Mophie Charge Force review

New smartphones still die after a single day of use, but battery cases are too bulky, and stand-alone battery packs require a tangle of cables to keep your phone juiced up. Mophie’s Charge Force series attempts to offer a solution  — eliminate the wires. It all starts with a magnetic smartphone case that’s capable of wireless charging. You then snap the case to various Charge Force accessories, such as a desk mount for the office, a vent mount for your car, a charging base station, or portable battery packs. Mophie describes Charge Force as a cable-free method where you can “just drop and charge.” For our Mophie Charge Force review, we snapped on the wündercase and discovered that it falls short of fixing a few glaring issues.

Thinner case, but still bulky

Mophie’s Charge Force wireless charging case is compatible with Qi wireless charging technology, so you can use it with a wide variety of wireless charging pads. Although, the Charge Force series eliminates the hassle of fussing with wires — and the feeling like your phone is chained down — it still doesn’t fix the main issues that exist with wireless charging. Namely, the case is still too bulky.

The Charge Force is much slimmer than most Mophie cases, but it adds weight to the phone and is still far bulkier than we’d like. It also adds a lip to the bottom of the smartphone with a cut out for audio to be directed to the user, turning the bottom-firing speakers into front-facing ones. While this does make the audio sound a little louder, we don’t think it justifies the added bulk.

If you’re an iPhone 7 user, you know the struggle of charging your phone and listening to music — especially if you don’t have wireless earbuds. The Mophie Charge Force case makes things worse. It’s extremely difficult to disconnect the case’s Lightning plug that’s connected to the wireless charger built into the case — resulting in the ultimate struggle to open it to plug your headphones in. Android device owners won’t have this problem, because USB Type-C is not a proprietary port.

Wireless is somewhat convenient

Then there’s the Charge Force devices that provide battery power to the case. The Powerstation Mini adds extra bulk and more weight, but it also isn’t flush with the back of the phone. It sticks out like Apple’s official battery case, but it’s worse because it doesn’t make for a comfortable hold. Handling the phone with both hands causes the battery to slip, forcing you to constantly put it back in place to make it recognize the internal charging pad in the case.

The Desk Mount charger is a little better — it acts like a dock, and you can rest your smartphone upright. It plugs into a wall outlet or laptop via USB, and it allows you place your phone easily thanks to the magnetic case. It certainly eliminates the need to manually plug your phone in, and while it does take up some space, it can be useful. The Vent Mount is more or less the same but for cars. Being able to easily snap your phone to the mount is useful — you don’t need to deal with any wires. This is also where the upright design is useful as you can see notifications, hopefully reducing the habit of picking up your phone to check for messages. The problem? They’re both $60 each, that we’re not including the cost of the case itself.

As for the wireless charging base, it can live anywhere around the home — the kitchen counter, coffee table, or your even your nightstand. Being able to have charging stations like this around where you can simply drop your phone to charge is ideal, but it’s not ideal when you want to use the phone while charging. With a regular wired charger, I’m still able to pick up my phone and use it. With the charging station, you have to either use your phone while it’s attached to the external battery pack, or pick up the phone and then place it back — inevitably extending the amount of time it takes to fully charge.

For those who need a serious charge while on-the-go, the Powerstation is a 10,000mAh portable battery pack that can charge your phone several times over, and it also has a USB port to charge another device simultaneously. It’s similar to the Powerstation Mini, but while it clearly packs a lot more power, it unfortunately adds a lot more weight.

For Android users, the Powerstation doesn’t support quick charging technology, but smartphones like the Samsung Galaxy S8 that have built-in wireless charging should still be compatible without the need for Mophie’s case.

The full experience comes at a high cost

When you have all the parts to the Charge Force series, wireless charging can definitely be convenient since you can simply place your phone to keep it charged at all times. But even buying one or two accessories will make your wallet feel light. The phone case itself costs between $50 to $60, depending on if you have an iPhone or an Android, while the docks and batteries run between $50 to $100. If you were to purchase the entire set — the phone case, desk and vent mount, Powerstation, Charging Base, and Powerstation Mini — it’ll run you over $400.

There are tons of other portable battery options currently on the market with almost as much charging power, if not more, for a cheaper price. For Android owners, the Charge Force series is a solid option, because you don’t need to deal with constantly removing the case’s plug. We don’t recommend this for iPhone users (unless you have wireless earbuds), because simply unplugging the case is incredibly difficult. Still, at a such a steep cost for the Charge Force series, wires suddenly don’t seem too bad after all.

