPG on the App Store or Play Store: it actually predates iOS and Android by a couple of years. And while Fountainhead Entertainment looked into bringing Doom RPG to Nintendo DS around the time of its original release, the game was exclusively available on Java-




Elon Musk hasn’t tweeted in 10 days, but his Twitter account is once again news because time is a flat circle. This is why we must now scrunch our faces, cock our heads to one side and strain to recall a weed joke shared by the chief executive on August 7, 2018. Otherwise, we’ll never understand why activist investors are shouting for the Securities and Exchange Commission to intervene in Tesla’s



Venture capital investments may be slower, but that seems to be giving venture capital firms some time to go out and raise funds of their own. Sequoia Capital is the latest to reportedly be raising two new U.S.-focused funds, valued at up to $2.25 billion, The Information reported earlier this week . The publication reported that Menlo Park-based Sequoia is looking at $1.5 billion for a U.S. grow



100+Gizmodo / 10h
If you’ve been curious to know what’s in that infamous $5,000 Star Wars - themed drink, it’s no longer a complete mystery. The Kaiburr Crystal, available exclusively aboard the Disney Wish cruise ship in its Hyperspace Lounge , is an extravagantly presented, themed cocktail that should come with the camtono it’s served… Read more...



SpaceX's Starlink satellite internet system has crossed a major authorization hurdle with the FCC, making way for a more versatile service in the near future.



There’s bad news for travelers who were planning on connecting through London to other European destinations this summer. In a move set to affect more than 100,000 passengers, British Airways has cut a further 650 flights from London to destinations throughout Europe that were set to depart next month. The Gatwick Airport (LGW) and Heathrow Airport (LHR) services will bring the total number of Ju



Spotify Stranger Things•
With Stranger Things Season 4, volume 2 landing on Netflix today, it might be a good idea to figure out your own personal “saviour song,” the one that will deliver you from the clutches of Vecna. Spotify can help with that. To backtrack a bit – to Stranger Things Season 4, volume 1, specifically – in episode 4 the gang discovers that music can supercharge Max, allowing her to break free from the



American Express has sent out another round of targeted Amex Offers for Delta Air Lines frequent flyers. This time, there are two Amex Offers. One provides $75 off $200 or more in spending with Delta and one offers $100 off $350 or more in Delta purchases. Some American Express cardmembers with more than one card may see both offers on different cards. For more TPG news delivered each morning to



Childhood emotional neglect (CEN) occurs when caregivers fail to fulfill a child’s emotional needs. This can include overt, verbal abuse, as well as passive acts of ignoring or neglecting the child’s needs. Both emotional neglect and emotional invalidation fall under the larger category of CEN and have different… Read more...



21Gizmodo / 11h
A patchwork of individual state privacy laws isn’t filling the hole left by absent federal government regulation on facial recognition. Virginia, which approved a ban on local police use of biometric identification tools around a year ago, formally bailed on the law’s most substantive measures on Friday. Now, under an… Read more...



41Gizmodo / 11h
We’re only two weeks into summer, and heatwaves are already scorching the United States. Memphis, Tennessee hit a daily record high temperature of 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 °C) on June 17. Three days later Houston, Texas hit a daily record of 102 degrees (39 °C). Multiple regions of the country have seen dangerous … Read more...



Technoblade Minecraft•
He read his son’s final message on the YouTube channel where the 20-something had entertained more than 11 million subscribers with Minecraft gameplay and wry commentary. The title: “so long nerds.”



The film and automotive industries have come together for over a century. But sometimes, imagination plays a bigger role than practicality.



FCC Spacex Starlink•
SpaceX's satellite internet service is officially going mobile after the Federal Communications Commission on Thursday authorized the company to provide its Starlink WiFi service to vehicles. SpaceX already offers Starlink home internet, which left beta last October . "We agree with SpaceX... that the public interest would benefit by granting with conditions their applications," The FCC wrote in



96Futurism / 11h
Former Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker is reportedly recovering from a bout of pancreatitis brought on by a recent colonoscopy — but doctors say that seems unlikely. Confirmed by TMZ , news of Barker's reported Tuesday hospitalization comes after the famed drummer and newest Kardashian clan member tweeted "God save me" that afternoon. Though the gossip news site reported that doctors believe Bark



66Gizmodo / 11h
A group of Black Tesla employees have filed suit against the company, claiming that they were subjected to racial discrimination at its factories in California. Tesla is facing at least 10 suits alleging sexual or racial harassment, including one recently filed by a Tesla shareholder accusing the company of harboring… Read more...



