Senior Correspondent Arnold Woodworth's Weekly Web Wrap-up

How Apple is trying to solve some of the world's major health problems

Apple built tools into the iPhone which allow researchers to build sophisticated medical apps. These apps use the iPhone's suite of sensors to monitor location, heart rate, and other factors.

Doctors have embraced the platform and created apps that track and study autism, concussions, heart disease, epilepsy, and other health problems.

http://www.businessinsider.com/6-health-problems-that-iphones-are-helping-to-solve-2016-2



Why does Apple keep making the Mac?

The simple reason is this: The Mac is a "halo" product. What this means, essentially, is that the Mac creates an image under which all other Apple products - from the TV, to the iPad, to the iPhone - are viewed.

The Mac mini, the cheapest computer Apple sells, is beautifully tiny, while the iMac has a presence that can be genuinely felt, thanks to a distinctive design that has adorned the desks of almost every film set ever.

The second reason, which is tied into the first, is that because Apple has been making the Mac for so long it has become well known and, as such, defines Apple as a brand and as a company.

The only company that isn't seeing a negative trend for its computers is Apple. So why is that?

The answer is simple: The Mac is so well known, has spawned another well known product, and continues to be the best computer - desktop or laptop - available today. In essence, the Mac is as premium as they come - and this defines the Apple brand.

the loyal following who originally bought the Mac - predominantly creatives and developers - were the first people who bought the iPhone and, more importantly, the people who persuaded their friends, parents, grandparents, and siblings to buy one.

Apple continues to service these users - which could be described as "power" users - with the Mac, adding another reason to keep the line going.

http://www.techradar.com/news/computing/apple/why-does-apple-keep-making-the-mac--1314907



Sleep++ 2.0 Proves That There’s Still A Market For Apple Watch Apps

Sleep++ turns your Watch into a sleep-tracking device and gives you insights about your sleep.

Sleep++ leverages the accelerometer in your Watch to register deep sleep, light sleep, restlessness and wakefulness. I’ve been using it for the past week and it’s interesting to wake up in the morning and get instant feedback about your night. It’s been pretty accurate in my experience.

http://techcrunch.com/2016/02/11/sleep-2-0-proves-that-theres-still-a-market-for-apple-watch-apps/



Trolls are trying to fool people into bricking their iPhones

A newly discovered bug renders iPhones useless if the system date is set to January 1, 1970.

Why would anyone purposely set their phone to a date 45 years in the past? Well, one possibility is that they've been fooled by a troll.

http://www.businessinsider.com/trolls-trick-users-into-bricking-iphones-2016-2



DON'T try this at home
A weird bug will brick your iPhone if you set it to a certain date

For the iPhone, January 1, 1970 was not a good day.

There's a bug that will render modern iPhones, iPads, and iPod touch models useless. All you have to do to turn your expensive iOS device into a brick is set its clock to the aforementioned date.

Manually restoring the device through iTunes doesn't work, so the only fix for victims of the bug is to pay a visit to their local Apple store.

http://www.businessinsider.com/janurary-1-1970-bug-bricks-iphones-2016-2



‘Error 53’ fury mounts as Apple software update threatens to kill your iPhone 6

Antonio Olmos had his handset repaired while on an assignment for the Guardian in Macedonia. “I was in the Balkans covering the refugee crisis in September when I dropped my phone. Because I desperately needed it for work I got it fixed at a local shop, as there are no Apple stores in Macedonia. They repaired the screen and home button, and it worked perfectly.”

He says he thought no more about it, until he was sent the standard notification by Apple inviting him to install the latest software. He accepted the upgrade, but within seconds the phone was displaying “error 53” and was, in effect, dead.

When Olmos, who says he has spent thousands of pounds on Apple products over the years, took it to an Apple store in London, staff told him there was nothing they could do, and that his phone was now junk. He had to pay £270 for a replacement and is furious.

How can a company deliberately make its own product useless with an upgrade, and not warn customers about it?