The best music streaming services

Updated: Added information including Taylor Swift’s music on Spotify, new Apple Music pricing and information, and Sprint’s new deal with Tidal.

The world of on-demand music streaming has never been more crowded. As more and more listeners shy away from physical recordings in favor of massive online music libraries, music streaming services keep popping up, each offering a varied amount of songs, features, and its own quirks. But only a choice few have what it takes to join our list of the best music streaming services.

We’ve spent some time with each of the most popular services online to create this list of the top five streaming services for all different types of listeners. Whether you’re into music discovery, streaming radio, or the highest audio resolution you can find, these are the best on-demand streaming services in the land.

Our pick

Spotify

Why you should subscribe: It’s the best music discovery platform you’ll find, it has a huge catalog, and it can be tested for free indefinitely.

Spotify Ad-Free

The user-friendly, undisputed king of music discovery, Spotify is our favorite on-demand streaming service.

$10.00 from Spotify

Who’s it for: Streaming newcomers, new-musical explorers, and just about everyone else.

How much will it cost: Free with ads, $10 per month ad-free for single users, $15 ad-free for families (up to 6 users), and $5 ad-free for students

Why we picked Spotify

With millions more paying subscribers than the closest competition, Spotify is — by a wide margin — the most popular on-demand streaming service on the market today. That’s true for a number of reasons, including the service’s extremely user-friendly interface on desktop, iOS, and Android, numerous third-party integrations — such as Amazon’s Alexa and Google Cast — and a diverse array of well-curated playlists and music-discovery tools.

One of the earliest pioneers of on-demand streaming, the Swedish streamer has long enticed newcomers with a free, ad-based desktop platform, and as streaming has begun to take hold of the industry, many of those users have eventually become paid subscribers. Apart from kicking the annoying ads, paying up allows you some real advantages, including being able to choose songs on-demand via mobile devices — an important feature for most users that the ad-based service doesn’t offer.

In a streaming market that increasingly turns to exclusive releases from big name artists to capture more users, Spotify employs its status as the industry leader to force the hands of artists and labels alike to release their music on the service. For instance, Drake is a paid ambassador for Apple Music, but his mega-hit album Views didn’t stay an Apple Music exclusive for long — the album landed on Spotify within a few weeks of its debut. Radiohead — a band with no shortage if terse words about Spotify’s paltry royalty payments — also eventually released their entire catalog on the service. Even Taylor Swift eventually gave up on her stand against Spotify, after years of Apple music exclusivity.

While there are a few Spotify holdouts (including Garth Brooks), Spotify’s catalog of well over 30 million songs assures that if you can’t find it on Spotify, it will be tough to find it anywhere else.

Those looking to find their next favorite band will also love Spotify for its updated playlists like Monday’s Discover Weekly and New Music Friday, all of which follow your listening habits to recommend surprisingly fitting new artists to match up with your listening tastes.

Looking to listen to that cool band your friend is into? Spotify’s Facebook integration allows you to follow friends and see what they have been listening to, as well as check out any playlists they’ve decided to make public. While competitors do offer some exclusive features, Spotify is the most well-rounded, intuitive, and hassle-free option available. Unless you have a very specific sonic need the service can’t satisfy (which we’ll outline below), we suggest streaming newbies get on the Spotify train.

While you’re at it, be sure to check out our massive assortment of Spotify playlists for all occasions.

The best for Apple fans

Apple Music

Why you should subscribe: You’re a diehard Apple user looking for the best service to integrate with all your stuff.

Apple Music

For serious Apple fans who want everything in one place, Apple Music is the answer.

$10.00 from Apple

Who’s it for? Lovers of iTunes, hand-curated live radio, and all things Apple.

How much will it cost? $10 per month for a single user, $15 for a family plan (up to 6 users), $5 per month for students, $99 per-year for those who have already subscribed.

Why we picked Apple Music

While we generally prefer Spotify to Apple Music when it comes to features and usability, there are still some compelling reasons to check out the second-most popular on-demand streaming service.

