Technology news

I understand people's phone choices say something about their personalities, so what does the luxury Lamborghini phone say about the person who uses it? They're glamorous? They enjoy leather? They value luxury, maybe? I can't say, nor can I even guess, because I doubt I'll ever see someone with Lamborghini's new Alpha - One smartphone. The Android device, which the company debuted today features "Italian handmade black leather" with a custom Italian leather accompanying phone case. That's about

PayPal today announced a new integration with Nintendo’s eShop so players can purchase digital versions of Switch games using a PayPal account. You can also now use PayPal as a payment option on Nintendo’s web store, so you can load up your digital wallet or purchase software direct from the site using your PayPal balance. The company says the feature is now live in a number of regions including the US, Japan, Canada, and more than two dozen countries in Europe. A full list can be fo

If you bought an Xperia device and it got wrecked from water damage, you might be eligible for a refund from Sony. A federal court in New York yesterday approved a class action lawsuit against Sony for overstating claims that its Xperia line of phones and tablets were “waterproof.”
The lawsuit alleges that Xperia owners were misled by Sony’s marketing verbiage, as the devices aren’t designed for underwater use and are more on the water-resistant level of protection. The c

 Laura Deming is not your typical venture capitalist. Then again, she isn’t typical in many ways. For starters, the 23-year-old, New Zealand native was home schooled, developing along the way a love of math and physics and, perhaps most interestingly, the biology of aging. We caught up with Deming to learn more about her path — and which technologies she’s betting on to extend… Read More

Hulu is streamlining its iOS apps, bringing its new design to the core iPhone / iPad app and phasing out the Hulu with Live TV app introduced earlier this year. The apps are merging into one, and both the $40-per-month live TV subscription services and the $8-per-month on-demand option will be available. The latest update for Hulu with Live TV says: “Heads up! We are saying goodbye to our Hulu with Live TV app so you can have all your TV in one place.”When opened, the Hulu with Live

Maybe you didn’t plan ahead for the eclipse and found yourself in the same situation I did: unprepared. I expected to be traveling on Monday, so when I found myself under the clear Boston sky as the Moon began to move in front of the Sun, I had no eclipse glasses, no supplies to make a pinhole projector, and no decent camera. All I had was my iPhone SE in its grubby plastic case.
If you’re like me, you might have taken as many photos as you could with your setup, and discovered some

Hulu continues the slow rollout of its updated app and support for the company’s live TV service today with the unlikely addition of the Xbox 360, a console that turns 12 years old this November.
The Xbox 360 joins the existing list of Apple TV, Xbox One, Fire TV,Fire Stick, iOS, Android, and Chromecast devices that support the new interface and live TV beta. Noticeably missing from that list is the PlayStation 4, which makes sense, since Sony has its own live TV service, and Roku, which i

On August 25th, Netflix is releasing its adaptation of the best-selling Japanese manga and anime series Death Note, about a sociopath who is granted a magical book by a Grim Reaper. Anyone person’s name he writes down in the book will die, in the exact manner he prescribes. As he uses the book to kill criminals, an eccentric genius investigator who goes by “L” starts hunting him down.
Netflix’s live-action version of the story, directed by Adam Wingard (The Guest, You&rsq

Drone maker DJI announced yesterday that it’s pushing out a firmware fix in response to a pernicious problem that sent an unspecified number of its new Spark drones falling out of the sky. One thing to note for Spark owners: if you don’t install the firmware update by September 1st, your drone will not take off. “DJI decided on the option of a mandatory firmware update in order to maximize flight safety and product reliability which we consider as top priorities,” the com

Nintendo is opening preorders for the SNES Classic today, and GameStop has announced how it’ll be handling the mad rush of customers looking to pick up the diminutive retro console: physical GameStop stores will be taking preorders for a $25 deposit. So, if you’re interested in trying your luck in person, I’d stop reading this post and run over to your nearest GameStop now. Supply, as is usual with Nintendo, will no doubt be extremely limited.Supply will no doubt be extremely l

Rights clearance startup Dubset has just inked a deal with Sony Music to allow monetization of its songs in DJ sets and of unofficial tracks that sample its artists. This means that artists could have their bootleg remixes and DJ sets legally cleared and distributed on Apple Music and Spotify, with every rights holder receiving a portion of royalties. This is the first major label Dubset has secured, and it’s a big step toward tackling gray area material that has proved problematic for pla

There are many, many gaming headsets that you can buy with your money. Corsair's Void is one popular option. It’s a $99 wireless headset that's generally well regarded. At Gamescom this week, Corsair is introducing the Void Pro, which offers a much better microphone and slightly tweaked ergonomics.
The new Void Pro RGB Wireless version is still $99.99, and there are also two $79.99 wired versions: a USB-only model, and a USB / analog jack hybrid for console gaming.
The wireless model is ra

