Patagonia’s interactive film experience aims to protect Bears Ears National Monument
Why it matters to you
National Monuments are meant to protect cultural landmarks for generations to come. Patagonia has found a new way to celebrate Bears Ears with a broader audience.
For years, Patagonia worked to protect natural land across the United States. Since 2013, it’s mainly focused on Bears Ears National Monument in Utah and now, its latest initiative is a collection of interactive 360-degree films which highlight the cultural and recreational importance of this threatened region.
This is Bears Ears National Monument is powered by Google’s 360 technology. While anyone has the ability to view it through a web browser, the website is best experienced through a smartphone using a virtual reality headset like Google Cardboard. Through ten short films, users are able to look around and feel immersed as they listen to stories from Native American tribal leaders and outdoor athletes. The experience ends with a call-to-action to the new Interior Secretary, Ryan Zinke, to stand up for public lands.
“Bears Ears National Monument is a sacred home for Native Americans, a world-class location for rock climbers and outdoor enthusiasts, and a mecca for archaeologists,” said Patagonia’s chief executive officer Rose Marcario in the press release. “But it is also a target for looters, mining, and energy companies and elected officials who want to privatize and develop the nation’s public lands. It is our hope that this film will help to defend this national monument by bringing it to life and spurring action to protect this American treasure.”
Anyone who visits the website has the ability to choose how they want to experience it by selecting either a cultural or sports aspect in whichever order they like. During some of the content, viewers explore walls of petroglyphs as they simultaneously learn from a Hopi archaeologist. Additionally, Navajo Elder Willie Grey Eyes tells stories of his ancestors as he journeys through a narrow canyon. For the adventurous, one video even has viewers climbing the North Six Shooter tower with Tommy Caldwell.
More: Two brothers are obsessively filming every national park, with spectacular results
Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard wrote an open letter to Utah Governor Gary Herbert earlier this year and in it, he demanded Herbert to stand up for public lands. After doing the opposite and signing a document asking President Trump to rescind the Bears Ears National Monument, Patagonia responded by boycotting Outdoor Retailer — a $40 million industry trade show — as long as it was in Utah. Days later, the Outdoor Industry Association followed and is now searching for a new home for the show.
The Android O rumor game has officially started, and here’s what we think
All the things that nobody knows but are fun to guess about. It’s that time!
Everyone has a list of things they hope to see in Android O. Some make a lot of sense and there’s a good chance we’ll see them, others are just pipe dreams. But now that the time for a new version of Android to be announced is getting closer, the guessing games can begin!
9to5 Google has a list of features they say might show up in Android O. They tell us we’ll see a new notification system, badges for application icons, picture-in-picture mode for multi-window, better text selection, and an assortment of other things that sources say are coming. You should go give it a read.
The people who have the answers are the people are keeping quiet.
Some of what they are saying matches what we’ve heard, some is close and gives more insight to our rumors, and some of the supposed features are dead wrong according to what we’ve heard. That’s how the rumor game is played — you get a little bit of good info and a little bit of bad info and mix it up with a whole lot of vague info.
For what it’s worth, our sources tell us that Android O will be about putting Google Assistant to work. Assistant will live as a system aware entity, much like Google Now did in previous builds, and be there to integrate with the things you’re doing and with ways to integrate into other applications that aren’t Google Allo. There may be app badges in a new launcher or even smart text selection and gesturing. But let’s be clear: the only people who actually know anything aren’t talking.
It’s fun to guess and play the game anyway, so we all will play it. Let’s hope that Google tells us what we want to hear at Google I/O 2017 in May. For now, let’s play — what do you think will be in Android O? Your guess is as good as anyone else’s!
Chat all things Android O in the AC forums
Guess the Android O name in our official guessing forum post!
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Pre-order a Samsung Galaxy Tab S3 and get some great free stuff
A great way to soften the blow to your wallet.
What’s better than a brand new Galaxy Tab S3 and its gorgeous screen? A brand new Galaxy Tab S3 with a free keyboard cover or 64GB SD card!
Folks in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland who pre-order a Galaxy Tab S3 through Samsung eShop before March 31 will be gifted a fancy keyboard book cover. These keyboard covers are priced at £119, so this is a really great deal and softens the blow that the £600 tablet gives to your wallet.
A good keyboard changes the way you can use a tablet and what used to be just something to consume your media or play a game or two is now a more productive part of your life. When you have to edit a document or work on a spreadsheet while you’re on the go, a good tablet with a good keyboard is the only way to do it.