First and foremost is Apple Music’s iOS and MacOS integration. Those with iPhones, iPads, and MacBooks will love the fact that they can ask Siri to search for specific artists, songs, or playlists, and virtually everything music related on an Apple device is tied into the service. In addition, longtime iTunes users will be pleased to find many of their songs are immediately available in their Apple Music streaming library upon signing up, along with the ability to store up to 100,000 songs for later use (Spotify downloads cap at 9,999).

The company also recently announced cool new multiroom integration will be coming with the release of iOS 11, alongside its announcement of a brand new multiroom speaker, allowing Apple fans a similar listening experience to that offered by Amazon’s Echo and Google’s Cast products.

Apple Music’s Beats 1 Radio is another huge bonus. The 24-hour live radio service features curation by famed DJs like Zane Lowe and numerous celebrities like Ryan Adams, Pharrell Williams, Mike D, and others. Beats 1 also frequently premieres some of the biggest songs in pop music.

Speaking of premieres, Apple works hard to be the first to showcase songs from some of the world’s biggest pop artists, including Drake, Taylor Swift, and Frank Ocean.

Those looking to save some cash will also be excited to note that the company recently quietly began allowing current subscribers to pay just $99 for an entire year on the service, allowing you to sign up and then save $20 per year on your favorite tunes.

If you’re a fan of the biggest names in pop, love radio-style listening, and own an iPhone or other Apple device, Apple Music could be your service of choice.

The best for passive listening

Pandora

Why you should subscribe: Pandora’s thumbs-up/thumbs-down algorithm still rules internet radio.

Pandora Ad-Free

If radio-style listening is your favorite way to play, Pandora is the service for you.

$5.00 from Pandora

Who’s it for: Those who like to press play and walk away.

How much will it cost: Free ad-based radio, $5 per month for ad-free radio, $10 per month for ad-free on-demand music streaming

Why we picked Pandora

Though Pandora recently unveiled its much-anticipated on-demand streaming tier that features 40 million tracks, the best reason to subscribe to the service is to bask in the glory of its Music Genome Project. Since the early 2000s, the company has been attempting to “capture the essence of music on every level,” categorizing tunes based on hundreds of unique characteristics.

With such an abundance of data about each song, Pandora is able to offer the best curated, radio-style streaming online, all based on simple thumbs up or thumbs down ratings. Users can pick a favorite artist or track and press play, letting the magic algorithms behind the scenes at Pandora go to work. No matter who you’re into, Pandora will create a constant list of complimentary songs to enjoy.

While the on-demand service is a nice addition, Pandora is best for people who like to simply sit back and let the tunes roll on.

The best for indie music discovery

SoundCloud

Why you should subscribe: With over a hundred million user-created tracks, SoundCloud has one of the most diverse indie libraries online.

Soundcloud Ad-Free

Those on the hunt for the next big band will love the wide diversity of SoundCloud’s indie catalog.

$5.00 from Soundcloud

Who’s it for: Indie music fans who prefer to take a hands on approach to music discovery.

How much will it cost: Free with ads for access to 120 million user-added tracks, $5 per month for ad-free access to user-added tracks, $10 for user-added tracks plus 30 million major label tracks.

Why we picked SoundCloud

SoundCloud’s biggest asset is its extremely creative, massive user base. With nearly 200 million active users per month and a huge number of small-name artists constantly uploading their latest and greatest songs to the service, those who have the patience to dig through SoundCloud’s immense track list are sure to find an unknown artist they love.

However, because it has so many songs and a layout designed around single tracks rather than playlists, SoundCloud really is for crate-digger types — those who’d prefer to sift through tons of tunes to find their next favorite band, rather than relying on a computer algorithm to predict what they may or may not like.

While this is great for a very specific kind of user, it may not be right for the average listener. In fact, SoundCloud is having a lot of trouble getting people to pay up for its service, routinely needing cash infusions from investors to remain solvent. Still, if you find yourself on SoundCloud searching for new favorites for hours a week (like we do), you may want to think about upgrading to an ad-free experience.

The best fidelity

Tidal

Why you should subscribe: You demand the highest audio resolution and you’re willing to pay for it.

Tidal

For listeners who refuse to compromise on audio resolution, Tidal is the only way to go.

$10.00 from Tidal

Who’s it for: Stubborn audiophiles, serious Jay Z fans.

How much will they cost: $10 per month for compressed 320kbps audio, $20 for lossless 24-bit 1411kbps audio.