Last year, Nintendo released an incredibly cool-looking Super Famicom-themed New 3DS XL — but only in Japan. The good news is that the company announced a new Super Nintendo-themed version for Western customers that just swaps the Famicom logo for the SNES one at Gamescom (via Polygon). The bad news? It’ll only be available in Europe, so Americans are still out of luck for now.Introducing the New Nintendo #3DS XL – Super Nintendo Entertainment System Edition, coming to store sh

CrashPlan is making an immediate pivot to focus its cloud backup service exclusively on businesses, and the company is planning to shut down its consumer-facing “CrashPlan for Home” product as a result. That process will last several months, but effective immediately, CrashPlan has already stopped accepting new consumer users and won’t allow existing non-business customers to renew their backup plan.“Over the past few years, we’ve seen data protection needs of consu

Buying games and digital goodies online for your Nintendo Switch is about to get easier for those with PayPal accounts.
The digital banking tool has become a payment option for the Switch worldwide today. Other consoles, including the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, have supported PayPal for years, but this is a first for Nintendo systems.
PayPal gives its people a way to purchase goods online and access their bank accounts while using a single login. For many, it’s a big convenience over havi

If you, like me, spend a lot of time shouldering the nagging anxiety of an ever-depleting phone battery, you’ve probably heard of Anker. The company, a Chinese accessory maker that’s grown into a consumer electronics juggernaut these past few years, is the leading maker of portable USB battery packs. But CEO Steven Yang has big ambitions: he wants Anker, with its reputation for high-quality and low-cost products, to be just one brand of many in a sprawling and trusted ecosystem cover

Medium plans to start letting more and more authors publish paywalled articles. And to determine how they get paid, the blogging platform has selected a fairly unorthodox method: claps, which are, basically, Medium’s equivalent of a Like.
A couple weeks ago, Medium replaced its “recommend” feature — a little heart button at the end of each article — with a “clap” button that you can click as many times as you want (much like how Periscope lets you send b

If you’re looking for a way to mow people down in style in Grand Theft Auto Online for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC, you might want to check out this new car.
Rockstar Games has added the Ocelot Ardent to the mutliplayer online component of its hits open-world game, Grand Theft Auto V. The Ardent has two front-face machine guns. You can use in-game money to get your own … but if you’re short on virtual cash, you can boost your wallet with real money.
This economy, along wit

Sledgehammer Games has unveiled the new multiplayer map of Gibraltar for Call of Duty: WWII, the first-person shooter coming November 7. It also showed off the new social hub that will invite players to linger in its community.
The company unveiled the new map at the Gamescom convention Cologne, Germany. I played it, as well as a couple of rounds of the previously announced Ardennes, War, and Pointe Du Hoc multiplayer maps. I’m happy to report that I held my own against the influencer

It’s going to be a long time before robots are genuinely useful around the house, but when they get there, we’ll need to be sure they’re safe. A cybersecurity firm has proved this with a new report today demonstrating how to hack a number of popular robots — including Pepper, a humanoid greeting bot built by Japanese company SoftBank.The researchers from Seattle-based IOActive show how the machines can be turned into surveillance devices, sending audio and video of their

Chromebooks are headed to work this fall, thanks to a new program that Google introduced today. The new Chrome Enterprise bundle provides enterprises with a set of services that help bring Chromebooks on par with Microsoft Windows PCs.
Chrome Enterprise will give IT administrators a cloud-based management portal for handling a fleet of Chromebooks, support for virtualized desktop applications, theft prevention, and a host of other features. One of the most important features in the bundle for ma

Uber is adding more features to its app that are designed to benefit its drivers. Now drivers will be able to set their arrival times and trip preferences, get notifications if a trip is going to take 45 minutes or longer, and set more preferred destinations.Prior to this update, drivers could set two destinations a day, allowing them to make a trip only in a preferred area, which is supposed to make commuting to and from home more convenient. Uber has now increased the limit to six destinations

Western Digital has announced a new 20TB version of its My Book Duo storage system, the highest capacity system it has ever made. The new RAID-optimized system features speeds up to 360 MB/s sequential reads, and comes with a USB-C port and two USB 3.0 ports.The My Book Duo also comes with 256-bit AES hardware encryption to lock down all of your important files. At $849, it’s not exactly cheap, but you will likely be able to store all of your content in one location, and that may be worth

PREVIEW: I was not happy during Sony’s E3 2017 press conference in Los Angeles when we learned that the newest entry in Capcom’s monster-hunting series, Monster Hunter: World, would be releasing worldwide in early 2018 for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC.
Why wasn’t I happy? What’s missing from that list? Monster Hunter was leaving Nintendo consoles behind. (It also fell in line with not-so-promising rumors that were floating around, as well).
It’s also a weird deci

Gamescom — the massive video game convention that takes place annually in Germany — officially gets underway today. But for those of us not attending, there’s already plenty to get excited about, thanks to a deluge of trailers. Gamescom typically isn’t the place for major reveals, so few of the games on display are brand-new. But it’s still a great chance to get a deeper look at some of the blockbusters launching later this year and next, as well as some of the quir

