Tag: newsletters

PSA: Classic Bethesda titles available DRM-free on GOG

Bethesda Softworks is mining its library of good, old games and offering many of them up without any digital protections on GOG starting today. Eleven titles from the venerable Doom , Quake , Fallout , and Elder Scrolls series are now available on the service, and are being offered at discounts if you buy them in bundles before September 2. Here are the details. The Elder Scrolls Bundle : 33% off if purchased together Read 5 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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PSA: Classic Bethesda titles available DRM-free on GOG

Comcast planning gigabit cable for entire US territory in 2-3 years

While Comcast has started deploying  2Gbps fiber-to-the-home service to certain parts of its territory, much of its network is going to be stuck on cable for years to come. But customers outside the fiber footprint will still be able to buy gigabit Internet service after Comcast upgrades to DOCSIS 3.1, a faster version of the Data Over Cable Service Interface Specification. Comcast said in April  that DOCSIS 3.1 will be available to some of its customers in early 2016 and eventually across its whole US footprint. Last week, Comcast said it wants to complete the whole upgrade within two years. “Our intent is to scale it through our footprint through 2016,” Comcast VP of network architecture Robert Howald said in an interview with FierceCable . “We want to get it across the footprint very quickly… We’re shooting for two years.” It could take up to three years, the story said. Read 4 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Comcast planning gigabit cable for entire US territory in 2-3 years

Elon Musk’s hyperloop is actually getting kind of serious

The hyperloop sounds like science fiction, Elon Musk’s pipe dream: leapfrog high speed rail and go right to packing us into capsules that fling us across the country in hours using what are, essentially, pneumatic tubes. It sounds crazy, when you think about it. It’s starting to look a little less crazy. Hyperloop Transportation Technologies announced today that it has signed agreements to work with Oerlikon Leybold Vacuum and global engineering design firm Aecom. The two companies will lend their expertise in exchange for stock options in the company, joining the army of engineers from the likes of Boeing and SpaceX already lending their time to the effort. Read 13 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Elon Musk’s hyperloop is actually getting kind of serious

New record temperature for a superconductor

Superconductivity was first seen in metals cooled down to close to absolute zero. But after exhausting every metal on the periodic table, the critical temperature at which the metal transitions to superconductivity never budged far from those extremely low temperatures. That changed dramatically with the development of cuprate superconductors, copper-containing ceramics that could superconduct in liquid nitrogen—still very cold (138K or −135°C), but relatively easy to achieve. But progress has stalled, in part because we don’t have a solid theory to explain superconductivity in these materials. Now, taking advantage of the fact that we do understand what’s going on in superconducting metals, a German research team has reached a new record critical temperature: 203K, or -70°C, a temperature that is sometimes seen in polar regions. The material they used, however, isn’t a metal that appears on the periodic table. In fact, they’re not even positive they know what the material is, just that it forms from hydrogen sulfide at extreme pressures. Read 8 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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New record temperature for a superconductor

Windows 10 won’t run games with SecuROM DRM, says Microsoft

While Windows 10 is  largely good news for gamers , it turns out that those with a collection of older games laden with DRM copy protection software are going to have a hard time getting them up and running on the new OS. In an interview with Rocket Beans TV (as translated by Rock, Paper, Shotgun ) at this year’s Gamescom, Microsoft’s Boris Schneider-Johne explained that that Windows 10 won’t be able to run games that use SafeDisc and SecuROM technology. “Everything that ran in Windows 7 should also run in Windows 10,” said Johne, “There are just two silly exceptions: antivirus software, and stuff that’s deeply embedded into the system needs updating—but the developers are on it already—and then there are old games on CD-ROM that have DRM. This DRM stuff is also deeply embedded in your system, and that’s where Windows 10 says, ‘Sorry, we cannot allow that, because that would be a possible loophole for computer viruses.’ That’s why there are a couple of games from 2003-2008 with SecuROM, etc. that simply don’t run without a no-CD patch or some such.” This isn’t a bad thing for most people, though. While SafeDisc has hit the headlines before thanks to security issues in Windows— introducing access vulnerabilities into the OS , for example—it’s SecuROM that is the most famous, and the most hated of all DRM software. Developed by Sony DADC, SecuROM took a heavy-handed approach to DRM, limiting the number of installs and activations end-users had access to, as well as requiring users to check in online to keep the game running. SecuROM even counted certain hardware changes as a change of computer, forcing another activation. Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Windows 10 won’t run games with SecuROM DRM, says Microsoft

People in rough neighborhoods trade HIV meds instead of taking them

The social environment of an area, including factors such as poverty, stress, and living conditions, contributes to the disease burden. A recent study published in AJPH shows that patients from a disordered environment don’t stick to their medication schedule, even for a potentially lethal condition like HIV. As the researchers found, residents of highly disordered neighborhoods will sell or trade their antiviral medication rather than taking it and adhering to their drug plans. Poverty, a condition often associated with specific geographic regions or neighborhoods, is linked to many poor health outcomes. People living in poverty often lack access to nutritious food, good healthcare, strong social support, and other structural advantages that can ensure better health. Neighborhood disorder theory focuses on the role of economic disadvantage as a driver of adverse health outcomes among residents of poor neighborhoods. In previous studies, neighborhood disorder has been linked to increased HIV risk-taking behavior, which helps explain why HIV infections tend to cluster in areas with higher poverty and other forms of risk taking. For this study, researchers interviewed 503 socioeconomically disadvantaged HIV-positive substance users, approximately half of whom were selling or trading their antiviral medication to other HIV positive individuals who didn’t have access to regular antiviral medication. Participants were from neighborhoods in urban Miami that have high and persistent levels of both HIV infections and poverty. Additionally, environmental risk factors were examined for these neighborhoods, such as prevalence of HIV and poverty levels. Read 5 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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People in rough neighborhoods trade HIV meds instead of taking them

