Zach Miners
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Verizon subscribers can now opt out of ‘supercookies’
Verizon customers can now opt out of having a unique identifier placed on their phones that critics have labelled a ‘supercookie’ because it’s almost impossible to remove.Verizon said in January that it would allow subscribers to opt out of the tracking mechanism, but it didn’t say when. On Tuesday, it said the identifier won’t be inserted for customers who opt out of its mobile advertising program.The move hasn’t satisfied privacy advocates, who say many customers won’t be aware that they need to opt out of the program. The identifier should be “opt in” instead, those advocates say.“This is an improvement, but it doesn’t do nearly enough,” said Jacob Hoffman-Andrews, a senior staff technologist with Electronic Frontier Foundation.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Verizon subscribers can now opt out of ‘supercookies’
Verizon customers can now opt out of having a unique identifier placed on their phones that critics have labelled a ‘supercookie’ because it’s almost impossible to remove.Verizon said in January that it would allow subscribers to opt out of the tracking mechanism, but it didn’t say when. On Tuesday, it said the identifier won’t be inserted for customers who opt out of its mobile advertising program.The move hasn’t satisfied privacy advocates, who say many customers won’t be aware that they need to opt out of the program. The identifier should be “opt in” instead, those advocates say.“This is an improvement, but it doesn’t do nearly enough,” said Jacob Hoffman-Andrews, a senior staff technologist with Electronic Frontier Foundation.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Amazon tries a physical button for making purchases
Amazon might be on to the killer app for restocking toilet paper from the privacy of your home.Amazon Prime members can now request an invite to get their hands on “Dash Button,” a small oval-shaped device to be placed strategically around the home like drawers, cupboards ... or the bathroom wall. Push its button, and the device will instantly purchase an item of the user’s choosing. Currently there’s more than a dozen buttons for buying Tide laundry detergent, Bounty paper towels and Gillette shaving products. Users can set up the device to send them any applicable item they want; a link on Amazon’s site refers users to more than 250 Dash button products including moisturizers, dog food, and paper towels.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Amazon tries a physical button for making purchases
Amazon might be on to the killer app for restocking toilet paper from the privacy of your home.Amazon Prime members can now request an invite to get their hands on “Dash Button,” a small oval-shaped device to be placed strategically around the home like drawers, cupboards ... or the bathroom wall. Push its button, and the device will instantly purchase an item of the user’s choosing. Currently there’s more than a dozen buttons for buying Tide laundry detergent, Bounty paper towels and Gillette shaving products. Users can set up the device to send them any applicable item they want; a link on Amazon’s site refers users to more than 250 Dash button products including moisturizers, dog food, and paper towels.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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With Tidal relaunch, Jay Z doubles down on streaming for audiophiles
Tidal, the Jay Z-owned streaming service built around high quality tracks, is relaunching in a move that could give consumers a new option when weighing competitors like Spotify or Pandora.The revamped Tidal will go live on Monday at 5 p.m. U.S. Eastern time, as indicated by a large countdown timer that dominates its homepage. A company spokesman confirmed the relaunch plan but declined to comment further on how Tidal’s service might change. It’s reasonable to speculate that the new Tidal may feature lower pricing, new app functions, or an expansion of its existing database of 25 million “lossless” CD quality songs.Tidal’s ad-free flagship service currently costs $19.99 per month, and can be accessed on the desktop, iOS, Android and home audio players like Sonos. A version offering standard sound quality costs $9.99 per month. Ad-supported services from competitors like Spotify, Pandora, Rdio and Deezer are free, although premium versions without ads cost around $9.99 per month or less.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Facebook reveals the logic behind its forced Messenger split
Facebook annoyed and puzzled many people last year when it forced them to download its Messenger app for chats. Its reasons for doing so are now clearer: Messenger is becoming a beast of an app, with its own links to outside businesses and software apart from Facebook’s main site.At the company’s F8 developer conference this week in San Francisco, executives pulled back the curtain on the new Messenger. It’s now a storefront and a platform for other mobile apps, which can be downloaded from within Messenger and integrated into people’s Messenger chats. There are more than 40 outside app partners already aiming to spice up users’ conversations with things like personalized GIFs, tools to turn your texts into songs, and even sports animations from ESPN. The apps can be accessed by hitting the “...” button on the Messenger compose screen.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Facebook reveals the logic behind its forced Messenger split