Why we picked the Tidal

It’s no secret that we aren’t big fans of Tidal, the music service purchased by hip-hop mogul Jay Z in 2015 and recently purchased in part by Sprint. With fewer tracks, poor music discovery features, and a sometimes buggy interface — not to mention a history of botched album releases — there are plenty of reasons to avoid the service entirely in search of calmer streaming waters.

However, for those who absolutely refuse to compromise when it comes to audio quality, Tidal’s $20-per-month Hi-Fi service, which offers 24-bit audio resolution, is essentially the only real game in town. This makes the service something of a dichotomy, as Tidal seems to be aimed towards the mass market, but it’s really best for those with high-quality gear who care more about the fidelity of their audio source than interface usability or library size.

This advantage is likely to change in the future, as companies like Spotify are anticipated to launch their own high-fidelity tiers down the road. But for now, those with extremely expensive stereo systems who actually care about rising above the typical 320Kbps resolution quality of Spotify, Apple Music, and virtually every other major streaming service on the market (including Tidal’s own lower tier), Tidal HiFi is the only way to fly.

• Apple Music vs Spotify
• Best new songs to stream
• The best headphones you can buy

Google just launched a new 180-degree VR format, plus cameras for it

Google has announced a new 180-degree VR format, including third-party cameras that you can use to shoot in it. Called VR180, it’s a collaboration, between YouTube and Google’s Daydream VR unit. It has been introduced alongside an announcement about a new line of VR cameras that comply with VR180’s certification standards. Google said you can expect these cameras to come from Yi, Lenovo, and LG, as well as other partners.

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New VR180 cameras

Their VR180 cameras are supposed to launch sometime this winter, and they will supposedly be affordable, likely even priced around the same as regular point-and-shoot cameras. We don’t know what these cameras will look like in terms of design, though Lenovo has released a line drawing of its upcoming VR180 format camera.

It seems to feature two wide-angle lenses that can shoot stereoscopic video. Obviously, it looks way different than the pricier VR camera rigs we’ve seen so far, like Google’s Jump system. Creators can shoot VR videos using any camera that’s VR180 certified. But here’s the thing about VR180 videos: they don’t wrap around.

YouTube

180-degree video format

You have to face forward while watching them, meaning you can’t turn and look back, but they’ll still be immersive when you watch them through the YouTube app with a compatible headset, such as Google Cardboard, Google Daydream, or PlayStation VR. If you don’t use a VR headset, they’ll appear as traditional flat videos.

So, what’s the advantage to a 180-degree VR video over a full 360-degree video one? The primary benefit is that it doesn’t require a VR system with multiple cameras, nor do you need to take the time to stitch together all the video feeds from those cameras in order to make an immersive VR video for YouTube.

Save time and money

You see, 360-degree videos, which surround you, typically require tons of time and money, as well as a filmmaker who is willing to hide behind things in order to capture a scene without their body in it. But with the VR180 format, there’s now a happy medium, literally. The format essentially renders 180-degree video in stereoscopic 3D.

The picture will appear wider than your field of view – about 135 degrees – and you’ll get a single image, so there’s no need to stitch or match anything. Just film, edit, and upload it to YouTube. Filmmakers will be able to shoot the way they would normally and even edit with Adobe Premiere Pro or other software.

YouTube TV expands to ten more US metropolitan markets

YouTube TV seemed an adequate addition to the increasingly crowded streaming television market, but it launched back in April with a modest area footprint, operating in only five US cities for its first few months. Today, they’re expanding availability to anyone in half a dozen secondary metropolitan areas in the country.

Those city-regions include: Phoenix, Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, Alabama, Miami-Fort Lauderdale, Orlando-Daytona Beach-Melbourne, Atlanta, Charlotte, Washington, D.C., Detroit, and Minneapolis-St. Paul. It’s still a slow rollout for a service that competes with the likes of the comparatively-priced Hulu Live TV, which is available everywhere, and there’s no telling where YouTube TV will expand next.

Source: YouTube

Airbnb tests payment-splitting feature so you don’t get stiffed

Airbnb is testing out a feature that would allow reservations to be split among multiple people. So, if you’re booking with rude friends who never pay you back or if you want to book an expensive reservation that may be too much for one credit card to handle, this new feature would help you out. The option allows a reservation to be split with up to 16 people and is being tested with just a few listings as of now.