Facebook user gets away with nearly a full day of trolling Target commenters

Mike Melgaard 9 more images in gallery While Facebook facilitates plenty of interaction between big companies and their customers, its interface doesn’t scale incredibly well once company-page comments creep into the hundreds (or more) per day. In particular, “comments by users” on a company page are relegated to a sidebar that is pretty hard to parse. On Sunday, one intrepid Facebook user took advantage of that to sneak onto a company page and mess with commenters before the company could get wise to it—and lucky for us, he screencapped the whole thing. This week’s case came from American retailer Target, whose Facebook feed began to blow up with unhappy comments over the weekend after the company announced plans to remove gender-specific signs in departments such as Toys and Entertainment. The retailer didn’t get around to individually responding to commenters, but that didn’t stop a user from creating a new account on Sunday, giving it a Target-styled bullseye icon and pretending to be an official company spokesperson. That user, Scottsdale, Arizona, resident Mike Melgaard , went on to respond to at least 52 negative comments left on Target’s official Facebook page with an account named “Ask ForHelp,” but rarely were his responses helpful . Melgaard heaped on sarcastic smiley faces, grammatical criticisms, and jokes about doing away with all gender-specific labels at the store (including bathrooms and changing rooms). It’s hard to pick a favorite among the jokes—we’ve posted a few of its safe-for-work screencaps above—but our favorite might be when he got into a multiple-comment conversation with one complainer, which he ended with a phony exclamation that it was his “first day, and this is just really frustrating dealing with all of this!” Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Facebook user gets away with nearly a full day of trolling Target commenters

Xbox streaming on Windows 10 has a hidden “very high quality” setting

In reviewing Windows 10’s new “Streaming from Xbox 10” feature , Ars’ Sam Machkovech complained that “streamed Xbox One games look significantly worse through Windows 10, even at the highest-quality setting.” Apparently, though, Sam wasn’t actually testing the “highest quality” setting available in the streaming app. That’s because there’s a newly uncovered “very high quality” option that can be unlocked by tinkering with some of the Xbox app’s configuration files. Reddit user OomaThurman has publicized the method for unlocking this hidden quality setting, which involves editing the “userconsoledata” file in your Xbox app folder. You can activate the new higher-quality setting by setting the “IsInternalPreview” flag from “false” to “true,” a naming convention that strongly suggests this feature is part of an early test that will be formally rolled out to all Windows 10 users in the future. We’ll be trying out this hidden feature for ourselves soon, but the folks at Digital Foundry already found a marked jump in quality when using the “very high” setting, saying it “appears to transmit full 1080p imagery.” Comparison shots published by Digital Foundry show a noticeable increase in sharpness of details like faces, hair, and edges, which are much closer to the “source” image with the new setting. Read 1 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Xbox streaming on Windows 10 has a hidden “very high quality” setting

No more endless CDs for pennies: Columbia House files for bankruptcy

It’s a sad day for the musical childhood of many generations. The Associated Press is reporting that the parent company of Columbia House, the organization behind the famous music and DVD clubs of yore, has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. The move comes after nearly 20 years of declining sales according to the AP. Filmed Entertainment (Columbia House’s parent company) told the wire service that revenue hit a high of $1.4 billion in 1996. In 2014, that figure fell to $17 million (or roughly 1 percent of its peak, the AP notes). While Chapter 11 protection doesn’t necessarily mean Filmed Entertainment intends to go out of business, it’s not looking good. Companies like RadioShack and Kodak  have done this in recent years to obtain a certain period of time within which to rebuild itself and shield itself from creditors. Kodak at least emerged from its situation. The service started in 1955 with vinyl records, and Columbia House introduced pop culture fans to many, many film and music entities over the years through its service. It operated on offers like eight CDs for 1¢ (plus shipping!) or an 8-track tape of the month club (relying on a “return or pay to keep” philosophy). But physical media at large has gradually fallen out of favor over the years, and services from Napster to Netflix to iTunes all overlap with what Columbia House intended to do. Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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No more endless CDs for pennies: Columbia House files for bankruptcy

Spaniard fatally gored while trying to film bull run on smartphone

While the Spanish town of Pamplona hosts the world’s most well-known running of the bulls, other cities in Spain, Portugal, and nearby nations host their own annual runs where bulls run through city streets while locals and tourists run alongside—or away from—the giant beasts. For one participant of a Sunday bull run in Villasecra de la Sagra, Spain, trying to share his experience by way of a smartphone recording ended traumatically. According to details ascertained from a local Spanish-language report , an English-language AFP report , and bystander video of the incident, a 32-year-old man was gored from behind while attempting to film that city’s annual bull run. The bystander video, posted Sunday on Instagram (not linked here due to its graphic nature), showed the currently unidentified victim standing near a barricade so that he was behind other viewers and away from the general fray of the bull run. However, a stray bull appeared to become separated from the general herd, at which point it ran at full speed behind the crowd and struck the 32-year-old while he was holding a smartphone to film in the opposite direction. According to reports, after receiving brief treatment at a nearby bullring’s medical center, the victim was transferred to a hospital in nearby Toledo, where he was soon pronounced dead from neck and thigh wounds. Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Spaniard fatally gored while trying to film bull run on smartphone