“The whole thing is extraordinary. How can a company deliberately make their own products useless with an upgrade and not warn their own customers about it? Outside of the big industrialised nations, Apple stores are few and far between, and damaged phones can only be brought back to life by small third-party repairers.

Could Apple’s move, which appears to be designed to squeeze out independent repairers, contravene competition rules? Car manufacturers, for example, are not allowed to insist that buyers only get their car serviced by them.

http://www.theguardian.com/money/2016/feb/05/error-53-apple-iphone-software-update-handset-worthless-third-party-repair



Apple under pressure as lawyers pledge action over 'Error 53’ codes

In the UK, a barrister told the Guardian that Apple’s “reckless” policy of effectively killing people’s iPhones following the software upgrade could potentially be viewed as an offence under the Criminal Damage Act 1971. The act makes it an offence to intentionally destroy the property of another.

If Apple continues with this policy, it could find itself fighting multiple legal battles.

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/feb/08/apple-under-pressure-lawyers-error-53-codes



Apple will replace some USB-C cables because of a 'design issue’

Apple has announced a worldwide replacement program for the USB-C cable that it shipped between April and June 8th of last year. The cable was released alongside the 12-inch Retina Macbook and also sold separately at the Apple Store.

The company has already corrected its mistake and has been selling fixed USB-C cables for months, but early MacBook buyers may be stuck with a bum one. If you gave Apple your mailing address when registering your MacBook, you'll receive a new cable by the end of this month. Everyone else can either make a Genius Bar reservation, visit a local authorized Apple service provider, or contact Apple customer support. And if your original cable failed and you bought another one, you may be eligible for a refund.

http://www.theverge.com/2016/2/12/10982062/apple-usb-c-cable-replacements-announced



Walt Mossberg says Apple’s apps need work

In the last couple of years, however, I’ve noticed a gradual degradation in the quality and reliability of Apple’s core apps, on both the mobile iOS operating system and its Mac OS X platform. It’s almost as if the tech giant has taken its eye off the ball when it comes to these core software products, while it pursues big new dreams, like smartwatches and cars.

Let me be clear: most of the time, Apple apps work well enough, sometimes delightfully well.

But the exceptions are increasing.

http://www.theverge.com/2016/2/3/10900612/walt-mossberg-apple-iphone-ios-mac-osx-app-problems



Influential and beloved iOS developer has some harsh things to say about the Apple Watch

The Apple Watch is far from a failure. It seems to be growing in popularity with each passing quarter and overall consumer satisfaction with the device appears to be extremely high. Still, the Apple Watch hasn’t exactly taken off in the way that some analysts were anticipating.

One of the issues preventing the Apple Watch from picking up steam is that the device still lacks an appealing killer app.

http://bgr.com/2016/02/09/apple-watch-confused-product-marco-arment/

https://marco.org/2016/02/05/watch



GitHub Users Find Women's Code Better Than Men's — Until They Know Who Wrote It

The Github.com community actually approves more code by women... until they know it's by women. A new study published inPeerJfound that software developers on GitHub respond to contributions differently when they know there are women behind them.

http://www.bustle.com/articles/141667-github-users-find-womens-code-better-than-mens-until-they-know-who-wrote-it



Very good Video:
Cops arrest teen for hack and leak of DHS, FBI data

Hacker did more than access info.  He altered the encryption.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2016/02/13/cops-arrest-teen-for-hack-and-leak-dhs-fbi-data.html



Should law enforcement be able to read your text messages?

Law enforcement claims it is so hampered by security measures on electronic communications that it hurts efforts to track down criminals, and has called for tech companies to give them a so-called backdoor. The tech and security industries says there’s no way to do that without also giving hackers a foot in.

two congressmen introduced a bipartisan bill that would stop states from requiring tech companies to build back doors into electronic communications for law enforcement, calling it an issue that requires a national decision.

”If our government can’t keep secret 20-something million security records, the most highly sensitive data the government has, no one should have any confidence our government can keep secret a backdoor encryption key,” Ted Lieu said, referencing the Office of Personnel Management data breach disclosed last year.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/should-law-enforcement-be-able-to-read-your-text-messages-2016-02-10



Banning Encryption Is Pretty Pointless, Report Finds

The majority of encryption products on the market today are developed outside the United States, according to a new report, raising serious doubts about whether the U.S. government could actually limit encryption tools by building backdoors for law enforcement access.

