Новости за 20.08.2018

Twitch Prime, the streaming video site’s Amazon-style benefits program, will no longer include ad-free viewing as a complimentary perk starting on September 14th, the company announced today. Initially launched two years ago as a suite of benefits for Amazon Prime subscribers, Twitch Prime has grown into a more robust platform that offers free games, in-game loot for select titles, and a monthly channel subscription credit that can be awarded to a streamer of the member’s choice.

Dontnod has finally revealed the heroes of its upcoming game Life is Strange 2, an indirect sequel to its award-winning episodic series Life is Strange. The game stars two young brothers, Sean and Daniel Diaz (ages 16 and nine, respectively), on the run from authorities following a “tragic event” as they seek refuge in Puerto Lobos, Mexico.

Amazon is discontinuing its two-year-old video game preorder discount program for Prime members on August 28th, the company announced today. In its place, Amazon will offer members a $10 credit with a preorder, but only for select titles. The credit will take up to 35 days to arrive. Once activated, customers will have 60 days to put the money toward a separate purchase on Amazon.

Apple is nearing the release of a long-awaited, completely redesigned successor to its MacBook Air laptop, according to Bloomberg. The new “low-cost” model reportedly features slimmer bezels and a high-resolution Retina display. It will otherwise “look similar to the current MacBook Air,” though port selection is anyone’s guess.

Google’s Undo Send feature has been saving people from embarrassing typos, mistakes, and other email taboos for years on the web version of Gmail. Now, the feature is being carried over to the official mobile version of Google’s email app, starting with a release on the official Android version of Gmail, according to Android Police. The feature should arrive with Gmail version 8.7.

Today, aerospace venture Stratolaunch announced plans to develop a whole suite of rockets that will be able to launch from underneath the wings of the company’s massive six-engine plane. Three entirely new rockets are planned, including a reusable spaceplane that would bring cargo — and, eventually, people — to and from orbit. Stratolaunch says the plan is for the first of these new vehicles to launch in 2022.

Weather app Dark Sky has been updated for iOS today with the same visual-focused upgrade that came to Android users several months ago. The update brings a few new features, most prominently the merging of forecasts into a single page that you can scroll through, which lists current weather conditions over the next hour, day, and week. There’s also a general interface overhaul that changes the app’s signature black-and-white weather icons into colorful sun and clouds.

Ray tracing. It’s a term you’re going to hear a lot now that Nvidia has announced professional and consumer graphics cards that use this technique to produce some of the most life-like simulations possible in games and other animations. So, what is ray tracing exactly, and how does it differ from current graphics rendering techniques?

fNvidia is unveiling its new GeForce RTX 2000 series of graphics cards at Gamescom in Germany today. While we’ve seen a number of teasers and plenty of card leaks recently, the GeForce RTX 2080 is finally official. Based on Nvidia’s new Turing architecture, the RTX 2080 is designed to succeed the popular GTX 1080 and push new real-time ray-tracing effects in upcoming games.

Nvidia is unveiling its new GeForce RTX 2000 series of graphics cards at Gamescom in Germany today. While we’ve seen a number of teasers and plenty of card leaks recently, the GeForce RTX 2080 is finally official. Based on Nvidia’s new Turing architecture, the RTX 2080 is designed to succeed the popular GTX 1080 and push new real-time ray-tracing effects in upcoming games.

Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund is negotiating a more than $1 billion investment into Lucid Motors, an electric car startup run by battery company Atieva, Reuters reports. The Saudis and Lucid are far enough along in discussions that the two sides have drawn up a term sheet, a document typically used to outline the broader points of a potential deal.

We’ve been unable to escape the prolific spread of Snapchat Stories since last year, seeing it superseded by Instagram and copied by everything from WhatsApp to even real estate websites. Now Giphy is announcing that it’s refreshing its homepage to prominently feature Stories, which will be curated by an editorial team. Stories will be centered around the day’s trending subjects, told through GIFs. One story will be published every hour, curated by categories of Entertainment, Sports, and Reactions. Читать дальше...

