Pokémon Go developer sued over Pokémon placed on private property

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IDG News Service:

A lawsuit in a federal court raises the ticklish issue of whether a company can be hauled to court because its augmented reality game places coveted fantasy creatures and in-game benefits in private property without permission.

Jeffrey Marder, a resident of West Orange, New Jersey, found in the days after the release of the successful augmented reality game Pokémon Go, that strangers, phone in hand, had begun lingering outside his home.

At least five of them knocked on Marder’s door and asked for access to his backyard to catch and add to their virtual collections of the Pokémon images, superimposed over the real world, that the game developer had placed at the residence without his permission.

No easy fix here. If this lawsuit is allowed to go forward, Niantic is going to have a thorny problem to solve. The database they rely on is incredibly large and complex. I can’t imagine it will be easy to excise all the private property from the map. And, if they do, will they replace those gyms and pokéstops? Or will the game get more sparsely populated?

Is this much ado about nothing? Not sure. But if the lawsuit does gain some teeth, I can definitely see lots of folks jumping on the bandwagon.

Meet Apple’s new Remote app, not quite the same as the old Remote app

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Dan Moren, writing for Six Colors:

The intent of the Apple TV Remote app is to duplicate all the functionality of the hardware remote, and in that it mostly succeeds. The majority of the screen is taken up by an area that mimics the hardware remote’s touch surface, and you can swipe or tap to control the onscreen interface. There are also dedicated buttons for Menu, Home (which you can double tap to bring up the multitasking switcher), Play/Pause, and Siri.

And:

It seems that if you have HDMI-CEC enabled to control your TV’s volume via the remote, it seems the iOS device’s physical volume buttons will actually control your TV’s sound.

This is just a bit of the review. If you haven’t downloaded the new Remote app (it is a completely different app – I deleted my old one), it is absolutely worth it.

Note that it works with the previous generation Apple TV and allows you to save profiles for multiple Apple TVs, in case you have more than one.

Harley Quinn’s back story

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This weekend, the movie Suicide Squad goes into wide release. Early buzz is, the movie is terrific. I can’t wait to see it.

The New York Times, on one of the main characters, Harley Quinn:

How did Harley become one of the most popular female characters in the DC Universe? In part, by cleaning up her act, or what passes for clean in her world. In several incarnations — most notably, her foray into video games — Harley has been a true supervillain, maiming and killing with unbridled glee. Now she’s more of an antihero, as in “Suicide Squad,” where she and a team of bad guys take on even worse guys in “Dirty Dozen”-style missions.

If you are a fan of the character, the movie, or the genre, this article is worth the read, chock-full of Harley Quinn background.

The Radar that brought the water pistol emoji to iOS 10

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Yesterday, Apple announced the addition of more gender diverse emoji in iOS 10. One emoji in particular, the handgun, got a lot of press attention when it was replaced by a water pistol.

Back in June, this radar (Apple’s internal bug-tracking system) was filed:

The current “pistol” emoji is a realistically rendered lethal weapon. As the spec doesn’t require it to be this way, Apple would be doing a service to society by changing this image to a plastic toy gun, such as a bright pink or green water squirter.

Solid suggestion, glad for the change.

No need for a Hackintosh, here’s how to breathe new life into an old iMac

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Andrew Leavitt, writing on Medium:

You need only spend $171 for your anemic 27” iMac to run macOS Sierra, boot in seconds and open applications in a blink. Or you can buy a used one and upgrade it for just $500 starting from scratch. You really only require the latest models if you are working frequently with 4K video.

A machine that was originally built in 2009 can easily perform past another 5–10 years with a few straightforward upgrades. CraigsList has these computers lightly used for as little as $325 if you are patient. For another $171 in parts you can rock a machine almost matching today’s specs. And if you are presently struggling with an older iMac the decision is even easier (c’mon, it’s less than $200 and just an hour of tinkering). It’s fun and you might even learn something. Keep in mind that a new 27 iMac has a base price of $1800 (that’s with a 5K screen but no SSD and only 8GB of RAM). Boom, you just saved $1300.

[…]

Today Weather

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Today Weather is a lightweight, fast loading, well designed weather site, optimized for your various devices.

This is my new go-to weather page. Worth a look.

How to use Digital Touch and handwriting in iMessage for iOS 10

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The Messages app has undergone a lot of changes in iOS 10. Much of the evolution is hidden behind two icons, just to the left of the iMessage text field (just to the right of the camera icon).