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2499184,00.asp



US intelligence chief: we might use the internet of things to spy on you

“In the future, intelligence services might use the [internet of things] for identification, surveillance, monitoring, location tracking, and targeting for recruitment, or to gain access to networks or user credentials,” Clapper said.

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/feb/09/internet-of-things-smart-home-devices-government-surveillance-james-clapper



Video:
Smithsonian Gives Virtual Look Inside Apollo 11

http://www.marketwatch.com/video/smithsonian-gives-virtual-look-inside-apollo-11/88AFAE8C-F947-499F-952F-7D5A444DC988.html



NASA's Gorgeous New Space Tourism Posters Are Retro-Futuristic and Fantastic

http://www.adweek.com/adfreak/nasas-gorgeous-new-space-tourism-posters-are-retro-futuristic-and-fantastic-169633



NASA's New Posters and the Retro Travel Ads That Inspired Them

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/02/jupe-forever-but-earths-nice-too/462477/



Video:
Propaganda Games: Sesame Credit - The True Danger of Gamification - Extra Credits

How the Chinese government might use social media to increase oppression and conformity.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lHcTKWiZ8sI

Senior Correspondent Arnold Woodworth's Weekly Web Wrap-up for February 6, 2016

Battling Postpartum Depression with an iPhone

 

"I am so grateful that I documented the good moments during such a dark time, because they remind me that even when we’re in pain, there is beauty. Those amazing moments were real, lovely, and aren’t cancelled out just because I was struggling."

 

http://www.slashgear.com/battling-postpartum-depression-with-an-iphone-02425115/

 

 

 

Buying a Refurbished iPad is Actually a Good Idea

 

According to Apple, before a model gets their "certified refurbished" stamp, it will undergo a thorough test and inspection process. The device is cleaned, the battery is replaced, and all parts identified in the testing process as problematic are swapped with new ones. After Apple deems it worthy, it gets a new serial number (indicating the refurbished status), and is re-packaged with a new box, cables, and documentation.

To further ease your mind, refurbished iPads come with a 1 year limited warranty.

 

http://www.macworld.com/article/3027532/macs/buying-a-refurbished-ipad-is-actually-a-good-idea.html

 

 

 

Apple's gigantic iPad Pro outsold Microsoft's entire Surface lineup last quarter — and it was only on sale for 6 weeks

 

Apple's newest iPad model, the 12.9-inch iPad Pro, outsold Microsoft's entire line of Surface tablets last holiday season.

 

http://www.businessinsider.com/ipad-pro-outsold-surface-2016-2

 

 

 

Here's the real story behind that mysterious 'Error 53' message on your iPhone

 

It's actually a smart security measure from Apple designed to protect all the personal stuff you keep on your iPhone tied to Touch ID like credit cards in Apple Pay.

 

http://www.businessinsider.com/iphone-error-53-2016-2

 

 

 

PHOTOS:

Here's all the progress Apple's made on its spaceship campus — the 'best office building in the world’

 

http://www.businessinsider.com/apple-spaceship-campus-2-photos-show-office-building-taking-shape-2016-2

 

 

 

An Expanding Universe of Space Apps

Start with the official NASA app, which is easy to navigate and is free on iOSand Android.
It’s educational, fun and enlightening to browse through the news and recent images from NASA’s many missions.

Check out EO Science 2.0 AR from the European Space Agency (free on iOS and Android).
EO Science 2.0 AR won’t keep you occupied for long: While it’s visually attractive, it doesn’t contain much real science or explanation — you’ll have to search online for that information to better understand the maps. But the app is a lot of fun and will excite younger users.

And that’s just for starters.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/04/technology/personaltech/an-expanding-universe-of-space-apps.html?emc=edit_ct_20160204&nl=personaltech&nlid=11893479&_r=0

 

Apple Beefs Up Its Security Team By Hiring Zero-Day Exploit Team

 

Last summer, Xeno Kovah and Trammell Hudson unveiled a serious zero-day vulnerability in OS X letting malware creators completely brick your Mac without any way to reset it to its factory status.

