VW pours $300 million into a national EV charging network

Volkswagen’s nearly $15 billion settlement over its diesel emissions cheating included a stipulation that it push clean transportation, and that involves a lot more than producing electric cars. The automaker’s Electrify America division has unveiled plans to invest $300 million into a national network of 450 electric car charging stations. The grid will cover 11 “major metropolitan areas” and high-traffic highways in 39 states. These won’t all be basic chargers, either. The 240 highway stations will include both 150kW and 320kW chargers that, at the higher power rating, will top up future EVs in as little as 15 to 20 minutes — a short enough time that you might not have to plan your schedule around your recharging habits.

The cash is part of a larger $2 billion commitment to zero-emissions infrastructure and awareness campaign. Even if you can’t take advantage of the chargers, it’ll be hard to completely escape VW’s marketing push.

This will undoubtedly help VW’s increasingly ambitious EV plans, but it could be a big deal for American drivers as a whole. Combined with other networks, it could make fast, non-proprietary EV charging stations relatively commonplace in heavily populated areas. The biggest challenge may be serving quieter regions. Until you can reliably travel cross-country (particularly in rural areas), it’ll still be easier for some people to live with gas-powered vehicles.

Via: HybridCars, CNET

Source: Electrify America

Google quietly takes on LinkedIn with its own job listings site

Google has a new job listings portal coming online soon, adding yet another site you’ll need to upload your resume to. You can even visit the Google Hire site now, though it won’t let you sign in, yet. According to Axios, Hire will enable companies to post job listings and individuals to search for and find their next job.

Details are rather sparse, but there are already privacy concerns with the public-facing new site, which asks users to sign in with their personal Google account. There have been some speculation (as yet unfounded) that this would allow potential employers to see your entire search history. According to the Daily Mail, Google has denied these claims. We’ve reached out to Google for comment.

Google isn’t the first big company to jump into the job-recruitment arena. Facebook started rolling out support for job listings this past February. Google is facing a pretty crowded market of established players like LinkedIn, Glassdoor and Monster. To succeed, it will need to bring something different and better to the table.

Update: A Google spokesperson emailed the following statement on privacy.

“Google Hire is a product under development that will help G Suite customers manage their hiring process more effectively. The product will allow employers to collect candidate applications online. Only information that a candidate voluntarily provides would be passed to a prospective employer as part of their online application. Private information will not be shared.”

Via: Daily Mail, Android Authority

Source: Axios

Most of us are using our phones while driving

Between the hefty fines, disturbing PSAs and social shunning that comes from using your phone while driving, it turns nearly everyone is still texting, tweeting and generally fiddling with their phones while behind the wheel. According to Zendrive’s extensive three month study of three million US drivers, we’re use our phones at least once during 88 percent of our trips.

Yeah, that’s not good.

The study analyzed 570 million trips over 5.6 billion miles and determined that on average, we used our phones instead of paying attention to the road for 3.5 minutes every hour. The state with the most distracted drivers was Vermont and the least distracted was Oregon. Both have hand-held phone bans. The most distracted city was Los Angeles while California as a whole was one of the least distracted states.

With motor vehicle deaths up six percent in 2016 from 2015, and 14 percent from 2014 to 2016, this study is a stark reminder that while automobiles are getting safer, drivers are actually getting worse behind the wheel. Taking your eyes off the road for just two seconds increases the possibility of a crash 24 times. It takes an average of five seconds to text during which a car traveling at 55 miles per hour can cover an entire football field. So maybe put your phone away next time you’re driving.

Via: Axios

Source: Zendrive

People really like to watch a giraffe give birth

For weeks, animal lovers have been holding their breath in anticipation waiting for April, a 15-year-old giraffe at Animal Adventure Park in New York, to give birth. Well, the moment finally arrived last Saturday. April had a healthy baby boy, and millions of people turned to YouTube to watch.