In April, Airbnb also began testing a flexible payment option, allowing customers to pay a portion of the reservation amount up front and the rest a little later. Other recent changes include a new search tool that pulls up listings suitable for business travel and a photographic guide feature to clarify the check-in process.

According to The Next Web, split payments has been one of Airbnb’s most requested features. While it’s only available in select places now, the company plans to expand the feature to more listings later this year.

Source: The Next Web

Love stickers? PicsArt now has more than a million that are free to use

Why it matters to you

If you’re looking for a specific sticker, PicsArt probably has it — or could help you make it.

Just two months after launching the ability to make customer stickers, PicsArt now has one of the biggest collections of free stickers in the world. The mobile photo editing app is now home to over a million stickers tagged with the #freetouse hashtag that means users can integrate them into their own shots.

Stickers, or small graphics that can be added to any photo, are growing in popularity with their inclusion in a number of social media platforms from Snapchat to Facebook. PicsArt’s photo editing tools makes it possible for users to create their own stickers from a photo or using drawing tools. Those custom stickers can then be exported to use within other apps, as well as sharing them within the PicsArt community.

Thanks to PicsArt’s #freetouse tag that allows users to indicate if it is OK to re-use that artwork, the custom sticker option has now generated more than a million stickers that have the tag. The feature allows the stickers to be used inside the PicsArt platform with attribution to the sticker’s creator, which the company says helps users to grow their number of followers on the platform.

‘’Our community has shown us how important stickers are for creative expression both on and off of PicsArt,” PicsArt CEO Hovhannes Avoyan said. ‘’With over 1,000,000 stickers created in 60 days and accelerating, we’ve quickly amassed a large collection of open-source stickers that will inspire creativity and remixing from millions more on PicsArt.”

PicsArt only launched the ability to develop custom stickers at the end of March. The feature uses PicsArt’s existing tools and filters to cut an object out of a photo, adjust it and save it as a sticker than can be used with other images or exported to use on Facebook, Messenger, Instagram, Twitter, What’s App and iMessenger.

Since the launch of the feature, the app has also integrated the ability to use stickers on a live preview, before taking a picture. It has more than 400 million installs — with 90 million of them active monthly users — making it one of the leading social image editing apps.

TEO the ironing robot is here to steal the job you never wanted anyway

Why it matters to you

This robot will ensure that your work trousers and shirts remain wrinkle-free. And it promises to do other chores, as well.

If you’re an enlightened, modern sort of person, you feel that ironing duties should be split 50/50 between men and women. Not so, if you’re a researcher at the Carlos III University of Madrid, Spain. They believe the task of ironing should reside entirely with one member of the household: The domestic robot.

With that in mind, they’ve developed a humanoid robot called TEO that has mastered the art of ensuring your shirts and trousers are wrinkle-free — courtesy of some smart image recognition algorithms.

“Our goal is to develop the first robot household companion that can assist people with their domestic tasks,” David Estévez Fernández, a doctoral student in computer science and technology at the university, told Digital Trends. “While previous works on robotic laundry and ironing focused on just achieving the task, our goal was a bit more ambitious. Other approaches required very controlled environmental conditions to work, such as control of the room illumination to detect wrinkles, or predefined models for garment recognition. The key requirement for us was that our method must be implementable in a real-world domestic scenario, using the same tools as we humans use, without any modifications.”

That’s an admirable goal, but it certainly makes life harder for the team. Ironing might not be the most strenuous household chore from a human perspective, but clothes aren’t an easy thing for robots to manipulate. Challenges arise from the deformability inherent in garments. Unlike rigid objects, clothes get wrinkled and entangled, so garment manipulation requires careful planning of the moving trajectory, and a constant tracking of garments’ current shape on a moment-to-moment basis.

To cope with this, TEO gathers its images from a camera built into its head, which generates a high-resolution 3D representation of the clothes and ironing board. It then calculates a “wrinkliness local descriptor” to work out what’s a wrinkle and what’s a desirable crease. It’s smart stuff — and Fernández is hopeful that it will arrive in your home in the not-too-distant future.

