Andrew Zarian joins us and we’ll debate how good the possibility of HBO’s announced over the top Internet service might be.

MP3

Multiple versions (ogg, video etc.) from Archive.org.

Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.

A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the headlines music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke, sebgonz and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes

Today’s guests:  Andrew Zarian, founder of the GFQ Network

Headlines

CNET reports Google introduced three new Nexus devices today. The 8.9 inch Nexus 9 tablet by HTC, the Nexus 6 smartphone with a 5.93-inch display by Motorola and Asus’s Nexus Player, with Android TV. All run Lollipop, which is the new name for Android L. The Nexus 9 and Nexus Player start preorders October 17 – in stores November 3. Nexus 9 runs from $399 for 16GB up to $599 for 32GB with LTE The Nexus Player is $99 with an optional game controller for $40. You can preorder the Nexus 6 October 29 for sale in November. Sprint, US Cellular, AT&T and T-Mobile will have it in the US. Unlocked it runs $649 for 32GB and $699 for 64 GB.

So when will other phones are get Lollipop? Google says the Nexus 5 smartphone, Nexus 7 and Nexus 10 tablets and Google Play edition devices should get it in the coming weeks. Ars Technica reports HTC promised updates for some flagship phones within 90 days of Lolipop’s release. And Motorola says both the 2013 and 2014 Moto X, the 2013 and 2014 Moto G, the Moto E, and the Droid Ultra, Maxx, and Mini will all get it too though Motorola didn’t say when.

Usually I avoid Apple leaks especially the day before an announcement but this one has actual facts. Mark Gurman at 9to5 Mac discovered screenshots for the iOS 8.1 iPad user guide in iBooks included pictures of an iPad Air 2 and iPad mini 3. The screenshots indicated both new models had touch ID sensors and the iPad 2 has a new Burst mode for pictures. The designs pictured are nearly identical to current iPads.

ReCode reports HBO CEO Richard Plepler told investors at the Time Warner Inc. Investor meeting, “in 2015, we will launch a stand-alone, over-the-top, HBO service in the United States. We will work with our current partners. And, we will explore models with new partners.” Current partners are cablecos who also happen to be ISPs.

ReCode reports Netflix hit expectations for revenue in Q3 with $1.41 billion and 96 cents per share earnings. However they missed on subscriber expectations and the stock market is not happy. In a letter to investors, Reed Hastings wrote, “This quarter we over-forecasted membership growth.”

Ars Technica reports a new vulnerability in SSL version 3 called POODLE has been discovered that could be used to recover session cookies and impersonate users through a man in the middle attack. This is NOT OpenSSL so does not relate to Heartbeat. Modern browsers have switched to TLS not SSL v3 so most client-server interactions won’t be affected. HOWEVER, browsers have a nasty habit of falling back to SSLv3 when TLS fails or doesn’t exist, which mans attackers could use a link to trick a user into becoming vulnerable. What is to be done? Server operators should stop supporting SSLv3. GigaOm reports companies like Twitter, Cloudflare and others have done so. Users should turn off SSLv3 support in their browser. Go to zmap.io/sslv3/browsers.html for instructions. Mozilla and Google have announced they will remove support for SSLv3 from their client software. There is not a way to turn off SSLv3 in Safari or IE6. Hopefully Apple will fix Safari. IE6 on the other hand should be long dead anyway.

Venturebeat reports that Qualcomm will acquire CSR, maker of Bluetooth and GPS chips for $2.5 billion in cash. CSR is based in Cambridge, England; in addition to its chips, the company has branched out into cars, and the internet of things. CSR had previously turned down an acquisition offer from Microchip Technology, a maker of microcontrollers.

ZDNet’s Mary Jo Foley reports Microsoft and Docker have announced Docker container support will be included in the next release of Microsoft Windows’ Server, expected mid 2015. Docker container apps will run on Windows Server or Windows Server Next vm in Azure. Docker uses containers to enable apps to run across platforms, or have multiple apps run at once on one server, without needing a vm.

Ebay reported its 3rd quarter earnings, reported revenues of $4.4 billion, growing 12% from a year ago, and beating both Wall Street’s expectations and Ebay’s own estimates. PayPal is on track to process 1 billion mobile transactions in 2014, with mobile payments this quarter at $12 billion, up 72%.

News From You

ebridges13 submitted the Sploid post about the Aviation Week story on Lockheed Martin’s compact fusion reactor, which is safer and cleaner than nuclear fission. The CFR experiment T4 is about the size of a business jet engine. Up until now fusion reactors were massive in size and expense. Lockheed’s CFR uses plasma containment more efficiently such that for the same size it can generate 10 times more power than a typical fusion reactor. Before you get too excited Lockheed has yet to build a prototype and even then would be 5 years off from production.

MacBytes submitted The Verge Report writeup of the news that Facebook and Apple are offering a new employee benefit: both companies cover the costs of egg-freezing procedures up to $20,000 for individual employees. The procedure, known as oocyte cryopreservation, allows women to harvest healthy reproductive eggs during their most fertile years and freeze them for later. While the procedure is still relatively new, and doctors are still assessing its effectiveness it does indicate that Apple and Facebook are thinking about the needs of their current and possibly future female employees.

KAPT_Kipper submitted the VentureBeat article that Firefox 33 arrives today for Windows, Mac, Linux and Android. Among the new features is support for encoding and decoding OpenH264 sandboxed support through Cisco’s H.264 implementation. It works for WebRTC but not the video tag yet. There are also improvements to the search bar. The Android version has added a send to device option for video that works with Roku and Chromecast devices.

Discussion Links: HBO To Go?

http://recode.net/2014/10/15/hbo-says-its-going-to-start-selling-on-the-web-next-year/

http://www.theverge.com/2014/10/15/6982281/hbo-go-no-cable-streaming-netflix-worst-nightmare

http://www.timewarner.com/newsroom/press-releases/2014/10/15/hbo-chairman-and-ceo-richard-plepler-announces-hbo-to-offer-a

Pick of the Day: NoRoot Firewall via Loren Ahrens

I developed a problem with my android phone telling me, “Temporary server error, please try again later.” To isolate the app that is causing the problem I am using NoRoot Firewall. Every app that is calling home is easily identified. I’m surprised by a few and the will be uninstalling them now. Since it has been so easy and useful, I thought I’d share it.

