Piracy causes Google to yank Kodi from its autocomplete list in search results

In Google’s ongoing crusade to eliminate ties to piracy in search results, the company removed the search term “Kodi” from its autocomplete list. Those who type in the term won’t see a list of suggestions related to the popular tool or associated software, but instead will see results tied to the term “Kodiak,” such as Kodiak Bear and Kodiak Cakes. 

What’s Google’s problem with Kodi? “Since 2011, we have been filtering certain terms closely associated with copyright infringement from Google Autocomplete. This action is consistent with that long-standing strategy,” a spokesperson said. 

Kodi is an open-source home theater software solution developed for Windows, MacOS, iOS, Android, Linux, Raspberry Pi, and Xbox One. It’s a network-capable tool for managing and streaming your favorite music, movies, TV shows, and photos on any device that supports the software. You can either view media stored on your device or push all media to a centralized storage unit connected to the network that’s accessible by all devices. 

Google’s beef with Kodi is that the software supports third-party add-ons. Developers can create add-ons granting full access to pirated content, or free access to video services that typically require a monthly subscription. Kodi itself is not illegal software; it’s a media organizer and playback tool that, unfortunately, can be used for illegal purposes. 

To throw Kodi even further into the piracy spotlight, fully loaded “Kodi boxes” are on the rise: Miniature computers with Kodi pre-installed and loaded with add-ons linking to pirated content and services. The team brought the rising problem to the attention of Kodi users more than two years ago, warning that these sellers and YouTube promoters are killing the brand.  

“These sellers are dragging users into the world of piracy without their knowledge and at the same time convincing new users that Kodi is a buggy mess because they never differentiate Kodi from third-party add-ons. Every day a new user shows up on the Kodi forum, totally unaware that the free movies they’re watching have been pirated and surprised to discover that Kodi itself isn’t providing those movies,” the Kodi team said at the time. 

Because of their nature, add-ons linked to piracy often break. The big scam with these “fully loaded” Kodi Boxes is that customers will purchase the device and discover broken add-ons. These disgruntled customers can’t get their money back because the seller simply vanished. 

Kodi can’t seem to escape its association with piracy. The team stays neutral regarding what users do with the media player, but clearly doesn’t “love this use of Kodi.” The team also recently said it was “surprised and disappointed” over Google blacklisting the “Kodi” term in auto search results. 

“We have a professional relationship with the MPAA, who have specifically made clear in the past their own position that Kodi is legal software,” XBMC Foundation President Nathan Betzen said in a statement. “We hope Google will reconsider this decision in the future, or at a minimum limit their removal to search terms where the legality is actually in dispute.” 

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These smart lights work with Amazon Alexa

Control your home’s lighting using Alexa and these smart bulbs.

Amazon offers an affordable way to start building out a voice-activated home automation system for your house or apartment with their Amazon Echo and Echo Dot powered by their A.I. assistant, Alexa. On its own, you can use Alexa to play music and find news, sports, and other information. But things get really interesting when you start to connect Alexa up to smart devices, including connected LED bulbs and smart switches, around your house.

There are many light options compatible with Alexa. We’ve broken things down based on the different brands and ecosystems that each have their own compatibility with smart lights and smart switches that you’ll ultimately be able to control via Alexa on your Amazon Echo.

• Philips Hue
• Samsung SmartThings
• Insteon Hub
• WeMo switches and outlets
• Lutron dimmers and switches
• LIFX smart bulbs
• GE Link LED Smart Bulb
• TP-Link
• Nanoleaf Aurora Smart LED Light Panel – 9 Pack
• Haiku Home Premiere LED Lights
• Smartika Smart Home Lighting

Philips Hue

Philips Hue is the leader in smart bulbs, and are downright cool. You can connect up to 50 Philips Hue bulbs, lamps and lighting strips via the Philips Hue Bridge, so chances are you could convert all your home’s lighting over to the Philips Hue system. Whether you’re looking for 60W equivalent white LED bulbs, bulbs that feature 16 million colors, or LED light strips for futuristic accents, there’s a reason why so many people have gone with Philips Hue.

Alexa syncs right up to the Philips Hue Bridge, which means you’ll be able to set up different lighting groups for your rooms and IFTTT recipes on your phone, then also control everything with the sound of your voice via your Amazon Echo. There’s a lot of fun to be had here, as Philips Hue lights can be synced up to your music for epic dance parties, and otherwise customized in countless different ways to suit your lifestyle.

If you’re interested in getting started with Philips Hue, you’re best off getting a starter kit. There are a couple of different options to consider:

• Philips Hue Starter Kit w/ two bulbs and one Bridge — $69.99 on Amazon
• Philips Hue Starter Kit w/ two bulbs, one bridge and an Amazon Echo Dot — $99.99 on Amazon
• Philips Hue Starter Kit w/ two A19 bulbs, one Bridge and one Dimmer switch — $125.47 on Amazon
• Philips Hue Starter Kit w/ three White and Color Ambiance bulbs and one Bridge — $142.77 on Amazon

No matter which starter kit you choose, the beautiful part of going with Philips Hue is that it’s super easy to add extra bulbs or other elements to your ecosystem later.

Samsung SmartThings

SmartThings provides a full suite of options for home automation, which includes a few options for smart lights. You’ll need a SmartThings Hub ($98) to get started, but from there you can connect plug-in smart switches for appliances, lamps and outdoors, and in-wall dimmers which support dimmable LED and CFL technologies along with legacy support for incandescent, halogen, Mark 10, and magnetic lighting loads.

You can also connect smart bulbs from Philips Hue or Osram to your SmartThings Hub, along with a host of other super handy home automation products that all work within the SmartThings ecosystem.

If you’re mainly interested in smart lights, you can get a SmartThings Hub and an Osram bulb bundle. If complete home automation is your ultimate goal, you might be more interested in the SmartThings Home Monitoring Kit, then build your own lighting arsenal from the available SmartThings-compatible lighting options.

Insteon Hub

Insteon’s offerings for smart home lighting mostly include in-wall dimmers and switches and plug-in dimmers. They do offer their own programmable, dimmable LED bulbs, available in two styles: 8W LED bulbs and 12-watt recessed bulbs. You can use the Insteon app to set bulbs into groups for scheduling and creating scenes, then take control via Alexa.