Animal Adventure Park now is the second most live-viewed channel in the history of YouTube, the website reports on its official blog. That’s kind of amazing considering the channel has only been around for about 66 days. It became the fifth fastest channel to 200 million views, a feat usually reserved for non-giraffe celebrities like Lady Gaga and Zayn.

April’s delivery had over 232 million live views and 7.6 billion minutes of live watch-time total, YouTube says. Saturday was naturally the channel’s biggest day, with live views surging to over 14 million. More than 1.2 million people tuned in simultaneously at around 6:55 a.m. PST, making it one of the top five most-watched moments during a live event ever on YouTube.

So, if Animal Adventure is now the second most live-viewed channel in YouTube history, what’s the first? A Google spokesman tells us it’s the League of Legends esports channel. Not even the miracle of life can beat a good tower dive, apparently.

Source: YouTube

NASA seeks comet ‘crumbs’ with a new detection technique

It’s relatively trivial to spot comets, but spotting the dust they leave behind? That’s no mean feat — it’s like tracking grains of fast-moving sand on a cosmic-scale beach. NASA, however, might just have a way of mapping that dust. It’s developing a technique that would use the movement of the ESA’s LISA Pathfinder probe to detect the minuscule “crumbs” left by comets and asteroids. The trick involves tracking the tiny thruster bursts Pathfinder uses to compensate for dust stream impacts. When you measure the direction and strength of those bursts, you can get a good sense of the dust’s impact location, size and trajectory.

This is just a proof of concept study, and NASA would have to get the go-ahead to use it. The dream is to use it with a dedicated gravitational wave observatory that’s still in development. However, the possibilities are already very apparent. This could lead to a comprehensive map of the inner Solar System’s dust, with clouds traced back to individual space rocks. That, in turn, could help understand how planets form and predict the likelihood of impacts that could prove deadly to future spacecraft.

Source: NASA

Netflix expects to sign up its 100 millionth subscriber this weekend

Netflix’s earnings report is out (PDF), and the nearly-worldwide video streaming company has seen its subscriber count creep up to 98.75 million. To close the letter to investors, execs said they expect to cross the 100 million customer barrier this weekend, as they reorganized their data to deemphasize subscriber count in favor of revenue. the company also reported that Dave Chappelle: Collection 1 is its most-viewed comedy special ever.

The company also shed light on its growing plans for movie production. By Netflix’s measure, flicks like Adam Sandler’s movies and The Siege of Jadotville were successes, while Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon:
Sword of Destiny was not. As usual, it did not release any numbers, but said its formula for success is if a movie “will attract and delight members at better economics relative to licensing movies under traditional windowing.”

Developing…

Source: Netflix Q1 2017 Letter to Shareholders (PDF)

LG’s ultra-light Gram laptop has too many compromises

LG’s Gram is a wonder to hold. It’s one of the lightest 15.6-inch notebooks we’ve ever seen, at just 2.4 pounds. But that extreme portability has some tradeoffs, especially when it comes to build quality. To make things worse, it doesn’t even live up to LG’s lofty battery claims. That leaves the Gram in a weird spot. It could be useful if you’re looking for the lightest 15.6-inch laptop possible, but for most consumers, it doesn’t too much to differentiate itself from other ultraportables.

Hardware

The Gram’s case is made out of magnesium alloy, but, strangely enough, it doesn’t feel like metal. There’s a flimsiness to it that gives off a plastic vibe. LG likely went with incredibly thin case molds to help reduce weight, but that inevitably lead to some structural issues. For example, there are air pockets galore throughout the Gram, which leads to plenty flex, especially on the bottom of the case. There’s even a noticeable amount of space between the screen and its back panel. So much of the Gram’s construction feels precarious, instead of thoughtful — as if LG would do anything to reach its weight goals.

It’s not all doom and gloom, though. The portion of the case around the Gram’s keyboard feels sturdy, so you can type without worrying about bending the case. And, honestly, it’s impressive that LG could fit such a large touchscreen into the frame of a typical 14-inch laptop.