There’s a lot to play with here. Just be aware that some of the actions will send without a specific confirmation. So if you are going to experiment, you might want to warn the person on the receiving end. For example, if you tap the Digital Touch icon (two fingers on a heart), then scribble out a sketch or two finger tap, the scribble or kiss will be sent immediately, without any staging. This is not a complaint, just an observation.

All that said, the linked post from Rene Ritchie talks you through some of these features. I love this path for Messages, looking forward to seeing more of this.

The world’s largest SSD is now shipping for $10,000

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The Verge:

That’s where the Samsung PM1633a SSD comes in, clocking in at a massive 15.56 terabytes (or 15,360,000,000,000 bytes) of storage. Such power comes at a price, however, with preorders for the 15.56 terabyte behemoth coming in at around $10,000. The 15.56 TB size is not only the largest SSD ever made, but the largest single hard drive ever, finally breaking the 10 TB barrier that spinning disk drives seem to be capped at.

The drive’s small size and huge storage capacity means that you’d be able to outfit a standard 42U server storage rack with 1,008 PM1633a for a cool 15482.88 TB (over 15 petabytes) of storage, to presumably store a spare copy of the known universe. (Assuming you can afford the $10,080,000 price tag for such a setup.)

See main post for a link, in case you want one.

The most famous band formed each year since 1951

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Pretty Famous:

PrettyFamous, an entertainment research site by Graphiq, found the most famous band formed each year since 1951. To do this, they created a customized Band Score on a scale of 1 to 100 based on a weighted average of a band’s Wikipedia page views in the last 30 days, page views of album releases and total number of Spotify followers.

The bands with the highest Band Score from each year were then ordered into a list starting in 1951 and continuing to 2015. It is important to note that since Wikipedia page views are current, all of these bands have stood the test of time, and remained famous many years after they were formed.

Interesting methodology. Not sure how you’d come up with a better measure of fame without turning straight to sales numbers.

Regardless, I found this pretty interesting. Scroll down to the tool, type in a year, then start clicking the arrow just to the right of the band picture to step through other bands formed in that year.

Apple invested in China’s Didi Chuxing, Didi just bought out Uber’s Chinese operations

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Bloomberg:

Didi Chuxing, the dominant ride-hailing service in China, said it will acquire Uber Technologies Inc.’s operations in the country, ending a battle that cost the two companies billions as they competed for customers and drivers.

And:

The truce brings to an end a bruising battle between the two companies for leadership in China’s fast-growing ride-hailing market. Uber has been spending at least $1 billion a year to gain ground in China, while Didi offered its own subsidies to drivers and riders to build its business.

Didi Chuxing and, as an investor, Apple are now in the driver’s seat (sorry) in China.

Jack off

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John Gruber explores a tree of possibilities:

The question is, what will Apple ship in the box with the new iPhones? I see the following options:

  • Wireless ear buds.
  • Wireless ear buds and this adapter.
  • Lightning ear buds.
  • Lightning ear buds and this adapter.
  • The existing 3.5mm ear buds and this adapter.

At the bottom of the piece:

The bottom line: this move should be about moving away from wired headphones period, not moving from one wired jack to another. The best way to achieve that is for Apple to ship wireless ear buds in the box.

Great stuff.

Fantastic Siri resource

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This site aims to be a comprehensive list of things you can do with Siri. Save the link, but spend a few minutes scanning through the commands to see if there are any use cases that are new to you. And, of course, if you find this useful, pass the link along to your iOS friends.

Celebrating Brooklyn’s first Apple store

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Apple’s newsroom:

Thousands of customers turned out Saturday for the grand opening of Apple Williamsburg, the first Apple store in Brooklyn. Customers began queuing Friday on Bedford Ave before midnight, and when the store opened at 10 a.m. Saturday the line stretched around the block.

iTunes phishing scam, well done, but easily detectable

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The Telegraph:

Apple’s iTunes customers are being warned to delete “scam” emails that are being sent to some customers claiming they have been charged more than £20 to download a song.

Reports have surfaced on social media of iTunes users receiving an email claiming to be from Apple, detailing an alleged recent song purchase from the iTunes Store that costs £23.34.

Phishing continues to thrive because it works, at least to enough of a degree that it is profitable overall. As always, be vigilant, hover over links to verify before clicking on them.

New dinosaur novel coming from Michael Crichton

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The Verge:

When Michael Crichton passed away in 2008, he left behind a massive collection of papers: outlines, notes, and several incomplete novels. In the years since his death, Crichton’s widow Sherri has been combing through those files, and recently discovered a new manuscript called Dragon Teeth, which is now set to be published by HarperCollins in 2017.