To start building out your Insteon smart lighting ecosystem, you should get the Insteon Starter Kit, which comes with the necessary Hub, and two Dimmer Plugs, perfect for setting up a voice-controlled bedside lamp. From there, you’ll need to buy compatible bulbs as you need them.

Insteon’s system is a decent option for those looking for home automation, but overall their lighting options are somewhat lacking.

WeMo switches and outlets

WeMo offers Wi-Fi enabled smart switches and outlets that you can control via Alexa. The WeMo Light Switch can be used to replace any light switch in your home, letting you schedule and control your lights and appliances without the need of a central hub.

This one is better for the DIYers out there who are interested in manually creating their own home automation network with in-wall switches and plug-in adapters to control lamps and other small appliances. Those looking for hassle-free installation and smart bulb options are best looking elsewhere.

Lutron dimmers and switches

Lutron Caseta Wireless products offer a selection of smart dimmers and switches that connect via the Caseta Wireless Smart Bridge. Connect your Smart Bridge to Alexa allows you to control all the dimmers and switches with your voice.

Check out the Lutron Caseta Wireless Smart Lighting In-Wall Dimmer Kit or the Plug-in Dimmer Kit to see what this system is all about. This is another route that’s going to require DIY effort with initial setup and is also lacking branded LED bulb options, but the Hub is compatible with a bunch of other smart devices from leading brands including Ecobee, Nest, Honeywell, Logitech, and Sonos.

LIFX smart bulbs

LIFX offers a range of smart bulb selections for indoor and outdoor use that are compatible with Alexa. Not only can you turn your LIFX bulbs on and off using only your voice, but Alexa can also control and tweak your bulb color or light temperature, so you always have complete control over your bulbs.

You can buy them individually or save money by bundling them into multipacks so you can upgrade bulbs around your home and link them all together via Alexa. They also sell bulbs with built-in infrared to enhance your security cam’s vision, as well as LED strips to add some futuristic and colorful accents to your home. Check ’em out!

See at LIFX

GE Link Smart LED Bulb

General Electric has a few smart bulb options available that work with Alexa but require a hub (compatible with SmartThings or Wink Hub 2.

You can get a standard A19 bulb for $29 (great if you already have a compatible smart home hub), or you can opt for the GE starter kit which includes two A19 bulbs and a compact GE Link Hub for just $75.

Other bulb sizes are also available.

See at Amazon

TP-Link

TP-Link offers smart bulbs that connect to your home network via Wi-Fi and do not require a standalone hub. There are four bulb options, from a standard white dimmable bulb to a fully-customizable multi-color bulb.

All of TP-Link’s bulbs are pairable with the Alexa app which allows you to control your lighting with your voice. TP-Link sells other smart home devices such as smart plugs which are also controllable via Alexa, as well as cloud-based cameras which are not.

See at TP-Link

Nanoleaf Aurora Smart LED Light Panel – 9 Pack

Not all lighting options need to be bulbs. The Nanoleaf Aurora are Smart LED Light Panels that you can connect to create an entirely custom and unique lighting solution for your home office, gaming corner, or wherever you want to show them off.

The best place to start would be the nine-pack kit that comes with nine panels that can be configured however you’d like, and you can add up to 30 panels if you desire. The nine-pack is available on Amazon starting at $220 and they might not be the most practical lighting solution but damn they’re cool. Add in Alexa functionality and BAM! Suddenly you got the coolest living room on the block!

Check out the full review of these modular lights.

See at Amazon

Haiku Home

Smart lights are awesome.
Hey Alexa, Turn them on.
The future is now!

All poetry aside, these light fixtures are stylish and premium smart lights to consider if you’re renovating your home and want to massively upgrade your home lighting with something you can control with Alexa.

Beyond Alexa voice control, these fixtures include built-in motion sensors that can be set up to instantly illuminate the room when you walk in and turn off when you leave. You can install them indoors or outside, and they also include Haiku’s Smart Lighting technology that measures the ambient light in the room and automatically adjusts the lighting level to ensure consistent lighting throughout the day.

These are highly reviewed on Amazon, are available in multiple styles and colors to match your decor, and start at around $199. Check it out!

See at Amazon

Smartika Smart Home Lighting

Smartika has been making stylish and functional smart home lighting options since 2014, developing a line of smart LED fixtures that would look great in any home.

They’ve got some cool looking stuff like the Indoor/Outdoor wall light pictured to the right, along with a track-light fixture and pot lights that can all be linked to a Smartika Central Control HUB ($35).

• Smartika PROFILE Indoor/Outdoor Wall Light ($110)
• Smartika HALO LED Integrated Track-Light Fixture ($190)
• Smartika RADIUS LED Smart Recessed Ceiling Light ($49)
• Smartika EDGE LED Smart Recessed Light Square Cover Plate ($55)

Learn More

Which should you get?

Thanks to Alexa’s compatibility with a variety of smart light systems, you’ve got several great options for automating and customizing your home. Which system you go with will greatly depending on your current living situation.

If you’re living in an apartment and are just looking to control some funky lighting options via Alexa voice controls, Philips Hue is your best bet. Buying a starter kit is a great investment that you can take with you as you move — and with the lifespan of LED lighting well exceeding a decade, you’ll enjoy the freedom to rearrange, expand and easily move your Philips system wherever you go.

If you’re a homeowner looking to integrate IoT devices throughout your home, you’ll want to buy an Alexa-compatible hub that shares a wide range of compatibility with other brands and products, such as SmartThings or even a Wink Hub 2, then build out your smart bulb and other devices to the exact specifications of your home.

And if you’re in the process of planning a home renovation, it might be worth looking at WeMo, Insteon, and Lutron’s in-wall switches or dimmers to convert your existing home wiring into a smart lighting system that you can then control with your voice. Don’t just update the look of your home — upgrade its functionality, then let Alexa control it all with the power of your own voice.

Updated March 2018: Added Nanoleaf, Haiku Home, and Smartika products to our list!