“Ironing is just one of the chores that people do on a daily basis,” he said. “To continue our work, we would like to teach the robot to perform other tasks, such as folding garments. For this, we are beginning to use deep reinforcement learning techniques, a recent field that combines traditional reinforcement learning with deep learning. Reinforcement learning is similar to how we learn. The robot perform actions and, when performed correctly, it receives rewards. The robot learns trying to maximize the amount of rewards obtained from its actions. This, combined with our Continuous Goal-Directed Actions method, will allow us to teach the robot how to fold garments just by showing it how we perform the folding task. This way, no programming or technical knowledge would be required to teach the robot how to perform the tasks we want it to perform.”

Coming soon to a house near you. We hope.

These freaky VR sex dummies pose some dark questions about the future

Why it matters to you

Project raises some big questions about the kind of society VR porn is ushering in.

Anyone who has watched and grappled with some of the issues raised by last year’s breakout hit Westworld knows that, when it comes to sex and the fantasy world of artificial beings, there are some pretty dark questions to explore. While we’re not yet in the technologically advanced world that show depicts, there’s no doubt that things like AI-equipped sex dolls and virtual reality pornography are (no pun intended) on the rise. What, then, will be their impact — and will they make society a better or a worse place?

That’s something Central Saint Martins graduate Marta Dunjó set out to explore with a recent project called Virtual X that combines virtual reality what used to be referred to as “marital aids.” Essentially, she’s created a series of proof-of-concept VR accessories that a user could *ahem* interact with while engaging in virtual fantasies.

The catch? That if regular sexually-explicit tech devices on the market aren’t meant to immediately make you reel in horror; these ones kind of are. In terms of highlighting the objectifying undercurrent of similar “tools” — and the questions they prompt about subjects like consent — Dunjó’s Virtual X products do exactly that. All the while looking like something out of a David Cronenberg movie.

“The project began with my interest in VR and its impact in society,” she told Digital Trends. “One of the first industries to begin investing in the technology was the pornography industry and I began to explore what the industry looks like today and how VR might create a shift in its production, distribution and consumption. Currently, the internet has normalized and facilitated access to extreme pornographic imagery, such as simulated rape scenes towards women. My aim was to understand if hardcore pornographic experiences in VR would become an outlet for deviant behaviours so people can satisfy and explore these types of fantasies, or rather if it would become a trigger for these impulses to happen in real life.”

Questions like this aren’t clear cut, of course. Just like the issue of whether violent video games make people more violent, queries about whether ever-more-immersive (and probably shocking) adult content will normalize deviant behavior or give people an outlet for taboo fantasies will continue to be argued both ways.

Dunjó makes clear that Virtual X is a conceptual art project, rather than, say, a Kickstarter waiting to happen (there are no plans to bring this to market), but it certainly gives plenty of pause for thought. “The technology [for this] wasn’t there until recently and there seems to be a lack of research in the field because it is clearly a taboo topic and there is little funding for it,” she said.

Hopefully projects like this force us to confront some of these inevitable realities.

Sixers and Celtics and trades, oh my! How to stream the 2017 NBA Draft live

The NBA postseason has wrapped up, and the Golden State Warriors have left a smoking crater where a competitive league once stood. For the other 29 teams, the choices are these: Make bold moves to create a roster that can topple the 2017 champions, or resign themselves to years of stockpiling assets while the Warriors rule the world. Whether your favorite team is trying to get better, or to take shelter in a Sixers-esque bunker of ineptitude for the next five years, the 2017 NBA draft is the first step on the path. As such, we’ve created this streaming guide to help you watch the madness.

If you’re new to basketball, you’ve started at an exciting time, despite the embarrassment that was this year’s playoffs — the league is experimenting with new technologies like virtual reality and machine intelligence software, and even embracing esports. Although the NBA seems locked in a yearly struggle between the Warriors and the Cleveland Cavaliers, there are plenty of young teams eager to disrupt the established order.

As the draft commences Thursday, 30 NBA teams will take turns picking players from the draft class. The first seven picks are awarded via a lottery, in which teams that did not make the playoffs have a number of ping pong balls based on how they did in the previous season; the team with the worst record has the most balls, and thus the highest chance of a top pick. After the lottery picks are awarded, teams pick based on their record, with lower-winning teams going first. The top five picks in order are: the Philadelphia 76ers, the Los Angeles Lakers, the Boston Celtics, the Phoenix Suns, and the Sacramento Kings. The complete draft order is available here.

The draft will take place at Barclays Center in Brooklyn starting Thursday, June 22, at 7 p.m. ET. ESPN will be presenting, so legal streaming options are limited, but below are the best ways to watch online without paying a dime.

