NES Classic Mini controller problem solved, add this Bluetooth adapter
There’s no doubt about it, the NES Classic Mini is a fantastic little games console – hence it’s sold out almost everywhere.
We’ve loved revisiting the 30 Nintendo Entertainment System games that come pre-installed. What we don’t love, however, is having to sit a hair breadth’s away from the TV because the controller cable is as short as a nudist holiday to the North Pole.
At just 30-inches long, the cable prevents us from sitting on the couch while playing, and our couch is fairly close to the television as it is. It therefore means we don’t play with the mini games machine as often as we’d like.
Thankfully, retro games accessory company 8Bitdo is about to offer an elegant solution. On 16 December it will release an NES Classic Mini version of its Retro Receiver, which works with Bluetooth controllers and therefore makes the box wireless.
- NES Classic Mini review: Comes up a little short
- Can’t buy a NES Classic Mini? How to build your own retro console for just £50
You also get one of the manufacturer’s NES30 controllers, which looks and feels just like a NES controller but comes with a couple of extra buttons. It can be used to play all of the games on the Mini and also works with the reset option that brings you back into the menu screen and saves your progress.
Nintendo put its reset button on the console itself, which explains the short cables, but that never made sense to us. 8Bitdo neither. If you press down and select at the same time on its Bluetooth joypad, it’ll do the same thing.
The only snag with the Retro Receiver Classic Edition Set is that it weighs in at $39.99 (around £32) – almost as much as the NES Classic Mini itself. And if you want to play two-player games, you’ll need a second receiver and controller.
It is also only currently listed on Amazon.com in the US, although you can ship to the UK for an extra $13.58, including import fees. However, considering 8Bitdo’s other products are also on Amazon.co.uk, it’s probably only a matter of time until it launches here too.
How to use the Pokemon Go Nearby feature
First leaked in August, the Nearby feature in Pokemon Go will change how you play the game, making your Pokemon time more effective.
Rolling out initially in limited regions, the Nearby feature is now available in the UK, so it’s much easier to find out exactly where those Pokemon are located.
Nearby sits in the “sightings” section at the bottom right-hand corner of your display. This has always shown Pokemon that are near you, or thought to be near you, but it’s never really been very useful. Now it is.
Pocket-lint
Using the new feature is simple:
Tap the bottom right-hand tab to open up the Nearby screen.
Pokemon nearby are shown with a picture, taken from the local Poke Stop.
Tap on a Pokemon you want, then tap on the footprints below the location and Pokemon picture.
The map then zooms to a top-down view, showing the area, near a Poke Stop, that the Pokemon was sighted.
When returning to your normal Pokemon Go navigation view, that selected Pokemon is indicated with a pink footprints indicator, so you can walk that way and catch it.
When you arrive in that location, you’ll either find that Pokemon there, or you’ll get a message to tell you that it has fled the scene.
The good thing about the Nearby feature in Pokemon Go is that it helps you make decisions about which way to go and should make it easier to locate those Pokemon that you’re yet to catch.
Happy hunting!
- Pokemon Go review, or The Trials and Tribulations of a Pokemon Go addict
- Pokemon Go Gym tips: How to battle, train and win
- How to catch Ditto in Pokemon Go
- Pokemon Go: How to raise your XP level, power up and evolve your Pokemon
B&O brings noise cancellation to its wireless over-ear headphones
Bang & Olufsen debuted its wireless over-ear headphones over two years ago and despite offering active noise cancellation (ANC) for its on-ear model, the Beoplay H7 lacked that important feature. Just in time for Christmas, the company is back with an update to those over-ear headphones that delivers ANC for $100 more. The new Beoplay H9 looks nearly identical to the H7s with the only aesthetic difference being the addition of microphones on the outside of the ear cups to help block out unwanted noise.
Those handy touch controls from the H7 are still on the outside of right ear cup, allowing you to tap and swipe to play/pause, adjust volume, skip songs or take a phone call. With the H9, you can also use that touch surface to turn the noise cancellation off. You know, for all the times you need to conserve battery.