One of the first things that struck me when I launched Sonic Mania is that it doesn’t have a tutorial level — and that’s because it doesn’t need one. After years of Sonic games piling on power-ups, abilities, characters, and weird bandanas, Sonic Mania reaches back in time, sheds that accumulated baggage, and returns to its bare-bones, 16-bit roots. The best part of Sonic Mania is how simple it is.
The best part of ‘Sonic Mania’ is how simple it is
Instead of

VB LIVE: In a world of connected devices, consumer expectations for transactions — from phone to fridge — will be higher than ever. Learn how to deliver seamless, simple, and secure customer experiences that earn their confidence and cash when you join this VB Live event!
Register here for free.
By 2020, annual revenue in the Internet of Things market is expected to exceed $470 billion, with investments in industrial IoT expected to top $60 trillion in the next 15 years. And consumer

About five or six years ago, one of Karl Ricanek’s students showed him a video on YouTube. It was a time lapse of a person undergoing hormone replacement therapy, or HRT, in order to transition genders. “At the time, we were working on facial recognition,” Ricanek, a professor of computer science at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington, tells The Verge. He says he and his students were always trying to find ways to break the systems they worked on, and that this video

LinkedIn is primarily used as a business networking tool, or to find a job. While LinkedIn refreshed its entire site earlier this year, most users don’t use it for daily social networking updates like they might on Facebook or Twitter. LinkedIn is trying to tempt users to share more on the site by adding video support today.
Video testing began last month, and now all LinkedIn users can upload videos to the social network. LinkedIn’s Android and iOS apps support video uploads, but th

Cyborg bacteria covered in tiny solar panels can beat plants at photosynthesis, which means they could be key in creating renewable solar fuels.
Photosynthesis, or the way plants turn carbon dioxide into oxygen, is crucial for life on Earth — but it’s not a very efficient process. Scientists at a UC Berkeley lab taught bacteria how to cover their own bodies with nanocrystals, which function as tiny solar panels that capture more energy than plants can. The bacteria ended up having 80

PRESS RELEASE:Augmenix Maintains Spot in Top 10% of Metro-Boston Companies; Three-Year Growth over 2,000% Ranked Company Number 207 on Inc. Magazine’s Top 500BEDFORD, Mass.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–August 22, 2017– Augmenix, Inc., a medical technology company that develops, manufactures, and sells proprietary absorbable hydrogels that separate and protect organs at risk during radiotherapy, has again been named on Inc. magazine’s fastest-growing private companies for the sec

As a creator of some of the internet’s biggest brands, Jim Clark should require little introduction. But the 73-year-old Texan billionaire doesn’t garner the same kinds of headlines as Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, or Mark Zuckerberg.
In 1981, computer scientist Clark cofounded Silicon Graphics, a high-performance computing hardware and software manufacturer that became pivotal to the production of visual effects and 3D imaging within the movie industry. After leaving Silicon Gra

FreedomPop, the mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) that offers SIM cards with completely free basic mobile service plans, has announced what it is touting as the mobile industry’s first-ever annual plan.
The Los Angeles-based company is offering a reasonably generous 1,000 minutes, 1,000 texts, and 1GB of data per month, either via AT&T or Sprint’s LTE network, for $49 per year — the equivalent of around $4 per month.
Founded in 2012, FreedomPop has built its

Leap.ai, which uses artificial intelligence to match job seekers with employers, today launched with $2.4 million in seed money. Participants included ZhenFund, established in collaboration with Sequoia Capital China, as well as several angel investors.
Users sign up on Leap.ai’s website or iOS app to create a profile and submit a self-assessment, detailing their strengths, personal values, and job preferences. The algorithm then matches the candidate’s profile with a company’s

Latch is introducing a new smart door lock today that can be controlled with an iPhone. It’s called the Latch C, and in addition to iPhone control through Apple’s HomeKit platform, it has all the same smart features as the original Latch door lock: a built-in camera to see who’s at your door, the ability to use passcodes and cards instead of a key, and a recorded log of who’s come through.
The Latch C is much smaller than the original Latch lock, called the Latch M, becau

A new trailer has dropped for Shenmue III, showcasing the first footage we’ve seen so far of the highly anticipated sequel. The original Shenmue was one of the most expensive video games ever made. It garnered a cult following when it was released on Dreamcast in 1999. The game was notable for its day and night mechanics, interactivity, and mini games.
Unfortunately, the game was a commercial failure, and the long-awaited sequel was only able to go ahead after a successful crowdfunding cam

The second season of Netflix’s Stranger Things isn’t set to air until October, but co-creators Ross and Matt Duffer have already confirmed a third. In an interview with Vulture, Ross said the series will likely be “a four-season thing and then out.” The imagined fourth season hasn’t actually been greenlit yet.In the same interview, the Duffer Brothers reveal a few minor details about the second season — mainly that it will feel more like a movie sequel than a