Tomorrow’s guest: Andrea Smith, technology journalist

Dan Patterson and Jill Duffy join the show and we talk about the latest Dropbox hack (not hack) and where the line of security responsibility is between you and your services.

MP3

Multiple versions (ogg, video etc.) from Archive.org.

Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.

A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the headlines music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke, sebgonz and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes

Today’s guests:  Dan Patterson, tech journalist and Jill Duffy, writer and software analyst at PC Mag.com 

Dan and Jill are also the hosts of the upcoming podcast The Signal – check out their site!

http://www.thesignalpodcast.com/

Headlines

TechCrunch noted that Dropbox confirmed 400 account credentials posted to pastebin were in fact for Dropbox accounts. Security chief Anton Mityagin dropbox was not hacked, these were users who had the same password at dropbox as other services. Most of the credentials had already been caught and deactivated and the rest have now been reset so none of the posted credentials are valid. Several hundred more credentials were posted later but Dropbox says those are not associated with Dropbox accounts.

The Next Web reports that Google’s same day delivery service is no longer free. It also got a name change. Google Shopping Express is now just Google Express and brings groceries and other purchases from various stores to your door at a convenient time. The service now costs $4.99 per order, though you can subscribe for $95 a year or $10 monthly, and get first dibs on delivery windows. Memberships can be shared with people in your house. Google also added new retailers, including Barnes&Noble and Nine West shoes and expanded from San Fracnisco, LA and New York to include Chicago, Boston, and Washington, DC.

PC Mag reports August SmartLocks will be coming to Apple store shelves this week for $249.99. The smart lock works in single cylinder deadbolts and lets you create virtual keys on smartphones. Keys can be given to friends through the app and even revoked when necessary. Physical keys work too.

Skype has a new mobile messaging service call Qik. Yeah remember they bought Qik then ignored Qik then shut down Qik. Well now the name is back. Users can share video clips up to 42 seconds which disappear after two weeks, but the sender can delete the video any time. There’s a also Qik Flix which are 5-second clips available on the Android and iPhone apps and coming to Windows phone “in the coming months.” Blocking other users is available for Android and Windows phone but NOT the iPhone App.

The Washington Post reports that the FCC is considering Aereo’s request to be classified as a ‘multi-channel video provider‘ — like a cable or satellite company — subject to all the rules and regulations. This means Aereo could start negotiating with the broadcast networks for ‘retransmission fees.’ Right now no Internet video providers are classified as MPVDs and are basically ignored by the networks. If Aereo gets classified as an MPVD it would have to pay more for content, but the networks would have to let them.

PC Mag reports iSight Partners announced a zero-day Windows vulnerability today that it says Russian attackers are using against US, European and Ukrainian government agencies, NATO, telecom companies and an unnamed US academic organization. The attacks are attributed to a group nicknamed “Sandworm Team” because of their frequent references to the book Dune. Security experts have been tracking the five-year-old group, referred to as “Quedach” by F-Secure, since late 2013.

Android police report on leaked Google ads featuring little Android characters with the slogan “Be Together, Not The Same.” It includes an animated version of the the Nexus 6 running Android L. The video comes with a link to a page on the Android site that isn’t yet live, but probably will be after the Nexus 6 is announced, which Forbes speculates may be as early as tomorrow.

News From You

AllanAv submitted the TechDirt story about a comment on the US FCC’s open Internet guidelines filed by VPN company Golden Frog. The company describes evidence that a wireless broadband provider actively blocked STRTTLS encryption, preventing a user from encrypting SMTP email traffic. Golden Frog described the provider as modifying messages in transit in one case from 250-STRATTTLS to 250-XXXXXXXA causing encryption not to be started.

tm204 passed along the Science Daily report that researchers at Nanyang Technological University have developed a battery that can be recharged to 70% capacity in 2 minutes and have a more than 20-year lifespan. NTU Singapore’s scientists replaced the graphite used for the anode (negative pole) in lithium-ion batteries with a new gel material made from titanium dioxide. Yeah the same stuff in your sunscreen. The nanostructure of titanium dixoxide helps speed up chemical reactions.

AllanAv posted the Wired story about the launch of Kickstarter funding for Anonabox. The $45 open-source router directs all data through Tor, hiding the user’s IP address. The box is tiny enough for two to fit in a pack of cigarettes. While not the first Tor in a box, the hope is that it strikes the best balance of cost, setup, size and security. The project is open source but has not been audited yet for security.

And finally, Bishma submitted the TechCrunch story that Dorian Nakamoto is suing Newsweek for writing an article claiming that he was the creator of Bitcoin. Nakamoto denied creating the crypto currency, and says he was “targeted and victimized by a reckless news organization.” Nakamoto has created a web page asking for donations to his legal case. And yes, in case you were wondering, you can donate by check, money order, credit card and yes, Bitcoin.

Discussion Links:

http://techcrunch.com/2014/10/14/dropbox-pastebin/?ncid=rss

https://blog.dropbox.com/2014/10/dropbox-wasnt-hacked/

http://blog.snapchat.com/post/99998266095/third-party-applications-and-the-snapchat-api

http://www.theverge.com/2014/10/13/6958745/is-snapchats-api-too-easy-to-hack

Pick of the Day: Splashtop via Ken Shabby

On Monday’s show you discussed attaching pc’s to televisions and the problems controlling them with wireless mice/keyboards. My pick, Splashtop, is a free remote desktop app that makes controlling your computer with your mobile device easy. Splashtop consists of an app you install on your tablet and a streamer program you install on your mac or pc. Some features are:

You can control your old XP pc using new touch gestures on your tablet. No more trying to use a mouse while in a Lazy Boy. No more having the giant wireless keyboard laying around the living room.

If your mobile device doesn’t run Flash, you can still view Flash web pages by running them on your pc and streaming them to your mobile device.

Splashtop allows you to mute the sound on the pc and listen via your mobile device. This way you can plug in head phones watch without annoying anyone else in the room. It works like the Roku 3 remote with head phone jack.

Not sure how well it would work on a phone, unless you have really small fingers. It might be hard to control your computer on a smaller screen. Works fine on my Nexus 7 and would probably work even better on a 10 inch tablet.