Facebook annoyed and puzzled many people last year when it forced them to download its Messenger app for chats. Its reasons for doing so are now clearer: Messenger is becoming a beast of an app, with its own links to outside businesses and software apart from Facebook’s main site.At the company’s F8 developer conference this week in San Francisco, executives pulled back the curtain on the new Messenger. It’s now a storefront and a platform for other mobile apps, which can be downloaded from within Messenger and integrated into people’s Messenger chats. There are more than 40 outside app partners already aiming to spice up users’ conversations with things like personalized GIFs, tools to turn your texts into songs, and even sports animations from ESPN. The apps can be accessed by hitting the “...” button on the Messenger compose screen.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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At Facebook, a sharpening focus on virtual reality
In 10 years, there may be no need to check Facebook’s site to see what that friend overseas is up to. You might just pick up a pair of goggles, reach out and hold her hand at her birthday party.You won’t have to actually be there. The experience could be made possible through virtual reality.Facebook sees it as a radical and important technology that in the not-too-distant future could provide new ways to help people connect and transport them to places that are out of reach or don’t even exist. Providing those experiences is among Facebook’s ambitious long-term goals, along with providing Internet access through aerial drones and deepening its artificial intelligence technology to better understand what people want.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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WhatsApp not as open as Messenger to outside developers
Facebook-owned WhatsApp, the popular mobile messaging and calling service, has no immediate plans to offer tools to outside developers to let them build services on top of it.Doing so could potentially introduce unwanted content into the app, slow it down, and disrupt the flow of one-to-one messages and interactions between its users, WhatsApp cofounder Brian Acton said Wednesday during a panel talk at Facebook’s F8 conference in San Francisco.Acton delivered his remarks after two developers from the audience asked when, if at all, WhatsApp would offer application programming interfaces or APIs to them.Acton was adamant. For the year, the company is focused on its voice calling service—which is available for Android now and coming to iOS soon—as well as its recently launched Web software, he said.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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How Messenger chats factor into what you see in Facebook news feed
Havent seen many posts from some friends lately on Facebook? Perhaps you need to reach out directly to them.How often you chat with someone using Facebooks Messenger app is a signal the company uses to determine how to place posts in your feed. If you havent chatted with someone in a while on Messenger, and then you start chatting again, posts from that person might appear higher in your news feed.That was one piece of information shared by Facebook engineers during a session Wednesday during the companys F8 conference in San Francisco.The algorithm Facebook uses to rank posts in peoples news feeds is a complicated one, and it’s always in flux, but the session, titled “How News Feed Works,” shed light on it.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Facebook extends Parse to build IoT apps
Facebook is extending Parse, its suite of back-end software development tools, to create Internet of Things apps for items like smart home appliances and activity trackers.By opening Parse to IoT, Facebook hopes to strengthen its ties to a wider group of developers in a growing industry via three new software development kits aimed specifically at IoT, unveiled Wednesday at the company’s F8 developer conference in San Francisco.The tools are aimed at making it easier for outside developers to build apps that interface with Internet-connected devices. Garage door manufacturer Chamberlain, for example, has already used Parse for its app to let people open and lock their garage door from their smartphones.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Google said to prep billing payment service for Gmail
Google reportedly is creating a service to let people pay their bills from their Gmail accounts.The service, currently dubbed Pony Express, would ask users to provide personal information, including credit card and Social Security numbers, to a third-party company that would verify their identity, according to a Re/code report on Tuesday.Google also would work with vendors that distribute bills on behalf of service providers like insurance companies, telecom carriers and utilities, according to the article, which was based on a document seen by Re/code that describes the service.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Twitter tests videos that play automatically
Twitter has started to let videos play automatically in some people’s feeds, in a test that could allow it to make more money from video advertising.The videos will play automatically for a small percentage of people who use Twitter’s iOS app in the U.S. “We’re running a small test on a few variations on the video playback experience,” a Twitter spokesman said.The test, first reported by Advertising Age, applies both to videos uploaded by users and to those posted by advertisers, but it doesn’t apply to looped videos from Twitter’s Vine service.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Twitch hit by possible data breach, resets user passwords