The Tab S3 keyboard attaches with magnets and while putting things together can be a bit fiddly, once in place, it really becomes a part of the hardware and everything looks — and works — great.
If you’re stateside, the Tab S3 pre-orders start March 17 and it checks in at $599. You’ll also be able to see it in your local Best Buy starting March 24 if you need to hold it and see that screen before you dole out some cash.
When you pre-order, Best Buy has a care package for you that includes a six-month subscription to Webroot software and a 64GB Samsung microSDHC Class 10 UHS-1 Memory Card. That gives you room to store all your photos or a handful of full-length movies or about a gazillion songs. And it’s free, so everything will look or sound a tiny bit better when you remember you didn’t have to buy the SD card.
See at Best Buy
You can see everything you need to know about the Tab S3 in our hands-on preview. Peep the video below!
Facebook videos now auto-play with sound on: Here’s how to stop it
Facebook’s auto-playing videos in the news feed are tolerable – even enjoyable – because they’re muted by default.
But that’s about to change.
Going forward, videos will now automatically play with the sound turned on. Facebook recently announced the change in a blog post, saying that “as people watch more video on phones, they’ve come to expect sound when the volume on their device is turned on.” It’s been testing the sound-on feature and claims to have received “positive feedback”, so it’s decided to slowly roll it out to more users.
Previously, videos in the news feed were silent until you tapped them to listen. Now, unless your phone is on silent, sound will fade in and out as you scroll through videos on your news feed. If you hate that, no worries. We’ve figured out how to disable the new feature so that videos continue to play muted by default in your news feed.
Here’s what you need to do.
How to mute Facebook auto-play videos
If videos are still silent by default, or if you don’t see any of the following settings listed in the instructions below, the update probably hasn’t rolled out to your Facebook app. Be sure to update the app before tinkering around in Facebook settings.
iOS
- Tap More (the button with three horizontal lines – usually it’s near the bottom-right)
- Tap Settings
- Tap Account Settings
- Tap on Sounds
- Disable ‘Videos in News Feed Start With Sound’
Android
- Tap More (the button with three horizontal lines – usually it’s near the top-right)
- Tap App Settings
- Disable ‘Videos in News Feed Start With Sound’
Web
- If you’re on a desktop, you will need to mute your system, or you can use a Google Chrome extension such as AutoMute or Mute Tab.
Is that it?
Yep. Well, if you don’t want any video to autoplay, which could spare you data allowance, follow the instructions on this FAQ page.
LG sweetens its G6 deal with a free TV
LG wants you to take a look at its upcoming G6 smartphone so badly that it’s partnered with Sprint and Verizon to offer a fairly ridiculous deal. When you pre-order the G6, each carrier will give you a free big screen TV. That’s in addition to the free Google Home already on offer.
This isn’t the first time a phone maker has offered a TV with a new smartphone, but the size of the prize has definitely gotten larger. Samsung only offered 32-inch TVs with the purchase of its Galaxy S7 at Best Buy last year.
The new G6 handset will be available on April 7 at all four major US carriers. Prices for the device will range from $650 to $720 with various monthly payment options, depending on which convoluted pricing plan you opt for. Verizon will give you a 43-inch Smart TV with your pre-order, while Sprint super sizes their deal with a 49-inch LG HDTV.
Neither AT&T nor T-Mobile have a television on offer, but AT&T will give you a free LG Watch Sport with your pre-order. T-Mobile will hand you a Home device but no TV — they’ve got the lowest price for the G6 at $650. If you’re looking to add to your gadget pile at home, you can pre-order the LG G6 at AT&T, Sprint and Verizon right now, with T-Mobile pre-orders starting soon.
Via: Mashable
Source: Verizon, Sprint
Owners of bricked G4 and V10 phones sue LG
It’s been years since LG’s G4 and V10 smartphones launched, but the people burned by a flaw that made those devices non-functional haven’t forgotten. Four G4 and V10 owners filed a class-action lawsuit against LG earlier this week, alleging that the company “was aware, or reasonably should have been aware” of a hardware flaw that would force those two smartphones into a “boot loop” — a state of endless rebooting that basically made the devices bricks. The filing (obtained by Ars Technica) goes on to say LG failed to make customers whole again by refusing to perform repairs or offering those customers refurbished units that were as prone to boot loop syndrome as the devices sent in for repair in the first place.