Why don’t Fortnite and other PlayStation 4 games play nice with Xbox?

Is Sony a big evil monster keeping you from playing with your Xbox friends so they will go out and buy a PlayStation? No, probably not.

Game consoles have never really played nicely together. In the past, the reasons for this were largely hardware-related, with consoles built on different hardware architectures. This most recent generation of consoles saw a huge change in this limitation by using nearly identical processors, paving the way for a world in which crossplay gaming was actually possible. Great news, right?

So, why isn’t it happening? We’ve had several games come out in the last year with cross-play support for Xbox and PC as well as PlayStation and PC, but for some reason, PlayStation and Xbox cross compatibility doesn’t happen. If I can play Fortnite on my phone with people on consoles and PC, why can’t the consoles play nice with one another?

“You should ask Sony”

With Rocket League, Minecraft, Fortnite, and several others arriving everywhere over the last year, the lack of cross-play between PlayStation and the other consoles have become obvious. Nintendo and Microsoft seemed to have figured it out, with cross-play for Rocket League working very well in my tests, so what’s the deal?

If you ask Microsoft, it’s Sony’s fault.

We’ve worked closely with Nintendo to allow cross-network play between Xbox One and Switch and our offer to do the same with PlayStation players still holds. For any other questions regarding Fortnite cross-network play between Xbox and PlayStation, please reach out to Epic or Sony directly.

The company with ads over the last couple of years about how it is all about giving players what they want has been unusually silent on the subject, denying to answer most inquiries when submitted. The closest thing we’ve gotten to a real answer from Sony was this recent interview on Eurogamer:

We’ve got to be mindful of our responsibility to our install base. Minecraft – the demographic playing that, you know as well as I do, it’s all ages, but it’s also very young. We have a contract with the people who go online with us, that we look after them and they are within the PlayStation curated universe. Exposing what in many cases are children to external influences we cannot manage or look after, it’s something we have to think about very carefully.

There are a few things wrong with this statement. First, Sony allows cross-play with the PC with no issues as long as a third party is doing the connections. Second, there is no game company which works harder to keep kids safe on the internet than Nintendo. For Sony to claim a desire to keep kids safer than Nintendo is saint-like, but hardly accurate.

All roads lead to PlayStation Network

The biggest reason Sony doesn’t allow games to cross-play with other systems is the inability to extend its online features across those platforms. Sony needs its users to need PlayStation Network and its monthly fee, plain and simple. If the most popular games you can play with your friends don’t require PSN to function, that service will become less desirable. But there’s also a safety component. When connected through PSN, Sony controls the whole experience. You can report abuse, ensure only your friends can communicate with you, and your conversations can be easily had between phone and desktop and console.

When looking at PC cross-play games, like Star Trek: Bridge Crew on PlayStation VR, you get a good idea for how Sony treats these experiences. Bridge Crew uses the Ubisoft social layer to connect PC and PS4, totally separate from PlayStation Network. You can use PSN to connect to other PlayStation users, and when you do so social experience in creating matches for that game are actually much smoother. Sony is able to guarantee a level of convenience and stability where Ubisoft frequently delivers frustration.

Sony is never going to get PlayStation Network compatibility on the Xbox or Nintendo Switch, which means it is likely only ever to allow cross-play between those consoles when a third-party system can be used to replace PSN and Xbox Live and Nintendo Online as the communications layers. That’s a tremendous amount of work for any game company, especially when Sony wants it made clear the PlayStation Network is not at fault if and when something goes wrong. As you might imagine, this isn’t likely to happen anytime soon.

No solution in sight

While I would say it is a little misleading to suggest Sony is blocking cross-play to get people to buy PlayStation 4 consoles, it’s clear the company is being less than forthcoming about its desire to have either absolute or zero control over the online situation in a particular game. The desire to keep your users safe is a good impulse, but to assume that user safety is at odds with the desire to offer a larger audience for people to play against one another is going to continue to be a bad thing for Sony this year.

The number of games with cross-platform compatibility is not doing to decrease this year, and if Sony expects to maintain the healthy lead it has earned this generation this is going to need to be addressed in some meaningful fashion. Otherwise, users are going to go where there are more options.

PlayStation 4

• PS4 vs. PS4 Slim vs. PS4 Pro: Which should you buy?
• PlayStation VR Review
• Playing PS4 games through your phone is awesome

Amazon

Today’s best deals you won’t want to miss

Whether you’re looking for new tech gear or household items, we’ve got you covered.

Today you can get great deals on a variety of devices including Sony’s 49-inch 4K Smart TV, Syma drones, TP-Link routers, and more! Don’t pass these up.

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Smugglers used drones to sneak $80 million worth of phones into China

China’s Legal Daily reported today that officials in the country just shut down a major smartphone smuggling scheme. A total of 26 suspects were arrested in connection with the plot. The individuals allegedly used drones to string two cables between Shenzhen in southern China and Hong Kong and with the setup, they could reportedly transport as many as 15,000 phones in a single night. Those arrested are accused of smuggling 500 million yuan (approximately $79.5 million) worth of smartphones.

Attempts to smuggle devices from Hong Kong to China are fairly common. A few years ago, one man tried to sneak 94 iPhones into China, all of which were strapped to his body, and in 2011, some smugglers were busted for using a slingshot to set up a zip line in between Shenzhen and Hong Kong, which they were using to transport iPads and iPhones. And in a less-successful scheme, a would-be smuggler tried to hide over 200 iPhones in empty beer bottles that were then sent from Hong Kong to China.

The Legal Daily reports that this is the first known case to have employed drones as part of the smuggling arrangement.

Via: Reuters

Source: Legal Daily

Alexa’s DVR controls will finally let you record a show

For all the recent talk of using Alexa to control DVRs, there’s been a conspicuous inability to record to a DVR using the voice assistant. That won’t be a problem for much longer: Amazon has bolstered Alexa’s Voice Skill programming kit with recording features. Tell the AI helper to record a favorite show or sports extravaganza and you’ll capture the show without having to touch a remote or your smartphone. You’ll have to wait for TV and set-top providers to take advantage of this, but DirecTV, Dish, TiVo and Verizon are already lining up to provide support “soon.”