Tomorrow’s guest: Andrew Zarian of the GFQ Network

Iyaz Akhtar is here for our first show from NYC. We’ll talk about whether a PC really belongs in every living room.

MP3

Multiple versions (ogg, video etc.) from Archive.org.

Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.

A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the headlines music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke, sebgonz and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes

Today’s guest:  Iyaz Akhtar, senior associate editor, cnet.com

Headlines

You know about the Snappening right? SnapSaved is a third party service that apparently got attacked and some snapchat images were stolen. Ars Technica reports that a spokesperson for SnapSaved says the database storing user info about the images was not breached, so no identities can be attached to the images. They say 500 MB of images were accessed. A freelance security researcher contacted Ars and offered to sell 12.9 GB of images and 320 user names though the two aren’t correlated. The usernames have been posted on Pastebin.

Recode reports that Apple will launch the iPhone 6 and the iPhone 6 Plus in 36 more countries, including China and India by the end of this month. Apple is on track to have their latest smartphones available in 115 countries by the end of the year, which the company says is its fastest global rollout ever.

On Friday, Standard & Poors downgraded Finland’s sovereign debt from AAA to AA+. Sanctions against Russia and an ageing population are mostly to blame but the decline of its two biggest industries, paper and and cell phones certainly doesn’t help. The Verge reports Finland Prime Minister Alexander Stubb told CNBC Monday, “One could say that the iPhone killed Nokia and the iPad killed the Finnish paper industry, but we’ll make a comeback.” You hear that Tim Cook. They’re Finished because of you. No not Finish well they are Finish but —— never mind.

The BBC reports Samsung claims it has found a way to make WiFi data travel at 4.6Gbps and operate in the 60 GHz band. Samsung researchers limited interferece and improved the antenna to allow signals to travel farther without getting lost. Samsung said it plans to include the technology in TVs, medical devices, phones and smart home appliances.

TechCrunch has an update on Facebook’s internet.org initiative which is working to bring free mobile internet to 4.4 billion offline people . One part of the plan involves working with mobile carriers to improve their networks. In a recent trial in Indonesia (the 4th biggest country for Facebook usage) internet.org says Facebook and Ericsson were able to help speed up Indonesian mobile network XL Axiata by 70%. Mark Zuckerberg was in Jakarta today meeting president-elect. Joko Widodo

News From You

KAPT_Kipper would like you to know that Netflix is now charging a premium to access 4k streaming. The ‘Platinum’ streaming plan requires 25mbps download speed and costs $11.99 a month–that’s compared to the company’s HD streaming plan at $8.99 a month. The premium plan also allows four separate users stream video at once on one account, compared to two on the typical HD subscription. Current 4K streamers will be grandfathered in to their current plan.

MacBytes pointed out The Verge article that Google is testing a new service that connects people searching for health condition information with doctors over video chat. A Reddit user posted a screenshot of the service online and Google confirmed the test to Engadget. Google has a service called Helpouts, a marketplace where “experts” can charge to give lessons and advice over video chat. The screenshot seemed to indicate charging could be a part of this new health service.

metalfreak pointed out the Slashdot posting about devs for Chrome OS dropping support for ext2/3/4 file system on external drives and SD card due to low usage. Since this is the main file system for Linux, that community is not pleased.

Discussion Links: 

http://www.theverge.com/2014/10/13/6969671/living-room-pc

http://www.logitech.com/en-us/product/wireless-touch-keyboard-k400r?crid=26

Pick of the Day:  Soundboard for iPad via Tom

http://www.ambrosiasw.com/utilities/soundboard-ipad/

Tomorrow’s guest: Dan Patterson, tech journalist and Jill Duffy, writer and software analyst at PC Mag.com 

Jony Ive accuses imitators of laziness and theft. Lamarr Wilson joins the show to talk about Ive’s reaction and decide which one of us he’s talking about. It certainly isn’t Len Peralta who is neither lazy nor thieving but will work hard to illustrate the show with original artprov!

MP3

Multiple versions (ogg, video etc.) from Archive.org.

Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.

A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the headlines music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke, sebgonz and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes

The Verge reports 13 GB of private snapchats are circulating through 4Chan. The leak is being called ‘The Snappening.’ Snapchat has confirmed that the leak came from a third-party app that users installed to save snaps that would otherwise be deleted. The identity fo the app in question is not yet known. Snapchat pointed out that use of any such app violates its terms of service precisely because it weakens security.

Cnet reports that Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella went to a conference about women in computing and was asked what advice he’d offer women who were unsure how to ask their boss for a raise. His answer: “It’s not really about asking for the raise but knowing and having faith that the system will actually give you the right raises as you go along,” adding “I think might be one of the additional superpowers that quite frankly women who don’t ask for raises have.” This answer did NOT go over well with women everywhere, and Nadella said, CTRL+Z! CTRL+Z! Actually what he eventually actually said was that his response was ‘inarticulate’ and that the tech industry must close gender pay gap, and sent a letter to all of Microsoft saying “I answered that question completely wrong.”

Engadget reports Tesla finally unveiled the D yesterday. It’s a model S with all-wheel drive and autopilot and a dual motor that can go from 0-60 in 3.2 seconds. I get why they said ‘the D’ now. Because it’s the P85D of course. GigaOm reports the autopilot can read speed limit signs, recognise animals an dobjects and follow lanes through curves. The base model will run $120,000 list but come down below 6 figures with electric vehicle subsidies.

GigaOm reports Google released a European transparency report Thursday that indicates on a country-by-country basis how many requests it has received under right to be forgotten rules, and how many it has honored. The two biggest sources of requests were Germany and France who got their way just over half the time. Top domains for de-lisiting were Facebook, ProfileEngine.com, YouTube and Badoo. The report details the reasons for requests along with whether they were honored or not but does not identify the requestors.

Reuters reports Cisco and TCL Corp will create an $80 million joint venture to invest in commercial cloud services. TCL, a will pay $64 million for an 80% share while Cisco will drop $16 million for the other 20%. The new company will build data centers in China, and set up cloud-based video communication and collaborative office systems for Chinese small- and medium-sized enterprises and industry users.