Account information for users of Twitch, the popular live-streaming service for gamers, may have been accessed through unauthorized means, the service warned on Monday.Twitch, which is owned by Amazon.com, has reset users’ passwords and stream keys and disconnected accounts from Twitter and YouTube. Users will need to set up a new password the next time they log in, it said.In a brief blog post, Twitch didn’t say how many accounts were affected, nor did it say exactly what data was accessed, referring only to “user account information.” A spokesman for the service declined to comment further.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Facebook Messenger as a platform? It’s a gamble
Facebook’s Messenger app has traditionally been used for keeping in touch with friends. Now people can also use it to send each other money. In the future, it could become a platform which other apps could use, if recent rumors prove true.This Wednesday and Thursday at its F8 conference in San Francisco, Facebook will show off new tools to help third party developers build apps, deploy them on Facebook and monetize them through Facebook advertising.Among those tools might be a new service for developers to publish content or features of their own inside Messenger, according to a TechCrunch article. Facebook did not respond to requests for comment.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Leaked US antitrust report on Google adds weight to rivals’ complaints
A leaked report by staff at the U.S. Federal Trade Commission paints an ugly picture of Google as a bullying monopolist and adds credence to complaints from rivals who have long criticized its business practices.The report, which was mistakenly provided to the Wall Street Journal as part of a public records request, reveals that FTC staff concluded in 2012 that Google’s business tactics had caused “real harm to consumers and to innovation,” and the staff recommended a lawsuit against the company.The FTC’s commissioners ultimately decided not to take action and closed their investigation of Google. But the conduct described in the 160-page critique paints a damaging picture of the company and seems to vindicate rivals such as Yelp that have complained about its tactics.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Yahoo exits China, closing R&D center
Yahoo is closing its only remaining office in China and laying off between 200 and 300 employees there, news reports said on Wednesday.The moves are part of CEO Marissa Mayer’s efforts to rein in costs at the aging Internet company. Yahoo’s office in Beijing, the company’s only physical presence in mainland China, has housed an R&D center employing engineers.“We will be consolidating certain functions into fewer offices, including to our headquarters in Sunnyvale, California,” a Yahoo representative told the Wall Street Journal.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Feds fine Verizon $3.4 million over 911 service outage issues
The U.S. Federal Communications Commission has fined Verizon US$3.4 million over its failure to notify police and fire departments during a 911 service outage last year.Under the commission’s rules, Verizon and other carriers were required to notify emergency call centers of a six-hour outage that occurred in April. The outage involved multiple carriers and affected over 11 million people in seven states.Verizon’s portion affected 750,000 California residents who were unable to call 911 to reach an emergency operator at 13 call centers in northern California. The outage was the result of a coding error at a large 911 routing center.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Feds fine Verizon $3.4 million over 911 service outage issues
The U.S. Federal Communications Commission has fined Verizon US$3.4 million over its failure to notify police and fire departments during a 911 service outage last year.Under the commission’s rules, Verizon and other carriers were required to notify emergency call centers of a six-hour outage that occurred in April. The outage involved multiple carriers and affected over 11 million people in seven states.Verizon’s portion affected 750,000 California residents who were unable to call 911 to reach an emergency operator at 13 call centers in northern California. The outage was the result of a coding error at a large 911 routing center.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Facebook brings payments to Messenger app
Users of Facebook’s Messenger app will soon be able to do more than just chat with friends and send them emoticons. They’ll also be able to send money.Facebook is adding a payments feature to its popular Messenger app, letting users link their debit card and send each other payments within the app. The tool is designed to be as easy as sending messages, with a “$” icon that will appear in the app. By tapping it, users can send money to the friend they’re chatting with. Recipients of the money will have to link their debit card to accept the funds.The free feature will be rolling out over the coming months in the U.S. to Messenger on Android, iOS and the desktop. Facebook made no mention of Windows.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here