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Tri-County Sentry
Friday APRIL 4, 2014
Tech News
There's Now a Playstation Netflix Throws Down the Gauntlet You Can Wear on Your Face Over Net Neutrality
By Derrik J. Lang SAN FRANCISCO — Sony is getting into the virtual reality business. The Japanese electronics and gaming giant unveiled a prototype virtual reality headset to be used in conjunction with its PlayStation 4 video game console during a Tuesday talk at the Game Developers Conference. Shuhei Yoshida, president of Sony Computer Entertainment Worldwide Studios, showed off the slick black-and-white headset at the annual gathering of game designers. He said Sony has been working on the technology for more than three years. The adjustable device is codenamed Project Morpheus and features a head-mounted display with 1080p resolution and a 90-degree field of view. Sensors built into the headset can track a wearer's head movement in concert with a PS4 camera. "This prototype is by no means final," said Yoshida. "We will continue to work on this to improve it, but we believe it's a good representation of how PlayStation will deliver VR." Anton Mikhailov, a senior software engineer working on Project Mor-
The PlayStation 4 virtual reality headset Project Morpheus is shown on stage as Richard Marks, senior director of research and development at Sony Computer Entertainment America, answers questions at the Game Developers Conference 2014 in San Francisco. pheus, said the current on the headset with the version of the technology gesture-detecting PlayStamust be attached to a PS4 tion Move controller, as console with a cord that's well as the standard Duabout 15 feet (4.5 meters) alShock 4. He declined to long, and users' virtual specify when the headset perspectives can be simul- would be released or how taneously broadcast on a much it would cost. television screen. Project Morpheus was "The experience can be available for demonstrashared, and that's only go- tion for conference attending to allow it to spread," ees on the conference's said Mikhailov. "I think expo floor with four games: that's going to be the key. diving cage simulator "The Once people see someone Deep," medieval comelse interacting in VR, bat game "The Castle," they're going to want to put sci-fi dogfighter "EVE: it on and try it next." Valkyrie" and a VR rendiMikhailov said users tion of the stealthy actionwill be able to interact with adventure title "Thief." the virtual world displayed
A New York man who says he was scammed by an OKCupid user is now suing the online dating site for not properly warning him that he could be duped. In February 2013, 65-year-old Michael Picciano of Queens, N.Y.,
met a man on OKCupid who went by the username "genuineguy62," according to a complaint filed in New York State Supreme Court. Picciano and "genuineguy62," who claimed his real name was "Bruce Thompson," spent about a
Man Sues Dating Site After Getting Scammed Out of $70K
month talking on OKCupid and then began having phone conversations, the lawsuit says." Several days later, Thompson asked Picciano to wire him money. Thompson said he needed it for "unexpected fees" he incurred while setting up a computer parts business, the documents state. Picciano says he made four wire transfers in steadily increasing amounts to addresses in Texas, Ontario and England. The payments, which Picciano made from a local Capital One bank in Queens, totaled $70,460. About four weeks after making the first payment, Picciano called police. A friend of his had found Thompson's photo and information on a site called malescammers.com, the complaint states. Picciano gave authorities a forged check Thompson had sent him. Police, however, were unable to find fingerprints. Picciano's lawsuit alleges OKCupid "failed to exercise reasonable care" in communicating "the dangers associated with online matchmaking." OKCupid "provided not even minimal screening of its subscribers," the complaint says.” However, an OKCupid page called "Safety Tips" explicitly warns people against wiring money to OKCupid users -- or anyone they meet online -- because the sender "has no protections against loss." Picciano is also suing Capital One for "failure to comply with proper procedures for the transmission of wire funds transfers." The lawsuit says that none of the wire transfers contained the address of the recipient "as required by law."
By Drew Guarini Netflix CEO Reed Hastings gave Internet service providers a strongly worded piece of his mind over net neutrality in a blog post on the company's website on Thursday. In a post titled "Internet Tolls And The Case For Strong Net Neutrality," Hastings laid out why cable giants should be doing more to strengthen net neutrality and "protect our consumer experience." "Some big ISPs are extracting a toll because they can," Hastings wrote. "They effectively control access to millions of consumers and are willing to sacrifice the interests of their own customers to press Netflix and others to pay." The blog post comes less than a month after Netflix struck an "interconnect" deal with Comcast to give the streaming giant a direct connection to the broadband provider, instead of
through third-party providers. The deal is meant to improve both streaming quality and speed for Netflix's library of movies and TV programs. Since the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in January struck down a Federal Communications Commission order that Internet providers such as Verizon, AT&T, Comcast and Time Warner Cable had to abide by the princi-
ples of network neutrality, treating all users equally, Netflix has been feeling the squeeze. Without net neutrality, ISPs are free to charge more or throttle speeds for data-heavy services such as Netflix streaming or Skype video calling. Since the ruling, Comcast and Verizon customers have complained of a steep drop in the quality and speed of their Netflix streaming.
By Tyler McCarthy Anyone who has ever owned an iPhone has probably spent some time complaining about its short battery life. Well, in the future, your iPhone might analyze your daily habits to help conserve battery life. As AppleInsider pointed out, Apple has filed a patent application with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, laying out a system that could give iPhones the ability to more efficiently use power in between charges. The proposed system would keep track of when the device is being used throughout the day. With this information, the iPhone could adjust power-saving features by lowering screen brightness, decreasing performance speed when the phone is on but not in use, turning off functions that take up power but aren’t necessary at all times during the day -- to name a few.
CNET wrote that Apple has also filed a related patent application for making other power-saving decisions based on analyses of app use. One example from that second filing involves coupling a digital payment in a café with a geographic location. If a user’s iPhone knows he likes to have a coffee and read for a half-hour each morning, it would allocate battery power to the news apps.
Or, if the user is watching a video on his phone, performance to all other apps would be reduced since the user is unlikely to be multitasking. It makes us a little uncomfortable to think about our iPhones potentially adjusting themselves automatically to our day-today habits, but we'll just have to weigh that against having our phones dying on us when we're not near a charger.
ANKARA, Turkey — Turkey restricted access to Twitter on Friday hours after Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan threatened to "root out" the social media network where wiretapped recordings have been leaked, damaging the government's reputation ahead key local elections. Many users trying to access the network were confronted with a notice from Turkey's telecommunications authority, citing court orders for the site's apparent closure. Twitter spokesman Nu Wexler said the company was "looking into this now," without saying whether an outage had occurred in the country. Twitter's @policy account earlier sent out messages telling Turkish users in both English and Turkish they could send out tweets by using short message service, or "SMS." It was unclear if tweets sent this way would be viewable within the country.
European Commission Vice President Neelie Kroes criticized the ban on her Twitter account as "groundless, pointless, cowardly." "Turkish people and the (international) community will see this as censorship. It is," she said. The Internet has in the been awash with incriminating leaked recordings, including one in which Erdogan allegedly instructs his son to dispose of large amounts of cash from a
residence amid a police graft probe. Erdogan, who denies corruption, said the recording was fabricated. Links to the recordings were posted on Twitter. At an election rally, Erdogan vowed to take steps against Twitter regardless of "what the international community will say." Erdogan insists the recordings are fabricated and part of plot by followers of an influential U.S.-based Muslim cleric to discredit the government.
The Only Creepy Apple Maneuver We'd Be Totally OK With
Nation Reportedly Bans Twitter