Reuters reports Microchip Technology CEO Steve Sanghi’s warning is being taken seriously by the markets. Thursday Sanghi warned of a broad downturn in the semiconductor market. Several U.S. semiconductor makers with global operations have recently worried that industries like autos and network equipment, are reducing demand for chips.

The Verge reports that Norway has new banknotes with pixelated drawings of the sea on them. Norges Bank selected the blocky and abstract work of Snøhetta for the back of its notes, with traditional drawings on the front. The Verge notes that the money is designed in an “unashamedly modern style that the designers intentionally built around pixels in the belief that they are “our time’s visual language.” 8-bit MONEY!

News From You

TheLazyOne passes along a Washington Post report via Yahoo News that Head of Google Fiber Milo Medin said paying for the right to transmit television programs is the biggest impediment to the further spread of Google Fiber. Medin claimed that Google was paying double what Comcast and Time Warner pay in some markets. Who gets the licensing money? TV studios who pay to create the programs, and are not excited about seeing their business model disrupted by a bunch of nasty cordkillers.

diggsalot submitted the Business Insider story that San Francisco Quarterback Colin Kaepernick has been fined $10,000 for wearing Beats headphones in a press conference. They were pink Beats by Dre models. The NFL has an exclusive licensing agreement with Bose. Dr. Dre was in no way quoted as saying “Oops, I dropped $10,000 by your locker on accident but I’m too busy to go back and pick it up Colin.”

BUT WAIT. Spsheridan points out Apple may have the last laugh or at least a laugh of some kind. MacRumors reports a reliable source tells it that Apple will remove all Bose products from its retail stores starting early next week. — In good Bose v. Beats news, the two companies agreed to settle their patent dispute out of court. Presumably with a game of American Football.

Finally, tm204 brings us the tale of a comedy club in Barcelona that has a new business model. No more will they rely on the classic ‘two-drink minimum’, no, this comedy club is asking customers to pay, BY THE LAUGH. The Teatreneu club has installed tablets on the back of each seat equipped with facial recognition software that can detect when you laugh. The going rate is 0.30 Euros ($0.38) per laugh, up to a maximum of 24 Euros ($30.45). “I was just holding back a sneeze!” said everybody.

Discussion Section Links: Jony Ive on all the steals

http://www.theverge.com/2014/10/9/6954467/jony-ive-companies-that-copy-apples-style-are-stealing

http://techcrunch.com/2014/10/09/apples-jony-ive-is-not-flattered-by-xiaomi/

http://www.businessinsider.com/jony-ive-vanity-fair-summit-interview-2014-10?op=1

http://www.vanityfair.com/online/daily/2014/10/jony-ive-lessons-from-steve-jobs

http://gizmodo.com/343641/1960s-braun-products-hold-the-secrets-to-apples-future

http://www.cnet.com/news/apple-accused-of-ripping-off-famous-swiss-clock-design/

http://www.cnet.com/news/jonathan-ive-steve-jobs-stole-my-ideas/

Meetup in New York next week!

I’ll be doing the show from New York City next week with lots of great New York guests live and in person! I’ll also be hosting a meetup on Wednesday October 15th, at 7pm. The location is Peter McManus Cafe, which is a very old bar in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan.

Hey all,

As you may have heard, I’m doing my shows from New York next week and I’ll be having a meetup on Wednesday Oct. 15. You may have heard me say a different date. That was wrong. Apologies for that. Here’s the true details!

WEDNESDAY October 15th, at 7pm – 9 PM.

The location is Peter McManus Cafe, which is a very old bar in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan.

152 7th Ave
New York, NY 10011
b/t 19th St & 20th St in Chelsea

Scott Johnson is on the show and we’ll talk about why the PC market is not as doomed like everybody says. It’s doomed in a different way.

MP3

Multiple versions (ogg, video etc.) from Archive.org.

Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.

A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the headlines music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke, sebgonz and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes

Today’s guest:  Scott Johnson, co-host of The Morning Stream, The Instance, Current Geek and more! Chief Frogpantser.

Headlines

Yesterday we had an Apple invitation, today we have the reemergence of people familiar with the matter. Gigaom passes along the news that The Wall Street Journal’s sources say Apple had wanted to supersize the iPad with a 12.9 inch display this December, but those plans have now been pushed back so Apple’s suppliers can cope with demand for the iPhone 6 Plus. So yes. The iPad Apple never announced is now said by anonymous people not to be happening because reasons.

PC Mag reports that Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel said ads are coming. Speaking at Vanity Fair’s New Establishment Summit, Spiegel said ads would show up in the Snapchat stories feature, between shared photos and videos. Spiegel said ads won’t be too disruptive to users, and at this point the ads would not be targeted. This would be Snapchat’s first source of revenue.

Yesterday Carl Icahn told Tim Cook on Twitter he was going to send an open letter he believed Tim would find interesting. Today Icahn’s letter says he believes Apple is undervalued and therefore should accelerate its stock buyback program. That would turn some of Apple’s cash into some of Carl Icahn’s cash. Interesting!

Ars Technica reports Microsoft wants to reassure you its serious about hardware so its safe to buy a Surface. A new package bundles a Surface Pro 3, docking station and Type Cover keyboard for a savings of $150. There’s also a 3-year warranty option that covers accidental damage and speeds up hardware replacement. Microsoft also announced Surface Pro 3 is now Energy Star compliant and it will provide more info on driver and firmware updates.

Reuters reports Google will ask the US Supreme Court to rule on whether APIs can be copyrighted. Oracle is suing Google for incorporating parts of 37 Java APIs in Android. It’s not a patent lawsuit. It’s a copyright one. A San Francisco federal judge familiar with coding ruled Oracle could not claim copyright protection of parts of Java. A US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington overturned the decision. The case is not only about direct copying. The main issue is whether Google is guilty of infringement for writing its own different code to carry out exactly the same function or specification of any methods used in the Java API.

Sony announced its Xperia Z3 smartphone will launch in the United State on Verizon Wireless in slightly updated form as the Xperia Z3v. The new version will still have a 5.2-inch display, a Snapdragon 801 processor, and the ability to stream PlayStation 4 games within your home. But it will have soft plastic sides, instead of rounded metal, and the battery will be larger and use Qi wireless charging. The phone will be available October 23rd for $199.99, and only in black and white. Verizon will also begin offering Sony’s SmartWatch 3 later this month.

