Virgin Galactic is set to resume its rocket powered test flights, bringing consumer level space travel closer to reality after remaining fairly inactive throughout 2014. This means that passengers who made a $250,000 reservation to fly into space on a Virgin Galactic flight may not be left waiting too much …
Read More »Nick Clegg wants to protect journalists and whistleblowers
Nick Clegg, the current leader of the Liberal Democrat party and deputy prime minster in the UK, has called for journalists to be given more protection when it comes to releasing information that is in the public's interest. Specifically he said that he wants them to be able to technically break …
Read More »Good guy Zuckerberg? Facebook to sue lawyers
In a move that is unlikely to annoy anyone, Facebook has announced its intention to take on some of the world's biggest law firms in court, after they represented Paul Ceglia, a man who for several years claimed that he technically owned a big chunk of the social network, due to a …
Read More »GlobalFoundries to acquire semiconductor business from IBM
IBM and GlobalFoundries on Monday said that they have reached a definitive agreement under which the latter will acquire semiconductor manufacturing business of the former. GlobalFoundries will get intellectual property, world-class technologists and technologies related to IBM Microelectronics. It will also become IBM's exclusive server processor maker for 22nm, 14nm …
Read More »Microsoft may launch its own smartwatch in a few weeks
Microsoft is reportedly preparing to launch its own smartwatch in just a few weeks time, ahead of Apple's huge Watch launch early next year. Microsoft's watch will be focused on health tracking, including a heart-rate monitor, the watch will be capable of syncing with devices running Android, iOS, and Windows Phone, …
Read More »BBC to publish list of removed ‘right to be forgotten’ articles
The BBC is set to publish a list containing all of the articles recently removed from Google Search due to ‘right to be forgotten' requests. The list will be continually updated over time in an effort to always keep it relevant, this way, anything that should be public knowledge will be …
Read More »UK government to extend prison time for Internet trolls
The UK Government is looking to crack down on severe Internet trolling, raising the current maximum prison sentence from six months to two years if the amendment to Criminal Justice and Courts Bill as well as the Malicious Communications Act go through. This news follows on from the harassment of TV Presenter, Chloe …
Read More »South Korea is getting 10Gbps fibre soon
Since I don't live in any of the recently upgraded areas, I'm still drumming my fingers on a regular basis while we wait for fibre to the cabinet to be implemented here, but even I know I'm lucky compared to some with my 16Mbps connection. Over in South Korea though, …
Read More »Google to make big push for legitimate media sources
Google has announced that in the near future, its search features are going to cater much more to legitimate sources of media than it does currently, promising that some of the world's most popular and stubborn pirate sites will no longer feature anywhere near as high in the rankings as …
Read More »Clever chaps build functioning, reversible tractor beam
People often harp on about how we shouldn't be spending money on research into space age technologies, collecting rocks from other planets, or even consider the idea of sending people there, when we have so many problems here on Earth. What people often don't realise is it's these very technologies …
Read More »Dyson launches bacteria killing humidifier
Dyson might be more well known for its vacuums than anything else, but it's released a lot of other clever electronics over the past few decades, including the Airblade hand dryer. Today though it's launching a new product: a humidifier to help combat skin conditions that also uses UV radiation …
Read More »TSMC postpones mass production of 16nm chips to Q2 2015
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. on Thursday gave an update regarding the status of its 16nm fabrication processes. The company said that it is satisfied with the yield, but at the same time postponed the start of mass production using its 16nm manufacturing technology from early 2015 to the second or …
Read More »Google reports weaker than expected third quarter results
Google reported its third quarter earnings last night, revealing a gross revenue of $16.52 billion, acquisition costs of $13.17 billion, GAAP earnings per share of $4.09 and non-GAAP earnings per share of $6.35. Those are some pretty strong numbers, but apparently they weren't strong enough for Wall Street as Google …
Read More »AMD vows not to cut R&D expenses, plans to streamline operations
Although AMD has just announced a plan to reduce its workforce by 7 per cent and align its real estate footprint with its reduced headcount, the company has no plans to reduce spending on research and development (R&D). All the cuts will be made in different segments. While it is …
Read More »NZ journalist raided during work on Snowden documents
Nicky Hager is an independent, New Zealand based journalist, who's perhaps most well known for going after the NZ National party before the latest election, publishing a book which showed key members of the PM's government had sent information about their political opponents to a right wing blogger. Last month, …
Read More »US government still pushing for restrictive copyright bill