Overall, though, the Gram doesn’t seem as refined as other all-metal ultraportables, like the MacBook and Dell’s XPS 13. Even the most recent Asus Zenbook, which had its own flexing issues, feels more substantial. Personally, I’d rather have a machine that’s slightly heavier, but could stand up better to the typical rough and tumble of laptop ownership. It’d be nice if I wasn’t worried about seriously damaging the Gram if it fell a short distance, or if I tossed into a bag with a bunch of other gear.

At least LG didn’t compromise much when it came to ports. The Gram features four USB ports (two of which are USB 3.0), a USB-C connection, a micro-SD card slot, headphone jack and a full-sized HDMI port. And yes, you can charge the laptop over USB-C, in addition to its standard power adapater. While it’s not unusual for 15-inch laptops to come with a slew of ports, it’s rare to see them in one this thin and light.

Given that it had a lot of room to work with, LG includes a large keyboard on the Gram, complete with a set of number keys on the right side. Typing on it feels like a throwback to days using large Thinkpads — but not in the good way. It’s a bit awkward typing on the left side of the keyboard, rather than naturally centering my hands on the laptop. The Gram’s chiclet-style keys don’t have much depth, either, which makes for an overall unsatisfying typing experience.

On the bright side, the Gram’s large trackpad fares better than the keyboard. It’s smooth and responsive, and ranks among the best I’ve used on a Windows laptop. It does have a bit of trouble distinguishing left clicks from right clicks, but that’s a problem most of the competition has as well.

LG is following in Dell’s footsteps by placing the Gram’s HD webcam right below the screen. While that leaves room for a thin bezel at the top of the monitor, it also means you’ll be stuck with very unflattering angles while video chatting. The camera itself delivers merely adequate images — you won’t be mistaking it for a high-quality desktop webcam. The Gram’s speakers are another story. They’re positioned towards the front of the laptop and fire straight down, so it’s tough to pin down where the sound is actually coming from. The speakers can get loud, but they’re incredibly tinny no matter the volume.

Display

Aside from the weight, the most impressive aspect of the Gram is its 15.6-inch 1080p screen. Not necessarily because it’s a great display — it’s adequate for movies and browsing around the web — but because it’s large for a laptop this size. It’s ideal for just vegging with Netflix in bed. It has a very thin bezel around the sides and top, as if it were taking a few cues from Dell’s XPS lineup. The larger bezel below the screen seems to exist just to show off a sizable LG logo.

The biggest downside of the display is that it’s incredibly glossy and reflective. It was practically impossible to use outdoors in sunlight, and I even had trouble angling it away from light sources inside. This is an issue with any glossy display, but the Gram fares worse than most. The display also feels incredibly cheap, which isn’t a good thing when you’re using it as a touchscreen.

For the most part, the Gram’s screen feels merely adequate. It would have been nice to see a 1440p display here, even though that would have meant a battery hit. 1080p just feels too restrictive for a display this large, especially in 2017.

Performance

We tested the highest-end LG Gram model, and it shows. Its 7th generation Intel Core i7-7500U CPU bested most other ultraportables, and it was also buoyed by 16GB of RAM. The laptop handled just about everything I threw at it, be it extreme multitasking (with several browsers, dozens of tabs, Photoshop, Spotify and other apps running), or playing light games like Minecraft. But since it’s relying on integrated Intel graphics, it’s not a machine you’ll be using for the Doom remake.

While LG originally claimed its 14-inch Gram laptop would get 24 hours of battery life, the company quickly backtracked on that figure when they were found to be using old benchmarks. For this 15.6-inch model, LG estimates it would last around 12.5 hours. In our testing, which involves looping an HD video, it came in at 10 hours and 42 minutes. That’s nothing to scoff at, but we’ve seen far better battery figures from Lenovo’s Yoga 910 and HP’s recent Spectre X360.