This lawsuit is the latest development in a smartphone odyssey that has lasted almost since the launch of the G4 itself. So far as we can tell, the first reports of bum G4s started surfacing in the tail-end of 2015, mere months after the phone launched. It wasn’t long before YouTube videos on the matter started gaining traction and threads on Android enthusiast forums stretched into hundreds of pages. The problem was undeniable, and LG wasn’t responding fast enough.
The company eventually admitted in January 2016 that the boot loops were caused by a “loose contact between components” — more specifically, G4 owners figured out the phone’s processor was slowly being disconnected from the motherboard, with prolonged periods of lousy performance often preceding the eventual boot loop. And since the LG V10 was more-or-less a hardened version of the G4 with better audio, people reported similar issues with the newer phone, too. At the time of disclosure, LG told its customers to contact the carrier where the phones were purchased or an LG service center for repair. This is when things started to get really dicey.
As mentioned, this lawsuit has multiple plaintiffs, each with a unique story of getting screwed. One person bought a V10 that fell prey to the boot loop issue, sent it off for repair at an LG service center, and received a “fixed” phone that boot looped right out of the box. (The carrier in this case, T-Mobile, eventually swapped that V10 for a refurb.) Another plaintiff bought two G4s prior to LG’s admission — AT&T replaced one G4 twice, and LG refused to repair the other when it failed this year because it was out of warranty. One more: a plaintiff received two G4 replacements from Verizon, contacted LG about it, and was told she would receive neither a refund nor a fully functional phone. More than a year had elapsed since the sale of the original, defective phone, but refusal to handle a known issue is really something.
While subsequent phones like the G5 and V20 were mostly free from the flaw, LG’s handling of the boot loop problem easily eroded some people’s faith in the company and its work. LG hasn’t returned our requests for a comment on the matter, but we’ll keep you posted as things progress. Who knows? Maybe you’ll wind up getting a paltry check in the mail down the road as a result of all this.
Via: Ars Technica
Infrared light could someday deliver super-fast WiFi
WiFi has become essential to our everyday lives, which is why slow speeds piss us all off. Luckily, a PhD student in the Netherlands has come up with a potentially groundbreaking idea: using infrared rays to carry wireless data to your laptop or smartphone.
The capacity of the proposed system is massive, with more than 40 gigabits per second possible per light ray. Contrast that with current 802.11ac, which can transmit up to 1 gigabit per second. This new infrared system can target multiple devices at once, is cheap to set up and doesn’t have any issue with radio interference, unlike traditional WiFi. The research team has only tested download speeds and only across short distances, but the potential is clear.
This new concept won’t simply outstrip current WiFi speeds and provide interference-free connections. There are no moving parts here, making power requirements much lower. “Light antennas” radiate infrared light rays at different angles to accurately target many enabled devices at once without getting congested. Of course, since infrared won’t go through walls, you’ll need an antenna in each room. Infrared light is harmless to the human eye, so you won’t have to avert your gaze, either.
Other light-based WiFi solutions have been limited to slow speeds in the past and relied on LED bulbs. Keeping the lights on all the time seems untenable at best, and it’s pretty easy to block regular light with your hand. This much more robust infrared light concept earned Joanne Oh her PhD at the Eindhoven University of Technology in the Netherlands.
Other PhD students at the university are working on ways to track the location of wireless devices, while still others are figuring out how to connect the light antennas with fiber-optics. Project head Tom Koonen thinks it won’t be too long before we see this technology in stores and in our homes, estimating a short five years until we start seeing light-enabled WiFi devices like laptops and video monitors.
https://phys.org/news/2017-03-wi-fi-rays-light100-faster-overloaded.html#jCp
FBI apprehends troll for seizure-inducing Twitter attack
The perpetrator who tweeted a seizure-inducing image to a journalist has been apprehended by the FBI. In December a troll sent Vanity Fair and Newsweek writer Kurt Eichenwald, who is epileptic, a flashing, auto-playing image. Earlier this morning, Eichenwald tweeted that following three months of research, that the Federal Bureau of Investigation has arrested the suspect. Eichenwald says that the perpetrator faces federal charges and will be indicted by the Dallas district attorney (where Eichnwald lives) on “different charges” over the next few days.
Exactly what those will be aren’t clear. The FBI hasn’t issued a press release regarding the arrest as of publication time, and a spokesperson hasn’t responded with additional information yet either. We will update this post when we receive a response.
Combined with the recent arrest regarding a Twitter prank that brought the 911 emergency service to its knees, this is further proof that what you do and say on Twitter can have real-world consequences. Especially, in this case, where it was used to cause harm to a user.