I’m a huge fan of Michael Crichton’s writing, from The Andromeda Strain, up through Jurassic Park and beyond, to project like the E.R. TV series. His books fueled my imagination. I hope that Dragon Teeth is up to the standard.

Apple said to redesign online store app with recommendations

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Mark Gurman and Alex Webb, writing for Bloomberg:

Apple Inc. plans to roll out a redesigned version of its Apple Store mobile app for selling devices that will use a customer’s buying history to recommend further purchases, taking a page from Amazon.com Inc.’s playbook. The updated retail app could be rolled out in the next two weeks, according to people familiar with the intended revamp. It’s likely to include a “For You” tab that suggests products based on prior orders, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the project isn’t yet public. While there are currently separate Apple Store apps for the iPhone and iPad, the new app will work on both devices and have the same basic features and interface.

Tune up your two-step Recovery Key

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Glenn Fleishman, writing for Macworld [AUTOPLAY]:

If you’re using Apple’s two-step verification system for logins, I have just one (not two) questions for you: do you know where your Recovery Key is?

A friend recently went through a multi-week set of interlocked problems when he was locked out of his Apple ID account on his iPhone, and couldn’t find his Recovery Key. He wasn’t ultimately able to get Apple to unlock his account. (During this period, his phone also locked up for a few days and he couldn’t receive texts or alerts, either.)

He had forgotten he’d enabled two-step verification, which is the older of Apple’s two methods of using a second piece of information to validate that you’re the accountholder. With the two-step system, Apple uses something akin to Find My iPhone to provide a code on your iOS devices or sends an SMS that you use to complete your login.

If you are not sure what kind of verification you have in place on your account, read this post.

Skydiver plans jump tomorrow from plane, no parachute, into a net, on TV

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AP News:

He’s made 18,000 parachute jumps, helped train some of the world’s most elite skydivers, done some of the stunts for “Ironman 3.” But the plunge Luke Aikins knows he’ll be remembered for is the one he’s making without a parachute. Or a wingsuit.

Or anything, really, other than the clothes he’ll be wearing when he jumps out of an airplane at 25,000 feet this weekend, attempting to become the first person to land safely on the ground in a net.

The Fox network will broadcast the two-minute jump live at 8 p.m. EDT (5 p.m. PDT) Saturday as part of an hour-long TV special called “Heaven Sent.”

Way back when, Evil Knievel did these sorts of televised, death-defying stunts on a regular basis.

More recently, we had Felix Baumgartner jumping from a balloon on the edge of space, albeit with a parachute.

Godspeed, Luke.

California closes the Steve Jobs license plate loophole

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Ars Technica:

One of the many things Steve Jobs was famous for was his refusal to put a license plate on the back of his car, a Mercedes-Benz SL55 AMG. Jobs—or someone close to him—spotted a loophole in California DMV regulations allowing six months of grace before a license plate had to be attached to a new car. As a result, the Apple supremo maintained a rolling six-month lease on a series of new SL55 AMGs, replacing one with another just before the grace period ran out.

Steve’s license plates were the center of many an anecdote. Miss him.

A new way to fight back when hackers take your data hostage

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The Washington Post:

Imagine having all the files on your computer — your documents, your photos, your videos — locked and held hostage by hackers who demand a payout just because you opened the wrong email attachment or clicked the wrong link. That’s the nightmare scenario facing victims of ransomware, a type of malware that quietly encrypts files on a computer so that only a digital key held by the attacker can release them.

But a new initiative called No More Ransom may offer a glimmer of hope for victims. The project, a collaboration among Europol, the Netherlands’s national police and cybersecurity firms Intel Security and Kaspersky Lab, launched a website Monday featuring tools that can help some victims decrypt their data without paying off the criminals.

Read on for more details.

Wi-Fi Calling can kill iPhone battery life – Here’s how to fix it

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Mac Kung Fu:

I switched to an iPhone SE a few days ago and, while I’m happy with the diminutive device, I’ve been a little worried to see battery life draining incredibly quickly. I would take the device off charge and after an hour of non-use the battery would be down to 90%. A full working day’s standby brought it down to 10%. This was very odd because all the reviews said that iPhone SE had superb battery life, and perhaps even better than the iPhone 6S.

