Wine 1.8 Released

An anonymous reader writes: Wine 1.8.0 is now the latest stable release of Wine Is Not An Emulator and available from WineHQ.org. Wine 1.8 features include support for DirectWrite, Direct2D support, very limited Direct3D 11 support, simple application support of DIrect3D 10, support for process jobs, 64-bit architecture support on OS X, networking updates, and over 13, 000 other individual changes. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Wine 1.8 Released

Sony Creating Sulfur-Based Batteries With 40% More Capacity Than Li-Ion

MojoKid writes: Since the original iPhone was released in 2007, we have seen some incredible advances in smartphone processing power along with a wealth of feature improvements like faster Wi-Fi and cellular speeds and larger, higher resolution displays. However, battery technology, for the most part, hasn’t kept up. There are a few major battery suppliers but Sony is currently an underdog, commanding just 8 percent of the market for compact lithium-ion batteries. Its three largest competitors — Samsung (SDI), Panasonic and LG Chem — each command around 20 percent of the market. In an effort to change that, Sony is developing a new type of battery chemistry that can boost runtimes by 40 percent compared to lithium-ion batteries of the same volume. Sony’s batteries use a sulfur compound instead of lithium compounds for the positive electrodes, reportedly allowing for much great energy density. Sulfur batteries can also supposedly be made 30 percent smaller than traditional lithium-ion cells while maintaining the same run times. The company is now working to ensure that the new battery chemistry is safe enough for commercial use. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Sony Creating Sulfur-Based Batteries With 40% More Capacity Than Li-Ion

LifeLock Agrees To Pay $100 Million Fine In Settlement With FTC

New submitter dasgoober writes: Lifelock has agreed to pay $100 million to settle charges that it failed to properly protect user data, the F.T.C. announced on Thursday. This is the second settlement between the company and federal authorities. In 2010, the F.T.C. charged the company with failing to provide strong security measures for personal data. “This settlement demonstrates the Commission’s commitment to enforcing the orders it has in place against companies, including orders requiring reasonable security for consumer data, ” F.T.C .Chairwoman Edith Ramirez said in a statement. “The fact that consumers paid Lifelock for help in protecting their sensitive personal information makes the charges in this case particularly troubling.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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LifeLock Agrees To Pay $100 Million Fine In Settlement With FTC

iPhone Hacker Geohot Builds Self-Driving Car AI

An anonymous reader writes: George Hotz, known for unlocking early iPhones and the PlayStation 3, has developed an autonomous driving system in his garage. “Hotz’s approach isn’t simply a low-cost knockoff of existing autonomous vehicle technology. He says he’s come up with discoveries—most of which he refuses to disclose in detail—that improve how the AI software interprets data coming in from the cameras.” The article has a video with Hotz demonstrating some basic autonomous driving similar to what Tesla rolled out earlier this year. He’s clearly brimming with confidence about what the system can accomplish with more training. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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iPhone Hacker Geohot Builds Self-Driving Car AI

Universal Remote Desktop Coming To Windows 10 Soon

jones_supa writes: For those using the Continuum feature of Windows and who work from home or in the office, you’ll be pleased to know that the Remote Desktop Universal app is not only happening but will be released soon as a Technical Preview. This follows up on the Remote Desktop preview, which is already available for PC. The news came from Jason of the Microsoft Continuum team: “We’ve heard a lot of buzz around being able to connect to a remote desktop from Continuum for phone. We are excited to share that the Remote Desktop Universal Windows Platform (UWP) app will be released very soon in Technical Preview.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Universal Remote Desktop Coming To Windows 10 Soon

Developer Claims ‘PS4 Officially Jailbroken’

colinneagle sends word that a developer has claimed to have achieved a jailbreak of the PlayStation 4. Networkworld reports: “If you have a PS4 and want to run homebrew content, then you might be happy to know developer CTurt claimed, “PS4 is now officially jailbroken.” Over the weekend, CTurt took to Twitter to make the announcement. He did not use a jail vulnerability, he explained in a tweet. Instead, he used a FreeBSD kernel exploit. Besides posting “an open source PlayStation 4 SDK” on GitHub, CTurt analyzed PS4’s security twice and explained PS4 hacking. CTurt updated the open source PS4 SDK yesterday; he previously explained that Sony’s proprietary Orbis OS is based on FREEBSD. In the past he released the PS4-playground, which included PS4 tools and experiments using the Webkit exploit for PS4 firmware version 1.76. To put that in context, Sony released version 3.0 in September. However, CTurt claimed the hack could be made to work on newer firmware versions. Other PS4 hackers are reportedly also working on a kernel exploit, yet as Wololo pointed out, it is unlikely there might be more than proof-of-concept videos as the developers continue to tweak the exploit. Otherwise, Sony will do as it has in the past and release a new firmware version. In October 2014, developers nas and Proxima studied the PSVita Webkit exploit, applied it to the PS4, and then released the PS4 proof-of-concept. Shortly thereafter. Sony pushed out new firmware as a patch.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Developer Claims ‘PS4 Officially Jailbroken’

MST3K Breaks Kickstarter Record

the_Bionic_lemming writes: Raising over 6.3 million dollars in just one month MST3K fans helped push the new 14 episode series past the Official Kickstarter Veronica Mars total of $5, 702, 153 by raising $5, 764, 229 On Kickstarter. $600, 000 + Was added to the total from the Add on store at MST3K.com . And what’s more, they did it with only 48, 270 backers compared to 91, 585 Veronica Mars backers. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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MST3K Breaks Kickstarter Record

Germany Fires Up Bizarre New Fusion Reactor

New submitter insitus writes: On 10 December, Germany’s new Wendelstein 7-X stellarator was fired up for the first time, rounding off a construction effort that took nearly 2 decades and cost €1 billion. Initially and for the first couple of months, the reactor will be filled with helium—an unreactive gas—so that operators can make sure that they can control and heat the gas effectively. At the end of January, experiments will begin with hydrogen in an effort to show that fusing hydrogen isotopes can be a viable source of clean and virtually limitless energy. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Germany Fires Up Bizarre New Fusion Reactor

WordPress 4.4 Arrives

An anonymous reader with news of the newest release of open source WordPress, which adds a slew of new features to the blog management tool that will “make your site more connected and responsive.” You can download the new release now from WordPress.org/Download (7.3MB). WordPress is a content management system (CMS) that powers 25 percent of the Web. The latest version is dubbed “Clifford” in honor of jazz trumpeter Clifford Brown. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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WordPress 4.4 Arrives

MST3K Kickstarter Poised To Break Kickstarter Record

New submitter the_Bionic_lemming writes: Recently Joel Hodgson, the creator of Mystery Science 3000 — which had a successful run of over 197 shows — has after 15 years launched a kickstarter to relaunch the series. In just over two weeks Joel has been wildly successful in not only having over 25000 fans contribute, but actually scoring the second-highest show kickstarter on record — he has just under two weeks to shoot past the Number 1 kickstarter, Veronica Mars. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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MST3K Kickstarter Poised To Break Kickstarter Record