Speaking of battery life, B&O says these new headphones will blast tunes for 14 hours with ANC turned on before requiring three hours to fully recharge. Like the company’s other wireless headphones, the H9 has a removable battery so you can swap in a replacement should the need arise. This new model also has a battery-saving feature that will automatically turn them off in case you forget to do so. Last but not least, they play nice with the Beoplay app for Android and iOS to change sound settings, monitor battery life and download any software updates that may be released.
If you’re looking to snag a pair, the H9 is on sale now on the B&O site and from third party retailers. Expect to hand over $499 (€499/£449) in order to procure a set in either black or argilla grey.
Source: Bang & Olufsen
US lead on AI will shrink without more funding and education
Over a month ago, the White House released a report exploring AI’s promises and challenges. Today, climate change denier and Senator Ted Cruz, head of the Senate’s Space, Science and Competitiveness subcommittee, held a public hearing to follow up on the subject. He and members of the Senate’s greater Commerce, Science and Transportation committee petitioned four prominent experts in the field to give a status update on artificial intelligence. Their message was clear: AI has a lot of potential to boost American production, but unless we educate far more experts, US research will be overtaken by China, India and other nations that are increasingly investing in the field.
The hearing’s only pleasant surprise was its bipartisan support. Senators from both sides of the aisle, along with Cruz, all took the expert panel’s testimony seriously. Granted, AI still has the the new-car smell of a nascent field with great potential, which could boost US labor productivity by 40%, Cruz said in his introductory remarks. Golden bullet it might seem, but even the current experiments using AI to assist or solely could take a chunk out of the 35,000 annual vehicular deaths, 94% of which are caused by human error, committee member Senator Gary Peters noted.
Artificial intelligence could save even more lives, said the hearing’s first witness, Microsoft Research Lab’s managing director Eric Horvitz. AI could sift through vast quantities of medical data and catch things human doctors miss, as IBM’s Watson did back in August when it identified a rare form of leukemia and saved a patient’s life.
When people think of the cost benefits of AI, they think of automation. But reducing death and debilitating injury affects the overall economy, too: AI-assisted driving could also cut down on the 300,000 incapacitating vehicular injuries every year, which means more people remaining in the workforce and less time and money spent finding and training temporary or permanent replacements.
The looming fear over the hearing was China and India’s ever-greater competition in AI R&D. Logically, America’s lead on China and India could shrink simply due to how many more computer scientists they can train per their colossal populations. But letting US artificial intelligence slide could also be dangerous to national security. Back in August, the Defense Department suggested “immediate action” should be taken to boost development of AI war technology.
We can retain our lead to keep pioneering artificial intelligence by training America’s youth in AI programming as early as middle school, recommended the hearing’s second witness, Dean of the school of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University Andrew Moore. In his opinion, there’s a staggering amount of work and not enough trained computer scientists to perform it. Train a million middle school kids in AI, perhaps 1% stick with it, and even if you ended up with 400 experts at the level of Moore and his fellows at the hearing, there would still be too much work to do, Moore said. Pumping out more AI professionals won’t just be a smart move to fill a wanting workforce: for every programmer trained in artificial intelligence a tech company hires, Moore estimates, they earn $5 to $10 million more.
Collaboration could also help the US keep its lead, said the third witness, cofounder of the nonprofit OpenAI Greg Brockman. Making more AI systems open source drives innovation, Brockman said, along with unlocking datasets for anyone to use. But it’s not just amateurs and corporations working together: The tech industry, the government and academia should coordinate to establish standards of safety, security and ethics.
The last witness, senior research scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory Steve Chien, noted that the space agency put an AI-controlled spacecraft in orbit to track earthbound phenomena — which has been continuously snapping photos from the high atmosphere for a dozen years. Many of NASA’s vehicles, including its Mars rovers, rely on AI to navigate and triage environmental conditions.
With technological possibilities come dangers, and AI is no exception. Cruz’s limp Skynet joke aside, the pressing concern with creating more complex and prevalent artificial intelligence is the subsequent increase in cyber vulnerabilities. We don’t have to look farther than the last year to see government and political agencies hacked by foreign independent and state agents.