What will we get if everybody has gigabit Internet? PC World reports Pew Research Center asked more than 1400 experts that question. The most common theme in the answers was that it would change basic human interactions. Online interactons would feel more real including vivid telepresence and holograms some of which will disrupt the education models we use now. Wearable health monitoring could become more widely accepted.

Skype today announced Skype 7 for OSX today and a preview version for Windows. The Next Web reports that the latest desktop version of the app resembles the mobile version with a stronger focus on text chat and improved inline photo support. This version will also make it easier to text and share images while on a video chat, and include icons for file sharing that display the file type.

The Verge reports that Lenovo announced the Lenovo Yoga 3 Pro, which is 17% thinner and 15% lighter than the Yoga 2 Pro. The 3 features a watchband hinge to improve ‘flipping’ and is powered by Intel’s Core M-70 processor,with up to 8GB of Ram and 256 GB of flash storage. Battery life is advertised at 9 hours. The Yoga 3 Pro will cost $1,349 at Lenovo’s online store and Best Buy and come in three colors, silver orange and gold. Lenovo ALSO announced the Yoga Tablet 2 Pro with a built-in projector, which lets you beam 16:9 high res images (including movies) directly to a wall or screen. It has a recommended retail price of $499.

News From You

tm204 pointed out Imgur announced Project GIFV. GIFs uploaded to Imgur will be converted on the fly to MP4 video format. The conversion reduces file size, improves quality but still looks and behaves like an animated GIF.For instance a 50 MB animated GIF becomes 3.4 MB after conversion. Imgur plans to submit an accompanying specification for GIFV to relevant standards organizations before the end of the year.

ancrod2 didn’t want us to miss that Belkin explained why its routers stopped working earlier this week. Belkin told Techrunch that a cloud service associated with router operations caused a false denial of service. It took Belkin about 15 hours to fix the issue. Belkin did not specify what service it was.

Discussion Links: PC Life!

https://gigaom.com/2014/10/09/pcs-are-making-a-comeback-in-europe-and-the-u-s-analysts-say/

http://www.electronista.com/articles/14/10/08/market.still.slumping.overall.but.name.brands.see.growth.in.third.quarter/

https://gigaom.com/2013/11/07/think-the-pc-market-is-generally-scary-these-days-wait-until-you-see-the-uks-figures/

https://gigaom.com/2014/07/07/despite-slowing-growth-tablet-sales-expected-to-overtake-pcs-next-year/

http://appleinsider.com/articles/14/10/08/surging-mac-sales-put-apple-among-top-five-global-pc-vendors-for-first-time-idc-says

http://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/2869019

http://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=prUS25187214

Pick of the Day:  Telegram Instant Messaging via Dean aka ​DRAiNO

Telegram is a very lightweight instant messenger app that not only supports copy and pasting images and uploading of documents, but it is very secure (since it uses the MTProto protocol) and it simply requires only a mobile phone number and a unique code given to you via SMS for each device you set it up on. What’s even more awesome is that it integrates with your contacts on mobile platforms.

It is available for almost every phone/tablet platform (iOS/Android/Windows) as well as a very stable (yet unofficial) desktop application.

Tomorrow’s guest: Lamarr Wilson, 

Justin Robert Young is on the show and we’ll talk about Facebook’s alleged anonymity app, and Apple’s invite for the Oct. 16 announcement. How much parsing does it really need?

MP3

Multiple versions (ogg, video etc.) from Archive.org.

Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.

A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the headlines music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke, sebgonz and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes

Today’s guest: Justin Robert Young, co-host of Night Attack.tv

Headlines:

Tech Crunch reports that Apple sent out an invitation to an event on October 16th at Apple’s Town Hall theater in Cupertino, California. The invitation features a rainbow outline of the top of the Apple logo and the words “It’s been way too long.” Possible devices and software that COULD be announced on that date? Perhaps, a thinner iPad Air. Maybe a a retina display desktop iMac. Possibly the public version of OS X Yosemite. Or, maybe it’s just a barbecue.

JuRY: You know what I dislike, Tom? Cramming. You know when somebody unauthorized charges on your cell phone bill. Reuters reports that AT&T has agreed to pay $105 million to settle allegations of such things. The US Federal Trade Commission has been investigating consumer complaints about charges for ring tones, horoscopes, love tips and other things they never asked for. $25 million goes to penalties and fees and $80 million to consumer refunds. So if you were wrongly billed for a love tip that showed up as a generic “usage charge” you deserve a little something back. Besides love.

Bloomberg reports Symantec is considering breaking itself into two companies, which is all the rage these days. One of the resultant companies would sell security software the other data storage. Symantec bought storage company Veritas in 2005 and has been fighting off pressure to break up ever since. A split Symantec would be ripe for acquisition according to wall street analysts who may or may not have been salivating.

TechCrunch reports Facebook’s Josh Miller took to Twitter to respond to a NYTimes report that he’s leading a team working on an anonymous forum app. Miller acknowledge he’s working on soemthing but assured it’s not just a ripoff of Secret or IRC. Miller wrote “Identity isn’t a product goal. Focus should be on what human desire you want to enable, not anonymity as the focal point.” and “Can encourage positive use cases through product design.” In other words he wants to make a Secret type app without the damaging gossip aspect? Godspeed Josh Miller.

Google recently improved its sitelink subsection in search results for some websites. Now some search-related websites, like Vimeo, now get their own little search box just for their site. Torrentfreak points out that The Pirate Bay is one of these sites. Google has been under pressure to remove sites like The Pirate Bay. So expect that to become the next bone of contention with the MPAA. Oddly Bing doesn’t get it’s own search box in its sitelink section.

Apple Insider reports on a recent survey that show US teenagers still think iPhones and iPads are ‘pretty tope’ (that’s a tight+dope=cool) but are not yet OMFG about the Apple Watch. The survey conducted by Piper Jaffrey polled 7,200 teens; Only 16 percent of those surveyed said they would drop some cheddar on an Apple Watch. That’s down from 17% this past spring. However the survey also revealed that 67 percent owned an iPhone and 73 percent said they planned to buy one as their next phone. No reports on whether the pollsters asked teenagers if they had ever seen a real watch in the wild.