There’s more: Alexa now lets you launch directly into common navigation options, whether it’s a DVR interface on a set-top box or a service (like, say, Prime Video). Video apps can also report their state so that you don’t have to mention an app by name whenever you want to pause or skip ahead. You’ll need to wait for developers to implement these features as well, but it’s evident that Amazon wants Alexa to serve as a full-fledged video controller.

Source: Amazon

Congress just legalized sex censorship: What to know

One week ago, the worst possible legislation curtailing free speech online passed and sex censorship bill FOSTA-SESTA is on its way to be signed into law by Trump.

Hours after the announcement, everything from the mere discussion of sex work to client screening and safe advertising networks began getting systematically erased from the open internet. Thousands — if not hundreds of thousands — of women, LGBTQ people, gay men, immigrants, and a significant number of people of color lost their income. Pushed out of safe online spaces and toward street corners. So were any and all victims of sex trafficking that law enforcement might’ve been able to find on the open internet.

The Senate has passed the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act, or SESTA, and tacked-on FOSTA (Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act), by a vote of 97–2. Lawmakers did not fact-check the bill’s claims, research the religious neocons behind it, nor did they listen to constituents. Significant organizations, including the Department of Justice, ACLU, EFF, and more had assembled to object to the bill both publicly and in letters to elected officials. In the process, law professors and anti-trafficking groups, along with sex work organizations, unearthed the bill’s many alarming legal, constitutional, and human rights disqualifications.

It’s dubbed the “anti-trafficking” bill for the internet, but it’s really an anti-sex sledgehammer. The bill removes protection for websites under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, and makes sites and services liable for hosting what it very, very loosely defines as sex trafficking and “prostitution” content. FOSTA-SESTA puts into law that sex work and sex trafficking are the same thing, and makes discussion and advertising part of the crime. Its blurry interpretation of sex and commerce, as well as the bill’s illogical, incorrect conflation of sex trafficking and sex work is straight out of a bad movie.

If only the politicians who voted this Morality in Media (NCOSE) mess into law had fact-checked it with Freedom Network USA, “the largest coalition of experts and advocates providing direct services to to survivors of human trafficking in the U.S.” Freedom Network unequivocally states that protecting the rights of sex workers, and not conflating them with trafficking victims, is critical to the prevention of trafficking. They also have the data to back up the fact that “more people are trafficked into labor sectors than into commercial sex.”

It’s already an unmitigated disaster for free speech in America. Which was, of course, predicted. The Technology and Marketing Law Blog wrote that there’s no mistaking that FOSTA-SESTA violates the First Amendment; it plainly stated that “this statute implicates constitutionally protected speech.”

It’s unconstitutional, but the damage is already being done. Despite the fact that FOSTA-SESTA isn’t even law yet — it could take anywhere from 90 days to until 2019 to take effect — online companies, always dangerously prudish with their algorithms, or hypocritical with their free speech rhetoric, appear to be in a rush to proverbially herd sex workers (and all us people who talk about sex for a living) out of the airlock into places where no one can hear us scream.

Safety resources disappear overnight

Websites are removing content and communities wholesale, the result of FOSTA-SESTA making safer working conditions more difficult by criminalizing digital conversations about sex work, screening tools and discussions about how to be safe doing it.

By way of its ambiguity, FOSTA-SESTA has begun the largest wave of censorship the open internet may ever see.

Craigslist removed its entire Personals section. All these amazing moments can never happen again.

As some may recall, Craigslist already voluntary closed its Erotic Services section in 2010 under pressure from conservative groups. This is despite a study from Baylor and West Virginia Universities, which found that Craigslist’s erotic services page directly reduced female homicides in the US by 17 percent, “principally because sex workers were able to use the free advertising service to move into safer indoor environments and screen clients more carefully.” Request for comment to Craigslist and our queries asking why Personals was removed ahead of the bill’s signing were not responded to by time of publication.

Within days, Reddit removed entire communities. Notably, its r/escorts and r/sugardaddy subreddits. We asked Reddit for comment about its pre-emptive removal of those subreddits, and how that lines up with the company’s controversial philosophies regarding freedom of speech, but did not receive a response by press time.

Right now, sites and safety resources are falling like dominoes. In short order, sex work networks NightShift, CityVibe, and furry personals site Pounced shut down entirely. Sites that facilitated safety in sex work including The Erotic Review, VeryfyHim, Hung Angels, YourDominatrix, and Yellow Pages shut down their discussion boards, advertising boards, and community forums. Other sites, like MyFreeCams, have changed their policies to ban any talk about transactions of any kind.

FOSTA-SESTA’s timing puts a dark spin on recent Terms enforcement by Google Drive and changes with Microsoft products.

On the Survivors Against Sesta shutdown list of services, growing every day, Google Drive is listed as “deleting explicit content and/or locking out users.” Google declined to comment on the record, but Engadget was assured via email from a source with knowledge of the situation that the enforcement wave on Drive has nothing to do with FOSTA-SESTA.

Similarly, Microsoft released a Terms update this week that got the company put on the FOSTA-SESTA censorship list as well. A spokesperson for Microsoft told Engadget in an email that the changes are not related to FOSTA. Further, the spokesperson told us, “The recent changes to the Microsoft Service Agreement’s Code of Conduct provide transparency on how we respond to customer reports of inappropriate public content.”

Human canaries in the free speech coal mine

The hashtag #LetUsSurvive is a current rallying point on Twitter, directing attention to the sex work community’s determination to get out of this insidious wave of conservative anti-sex silencing alive. To that end, sex work websites feature guides to self-censoring, the kind of thing you’d expect belongs more in Weimar-era Berlin than coming out of modern-day San Francisco.

Sex workers are right to be scared. They’re facing all this sudden and casually disastrous censorship as a threat to their safety and livelihoods, and are well aware that few are willing or brave enough to fight for their free speech and human rights. Even sex writers such as myself know this; any of us who’ve tried to make a living off anything relating to sex online has a list of products, services, banks and payment processors, social networks, companies, and business tools that everyone else takes for granted — that we are expressly prohibited from using.