So you’ve set out to do a load of laundry only to realize you already used the last of the detergent. Bummer—but there is hope for your socks and underwear yet. In a pinch, you can sub in some common household items for your Tide or All; they may not have the same stain-busting power but they will get rid of odors and… Read more...



In a letter to nine Republican senators, TikTok said it's working to "remove any doubt about the security of US user data." CEO Shou Zi Chew reiterated a claim that TikTok stores American user data on servers run by Oracle, which will be audited by a third party. Chew also said the company expects to "delete US users' protected data from our own systems and fully pivot to Oracle cloud servers loc



40Gizmodo / 11h
Hideaki Anno seems to just be doing whatever the hell he wants after he finally wrapped up Neon Genesis Evangelion (for now, at least). He got to make an Ultraman movie and he’s now directing a Kamen Rider one , letting him live out creating a new chapter for two of his lifelong superhero obsessions. And it turns out… Read more...



Amazon Prime European EU•
Score one for consumer protection as Amazon agreed to follow the rules set by the European Commission and will make canceling a Prime subscription a lot easier. The process has been greatly simplified to follow a "two-click" process after consumer groups complained about how anti-consumer the process originally was. Now, European subscribers can go into their Prime account where they will be met



UK 22 Point Plan Summer•
Travel in the United Kingdom has been a mess so far this summer — to say the least. From long security lines at Manchester Airport (MAN) to baggage mountains at London’s Heathrow Airport (LHR), Brits have had a rough start to their summer holidays. The country’s transport minister has now released a 22-point plan to help get the current aviation crisis under control and save the summer travel sea




Actress Sydney Sweeney has an impressive car collection and equally impressive Tik Tok account that documents her work on classic cars.



For all the good things it does for us, the sun can also be a menace: It can burn your skin , mess with your eyes , and even damage your vehicle . It might also be responsible for that rash you’ve been Googling since you discovered it across your shoulders. You could have a “sun rash” or “sun allergy” and never have even… Read more...



June brought another wave of layoffs in tech, with cuts impacting roughly the same number of employees as May: 16,000 employees, according to tracker layoffs.fyi. Another layoff aggregator from TrueUp paints a more dire picture, counting 26,000 impacted employees this month, up from about 20,000 last month. Either way, the data is grim. The end of a second straight month of nearly daily layoffs s



Earlier this week, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission rejected two applications for bitcoin spot exchange-traded funds (ETFs). One of the firms, Grayscale Investments, responded by filing a lawsuit against the agency . But not everyone is convinced that it’ll work. “The SEC rejecting both Bitwise and Grayscale’s GBTC spot bitcoin ETF applications is not at all surprising because it follo



Superfetch (known as SysMain in Windows 10 and Windows 11) is a built-in Windows service that preloads your frequently used apps in the RAM. If you experience sluggish performance on your PC, you may want to turn this feature off. Here’s how to do that. Read This Article on How-To Geek ›



Spain is putting a stop to the unruly travelers who wreak havoc on its golden shores. Local authorities across the country have implemented new measures to reign in rowdy tourists. Measures include fines for urinating in the ocean, charges for drunk swimmers who need to be fished out of the sea, drink limits in all-inclusive resorts, shampoo bans on beaches, and outlawing soccer jerseys in certai



Enlarge / All four of the mascots seen in this SGDQ promo image appear in various speedruns hosted over the past week. (credit: Summer Games Done Quick) The Games Done Quick series of charity events has long been a favorite among the gaming fans and critics at Ars Technica since it combines classic, beloved video games and carefully studied methods to break them apart in search of high-speed expl



Elon Musk Twitter•
2KFuturism / 12h
Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has been noticeably quiet over the last ten days. It was weird before , and now it's even weirder. The last time the billionaire tweeted was June 21. For Musk, who tends to incessantly tweet at virtually any hour of the day, that's an eternity and a half. He did appear to fly to Rome, Italy last night after spending much of the last ten days in Austin, Texas, the si