Investor Carl Icahn took to Twitter today to write “”Tmrw we’ll be sending an open letter to @tim_cook. Believe it will be interesting” Yes Mr. Icahn, requets for Apple to give more cash to its stockholders is always very intersting… to the stockholders.

HTC unveils the Desire Eye

http://www.theverge.com/2014/10/8/6945967/htc-desire-eye-selfie-phone-announcement

News From You:

Attention aspiring coders! KAPT_Kipper submittted the Engadget report that GitHub has launched a new Student Developer Pack that gives students free access to fifteen tools for writing code, including Stripe, the Unreal Engine and a GitHub micro account with five private repositories. It’s available to students 13 and up who are enrolled in a degree or diploma granting course of study, and who can verify their students status. You can find it at education.github.com/pack

sleep-d-prived passes along a must-read Wired write-up about two men who discovered a bug in in a popular video poker game, won hundreds of thousands of dollars in Las Vegas and Pennsylania, overused the hack, were arrested and charged in federal court for violating the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, and even after the charges were dropped are still being hounded by the IRS for back taxes on the seized winnings. Oh, and it also destroyed their friendship. So maybe just go see a show and have a nice steak, eh?

metalfreak noted the Wired story that security researchers Adam Caudill and Brandon Wilson released a software patch for USB drives that demonstrates one method of addressing the vulnerability known as BadUSB. The patch disables boot mode preventing firmware updates for USB 3.0 firmware distributed by Phison. In addition Caudill suggests painting the inside walls of the drive with epoxy to prevent pin-shorting. Phison is the kind of controller BadUSB was demonstrated on at Black Hat by Karsten Nohl which was replicated by Caudill and Wilson.

Discussion Links: Invitesies

http://9to5mac.com/2014/10/08/its-been-way-too-long-apple-sends-out-invites-for-thursday-october-16th-ipad-mac-event/#more-345803

http://www.theverge.com/2013/10/21/4852132/history-of-apple-event-invitations-and-hints

https://plus.google.com/103207773865797007066/posts/Ctu4NVQqKN6 

Pick of the Day:  Ghostery via Loren Lang

Ghostery is a web privacy tool that is available as a browser add-on (for most major browsers, anyway) and an iOS app. It blocks all sorts of trackers, beacons and cookies from over 1900 sources and you can choose to allow or disallow any or all of them with individual granularity as well as whitelisting sites to allow everything from them. You can also choose to allow an item once and then automatically go back to blocking it which is extremely useful when blocking something breaks a site in some way.

Tomorrow’s guest:  Scott Johnson, co-host of The Morning Stream

Patrick Beja is on and we’ll talk about Nobel prize winning LEDs and Google’s new definition of news.

MP3

Multiple versions (ogg, video etc.) from Archive.org.

Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.

A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the headlines music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes

Today’s guest: Patrick Beja, host of Le Rendez-vous Tech

Headlines

The 2014 Nobel Prize for physics was announced Tuesday, going to Isamu Akasaki, professor at Meijo University and Nagoya University; Hiroshi Amano, professor at Nagoya University; and Shuji Nakamura, professor at the University of California in Santa Barbara for their workd on Blue LEDs. An efficient way to grow usable sizes of Gallium Nitride crystals paved the way for Blue LED and thus white light LEDs either by combining with green and red LEDs or by exciting phosphors. CNET reports Akasaki and Amano worked together on the technology at Nagoya University, while Nakamura worked at Nichia Chemical Corporation. It took more than a decade of work to produce practical blue-LED designs in the 1990s.

TechCrunch reports Facebook has officially launched its “Audience Network” which allows any advertiser to buy ads —and any third-party app to host them— while Facebook uses its data to target the ads to the right people. This increases the number of ads Facebook can sell and puts them in direct competition with Google’s AdMob, Yahoo’s Flurry, and Twitter’s MoPub. It’s also a reason for many people to investigate how to turn off Ad tracking in iOS and Android.

CNET reports AT&T has warned 1600 customers in Vermont of a data breach. AT&T claims an employee violated the company’s privacy policy in August, obtaining customer data like social security numbers and driver’s license numbers. The employee in question is no longer employed by AT&T, law enforcement was contacted and customers are advised to place a fraud alert on their accounts.

Venturebeat reports Nvidia is launching its Maxwell based mobile GPUs for laptops, the Nvidia GeForce GTX 980M and 970M. Maxwell chips can deliver twice the performance per watt of power consumed compared to the previous generation of chips. The chips can render 4K, have multiframe aliasing, Voxel Global Illumination and twice the energy efficiency of the previous generation. The chips are available in many laptops starting today.

Engadget reports Samsung announced its operating profit for Q3 will be down $3.6-$4 billion, which would be the fourth straight quarter of declines. analysts believe Samsung is feeling a squeeze on its phones at the high end by new iPhones and at the low end by Xiaomi and Lenovo.

Josh Ong of The Next Web writes about a company called ‘Highfive, run by two former Google employees, trying to fix the dreaded ‘conference call. First the hardware: a $799 device that includes a wide angle 1080p video camera, microphone array and HDMI and internet connections. It sits on top of a tv or mounts to a wall. If you’re running late to the meeting, you can start the call on your smart device and then ‘send’ it to the Highfive device when you arrive. The device also supports wireless screensharing, and allows up to 10 people (or rooms) on a call. The service is free for any company that buys at least one device, and a pro plan ($10/AU/mo.) with added features is coming soon. Now if they can just work on the pain of scheduling conference calls…

News From You

KAPT_Kipper flagged us to Buzzfeed story about a DEA Special Agent who appropriated the identity of a woman named Sondra Arquiett and created a fake Facebook page in her name in order to communicate with suspected criminals. Arquiett was arrested in 2010; DEA agents alleged she was part of a drug ring, but a judge sentenced her to probation. However one agent used photos from Arquiet’s seized cell phone–including images of her underage son– to populate the fake account. Arquiett sued the agent for violating her privacy and placing her in danger. The Justice Department claims via a filing the agent had the right to do so. Privacy advocates are, to say the least, concerned.

habichuelcondulce points us to the Verge write up of a Buzzfeed investigation which used an Android app called “iBeacon detector” to find 13 beacon bluetooth transmitters inside New York City phone booths. Turns out there were about 500 of them total. Beacons can send alerts and can be used to collect anonymized data like location, time of data app usage and more when coordinated with an app. New York didn’t seek public approval before letting outdoor ad company Titan install them. After Buzzfeed published their report, the city asked Titan to take the beacons down. Titan maintains the beacons were only being used for research and maintenance purposes.