But even things as mundane as liability could get in the way of AI application progress here in the US. The prospect of AI-controlled cars getting into collisions could lead to a legal impasse between carmakers, insurance companies and citizens as fault becomes uncertain. Public uncertainty or displeasure could derail AI implementation in those applications, too.
To avoid the US slipping out of first place in the AI race, the panel of witnesses ultimately recommended more investment and collaboration. That means far more emphasis on AI programming earlier in education, as Moore points out, but also simply more money injected into research: Government investment in AI over the past year was $1 billion, while the tech industry spent $8 billion, Brockman pointed out. That funding will likely help us make the roads safer and people healthier, but as Chien stated, it will also help us discover the deep space answers to a few questions that have bothered mankind for eons — namely, how did life form along with the universe around it?
Source: US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation
Tor exploit targeted visitors to a Dark Web child porn site
Word has been circulating of a security exploit being used to compromise Tor Browser users, and we now know who some of the targets are. Motherboard has learned that the JavaScript-based attack was used to target visitors to The GiftBox Exchange, a Dark Web child pornography site. The discovery not only raised alarm bells on the shadier side of the Dark Web (one wiki warned that it was a “NIT,” or a network investigative technique used by law enforcement), but led GiftBox to abruptly shut down on November 15th out of fear of police action. You won’t find many people shedding a tear over the closure, of course. However, it raises a question: just who’s using it?
There are signs that it might be law enforcement. Analysis of the code suggests that some of the exploit code is “almost” exactly like what the FBI used in a 2013 bust that exposed child pornography users. Whether or not the FBI is wielding a hacking tool again isn’t certain, though. While that makes sense, it could be the work of another law enforcement agency (including one beyond the US) or a private outfit.
The Tor Project team has patched the flaw, so it won’t be usable again. However, the code for the attack was public for many hours before a fix arrived. There’s a possibility that someone else used the vulnerability in that time frame, and they might not have had a noble goal like catching sex offenders. Intruders could have used the exploit to unmask political dissidents or otherwise cause chaos for innocent Dark Web users. One thing’s for sure: if law enforcement did launch the GiftBox attack, it’s having little trouble keeping up with Tor’s developers.
Source: Motherboard, Tor Project (1), (2), (3)
Facemoji Keyboard: A fun, customizable keyboard
Keyboards might be the most boring things on our phones. For the majority of people, the keyboard that comes on your phone is the one you stay with. But there is a world of third party keyboard apps out there that do more than a stock keyboard app could ever dream. Today, we are taking a look at a keyboard that is trying to add some fun to your typing experience – Facemoji Keyboard.
Setup
If you have ever used a third party keyboard before, the setup here is no different from that. However, for those of you just now moving away from your stock keyboard, the setup has a couple of extra steps. After downloading the app, you will have to enable it on your device and set it as your default keyboard. Thankfully, when you first open Facejomi Keyboard, it walks you through these steps in a way anyone can follow. After that is all done, you are ready to type.
Experience
So what makes Facemoji Keyboard different from all the other keyboards out there? Over my week or so using the keyboard, I have to say that it is the most fun one I have ever used. The first thing you will notice is the emphasis on personalization within the keyboard through keyboard themes and emoji styles.
There are the normal keyboard themes like dark, light, and colors, but that is only the tip of the iceberg. Just scrolling through the library of themes for a few minutes, I came across ones about baseball, flowers, tattoos, and Paris. Some of the themes are even animated to add to their uniqueness, but I don’t know how friendly that will be to your battery life. I personally stuck with a normal blue color, but the option is there to pick anything you want. The default emoji style is iOS-like, but it can be changed to several different styles. I went back to the standard Android emojis as I am one of the few that seems to actually like the way they look.
After spending some time making the keyboard look just the way you want, you can finally get into the typing experience itself. At the top of the keyboard, you will notice several hotkeys. The left-most one that resembles a four-leafed clover will show you different settings options. The shirt icon will let you choose a theme to apply from any of the default themes or those you have downloaded. You can also quickly access the theme gallery to find a new one. The cursor icon in the middle lets you precisely move the cursor around to place it exactly where you want. While I appreciate this addition and love how useful it is, I wonder why it was not done in a similar fashion to Google Keyboard where you long-press the spacebar and drag to position the cursor. This way would have freed up a spot in the top bar for another hotkey, but at least the feature was included in the app.