According to Newsweek, some 40 other trolls have sent strobing images to Eichenwald since December, and those accounts have been submitted to the FBI as well. “We’re very gratified that the government has worked hard and promptly to make sure that the person who was responsible for this attack is held to account,” Eichenwald’s lawyer Steven Lieberman told the publication. “It sends an important message that there is no free shot against journalists in the country.”
Lieberman said that this tweet wasn’t an effort to curb free speech, equating it to sending an envelope of Anthrax spores or a bomb to someone. “It wasn’t the content of the communication that was intended to persuade somebody or make them feel badly about themselves; this was an electronic communication that was designed to have a physical effect.”
I want to thank Dallas Police, Dallas DA, US Attorney in Dallas, the FBI & the Dept of Homeland Security who all played a role in this case.
— Kurt Eichenwald (@kurteichenwald) March 17, 2017
Via: The Verge
Source: Kurt Eichenwald (Twitter), Newsweek, Dallas Morning News
Apple paid Chance the Rapper $500,000 for a two-week exclusive
It’s tough for streaming music services to stand out. Cosmetic differences aside, all of them offer virtually the same thing. Each major platform has the songs listeners want, for the most part. One method that services are using to stand out is exclusive releases — even if they’re only exclusive for a short time.
For instance, Apple Music was the only place to stream Chance The Rapper’s 2016 mixtape Coloring Book for the first two weeks after its release. Apple also struck a similar deal for Frank Ocean’s Boys Don’t Cry last year. We had no idea how much this type of arrangement costs until, as The Fader notes, Chance The Rapper pulled back the curtain today. In a series of tweets, the artist said that in exchange for advertising and two weeks of exclusive streaming rights, he was paid half a million dollars.
“I wanna clear things up,” Chance tweeted before revealing that Apple gave him $500,000 for the two-week exclusive. A couple minutes later, he added, “That was the extent of my deal, after 2 weeks it was on SoundCloud for free. I needed the money and they’re all good people over there.”
Chance prides himself on being an independent artist, so he shared this information to “remain transparent” about his relationship with the streaming giant. He wrote that as long as they’re working with good people, getting paid, and keeping your integrity, artists shouldn’t have to justify partnering with anybody.
Exclusives are a point of contention, since ultimately, they keep music away from listeners. Consumers subscribed to the “wrong” service could miss out on the songs they want. Exclusives are apparently a headache for record labels as well, since Universal Music Group claims to be done with them. Artists have the potential to do well in this situation, though: “I think artist can gain a lot from the streaming wars as long as they remain in control of their own product,” Chance tweeted.
This is the first time we’ve been able to put a dollar amount on timed streaming exclusives, and that’s significant. Coloring Book was the first streaming-only album to chart on the Billboard 200 and be nominated for (and win) a Grammy. We know streaming is a big part of popular music’s future, and now we have a better idea of how much money is involved.
I never felt the need to correct folks on my relationship with @apple but now that more people have tried to discredit my independence..
— Lil Chano From 79th (@chancetherapper) March 17, 2017
I wanna clear things up. @apple gave me half a mil and a commercial to post Coloring Book exclusively on applemusic for 2 weeks https://t.co/dMWwptrHHH
— Lil Chano From 79th (@chancetherapper) March 17, 2017
That was the extent of my deal, after 2 weeks it was on SoundCloud for free. I needed the money and they’re all good people over there https://t.co/5kIhv0YaKS
— Lil Chano From 79th (@chancetherapper) March 17, 2017
I feel like if I didnt clear it up people would keep trying to discredit all the work we did to make Coloring Book what it became https://t.co/05v81I38ur
— Lil Chano From 79th (@chancetherapper) March 17, 2017
I think artist can gain a lot from the streaming wars as long as they remain in control of their own product. https://t.co/6agVO3uIdf
— Lil Chano From 79th (@chancetherapper) March 17, 2017
I just wanna remain transparent. Folks out there without a deal need to know they’re doing everything right just keep at it. https://t.co/5udstMPX62
— Lil Chano From 79th (@chancetherapper) March 17, 2017
If you come across oprtunities to work with good people, pick up cash and keep your integrity I say Do It https://t.co/yF0gBPkLhY
— Lil Chano From 79th (@chancetherapper) March 17, 2017
Via: The Fader
FCC: Your cybersecurity isn’t our problem
The new FCC Chairman hasn’t wasted any time getting down to business. That is, the business of burning consumer privacy and security to the ground.