Beacons don’t worry you? Not scared of the DEA? Well how about this article blackandwhitefield submitted from The Digital Reader.com. A hacker recently noticed that Adobe’s e-publishing software seemed to be sending a large amount of data to Adobe’s servers. Apparently Adobe’s Digital Editions 4 is gathering data on which ebooks that have been opened within the app, which pages were read, and in what order. The app also scanned the computer, gathering the metadata from all of the ebooks sitting on the hard disk, and uploading that data to Adobe’s servers. Bonus: All of the data is being sent to Adobe’s server in clear text.

Discussion Link: Google News +

http://searchengineland.com/googles-news-listings-beyond-traditional-205213

Pick of the Day: Sight via Sachin Bahal

First off I wanted to say, I’m addicted to the Daily Tech News Show, it is now one of my favourite podcasts to listen to. My pick of the day is the app called Sight. It is an awesome app, it works almost like Pocket or Instapaper but all you have to do is take a screenshot of the article you are reading and boom, you can read it later on. The developer just recently updated the app, so it take advantage of iOS 8’s extensions, so you can still save stuff to read it later (and offline). Did I mention that it is a free app? because it is. The only downside is that it is available for iOS only but you can view your saved stuff on their web interface.

Tomorrow’s guest: Justin Robert Young, co-host of Night Attack.tv

Allison Sheridan and I talk about HP splitting into two. Giving up on what made it famous, or history repeating itself? Or neither. Join us to find out.

MP3

Multiple versions (ogg, video etc.) from Archive.org.

Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.

A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the headlines music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes

Today’s guest: Allison Sheridan, host of the Nosilla cast at podfeet.com

Headlines

HP announced today it will split itself into two companies by the end of October next year. Hewlett-Packard Enterprises will keep the bulk of the company with enterprise level IT offerings like cloud storage, servers and big data. Meg Whitman will be CEO. The other company will be called HP Inc. It gets the personal systems and printing business, which means all the desktops and laptops and lucrative printer ink sales, and have current EVP of the division Dion Weisler as its CEO. Whitman will also server as Chairman of the board for HP Inc. Separate from the split, Ars Technica reports HP said its current round of layoffs will total 55,000.

Facebook officially owns WhatsApp. TechCrunch reports that the deal closed for 4.5 billion dollars and 177.7 million shares of Facebook stock, plus 45.9 million in restricted stock for WhatsApp employees. WhatsApp founder Jan Koum will join Facebook’s board, and receive a salary of $1, plus almost 25 million units of Facebook stock.

GigaOm reports Redbox Instant will shut down tomorrow, October 7th. The streaming video service jointly operated by Verizon and Redboxhas’t been able to sign up new users in three months. Information on refunds will be emailed and posted on the Redbox Instant website October 10

ZDNet reports GT Advanced, the company that sells sapphire to Apple, has filed for bankruptcy. The company suffered a massive drop in share price after the latest iPhone did not use their material in its display glass. Apple still uses sapphire in its rear camera lens and Touch ID fingerprint sensors and the forthcoming Apple Watch will use sapphire in its display.

Reuters reports Samsung will spend $14.7 billion on a new chip facility in Pyeongtaek, 75km south of Seoul. Its Samsung’s biggest investment yet in a single plant. Samsung is the world’s top memory chip maker and chip-making is the only steady profit generator in the company. Profits from Samsung’s semiconductor division may be larger than its handset division for the first time in more than three years.

News From You

motang passed along a Times of India report that Skype will stop delivering calls on landline and mobile phones in India starting November 10th. Skype calls outside of India will still be connected. If you are outside India you will be able to use Skype to call a number inside India as well. Skype did not give a reason for the change but India has a law preventing internet-based phone calls originating from India. Companies like Skype usually reroute the calls internationally to circumvent the law.

spsheridan submitted the CultofMac story that T-Mobile CEO John Legere responded to questions about bent iPhone 6’s while speaking at GeekWire Summit 2014. In his usually sweary manner, Legere called bendgate Horse Manure and said anybody who bends an iPhone is an idiot. Going 12 straight words without cursing Legere said, “The demand for these devices in the last few weeks is unbelievable.” Not Un-effing-believable? That almost sounds disappointing John.

Sunbun sent us The Verge report with the latest info on Microsoft’s ongoing attempt to turn your entire living room/den/basement into an interactive gaming environment. Yes IllumiRoom is back and it has a new name and new capabilities. Now call Room Alive, the latest concept demo uses video projectors to map the room, and the Kinect sensor to track your movement, allowing you to interact with games on the walls of your room. Right now the system is still too expensive to live out in the wild, but Microsoft really believes it will get cheaper soon. Hang in there. Someday soon you’ll be banging your shin against the coffee table while playing Halo not just Kinect’s balloon game.

MikePKennedy writes in to let us know that the US Navy is building ‘swarm boats‘, automated small patrols ships to help protect large naval vessels while they resupply in port, to prevent incidents like the attack on the USS Cole in 2000. Wired Magazine describes the technology as autopilot on steroids, allowing a human operator to control the small craft with a laptop. A swarm boat could also be used to deploy Navy Seals on a beach and then go back to sea and await instructions.

spsheridan and KAPT_Kipper submitted stories about Facebook’s hidden friend-to-friend payments system coming to light. Cult of Mac. Stanford student Andrew Aude found code in Facebook’s Messenger app referring to the kinds of data you’d need to handle in a payments system. Looks like you’d need to add a credit card and pin to make it work if and when a payment system goes live in Facebook Messenger.