A convincing and polished, yet entirely fake, advertising campaign under the slogan, “Don’t Believe Every Tweet,” made the rounds early this morning, fooling tech critics and reporters into thinking Twitter had launched a marketing effort centered on its own inability to police fake and misleading information. The company confirmed to The Verge that it has nothing to do with the campaign.

Back in January, Skype announced it was testing end-to-end encrypted chat conversations, secured using Signal Protocol by Open Whisper Systems. Now, the feature is available for all users on Skype iOS, Android, Linux, Mac, and Windows Desktop.

Female users are 79 percent more likely than male users to make in-app purchases in mobile games. The data comes from a marketing report by Liftoff, a firm that studies the mobile gaming market, as spotted by VentureBeat today.

Sony has announced four new PlayStation 4 controller color schemes today for its standard DualShock 4 line, and they are some of the more extravagantly colored models we’ve seen in a while. The four options are berry blue, sunset orange, blue camouflage, and copper. The devices go on sale in September for US and Canada customers with a price tag of $65. The copper color will be a GameStop exclusive in the US for launch.

Facebook is caught in a secret legal fight with the FBI. The fight, which centers on an alleged MS-13 gang member in Fresno, California, has been kept out of public court records, but Reuters broke the story on Friday, citing sources familiar with the situation. According to Reuters, prosecutors are looking to listen in on all Messenger voice calls from the target, similar to a conventional phone wiretap. Facebook says it’s impossible to comply because of the service’s end-to-end encryption, and... Читать дальше...

After nearly two years of debate, NASA has finally approved SpaceX’s plans to load propellant onto its rockets with people on board — a move that has been considered risky by some aerospace experts. However, the approval is contingent upon one thing: SpaceX must successfully demonstrate this fueling method at least five times on its new upgraded Falcon 9 rocket, the Block 5, before the process is certified for human spaceflight.

Smartphone cameras are better than ever, but sometimes there’s just no substitute for a full-sized DSLR. Unfortunately, it seems that Huawei thinks so, too. A shot in the company’s latest commercial for its new Nova 3 smartphone has been revealed by a behind-the-scenes photo to be a DSLR, not the smartphone as the ad alleges (spotted by Reddit user AbdullahSab3, via AndroidPolice).

As a professional DJ, I’ve been obsessed with music and technology for as long as I can remember — performing at parties and festivals around the world, producing records, and even building my own synths. Music has always been a way for people to connect and communicate. It’s part of being human and a language we all share. But thanks to technology, the way we make music is changing faster than ever.

The 2018 Hugo Awards were held last night at the World Science Fiction Convention in San Jose, California. The Hugo award, voted on by members of the fan community, is considered the highest honor for science fiction and fantasy literature.

It may feel like all the attention is on full-fledged smartwatches these days — devices like the Apple Watch, Galaxy Watch, and Fitbit’s own Ionic and Versa watches — but the popular fitness company hasn’t forgotten about its fitness trackers yet. Today, Fitbit is announcing (as the leaks predicted) the Fitbit Charge 3, the latest update to the company’s Charge line of trackers.

The smart home was supposed to make things simple. It was supposed to cook for you, clean for you, pick out your clothes, and gently wake you up by parting the curtains.

Signify is introducing two new Philips Hue lights today that are designed to project color onto your walls. The first are new Hue Signe lamps that can be easily positioned next to a TV against a wall. These lamps are available in a table version or traditional floor lamp, and will fire colorful light onto nearby walls to create ambient lighting that can brighten up the dark areas near a TV. You can even sync with the Hue Sync app to mirror content from a PC or Mac. Signify is also releasing a... Читать дальше...

Nvidia is introducing a new series of GeForce gaming GPUs today. Teasers and leaks have revealed that the graphics card maker will announce at least two new cards, aimed as successors to the popular GTX 1080 series. Nvidia’s GeForce RTX 2080 Ti has leaked multiple times over the weekend, with specifications that reveal it’s a powerful card. Nvidia is expected to focus on real-time ray-tracing during its RTX series introduction, showing how it will allow games to render new cinematic lighting effects. Читать дальше...