It has been a speech issue for a long time, one most people have turned away from as Instagram censors more nipples, as PayPal freezes and shutters the accounts of sex bloggers and book authors, Tumblr deep-sixes erotic artists, and more.

Hateful gamers? No problem. Death threats toward women? Here’s a form to fill out. MAGA racists terrorizing women and people of color off the platform? Gotta hear both sides. But expose a nipple in artwork, discuss non-reproductive sex ed, or talk about making sex work safer by screening clients? Now that’s a misguided business plan guaranteed to create lasting cultural harm. Let’s definitely keep Peter Thiel on the board. If you thought all that was bad enough, just you wait. FOSTA-SESTA is making us disappear before your very eyes — and it will affect you, too.

Under FOSTA-SESTA, we’d most likely have no Stormy Daniels. That Stormy Daniels is making headlines while the absolute worst is happening to sex workers online is not lost on anyone.

“In a titillating cross-section of lawmaking and scandal,” wrote sex worker Morgan Claire-Sirene, “we have on one side Stormy Daniels suing 45 for unlawful payoffs and calling him to account publicly for his associates’ threats against her, and on the other side, legislation that has already silenced common sex workers, with the overlaying intersections of race and class; good whores and bad whores; victims and perpetrators; and misinformation all around.”

Daniels is a perfect lens with which to view the exact way FOSTA-SESTA harms one of America’s largest at-risk populations. Writer Ben Udashen points out, “The level of sex worker whose lives will be harmed by SESTA are not at the same level of fame and notoriety as Stormy Daniels.”

Daniels won’t be caught up in a sting sending her to jail because she had to work as a street walker to help pay her rent and feed her children. Daniels won’t have to carry a weapon to defend herself when she meets with a new client.

Most importantly, Daniels’s children won’t be woken up to the news that their mother didn’t come home last night because she was murdered by a serial killer, a class of criminal who have always targeted sex workers from Jack the Ripper to the Green River Killer. Poor and working class sex workers, regardless of gender identity, will pay that price.

And for a short moment in history, the advent of the open internet reduced that horrible cost.

Images: Getty Images/iStockphoto (Cuidado); Getty Images/iStockphoto (Woman in cage): CQ-Roll Call,Inc. (Stormy Daniels)

The best wireless headphones

Music is a necessity while I’m working. If it’s not tunes from Spotify, there’s at least a podcast chattering on in my ear. Of course, if you don’t want to bother those around you with what you’re listening to, you need a good set of headphones. The best options will also do a good job of blocking out the outside world. We’ve already offered some suggestions on the best wireless earbuds, so now it’s time to examine the best over-ear wireless headphones. Each was selected for its mix of comfort, sound quality and effective noise cancellation. Because let’s be honest: Audio is just one part of the equation when it comes to long listening sessions.

Sony WH-1000XM2

Sony had earlier won the crown for our favorite set of wireless headphones with a revised version of the MDR-1000X, which debuted in 2016. The new WH-1000XM2 ($350) keeps everything we loved about the original but adds longer battery life (now up to 30 hours) and more control over audio settings, through a companion app. What’s more, Sony added a Quick Charge mode that will give you an hour of listening time after just a 10-minute charge.

The new additions are great, and, combined with Sony’s mainstay features, make for a really good set of headphones. The same stellar audio quality is back, with clear sound and a balanced EQ that provides a near-perfect amount of bass. Noise cancellation on the WH-1000XM2 is better than on the Bose (I tested both on long, noisy flights), which, besides sound quality and battery life, was a key reason these headphones took the top spot on this list. Additionally, Sony kept the convenient touch-sensitive control pad on the outside of the right ear cup, allowing you to make adjustments with a tap or swipe. And, perhaps best of all, they’re still comfortable to wear.

Bose QuietComfort 35 II (and QuietComfort 35)

For a long time, Bose was the category leader in noise-canceling headphones. The company debuted its first wireless model with its trademark feature in 2016, the QuietComfort 35, before following up with the QuietComfort 35 II last year, as part of Google’s push for headphones that worked well with Google Assistant. The only real difference is a new “Action” button that summons the virtual helper whenever you press it. Version 2.0 still has Bose’s great noise cancellation and strong overall sound quality, alongside a lightweight design that’s super-comfy to wear, even for long periods of time. In fact, the QC 35 II’s lack of heft makes it more comfortable than the WH-1000XM2, but Sony still wins when it comes to audio quality and active noise cancellation.

Even if you don’t use Google Assistant, that extra button can still lend a hand. You can also use it to cycle through the three different noise-canceling modes on the QC 35 II, rotating through the trio to find which is best suited to your current surroundings. If you don’t think that additional control will be useful, you can save a few bucks and get the original QuietComfort 35 — if you can find it. For iOS users, the button that’s used to play/pause or skip songs on both models can also be used to activate Siri when needed. In other words, you’ll have access to Apple’s virtual assistant on either set. Bose offers only the QC 35 II in its online shop, but some retailers still stock that first model for around $329.

Blue Satellite

Wireless headphones with a built-in amp? Look no further. Blue may be best known for its microphones, but the company began putting its stamp on headphones a couple of years ago. At CES last year, it debuted the Satellite, a set of wireless noise-canceling headphones that also pack in an amplifier to further improve sound quality. These added components make the Satellite a bit bulky, and you’ll certainly notice the extra heft when you compare them with competing models from Bose and Sony. And, as you might expect, using that built-in amp will really cut into your battery life. However, I found during the course of my review that you can still rely on these headphones for almost a full workday, even if you use the Satellite’s trademark feature the entire time.

What the Satellite lacks in comfort it makes up for in overall audio quality. These are some amazing-sounding headphones; in my opinion, the audio here may be the best of this whole group. However, when judging the merits of headphones, comfort is almost equally important to me — which is why Blue is midway down this list. But there’s a much fuller sound here, thanks to the built-in amp, with depth and clarity that not even the WH-1000XM2 can match. Of course, at $400, that stellar audio doesn’t come cheap.