Remember SOPA, PIPA and ACTA? Those copyright enforcing, internet freedom restricting bills were set to be pushed through by governments around the world just a few short years ago, but the internet rose up like an angry swarm and swatted them aside. Unfortunately, the clear distaste the world has for these …
Read More »Razer is now valued at over $1 billion
Razer, the US based high-end gaming peripherals company famous for its mice, keyboards, headsets and line of super thin laptops, recently closed a round of funding with Intel on at least a $1 billion valuation. This information has been made public via a leaked staff memo, which was passed on …
Read More »ASML: EUV tools continue to make progress, adoption to start in 2016
Although Intel Corp. does not plan to use lithography with extreme ultraviolet (EUV) wavelength with its 10nm fabrication process, it looks like other makers of semiconductors still pin hopes to take advantage of the EUV in connection with 10nm technology. ASML, one of the leading producers of semiconductor manufacturing tools, …
Read More »Google drops search box support for torrent sites
One of Google's latest additions to its long standing search engine, was “sitelinks,” which gave you links to some of the world's biggest sites' most popular sections from within the Google results pages. It also often bundled a search box to look through that site's content. That's great for end …
Read More »Google could be working on ‘wireless fibre’ speed internet
Although it remains unconfirmed for now, Google could be working on a new standard of wireless internet transmission, which would allow for fibre broadband like speeds of connectivity, without the need for any sort of cable system at all. This is according to sources that Reuters describe as “telecommunications experts,” that have …
Read More »ESA condemns industry death threats
It should come as no surprise to anyone, that while there might still be a lot of arguing back and forth about what the recent GamerGate debacle is about, who's fault it is and if anything of use will actually come of it, that the legitimately scary death threats being …
Read More »UK police drop charges against pirate sports streaming site operator
The UK Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit has decided to drop charges made against a man who had his home raided and was subsequently arrested for running an “industrial scale” pirate sports streaming operation. The original arrest was made back in early September, the raid took place in Greater Manchester. …
Read More »Amazon begins same-day delivery services in the UK
If Amazon has something you need quite desperately, getting a hold of it on the same day you click buy could now be possible, with the launch of the retailer's new same-day delivery service in the UK. It won't make it all the way to do your door, but for …
Read More »ARM: 20nm process tech will not be used by mainstream applications
Due to multiple reasons the majority of developers of various system-on-chip devices will skip 20nm process technology of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. and will use 14nm and 16nm FinFET fabrication processors of TSMC, GlobalFoundries and Samsung Electronics. Traditionally TSMC and other foundries develop multiple different process technologies for different kinds …
Read More »Google invests $500 million in augmented reality company
Google has invested $500 million in to Magic Leap, a ‘cinematic reality' company developing its own headset using a “digital light field” to project ultra realistic images directly on to your eyes. Not a whole lot is known about Magic Leap as a company, it tends to keep its projects …
Read More »Samsung has developed 60GHz Wi-Fi tech to significantly increase speeds
Samsung claims to have developed a new Wi-Fi technology that takes advantage of the 60 Ghz wireless range to bridge the gap between theoretical and actual wireless speeds. Unlike existing 2.4 GHz and 5GHz technologies, Samsung's new 802.11ad standard 60 GHz Wi-Fi manages to maintain maximum speed by eliminating co-channel …
Read More »Dotcom’s team claims government charges are ‘imaginary’
Kim Dotcom has been run through the legal mill several times over the past few years, with his company shut down, his assets seized and his home raided in a short period of time. The only real development though in the ongoing and oft-delayed extradition trial, is that recently the …
Read More »Youtube set to open Manhattan production HQ in November
Youtube might not have the best reputation for supporting its content creators when it comes to copyright claims, but what it lacks in the understanding of fair use, it makes up for in its provision of production equipment and facilities for the site's creators to make use of. Following on from …
Read More »Erik Martin to leave Reddit GM position
Erik Martin, one of Reddit's longest running employees and General Manager of the internet behemoth for the past six years, has announced that he's stepping down from the role and will be leaving the company. Reddit has yet to announce a replacement for his position. “Hard decision, but after 6 …
Read More »Netflix finally works on Linux
Netflix streaming is finally working natively on Linux, without the need to trick the website in to thinking that you're actually running a different OS. Streaming via Google's Chrome browser is currently working on a few distros including Ubuntu, Fedora and the Ubuntu-based Mint. More distros are expected to be …
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