500+Futurism / 12h
Burning Birds Exploding limbs, burning plumage, bodily water cells instantly turned to steam — electrocution sounds like a terrible way to go. Even worse is the new discovery that when birds on power lines combust from an electric shock and fall to the ground, their dead bodies can cause deadly wildfires. A group of researchers in Colorado published their findings in the journal Wildlife Society



J.B. Hunt Waymo Texas•
The most serious crash to date involving a self-driving truck might have resulted in only moderate injuries, but it exposed how unprepared local government and law enforcement are to deal with the new technology. On May 5, a Class 8 Waymo Via truck operating in autonomous mode with a human safety operator behind the wheel was hauling a trailer northbound on Interstate 45 toward Dallas, Texas. At



300+Gizmodo / 12h
Whether you loved the Obi-Wan Kenobi TV series or it left you feeling disconnected from the Force of the Star Wars franchise, it’s interesting to think about the show we might have gotten. While we heard earlier this week that the show planned to kill off the villain Reva , and that the initial plan was to make a… Read more...



Reddit announced Friday that it’s acquiring MeaningCloud, a natural language processing company, for an undisclosed amount. The MeaningCloud team has joined Reddit and will support machine learning projects across its product, safety and ads teams. The acquisition marks Reddit’s first office in Spain. MeaningCloud was founded in 2015 and specializes in extracting meaning from unstructured content



After a lovely night at the Hyatt Regency Zurich Airport , it was time to fly SWISS A220 business class from Zurich to Sylt. While I won’t be reviewing the flight (since I’ve recently reviewed both SWISS’ A220 business class and SWISS’ A320 business class ), I did want to review the SWISS Alpine Lounge Zurich Airport (ZRH), which is one of SWISS’ newest lounges at its biggest hub. This is a prett



This week in the Guardian, writer Rachel Sigee pondered the question of why so many of us frequent sites like Goodreads and Letterboxd to log our media consumption, and came up with an answer that seems obvious in retrospect: It’s dopamine . Read more...



Last fall I found several Marriott hotels sell their rooms for less on Airbnb than at Marriott.com . Marriott isn't ok with this and cracked down on the specific properties I noted, but the practice continues and one guest even managed a successful best rate guarantee against an Airbnb listing. Continue reading ...



51Gizmodo / 12h
Raspberry Pi is adding to its family of ultra-low-cost microcontrollers with the debut of three new Pico models. Perhaps the one DIYers will be most excited to see is the Pico W, an exact copy of the original Pico except with the addition of 802.11 Wi-Fi connectivity, a feature that will significantly enhance the… Read more...



I think I wildly underestimated the impact of iOS 16 and its new Lift Subject from Background feature. This is next-level image stuff that fundamentally changes how you can interact with the 15-year-old platform. Let's start by getting something clear: Apple's next big mobile platform update, iOS 16, is still months away from final release and is currently only in developer beta. The public beta



It’s out with the old and in with the bayou! More than two years after the original announcement, Disney has finally shared exactly when the Splash Mountain log flume attraction will receive its highly anticipated “The Princess and the Frog” makeover, along with new details and artwork for the ride. The revamped ride will be called “Tiana’s Bayou Adventure” and it will open in late 2024 at Disney



FTX US Deal BlockFi•
Sam Bankman-Fried’s FTX is taking advantage of rampant instability in the crypto lending market to assert itself while propping up major institutions. The company’s U.S.-based arm has a deal in place with troubled crypto lender BlockFi that gives them the option to buy the startup, recently valued at $2 billion, for up to $240 million based on the startup’s performance. BlockFi CEO Zac Prince did



1KGizmodo / 12h
To “gore” is to “pierce or wound with something pointy (such as a horn or knife),” according to Merriam-Webster dictionary. With that context, I can now tell you that a 71-year-old woman was gored by a bison this week in Yellowstone National Park . Read more...




Hundreds July Summer•
Air travelers have been dealing with severe delays this summer, with U.S. airlines canceling flights by the thousands and delaying even more. The causes of the disruptions are complex and multifaced. Reasons include a shortage of pilots and other workers throughout the entir


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