Beats Studio3

I know, I know. You’re probably thinking “Seriously, a pair of Beats headphones on a ‘best’ list?” Hear me out. Beats headphones are typically criticized for two key things: (1) overpowering bass, and (2) commanding a premium for the brand name. I’m not here to argue about that second point, but I will say that I find the overall sound much more balanced on the Studio3 ($350) than in previous Beats models I’ve tested. There’s still a solid dose of bass, but it’s not as obviously overpowering as it once was — at least not to me. Indeed, there are some audio adjustments, but there are some other features that earned these headphones a spot on this list.

First, the Studio3 packs Apple’s W1 processor for super-fast pairing — that’s the same Bluetooth chip used on the AirPods, Beats X and Powerbeats3 earbuds. There’s also a “Fast Fuel” mode that gives you three hours of listening time with only a 10-minute charge. And if you’re an iPhone and Mac user, you can take advantage of seamless switching between your phone and laptop, thanks to iCloud. Beats’ Pure ANC noise cancellation is pretty good too, though it’s not nearly as effective as what’s on Sony’s WH-1000XM2. After trying several pairs of Beats headphones that felt uncomfortable, the Studio3 ushers in soft earpads and a headband that won’t pinch your head.

Master & Dynamic MW60

Sometimes you want your audio gear to look as good as it sounds. If that’s what you’re after, consider the MW60. Master & Dynamic’s wireless over-ear headphones feature many of the same design cues as the company’s other products: a mix of metal, leather and other materials that create a more premium look and feel than rival headphones. Basically: You won’t see any plastic headbands or cheap-looking components here.

The MW60’s beauty is more than just skin-deep, though. While I would have preferred a little more volume, these, too, sound great. M&D set out to create a more natural sound profile that presents the music as the artist intended, and it largely accomplishes that. These headphones aren’t overly tuned, so you won’t have to contend with too much bass or some other heavy-handed adjustment. That refined design comes with a higher price, though: Expect to pay nearly $550 for these bad boys.

Sennheiser HD 4.50 BTNC

After a set of picks that cost a few hundred dollars each, you’re likely hoping for a more affordable option. The Sennheiser HD 4.50 BTNC won’t wow you with a flashy design, but what you get here for less than $180 is well worth considering. You still get a mix of good sound and active noise cancellation, but these headphones do have a cheaper-looking plastic design. They don’t look chintzy, by any means, but the aesthetic isn’t as refined as with some of the pricier options. However, for a pair of headphones that’s $150 to $200 cheaper than most of the other models listed here and still sounds quite good, I’m willing to overlook the fact that it doesn’t have the most stylish design.

Lincoln adds more pre-owned vehicles to its subscription service pilot

Lincoln announced this week that it’s expanding the pilot of its subscription service. The company said late last year that it planned to launch such a service and while a small selection of 2015 models have since been available through Ford’s Canvas platform for those in San Francisco and West Los Angeles, Lincoln is now including a much wider range of 2017 pre-owned vehicles for customers in West Los Angeles. Monthly payments depend on the mileage package a user wants, but they also cover insurance, warranty, maintenance and roadside assistance.

A number of automakers have embraced subscription models, though most of them offer new vehicles through their services. Lexus and BMW both announced subscription services recently while Cadillac, Volvo and Ford launched theirs previously.

Lincoln, which unveiled its Aviator SUV earlier this week, also includes its Pickup & Delivery service with subscriptions of its 2017 vehicles. If the vehicle needs service, Lincoln will send someone to pick up the car and drop off a loaner. And post-service, the car is returned in the same manner.

You can check out the available 2017 models here.

Via: Autoblog

Source: Lincoln

Ascape Audio and the economics of making headphones in America

Ascape Audio’s home page proudly proclaims “Designed in Detroit,” but at this point it’s not helping business.

“It hasn’t made any goddamn impact,” marketing director Dean Clancy said. “I want to put that in as many places as possible, because regardless of how it impacts our sales, I just want people to know we’re doing it here,” he said.

“Designed in Detroit” they may be, but economics makes manufacturing Ascape’s earbuds in the Motor City impossible. President Paul Schrems estimated it’d take at least $5 million to build a factory and staff it, so the company has offshore-manufacturing contracts for the wireless earbuds it designs in the D. “These things I wanna make are not made here,” Schrems told me recently.

Ascape’s next project is the Ascend-2, a pair of earbuds with a twist-to-lock feature to keep them from falling out during a run or sweaty workout, promising better comfort and audio quality than the previous iteration. Like Apple’s AirPods, they’ll come with a case that doubles as a charger and extends battery life. “No [local] manufacturing partner is motivated to make something like that,” he said.

Part of that is because Michigan, and the US in general, doesn’t have a supply chain set up for making consumer electronics at scale the way it does automobiles. Components and raw materials have to be sourced offshore, and currently there’s a dearth of talent required to oversee production and assembly once the injection molds start pumping out minuscule parts.

In a recent fireside chat, Apple CEO Tim Cook told Fortune that the reason Apple works with China is because the country’s people excel in highly skilled tooling environments and labor-intensive vocations. “In the US you could have a meeting of tooling engineers and I’m not sure we could fill the room,” he commented. “In China, you could fill multiple football fields.”

“It doesn’t even make sense to do it over here anymore,” Schrems said.

If the largest corporation in the history of the world can’t build phones and earbuds in America, how can you expect a five-man team from Detroit to do the same?

Ascape started life under a different name, shortly before Schrems graduated from the University of Michigan in 2011. He had a 40-minute hike from where he parked his car to the main building on campus and got tired of spending half his walk straightening out his headphone cables. “Everything tangles; it’s just a law of cables,” Schrems said. As an engineering student, he figured there had to be a better way.

Being on campus meant easy access to 3D printers, so Schrems spent his spare time mocking up designs for what would eventually be his first product, TurtleCell. It was an iPhone battery case with a spring-loaded mechanism that automatically retracted the headphone cable when not in use.

Along with co-founders Nick Turnbull and Jeremy Lindlbauer, Schrems twice took the project to Accelerate Michigan, a startup competition, and each time walked away with a $10,000 prize for the People’s Choice category. The team was featured in the Detroit Free Press and soon got a phone call from a company in nearby Auburn Hills that wanted to license TurtleCell.

The original TurtleCell team.