Battery life

LG Gram 2017
10:42
Lenovo Yoga 910
16:13
Apple MacBook Pro 2016 (13-inch, no Touch Bar)
11:42
HP Spectre x360 (13-inch, 2015)
11:34
Apple MacBook Pro 2016 (15-inch)
11:00
HP Spectre x360 15t
10:17
Apple MacBook Pro 2016 (13-inch, Touch Bar)
9:55
ASUS ZenBook 3
9:45
Apple MacBook (2016)
8:45
Dell XPS 2-in-1
8:34
Microsoft Surface Pro 4
7:15
HP Spectre 13
7:07
Razer Blade Stealth (Fall 2016)
5:36
Dell XPS 15 (2016)
5:25 (7:40 with the mobile charger)

Configuration options and the competition

The LG Gram comes in three flavors: a 13-inch model, a 14-inch, and this 15.6 inch. They all share the same basic design and features, though you’ll get a few more USB ports with the 15.6-inch version. We tested the $1,699 Gram configuration, but surprisingly enough, both the 14-inch and and 15.6-inch models start at $1,199 with Core i5 processors and 8GB of RAM. The only difference there is that the entry-level 15.6-inch doesn’t have a touchscreen display. The 13-inch Gram, on the other hand, starts at $999 with those same specs.

Of course, the Gram isn’t alone in the ultraportable arena. Dell’s XPS 13 and 15 were among our favorite laptops for the past few years, and HP has steadily made progress with its attractive Spectre X360 line. But, notably, those machines also come in heavier than the Gram series. The XPS 13 weighs around 2.8 pounds (depending on which model you get), while the XPS 15 weighs 4.4 pounds. While I’m not a huge fan of LG’s compromises in build quality, it’s definitely done a good job of beating the competition in the weight game. Hell, even the Surface Pro 4, which packs in a svelte 12-inch screen, is only slightly lighter than the Gram models.

Wrap-up

LG set out to make the lightest laptops possible, and it succeeded. While I’m not a fan of the flimsy design, I’m sure there are plenty of shoppers out there who would look past that just for the portability benefits. Aside from the weight though, there’s just not enough that makes the Gram series stand out. And, really, what good is a light laptop if you can’t use it outside?

Indie charmer ‘TumbleSeed’ will arrive on Nintendo Switch May 2nd

Okay, so you’ve had your Nintendo Switch for awhile. Ganon’s corpse is but a speck in the proverbial rearview mirror and hunting for the last remaining shrines in Breath of the Wild isn’t all that interesting. What’s a person to do? Well, that’s where indie games come in. And for the purposes of this article, we’re talking about TumbleSeed specifically. The charming rogue-like about climbing a mountain as a tiny future-flora will be released to Nintendo’s latest console May 2nd. That’s only a few weeks away!

As a refresher, you’re controlling the titular TumbleSeed (the pink eye-looking thing above) on its way up a mountain and battling its possessed inhabitants along the way. If you’re defeated before reaching the summit, you have to start over from basecamp. Every time. It comes to us from the team behind the simple yet addictive Threes and Ridiculous Fishing, and its aesthetics and play style could be a perfect fit for the Switch.

“TumbleSeed has a lot of the same values a Nintendo game has,” developer Greg Wohlwend told us earlier this year. “It’s colorful and easy to get into. But it also has a lot of the things from the NES days, especially difficulty.

“We’ve spent a ton of energy on getting TumbleSeed to fit that combination of natural-to-learn mixed with challenging and fun, even after playing for two years.”

Given the pick-up-and-play nature of the game and how easy it is to swap between big and small screens with the Switch, this might be a breakout hit for the system. No Switch? It’s also coming to PC and PlayStation 4.

Source: Nintendo (YouTube)

‘iPhone Edition’ Said to Have Polished Stainless Steel Frame Similar to Apple Watch, Vertical Camera for VR

Apple’s widely rumored iPhone with an OLED display will feature a polished stainless steel enclosure sandwiched between front and back glass, says Japanese blog Mac Otakara. That’s the same design that reliable Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo of KGI Securities has expected since last year.

