Low Visibility Into Blizzard
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| Low Visibility Into Blizzard | |
| Number | 3717 |
| Broadcast Date | FEBRUARY 12, 2020 |
| Episode Length | 29:23 |
| Hosts | Tom Merritt, Sarah Lane, Roger Chang |
| Guests | Scott Johnson |
Activision Blizzard is removing its games from the Nvidia GeForce Now game streaming service, including Overwatch, WoW, and the Call of Duty series. What can Nvidia do and does this bode well for GeForce Now?
Guest
Quick Hits
- Mobile World Congress has been canceled for the first time in its 33 years. Spanish health officials said there was no reason to cancel but GSMA CEO John Hoffman told Bloomberg "... the GSMA has cancelled MWC Barcelona 2020 because the global concern regarding the coronavirus outbreak, travel concern and other circumstances, make it impossible for the GSMA to hold the event." On another Coronavirus note, Reuters' sources say FoxConn expects to have 50% of its Chinese production back by the end of the month and get back to 80% Chinese production in March.
- Reuters saw a document indicating EU antitrust regulators plan to investigate emerging markets in tech and consider preventative measures to help smaller rivals to big companies. European Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager will present the paper in March. Meanwhile, Facebook postponed Thursday's launch of its dating service in the European Union due to concerns from Ireland's Data Protection Commissioner.
- The US Federal Trade Commission voted 5-0 to ask for public comments on whether the rules for influencer endorsements should be tougher. FTC Chair Rohit Chopra wants to make current disclosure guidelines binding and possibly include fines and other civil penalties.
- WhatsApp announced it now has two billion users, up from 1.5 billion two years ago. That makes it second only to the Facebook app itself which has 2.5 billion users.
- Andy Rubin's Essential Phone company announced it will shut down, citing an inability to find a "clear path" to deliver its Project Gem smartphone to consumers. Essential's phone will continue to work but it will not receive updates. Newton Mail will shut down April 30.
Top Stories
- Sony announced a remote control that is also a portable speaker. Or is it a portable speaker with a remote control built in? The SRS-LSR200 has a pair of 2 Watt speakers and a center unit tuned to human voices. The speaker sits in a charging base attached to a TV. It connects to the base using 2.4GHz wireless and can play audio simultaneously with the TV's speakers so you can take TV audio with you. The remote on top includes the usual number and up and down buttons. It comes to Japan February 22 for 20,000 yen (US$180).
- Agari's quarterly Fraud and Identity Deception trends report found that gift card phishing schemes accounted for 62% of all business email compromise attacks. Attackers who get control of a business email account will use it to ask subordinates to purchase gift cards, especially during holiday periods. Multiple employees are usually messaged at a time and the amount collected in attacks can be anywhere from $250 to $10,000. Gift cards can be cashed out immediately and are difficult to trace.
- Malwarebytes' State of Malware report detected 11 threats per endpoint for Macs in 2019 compared to 5.8 for Windows. An increase in marketshare for Macs is part of the reason as is an increase in the number of Malwarebytes Mac users. Malwarebytes also says macOS has not cracked down on borderline malware like adware as hard as it has on other more serious types. Adware called NewTab was the top detected threat. The data was collected from users of the Malwarebytes software. All but one of the macOS threats detected required a user to be tricked into downloading and opening something. The other one was a zero-day vulnerability in Firefox.
- US National Security Adviser Robert O'Brien told The Wall Street Journal, "We have evidence that Huawei has the capability secretly to access sensitive and personal information in systems it maintains and sells around the world." The evidence is being shared with allies, including the UK and Germany but has not been made public. The Journal says the US has been aware of a backdoor since 2009 when it was observed in 4G equipment, but did not say if it has observed Huawei using the access. Network equipment from all companies must have a way for authorities to access the network for lawful purposes but without the manufacturer having access. The US says Huawei built equipment that secretly preserves its access to this function without carriers knowledge. Huawei denies the accusations.
- A new feature of Google's Gboard keyboard called Emoji Kitchen lets you combine two emojis into one and use it in a sticker in your messaging app including WhatsApp, Telegram, Snapchat and Messenger. Google designed the combos by hand. You tap on an emoji in the keyboard and it will suggest predesigned combinations you can use. The feature starts rolling out to Android users today.
Discussion
- Nvidia’s GeForce Now is losing all Activision Blizzard games, a bad sign for cloud gaming
- Activision Blizzard pulls its games from GeForce Now
- Activision Blizzard is removing its games from the Nvidia GeForce Now game streaming service, including Overwatch, WoW, and the Call of Duty series. GeForce Now just officially launched last week. Nvidia says it hopes it can work out a deal to bring the games back. Google has a multi-year partnership to bring Activision Blizzard esports like Overwatch League and Call of Duty League to YouTube. Google Cloud handles Activision Blizzard's game hosting and streaming.
- Microsoft is launching a beta for Project xCloud game streaming service through Apple's TestFlight to let xCloud beta testers try the service on iPhone or iPad. It's the first game streaming service to show up for an iOS device since OnLive. Halo: The Master Chief Collection will be available to 10,000 preview testers. The app is limited to xCloud, so does not include the Xbox Game Streaming feature.
- And finally, truly the death of E3 is Geoff Keighley not going for the first time in 25 years, right?
Mailbag
- Friend of the show Paul Thurrott had an interesting premium article on his site claiming that Windows 10X is much more ambitious than Microsoft is publicly suggesting - his view is that Windows 10X is essentially a new Windows NT, meaning a different platform that retains app compatibility and will eventually replace Windows 10. This would mean that all the benefits of Windows 10X won’t be limited to dual screen devices. Emphasizing dual screen devices is a way to make a splash while at the same time exposing the new OS to a smaller group of users prior to replacing Windows for everyone. The article is a fascinating look at how the new OS works and the goals of the platform long term.
- Sent by Markus in Frigid Minnesota
YouTube
Links
| Preceded by: "Mobile World Canceled?" |
Low Visibility Into Blizzard |
Followed by: "Nevada Gambles on A Tool" |