I removed various apps that Settings > Battery reported were eating juice. Gone were the news apps I had installed that fed me news flash notifications. However, battery life was STILL gobbled-up. I eventually realized the bad guy in the picture was the Wi-Fi Calling feature. Back into the Settings app I went, and tapped Phone > Wi-Fi Calling, and disabled it.

It was a miraculous fix. The battery percentage figure now barely changes across an hour of non-use.

I use Wi-Fi calling all the time and I’ve never noticed a problem with battery life. I say this not to cast doubt on the article (or anyone else’s experience) but to wonder if there’s another factor being missed, something that makes some iPhones drain their batteries and not impact others.

Nonetheless, I did find this an interesting read.

Apple patents Digital Crown mechanism for iPad

Written by

Patently Apple:

Today, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office published a patent application from Apple that reveals that Jony Ive and his team have considered expanding the Apple Watch’s digital crown to other iOS devices such as the iPad. Apple notes that the digital crown could be used as a volume controller or locking the touch screen, turning on the touch screen, taking a picture, resizing text and other actions.

This is an interesting choice. The digital crown is effective for sliding back and forth through a list or set of settings. The trick is to connect the digital crown to a specific element in the user interface.

[…]

iCloud Tabs not working in your macOS Sierra beta? Here’s a fix.

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While my macOS Sierra beta has been pretty rock solid, there is one feature that has stopped working for me. If I click the iCloud Tabs button (the icon of two overlaid squares in the upper-right corner of the Safari window), Safari should open a view that shows all the Safari tabs in my current window, as well as the Safari tabs in my other nearby iOS devices.

For me, the macOS tabs show up just fine, but the iCloud tabs do not appear. I depend on this feature, so I dug around the net to find a workaround while I waited for the Sierra beta that fixed this problem. […]

The tireless, automated bots that will play Pokémon Go for you

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One of the first things I thought of when I first experienced Pokémon Go was how dependent the game was on location and how easy that would be to spoof. It didn’t take long for developers to bring that idea to life:

A new wave of PC-based Pokémon Go “bots” take the hacking a step further, spoofing locations and automating actions to essentially play the game for you while you sit in the comfort of your own home.

There are a number of competing bots out there, from the open source Necrobot to the pre-compiled Pokébuddy to MyGoBot, which recently started charging $4.99 for its automation tool following a three-hour free trial. All of them work on the same basic principles, sending artificial data to the Pokémon Go servers to simulate an extremely efficient, entirely tireless player.

This same sort of thing happened in the early days of World of Warcraft. It took some time, but the folks at Blizzard figured out how to tell if robots were playing for you and took a hard line, suspending accounts that leveled up impossibly quickly or were otherwise found to be cutting corners in some automated fashion. I suspect Niantic will learn this same lesson, or things will go south pretty quickly.

Apple’s employee number one

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Craig Cannon, interviewing Apples’ first employee (beyond Steve Jobs and Woz), Bill Fernandez:

Craig: So at what point do Woz and Jobs come together and decide that they want to start working on Apple?

Bill: Okay, well during this Hewlett-Packard period when Woz and I were both there, Woz in the after hours designed his own Pong game. Pong was the first really popular, you know, video game that bars and pizza shops and restaurants could buy and put it in stores and people would come and put quarters in and play. So he built his own circuitry and used it with a small black and white TV set as the display.

Then a couple of things happened. He started working on building his own computer and he started attending the Homebrew Computer Club that was happening at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, SLAC.

So all of those things happened at the same time and then as his computer came together he would take it and show it off after the meetings. At some point there was enough interest shown that Jobs became aware of this. I don’t know if he went to the Homebrew Computer Club or just when he and Woz were together Woz was talking about it. Basically Jobs said, “You know, we could make printed circuit boards and just sell the computer already assembled so people wouldn’t even have to buy all the parts on the open market and figure out how to wire them together. We could just do it for them.” And so that was the beginning of Apple Computer.

Jobs got a printed circuit board made and he figured out where to get all the parts. They decided what to name the company and then, this is funny, Jobs got a front office front. There was a company at 770 Welch Road. If you look at the old literature that was their address, Apple’s mailing address. So there was this company on the second floor that had people who would answer the phone and depending upon what number was called would say, “Hello, this is Apple Computer, how can I help you?” And would receive packages mailed to Apple Computer and would mail things from Apple Computer. Jobs was working in his father’s garage and in his bedroom, you know, and this was like our front to make it look legit.

This is a nice, long interview, with lots of edge-on views of the stuff of legend, the birth of Apple.