Discussion Links: HP Splits

http://www8.hp.com/us/en/hp-news/press-release.html?id=1809455#.VDLWRildXA4

https://gigaom.com/2014/10/06/its-official-hp-is-better-not-together-company-to-split-into-enteprise-and-pcprinter-businesses/

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/07/business/hewlett-packard-announces-breakup-plan.html?_r=0

http://recode.net/2014/10/06/after-the-split-what-will-the-two-new-hps-be-worth/

http://recode.net/2014/10/06/hps-meg-whitman-splitting-up-is-the-right-thing-to-do/

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2014/10/06/hps-paper-jam-another-white-flag-for-the-old-computer-age/

Pick of the Day: CodeReddit via Omni-mono

Fully functional Reddit rendered as a programming language. (Python, PhP and others).

Important for developers allowing Reddit browsing in a more discrete fashion, all of course, on company time.

Tomorrow’s guest: Patrick Beja

Shannon Morse is here and we’ll talk about what Facebook might do if it moves into health care, and if anyone would trust them with their health data. Plus Len Peralta will illustrate the show!

MP3

Multiple versions (ogg, video etc.) from Archive.org.

Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.

A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the headlines music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes
Today’s guests: Shannon Morse,podcaster and producer for shows with @Hak5 @Revision3 and @TWiTand Len Peralta, podcast pioneer and art-prover!

Headlines

STRONGBAD AND HOMESTARRUNNER ARE BACK!!!!!! New toon. Next one? Mike Chapman told Rolling Stone: “We’re planning on doing a Halloween cartoon, but no promises there.”

You know that rumor that sources said rumored that Apple’s iPad announcement would come on a rumored october 21st date. Well the rumor has been rescheduled. Now Recode reports sources say the rumored event is rumored to be on Thursday October 16th. For its part Apple has not actually said anything about any of this.

More rumors! Reuters says three people familiar with the matter- THREE— claim Facebook is planning healthcare related projects. One idea is to create support communities for people suffering from particular illnesses. The other idea is an app for preventative care to help people improve their health. Facebook has allegedly held meetings with medical industry experts and entrepreneurs and set up an R&D unit to test new health apps. All of this is still in the idea gathering stage.

Ars Technica passes along the Wall Street Journal report that Google’s X lab is working on giant displays that are also modular. Smaller screens could plug together like interlocking bricks to create larger screens with a seamless image. Similar technology is used in stadiums for things like the jumbotron and in products like the Christie MicroTiles. However Google wants to get rid of any trace of the seams.

Recode reports that Marriott has agreed to pay $600,000 to settle a US FCC complaint that it blocked personal wi-fi networks at a Nashville resort, forcing consumers to purchase access from the hotel. Marriott told Recode it was merely protecting its patrons “from rogue wireless hotspots that can cause degraded service, insidious cyber-attacks and identity theft.” Marriott will be barred from using Wi-Fi blocking technology and must file regular reports with the FCC for three years.

The Next Web reports that, as expected, Facebook received approval from European regulators for its 19 billion dollar purchase of messaging company WhatsApp. Joaquín Almunia, EC Vice President in charge of competition policy, said that the deal would not hamper competition as consumers would still have plenty of options in the messaging field.

And Google would like to provide an alternative to WhatsApp since they lost out in the bidding war to buy it. The Economic Times of India reports that Google is planning its own mobile messaging app, which may launch in 2015, in India according to sources. The app would not require a google login and be free to use. An app like that might fit verynicely in the Android One ffort to encourage affordable smartphones in India and elsewhere.

Remember BadUSB. Karsten Nohl demonstrated the attack to a standing room only crowd at Black Hat. It showed that it was possible to corrupt any USB device’s firmware with malware. The problem has not been fixed, and Nohl had not released the code. However researchers Adam Caudill and Brandon Wilson reverse engineered the USB firmware for microcontrollers sold by Phison, and reproduced the attack. They also released the code in an effort to help people defend against it and put pressure on manufacturers to fix it. They also are developing a more dangerous attack that could spread more rapidly. They have not decided whether to release that code yet or not.

9to5 Mac passes along that security vendor Dr. Web has raised an alert for Mac.BackDoor.iWorm, a malicious worm that infects OS X and tries to connect to a botnet. It uses Reddit posts to find the IP addresses of possible servers to callback too. Dr.Web estimates over 15,000 distinct IP addresses have been connected to the botnet .

News From You

metalfreak submitted the Wired story that Cody Wilson’s 3D printer for guns called GhostGunner sold out in 26 hours. Wilson planned sell 110 of the machines, and sold more than 200 before cutting off orders. The $1200 computer-controlled milling machine makes the aluminum body of an AR-15 rifle. The machine is actually a general purpose CNC mill which can carve polymer wood and metal in three dimensions for any purpose. Defense Distributed marketed the machine for printing the AR-15 part to help fund its activities in support of second amendment rights.

KAPT_Kipper passes along an IT World report that talks are back on between Samsung and Nuance Communications the company behind Dragon Naturally Speaking and of course the tech behind Siri. Will Apple try to buy Nuance to stop Samsung from stealing Siri’s Mom? Will Samsung convince Nuance that Apple never cared and Nuance would be better forgetting about their dalliance in Cupertino? Will Apple and Samsung finally confront their feelings for each other? Tune in next week on Days Of Our Phones to find out!

Money can’t buy you everything you want anyway, right Google? Sunbun shot over the Engadget story that Cyanogen, the popular Android mod, spurned Google’s advances towards a possible acquisition. Cyanogen believes it can beocme the third most popular ecosystem behind Google’s version of Android and iOS. Cyanogen is looking for a $1 billion valuation and is reported to have added MicroMax on as a manufacturer alongside OnePlus.

Discussion Links: Facebook Health?

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/10/03/us-facebook-health-idUSKCN0HS09720141003

http://thenextweb.com/apple/2014/06/02/apple-announces-healthkit-ios-8-collect-health-data-3rd-party-apps/

http://venturebeat.com/2014/10/02/apples-healthkit-collaborator-mayo-clinic-launches-its-ios-8-integrated-app/

http://thenextweb.com/google/2014/08/07/google-fit-preview-sdk-arrives-help-android-developers-build-smarter-health-fitness-apps/

https://support.patientslikeme.com/hc/en-us/articles/201245750-How-does-PatientsLikeMe-make-money-

http://www.patientslikeme.com/about/privacy

Pick of the Day: 

Friday’s guests: Shannon Morse of hak5.org and Len Peralta, artprover