They signed a licensing agreement and eventually produced almost 100,000 cases, selling them online. The fledgling company hired additional help along the way, with Clancy being the first full-time employee and the local partner trying to get TurtleCell into retail. “The key word there is ‘tried,’” Schrems said.

Retailers didn’t trust retractable products because they’d been burned before. Mechanisms break, customers complain and the store is left with crates of unsold-and-returned merchandise. It’s hard to blame their reticence. Schrems went as far as to make a machine to test the mechanism’s mettle, certifying the retractor’s use up to 10,000 times. But nothing would change the big box stores’ minds.

After that, things started going south with their local partner, and Schrems had to fire the entire team. He was in China scouting suppliers when he let Clancy go. When Schrems mentioned the layoffs during our interview, Clancy turned to him, laughing, “Thanks, sweetie.”

Dean Clancy, Ascape Audio cofounder and marketing director.

Timothy J. Seppala

Clancy is a little brash, with a punk rock attitude that stems from playing guitar and growing up in Ann Arbor, near Iggy Pop’s hometown. He’s more outwardly opinionated than Schrems and has a fondness for four-letter words that his business partner can’t match.

The pair complement each other well, socially and professionally. Clancy does a lot of the creative work with branding and marketing while Schrems handles manufacturer relationships and other business-related duties as company president. “The stuff I’m not good at, Dean’s good at,” Schrems said.

Luckily for Clancy, he and Schrems hit it off in their short time together, and in 2016, less than a year after the TurtleCell ordeal, the pair co-founded Ascape Audio.

Because they’re designing a product that’s atypical for Michigan, the talent pool is limited. Ascape currently has around five employees, with the pair bringing in friends short term to fill in the gaps. Clancy hopes they don’t have to do that for much longer but admitted that at this stage of the business, it’s a necessary evil.

The TurtleCell.

Just outside Ann Arbor is Saline, where a few electronics manufacturers in Michigan reside — but they exclusively make medical devices. Schrems also reached out to shops in Tennessee and California with little success. Within a month, he realized that to bring Ascape’s product to market as envisioned, he’d need to start looking offshore. “The simple fact of the matter is no one makes headphones in America anymore,” he said.

At one Asian battery factory, Schrems said everything was “crystal clean” and modern. Later that day, he sat in a boardroom alongside his translator and another person he’d brought on the trip. Across the 120-seat conference table sat eight people from the manufacturer. One wall had a waterfall built into it. He couldn’t figure out why the cavernous boardroom had to be so big and elaborate, so he asked. They told him that “when Samsung shows up, they bring 80 people.”

On another tour, Schrems visited a different battery plant. Compared to the Samsung supplier, he said, it was filthy and inefficient. There wasn’t any automation, and every task was performed by hand. But the prices were cheaper than other suppliers’. By a lot. In the end, Schrems went with the cleaner plant, picking batteries that were already in production and, as such, less expensive.

Almost every company that makes headphones is doing it in Asia because the economics are better. Even Grado, which famously manufactures its shells in the US and assembles headphones in Brooklyn, sources its internal parts from Asia.

“It’s the American manufacturers, manufacturing companies, just choosing what products they want to make and which ones are profitable for them to make.”

When Schrems was still working on TurtleCell, he wanted to do a small manufacturing run to make sure the design for the battery pack was up to snuff. He reached out to Midwest Mold, a local tool shop in Detroit suburb Roseville.

The company looked over Schrems’ patents and estimated soft tooling would cost $55,000 just for one piece of the case. Hard tooling would cost an additional $80,000, and to build the entire battery case it would be at least $200,000 in up-front costs. Working with a Chinese partner would only cost Ascape $72,000. When Schrems told the local supplier how much he’d been quoted by the Chinese company, “they just laughed,” he said.

If the price of domestic manufacturing was only slightly higher than outsourcing, Schrems wouldn’t think twice about making Ascape products in Michigan. The control over the entire process would be a lot better, and he wouldn’t have to deal with headaches like language and social barriers every time he needed to communicate with the supplier. “If I could drive an hour to the place where it was getting made instead of having to schedule a two-week trip, and speak to the guy who’s actually gonna run the coding machine, it would be so much easier,” Schrems said.

“You get shit for it too. Trust me,” Clancy said. “It’s like … you think we don’t wanna do it here?”

“We’d love to,” Schrems added. “It’s the American manufacturers, manufacturing companies, just choosing what products they want to make and which ones are profitable for them to make.” In the end, Ascape paid Midwest Mold $5,000 in consulting fees to ensure its tooling was correct before sending the order to China.

Schrems in China at A&T Center of Research Institute.

It’s easy to make life difficult for yourself when working with offshore suppliers. There’s the language barrier, sure, but then there are the cultural hurdles. “Over there, they’re not as aggressive about telling you that you’re doing something wrong,” he said. “You’re the customer; you’re always right. So they’ll let you make mistakes without telling you.”

He brought up the example in Malcolm Gladwell’s book Outliers: One whole chapter details why Korea Air had so many crashes in the ’80s and ’90s. It was due to communication issues, because the cockpit crew members weren’t effectively telling one another or the control tower when something was definitely incorrect, in a forceful way. “I actually liked finding manufacturers who would tell me I’m wrong,” he said.

It typically takes two to three weeks for Ascape to go from making the initial order to getting a mock-up. “That’s pretty quick,” Schrems said. That doesn’t count the weeks of back-and-forth emails hashing out the engineering and design process itself though. He admitted that even with his experience and degrees (a bachelor’s in mechanical engineering and master’s in electrical engineering systems), there were still facets of the real-world process he wasn’t prepared for. “[Eastern companies] have been doing it for years, right?” he asked. “I had to learn through making mistakes of what can go wrong with the product.”

The TurtleCell designed for the iPhone 6 originally had a kickstand, because the marketing team demanded it. Since there wasn’t anything similar to a battery case with retractable earbuds and a kickstand, getting the tooling right was a nightmare. And expensive. The tooling supplier quit before production was finished, and the fledgling accessory company had to shell out extra money just so the manufacturer would complete the job. Schrems estimated it delayed shipment to customers by at least two months.

