JBL, SanDisk, Legrand, LE Audio, and More from CES 2020 – TMO Daily Observations 2020-01-07

LAS VEGAS – Live from CES 2020, Dave Hamilton and John F. Braun share their thoughts on the new stuff they’ve found. Cool Stuff Found includes JBL’s new Quantum gaming headsets, Legrand’s smart electrical panel, ChronoLife’s smart Nexkin shirt, SanDisk’s latest (r)evolution of the thumb drive (it’s got a lot of storage and it’s fast!), Bluetooth’s first audio evolution in decades, and even more. Listen, enjoy, and let us know what you think at [email protected].

Fresh Cambridge Analytica Leaks Reveal Scope of Manipulation

A fresh wave of Cambridge Analytica leaks is being disseminated by the press, and it reveals that its misinformation and manipulation reached at least 65 countries.

Platforms whose profiteering purpose is to track and target people at global scale — which function by leveraging an asymmetrical ‘attention economy’ — have zero incentive to change or have change imposed upon them. Not when the propaganda-as-a-service business remains in such high demand…

This campaign is still going, because Cambridge Analytica shut down and renamed itself as Emerdata.

CES - Danby Stops Porch Pirates with Danby Parcel Guard

LAS VEGAS, NV — Parcel theft, or “porch pirates” are an increasing issue in many areas.  They will take your parcel shortly after it’s been delivered, or when you’re not home.  Danby can help secure your parcels and even catch a thief with the technologies in Danby Parcel Guard.

PDF Expert: $29.99

We have a deal on PDF Expert for Mac from Readdle. You can create and edit PDFs, work with large PDFs smoothly, and it allows you to annotate PDFs, merge them, and much more. This PDF editor also has a nice list of distinctions, including being 2015 App of the Year in the Mac App Store and Top Paid App in the Mac App Store. It’s $29.99 through our deal.

The 20th Anniversary of Internet Explorer 5 For Mac, And The Difficulty of Dealing With Steve Jobs

Sunday, January 5th, marked the 20th anniversary of the release of Internet Explorer 5 for Mac. One of the developers on the project, Jimmy Grewal, recalled releasing the product, and the difficulty of dealing with Steve Jobs.

I was 22 years old and I was thrown into the deep end of the browser wars, the Microsoft anti-trust trial, and the love/hate relationship between Microsoft and Apple. I don’t want to delve into the details of what made MacIE 5 special because my friend Tantek Çelik has already documented that on his blog. Rather I want to focus on the inside story of how and why it was developed, and some of the people and personalities that shaped it’s success and eventual demise.

Wi-Fi 6 Will Get 6 GHz Capabilities Under Name ‘Wi-Fi 6E’

The Wi-Fi Alliance is extending Wi-Fi 6 into the 6 GHz band for faster performance, faster data rates, and lower latency. It’s called Wi-Fi 6E.

Wi-Fi 6E devices are expected to become available quickly following 6 GHz regulatory approvals, utilizing this additional spectrum capacity to deliver continuous Wi-Fi innovation and valuable contributions to consumers, businesses and economies.

Wi-Fi Alliance: “We’re moving away from 802.11.xx because that’s too confusing.”

Also Wi-Fi Alliance: “Welcome to Wi-Fi 6E.”

How Pokémon Go Changes People's Lives

Pokémon Go may not be as high profile as it once was, but it remains hugely popular. The geo-location based game has also helped many people, including those with disabilities, as BBC News discovered.

Matthew Gibson, the proud collector of more than 500 Pikachu soft toys, “didn’t want to go out much” before Pokémon Go launched. “I was like, ‘mum it’s a bit windy,’… or, ‘mum it’s a bit rainy,’… I didn’t even want to go out in the sun because there was nothing to do,” said 26-year-old Mr Gibson, who has cerebral palsy and autism. But he was “fantastically excited” when the game was released and says it has led him to places he would never have explored otherwise. “I’ve [found] things in my neighbourhood that I didn’t know were there. I even go to places like the parks and the castles so I can do Pokémon while mum and dad are looking around.”

The Anki Vector Robot is Coming Back

Anki built little companion robots like Vector and Cosmo. But in early 2019 the company ran out of money and shut down. But the CEO of Digital Dream Labs announced it had purchased Anki’s assets and will continue to develop the Anki Vector robot.

1)  We will develop an “Escape Pod”.  This will, safely, expose settings and allow the user to move and set endpoints, and by doing so, remove the need for the cloud server.

2)  We will develop a “Dev Vector”.  Many users have asked us for open source and the ability to do more with their Vector even to the point of hosting him on their own servers.  With this feature, developers will be able to customize their robot through a bootloader we will develop.