The ghost emoji will take you to the sticker page, which we will talk about soon. Finally, the downward arrow on the right will minimize the keyboard. I think this is another wasted button as the back key on Android phones will minimize the keyboard already. I would have rather seen another shortcut in place of the arrow.
The inclusion of stickers and GIFs is what set this keyboard apart from many others that I have used. For those of you who do not know what stickers are in a keyboard app, they are basically advanced emojis that are more detailed and sometimes animated. I personally have never used stickers or GIFs when texting anyone, but the features were integrated so well into Facemoji Keyboard that I decided to give them a try. The included sticker pack is iOS-style emojis that have been animated, but you can search through the sticker gallery and download any pack that you find interesting. I personally like the sloth pack, but your options are numerous.
When you switch to the emoji tab, you will find the option to use GIFs. You can choose from trending GIFs, select a tag to view related GIFs, or just use the search function. Earlier, I mentioned that Facemoji keyboard was the most fun keyboard I have used, and that is thanks in full to the inclusion of GIFs. Being able to quickly search up a GIF and drop it into a conversation is great, and although I know the same feature is available in other keyboard apps, I still thoroughly enjoyed it when using Facemoji Keyboard. My only problem was how Textra handled selecting a GIF from the keyboard. Instead of just sending it directly in the conversation I was in, a window would pop up and have me select who I wanted to send the GIF to. I did not experience this problem with other texting apps.
There are a few time-saving features that Facemoji Keyboard also offers. Emoji prediction is exactly like preditive text but for emojis. Suggested emojis are displayed in the bar at the top of the keyboard, and you can tap directly on them to avoid having to swipe through multiple tabs of emojis. Holding down on the Enter/Return key will bring up your five most used emojis, which definitely saves time for those of us who use emojis constantly.
The overall typing experience with Facemoji keyboard is about average, and I still cannot match the speed I get with Google Keyboard. The inclusion of swiping to type is wonderful, but I found myself typing at the speed I get with most other keyboards. There were a couple of problems I encountered while using this keyboard, too. If a word was autocorrected to another word after I pressed the space bar, I could not simply backspace and be given a list of words in the top bar (like I do in Google Keyboard). This meant I would have to retype any word that was wrongly autocorrected.
Also, when backspacing to add on to the previous word, the keyboard would sometimes randomly scramble the letters of the word I wanted to add on to. Finally, the keyboard would often overlap popups or boxes that were not covered up by other apps. Most notably, anytime I wanted to add a word to my dictionary, the button to press in the popup was covered by the keyboard. Thankfully, I believe all of these problems can be fixed through a software update.
Conclusion
I have enjoyed using Facemoji Keyboard over the past week, and I would recommend it to anyone looking to add some personal flair to their typing experience. As for me, I will be switching back to Google Keyboard for the typing speed improvements alone, but I will definitely miss the ease of sending GIFs with Facemoji Keyboard. For those of you looking to try this keyboard out, you can grab it for free from the Play Store.
Fitbit is reportedly buying Pebble
Pebble might only live on in our memories and Fitbit’s devices in the future. According to The Information, Fitbit is buying smartwatch maker Pebble for an undisclosed amount. An anonymous source indicates to Engadget that Fitbit is buying the indie smartwatch maker for only $34 to $40 million — barely enough to cover its debts to suppliers, which amount to at least $25 million. Pebble has apparently been looking to sell for quite a while now due to financial issues. If you’ll recall, the indie smartwatch company laid off 25 percent of its workforce back in March this year because money was “pretty tight.”
Our source also told us that Pebble has had better offers in the past. Citizen reportedly offered to buy up Pebble for $740 million in 2015, but the company refused. After Pebble Time Round’s poor performance on the market, Intel offered to acquire the smaller company for $70 million if it would agree to hold off on launching the Pebble 2 and Pebble Time 2 Kickstarter campaign. Unfortunately, the company refused that offer, as well despite key execs’ threats to leave.