New Trump appointment FCC Chairman Ajit Pai has suspended the agency’s consumer data privacy rules indefinitely. Before they even went into effect. He’s basically holding the safeguards under water while two Republican-backed congressional resolutions come in for the kill.
This neatly lays the groundwork for companies to spy, track, and profit off our private viewing and browsing habits. You see, ad industry trade groups absolutely hated those privacy rules, which were established under former Chairman Tom Wheeler.
The rules would’ve required internet service providers to notify consumers about the collection and use of their data. And require opt-in consent before using or sharing what the FCC considers sensitive information. That’s stuff like Social Security numbers, data associated with kids, health and financial info, email content, location data, internet history and app-usage data.
It seems like it should be a basic right to know what’s being collected about you, how it’s shared, and to have a chance to opt out. But no; leading ad groups have said that Wheeler’s protections would chill innovation.
So now if Verizon or Comcast want to share with their partners that you’ve visited websites about diabetes or pregnancy tests, the companies are freer than ever to do so. Former FCC enforcement chief Travis LeBlanc cautioned the press earlier this month that if Pai got rid of these protections, “then consumers will have nothing.”
“Think about how much your ISP can know about you,” he told Bloomberg Law last week. “Your phone is with you all the time, so your phone carrier knows where you are, they know who you’re calling, they can see all the websites you’re visiting.”
He added, “You can imagine a world in which you go on television and see an ad about something you just searched for on the internet 20 seconds ago.”
In addition to freezing the privacy protections, Pai gutted its provisions to make ISP’s notify consumers when there’s a breach. That would’ve been nice considering Comcast’s track record. But, unfortunately for us, making breach notifications mandatory would be very expensive for companies whose priorities are their advertisers, and not their customers.
Worryingly, this all is in lockstep with Pai’s attitude about consumer cybersecurity in general. He and fellow Republican commissioner Michael O’Rielly have made it clear that they don’t think the FCC should have any kind of active role in cybersecurity.
What happens without the rules in the event of a breach? Pai told Senator John Thune last week that consumers would be back to relying on any federal or state breach notification requirements. In absence of a federal breach notification law, we have to assume he means we’re stuck with state breach laws, which are, incidentally, a sprawling mess.
Cybersecurity in communications is not the FCC’s area, Pai and O’Rielly maintain when questioned, much to the delight of broadband and telecom providers, we’re sure. In fact, O’Rielly stated that it’s not really in any rules anywhere that the FCC should be doing anything about cybersecurity, so, like, they won’t be. Pai and O’Rielly didn’t high-five after he said that. But from the way their faces twitched to smiles, like when someone tells adults that safety in their frat house isn’t technically their responsibility, they didn’t need to.
The thinking by Pai and his cohorts seems to be that the Department of Homeland Security should be responsible for cybersecurity risk oversight in the communications sector. Yes, the DHS: an organization with no regulatory authority over the commercial communications sector. Which is, you know, exactly what the FCC was created for.
Pai didn’t stop there. The former Verizon attorney is, after all, the man who called net neutrality a “mistake,” so we know he’s got some slashing and burning to do around Wheeler’s old office.
The new FCC head has stopped an order that would’ve addressed flaws in the Emergency Alert System that allow hijackers to prevent 911 calls from getting through by performing the phone equivalent of a DDoS attack. He rescinded a notice for public input on cybersecurity risk reduction for next-generation wireless networks. Morning Consult reported that Pai also “removed from public view a study by FCC economists highlighting the growing gap between communications sector corporate cybersecurity investment and that needed to properly protect society.”
Did Pai and friends not read the instructions that came with the job? Maybe someone should tell these bros and their ad-beholden buddies that the FCC is a government agency created to regulate communications for the purpose of national defense, without discrimination, “for the purpose of promoting safety of life and property through the use of wire and radio communications.”
Making cybersecurity part of that mission isn’t just a good idea — even if it is a bunch of work for the FCC’s new boys — it should be a goddamn requirement. It’s difficult to comprehend the logistical gymnastics behind the belief that cybersecurity and telecommunications are separate entities. They’re so intertwined that to address communications regulation absent its security component would be reckless at best, catastrophic at worst. Our current situation adds a layer of creeping horror to Edward R. Murrow’s prescient warning of, “Look now, pay later.”
But now the FCC officially believes that cybersecurity is someone else’s problem. And in the real world, when security is “someone else’s problem” it quickly becomes your problem.
Images: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images (Wheeler / Pai)
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