WatchESPN

If you have cable (or someone you know does) and the provider includes ESPN, you can stream the draft on WatchESPN via a wide variety of devices. In addition to the draft itself, ESPN’s coverage includes real-time commentary by basketball luminaries and analysts. WatchESPN also has apps for viewing the draft on on your mobile device.

Download now for:

Android iOS

If you do not have cable, there are several subscription-based streaming services that include ESPN, each with their own selection of channels and features. And while you may not want to put down the dough for such a service, the best part is that they all offer free, no-risk trial periods.

PlayStation Vue

Sony’s live TV streaming service, Playstation VuePlayStation Vue, has access to ESPN, and thus the draft. Vue has a few different packages, but even the basic Access Slim package ($30 per month) includes ESPN. To sign up for Vue, you need a PlayStation Network account, and if you only want it for the draft, a free five-day trial is available.

SlingTV

Sling TV offers two packages, Sling Orange and Sling Blue, but Sling Orange ($20 per month) is the only one with ESPN. SlingTV offers new customers a seven-day free trial.

DirectTV Now

DirectTV Now’s most basic package, Live a Little, includes ESPN. This package is $35 a month, and is offered in a free, seven-day trial.

YouTube TV

YouTube TV offers one package, priced at $35 a month, that includes ESPN and many other sports channels. The service offers an extremely generous 30-day free trial, as well, so it just may be your best bet.

Hulu with Live TV

Hulu offers a $40 per month package that boasts ESPN, and offers a seven-day free trial.

When in doubt, check Reddit

If you don’t want to try one of those sanctioned services, you can certainly find alternative streams online, though they will be of varying quality and dubious legality. A good place for live coverage and discussions — and possible links to streams — is the NBA subreddit, one of the most active basketballs communities on the internet. To be clear, Digital Trends does not recommend streaming via any illegal services, which can pose a serious security risk. Assuming you can tolerate tired memes and the insane ramblings of Sixers fans, however, /r/NBA is a great place for news posts, highlight videos, and occasionally, insightful commentary.

Bright light pulses bamboozle mosquitoes, could help fight malaria

Why it matters to you

Discovery could help suppress the deadly spread of malaria by stopping mosquitoes in their tracks.

Researchers at the University of Notre Dame have made a potentially significant breakthrough in the battle against malaria by discovering a way to suppress mosquitoes’ natural biting behavior. The secret weapon? Exposure to just 10 minutes of pulsing white light during nighttime.

In a study involving the malaria-carrying Anopheles gambiae mosquito, the scientists tested mosquitoes’ biting preferences in different conditions by separating them into two groups. One group was kept entirely in the dark, while another received the pulses of light. Those mosquitoes which had received the light dosage showed “significant suppression” in terms of their biting.

In another experiment, the mosquitoes were pulsed with light every two hours, which minimized their biting through a large portion of a 12-hour night period.

“Anopheline mosquitoes are mostly nocturnal and bite at night, and Anopheles gambiae is the major vector for the transmission of the human malaria parasite in Africa,” Dr. Giles Duffield, associate professor of biology at the University of Notre Dame, told Digital Trends. “It is the bite of a female Anopheles gambiae mosquito that can transmit the malaria parasite. We examined the effect of light on both the biting behavior and flight activity of mosquitoes. We discovered that discrete treatments of light could suppress biting behavior when assayed on a human subject, specifically exposure of a container of mosquitoes to a human arm. This inhibition effect was observed during the light exposure, immediately afterwards, and several hours after the treatment.”

Sarah Craig, University of Notre Dame

As Duffield noted, flight activity was also affected in the mosquitoes — with those which received the light pulses appearing less interested in flying at the onset of the night.

The work is still at a relatively early stage. Duffield said that more work is still to be done, in order to discover exactly what the mosquitoes are reacting to. “Determining the optimal dose of light is important, which can be accomplished by testing different durations and intensities of light exposure; as well as examining the different wavelengths of light,” he said. “The aim would be to find a wavelength of light that is optimal at suppressing biting, while also being less disturbing to the human who may be sleeping.”

Long-term, he suggested that some kind of light-based tool could be used as a mosquito bite prevention measure, presumably in conjunction with some of the other innovative technologies being used in the battle against malaria.

A paper describing the work was recently published in the journal Parasites and Vectors.