“iPhone Edition” render by Japanese blog Mac Otakara
The blog claims the so-called “iPhone Edition” will use an improved version of the Apple Watch’s stainless steel enclosure. The smartphone, more commonly dubbed “iPhone 8” for now, will also allegedly have a conventionally flat OLED display with 2.5D cover glass along the edges, as rumored previously.

As seen in a few renders over the past few weeks, the “iPhone Edition” will reportedly also be equipped with a vertically-aligned dual-lens iSight Duo camera on the rear for VR purposes. Accordingly, when the iPhone is used in a VR headset, the cameras would be positioned horizontally as customary.

Meanwhile, the tentatively named iPhone 7s and iPhone 7s Plus are expected to be slightly thicker than the current iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus, meaning that some existing cases and accessories might not fit the newer models. From a cosmetic standpoint, however, those smartphones are expected to look similar.

Related Roundup: iPhone 8 (2017)
Tag: macotakara.jp
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Power Rangers: Legacy Wars – Galactic witch Rita Repulsa is back and has to be stopped (Review)

Overview

As a kid in the ‘90s I used to watch a lot of Power Rangers episodes. Over the years the television series was turned into an entertainment and merchandising franchise with its latest manifestation being the Power Rangers movie which was launched in 2017.

But Power Rangers fans weren’t treated only with the movie this year. Game developer nWay in collaboration with Lionsgate and Saban (owner of the frenchsie) also unleashed the Power Rangers: Legacy Wars game for Android. The title presents an alternate scenario than the one you’ll be seeing on the big screen, in which Rita Repulsa devices a master plan to pit Rangers against one another.

Getting started

The application is free to download from the Google Play Store. The game is quick to install and loads quite easily, so gamers will be transported to the Power Rangers universe in no time.

Impressions

As a player, you will need to resist the forces of darkness summoned by the evil witch Rita Repulsa by collecting Power Ranger characters that span over the franchise’s 24-year history. Assemble teams of both villains and rangers in order to take down the armies of the wicked witch which include Ranger clones that have been programmed to fight for her.

The gameplay is quite simple with no additional story overlay. The characters don’t interact which each other except in the arena where they are supposed to fight to the death in bands of three versus three. Players can move their characters backwards or forwards by simply swiping the screen. In order to attack or block you’ll need to tap on one of the three options. Every action costs power points, so after a hit you’ll need to wait a few seconds for the power to be replenished.

You’ll notice attack cards come in three colors: yellow, blue and red. That’s because the game has a system – red trumps blue (blocking), blue defends against yellow attacks and yellow attacks have priority over red. But while most of the time the game follows this pattern, a few times I noticed a disengagement from these rules. For example, I was able to block red attacks with blue more than a few times. Additional cards will let you invite another member of your team into the battle for a short period of time.

Additionally I observed some lag between tapping on a card and the Power Ranger actually executing the command, which was probably due to my data-connection or some server issues. During such matches, moving my character proved to be extremely difficult, while my opponent seemed to move extremely fast. Since the game allows you to fight against real players in real-time PvP, it is recommended to be on a strong Wi-Fi connection when you play the game.

Warriors can be upgraded using Zeo Shards which you earn through battles and missions. You if you want to get better players or upgrade your fighters, there are in-app purchases that can get you there fast. You can acquire Power Crystals (good for speeding things up and upgrading characters), Power Coins (also for upgrading characters), Morph Boxes (mystery prizes) and even new characters. But spending money is not the only option – you can simply play and play until you unlock these upgrades/characters.

A few words about the visual gaming experience – the graphics are quite well executed and the fighters enjoy fluid movements. The backgrounds aren’t super exciting but they look nice. As for the music, it’s nothing out of the ordinary – exactly what you’d expect from an action-packed game like this.

Conclusion: The game is fun and engaging to play at first, but be prepared to spend quite some time in the training pit if you want to upgrade your characters and be able to take on more skilled opponents. After a while it got a tad tedious for me, as you end up executing the same actions over and over again. Basically you just have to tap on cards and remember the rules.