So, what will happen to Pebble’s devices? The Information says they’ll be phased out after the acquisition, because Fitbit is buying the company to get access to its technologies and intellectual properties, including its operating system. Since the newest device out of Pebble’s HQ is more of a fitness tracker than a smartwatch, it doesn’t seem so odd that a company famous for fitness wearables would be interested in snapping it up. We’ve reached out to both companies for confirmation and will update this post when we hear back.
Source: The Information
The EU plans to cut 30 percent of its energy usage by 2030
Even if the forthcoming Trump administration doesn’t take climate change seriously, the European Union plans to slash its energy usage by nearly a third by the year 2030. By the terms of the Paris Climate Agreement, the EU already planned to cut carbon emissions by 40 percent over the same period, but the new usage goal will further eliminate waste by focusing on renewable energy sources and renovating older, less efficient buildings.
“Today’s proposals have three main goals,” the European Commission wrote in a statement today, “putting energy efficiency first, achieving global leadership in renewable energies and providing a fair deal for consumers.” As the BBC notes, the EU will also create new incentives for smart metering and innovative design in order to help energy suppliers cut back, as well as empowering more Europeans to produce and sell their own electricity. “I’m particularly proud of the binding 30% energy efficiency target,” Climate Action and Energy Commissioner Miguel Arias Cañete said, “as it will reduce our dependency on energy imports, create jobs and cut more emissions.”
For now, the plan is still in the proposal stages, but if passed by the European Parliament, the binding 30% energy efficiency target is expected to kickstart “up to 177 billion euros of public and private investment per year” from 2021 to 2030 and create some 900,000 new jobs on the continent.
Fitbit Reportedly Close to Acquiring Pebble
Fitbit is closing in on a deal to acquire smart watchmaker Pebble, according to a new report from The Information. While there’s no number on the price, The Information says the deal is for a “small amount.”
The deal will see the Pebble brand slowly phased out, with its products shut down over time. Fitbit will largely be acquiring Pebble’s assets, which include intellectual property and software. Pebble had reportedly been looking to sell as the company has been experiencing financial troubles over the past year.
Pebble debuted three new smartwatches — the Pebble 2, Time 2 and Pebble Core — back in July. In August, it issued a software update that streamlined its interface and redesigned the “Pebble Health” feature. However, the company also laid off 25 perfect of its staff in March.
Last February, Pebble CEO Eric Migicovsky said the company was unfazed by the Apple Watch, largely because the company was less focused on apps than Apple. The Cupertino company quickly became the leader in the smartwatch category after the launch of the Apple Watch, but last month market research from IDC indicated that the overall smartwatch market declined 51.6 percent in the third quarter.
As for Fitbit, the acquisition could signal that the company is looking to expand beyond fitness wearables. In August, alongside its new Charge 2 and Flex 2, the company announced all-new luxe leather bands and other premium accessories. Fitbit has also seen struggles recently, with the company’s shares tumbling 30 percent after announcing mixed third-quarter results and weak guidance for its fourth quarter.
Tags: Pebble, Fitbit, smartwatches
Discuss this article in our forums
Starz pulls Spotify music streaming into its apps
The pairing of Spotify and Starz in a single app seems odd, but it’s happening anyway. Subscribers to the premium channel who use its mobile app (via a direct subscription or participating cable provider — sorry Comcast customers) will notice links to the music service with its most recent update. It will provide a quick link to soundtracks and music from Starz-licensed movies like Star Wars: The Force Awakens (since that came out just before Netflix took over the deal from Disney) as well as its exclusive shows like Power and Outlander.
You’ll need to be a Spotify Premium subscriber to listen to full tracks, but anyone can save or follow playlists from within the app. It’s also promising to recommend videos based on your listening habits, if anyone is interested in that at all. We’ve seen other TV shows and creators link to Spotify playlists (like this one for HBO’s Insecure) before, but this is a new level of integration. Of course, it only really helps if Spotify is your music service of choice, but once you find the name of a song it should be easy to find on any music streaming platform.
Source: Starz
AIVAnet 