Ascape has been working on the Kickstarter campaign for the Ascend-2 since last October. A lot of the labor has been shooting lifestyle photos, filming a Facebook commercial and the pitch video, and rendering new models of the earbuds. It’s difficult to do that when the product you’re selling is aimed at folks with active lifestyles and you’re in the height of one of Michigan’s infamous winters.

The plan is to launch between the end of April and the beginning of May and have the initial goal set low enough that the campaign is fully funded within the first few days. Should that happen, it means Ascape will make the Kickstarter homepage and start generating organic interest. It also means that any money raised beyond the artificially low goal will stay in Ascape’s coffers.

Schrems said Kickstarter serves a few purposes: It’s an “awareness generator,” and the company will help fund projects launching on the platform. Ascape would’ve put the first Ascend on Kickstarter, but the team thought it was too late to the fully wireless earbud craze and wouldn’t generate any interest. Looking back, Schrems said it would’ve cut Ascape’s digital-marketing costs significantly and the first Ascend could’ve launched sooner.

The up-front costs for the Ascend-2 are much higher than for the previous model. Since there aren’t local angel investors or a licensor involved this time, Ascape needs as much cash on hand as possible to start production and buying inventory. Selling pre-orders on a crowdfunding website is an easy way to generate capital. Plus, courting investors would take more time. Schrems said it’s better to go to customers directly first and then once you have sales figures, let the investors follow.

While there have been a few organic multimillion-dollar campaigns, Schrems said they’ve “rarely” ever broken $1.5 million in pledges. And that if one has pulled in more than that amount, there was definitely a marketing agency working behind the scenes.

Ascape’s marketing agency is Jellop, which boasts it’s helped raise almost $210 million across 439 projects, including the $13 million campaign for Pebble’s second activity tracker. “If you’re looking to pump up your campaign, talk to them,” Pebble’s Benjamin Bryant writes on Jellop’s website. Jellop typically waits until a campaign is under way to offer its help, but the firm reached out to Ascape months in advance.

“If the Kickstarter goes wildly successful, like many of them do, then we can make these and become an acquisition target.”

Clancy and Schrems wouldn’t divulge how much the pre-launch social media ad campaign costs, but it sounded like it wasn’t cheap. “With the amount of money we’re spending on the advertising pre-campaign…” Schrems said before catching himself. “If we don’t [fully fund], that’s gonna be a fucking…” Clancy mused, before Schrems cut him off. “Maybe we shouldn’t be saying all this.” Suffice to say, Jellop has made a significant investment, and Ascape will dominate your News Feed in the run-up to launch.

“If the Kickstarter goes wildly successful, like many of them do, then we can make these and become an acquisition target,” Schrems said. If it gets mediocre results, Schrems said the plan is to take their self-written 50-page patent and proof of sales and, in a word, sell out to a big player in the space.

It’s happened before. Revols launched its campaign for form-fitting wireless earbuds in Nov. 2015 and its $100,000 goal was fully funded in under seven hours. By Jan. 2016 the company had raised $2.5 million with more than 10,000 backers. Last Dec., the company was bought by Logitech.

It’s pretty clear Schrems and Clancy wouldn’t mind being gobbled up by a larger company. But if that doesn’t happen, the pair would be happy to run a successful business for a few years and put a bit of Motown in people’s ears, regardless of what music they’re listening to.

Shinola’s Canfield headphones.

Detroiters show Ascape a lot of love. Clancy said that startups in the city benefit from people wanting to see it bounce back and throwing support behind those efforts.

Texas-founded watchmaker Shinola recently got into the headphone space with a collection of headphones and in-ear monitors named after the historic Canfield district in Detroit. Prices originally ran between $195 and $650 but have since dropped to $450 for the most expensive model. The company also offers a $2,500 turntable and $1,500 speakers.

“People are like, ‘Fuck, yeah. You’re not Shinola.’”

Shinola came under fire for the Canfield launch. Reviewers said the products were too expensive and the sound didn’t live up to the price while the Federal Trade Commission put Shinola in the crosshairs for its not-entirely-true “where American is made” marketing efforts. Others have complained that Shinola is an opportunistic outside company mining Detroit’s history and hardships to make a profit. Shinola’s in-ear monitors are produced by Campfire while its headphones are “designed, tuned and tested” in Detroit, but like Ascape’s models, they’re manufactured offshore.

“People are like, ‘Fuck, yeah. You’re not Shinola,’” Clancy bragged. “The support, for me, speaks a lot to our aspiration and our potential. I don’t think we’ll get any backlash.”

Clancy said that Ascape isn’t the typical team heading to crowdfunding platforms with a prototype and a twinkle in its eye. “We’re an established company,” he said. “We’ve kind of done this before. What we need is some credibility on Kickstarter to prove we’re not just another idea.”

Paul Schrems (left) and Dean Clancy (right).

Despite all the unforeseen hardships and trial and error, as late twentysomethings, Clancy and Schrems wouldn’t want to do anything else for a living.

“[We’ve been] doing it on our own and being just a group of fucking guys that wanna have fun and make money at the same time, and survive,” Schrems said.

When I first met Clancy and Schrems, the former was wearing a naval captain’s hat and sunglasses, hawking his wares to sweaty, sunburned, dust-covered concertgoers at Detroit’s Mo Pop Festival last July. Clancy assembled their display tables in his garage, and a lot of the engineering work on the Ascend-2s was done in Schrems’ garage. It’s been enjoyable for them, and they like the bootstrappiness of it all.

Clancy reminisced about breaking into the backstage area when Queens of the Stone Age played the Fox Theatre last fall. He hung out with guitarist Dean Fertita (who also plays in Jack White’s The Dead Weather), bonding over shoptalk and what it was like growing up in the area. Fertita hails from Royal Oak, where Schrems lives currently, and as such has become a hero for local musicians. “I hope someday we get to be that, in a weird way,” Clancy said, “for other people who wanna do hardware startups in Detroit.”

Images: Ascape Audio (Ascend-1 render, TurtleCell team photo, TurtleCell product shot, Schrems in China); Timothy J. Seppala (Dean Clancy, Clancy and Paul Schrems bar table, Shinola Canfield)