 

Thunderstrike 2 infected Thunderbolt devices like Ethernet adaptors or external DVD drives. If you reboot your Mac with an infected Thunderbolt device plugged in, the Mac firmware will execute the option ROM on the Thunderbolt accessory before booting OS X. It then bricks the firmware, rendering the Mac unusable.

 

And it looks like Apple didn’t just fix the vulnerability — it has also hired the team behind this exploit to work on security.

 

It makes sense that Apple would hire these security experts. Many tech companies hire hackers to fix security holes before they become public. It’s a great way to make sure that your products remain as secure as possible.

 

http://techcrunch.com/2016/02/03/apple-beefs-up-its-security-team-by-hiring-zero-day-exploit-team/

 

 

 

Silencing Noisy Web Pages

 

The most recent version of the Safari browser for OS X 10.11 (El Capitan) includes controls that let you quickly mute audio coming from any open tab in Safari's window.

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/04/technology/personaltech/silencing-noisy-web-pages.html

 

 

 

The App Bubble is dead, long live the App Revolution!

So the App Bubble has popped. But the App Revolution is just getting started. And I'm still betting on the App Revolution in many ways, including holding onto my long-held App Revolution stocks like Google, Facebook and Netflix.

I believe that over the next five years, the great fortunes in the App Revolution will be made, just as the companies that survived the Great Dot-Com Bubble eventually created great fortunes.

We'll want to continue to own the dominant App Revolution companies that have created platforms like Google with Android and Apple with iOS or that have become de facto standards like Netflix with TV and Facebook with social and messaging.

Apps are already a trillion-dollar industry and will only grow from here.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-app-bubble-is-dead-long-live-the-app-revolution-2016-02-05

 

 

 

Video:

Scientists have found a troubling health trend among people who check social media a lot

 

Not getting enough sleep — trouble sleeping at night.

 

http://www.businessinsider.com/social-media-affect-sleep-2016-2

 

 

Nootropic Brain Drugs Rise in Popularity for Today’s Cutthroat Corporate Climbers

Nootropics, from the Greek “noos,” for “mind,” are chemical supplements that claim to improve cognitive function, increase alertness and strengthen memory and recall.

“Other employees will burn out and ask me, ‘How did you deal with that crazy week?’ ” Andrew said. “It’s like a secret weapon.”

Besides a small dose of caffeine, Rise, which is manufactured in United States, contains two ingredients. The first is L-theanine, an amino acid most commonly found in green tea, which supposedly improves cognition and acts as a mood-booster. The second is bacopa monnieri, an herb that is meant to increase memory performance—Rise is, by weight, more than half bacopa.

These supplements aren’t new, or even terribly experimental. Bacopa, L-theanine and caffeine can all be bought on their own as over-the-counter supplements at local health food stores or pharmacies. What Mr. Brandt is doing is packaging them in a way that makes the concept of a brain-booster more, well, easy to swallow: a nice bottle, no-bullshit packaging and a simple subscription delivery.

“I try to promote brain health so people don’t develop a disease,” Dr. Isaacson said. “In that context, I’m comfortable. But when it comes to trying to game your system and push yourself to new heights … I don’t know. This is, in some ways, uncharted territory in the medical field.”

Dr. Isaacson worries that in the rush to alleviate “symptoms,” nootropics bypass causes.

Interest in pushing the brain beyond its natural limitations is advancing rapidly, even while the medical community is grappling and debating.

Noots bristle at the idea of a lobbyist-laden D.C. body popping up at any moment and taking their stacks away. But as the Nature piece points out, what we’re experimenting with here—the human brain—is possibly the most sensitive and mysterious organ in our body.

http://observer.com/2015/04/nootropics/

 

 

 

The Government Might Subpoena Your Toaster

Law-enforcement officials say they’re running out of ways to spy on criminals and terrorists. Maybe they’re not looking in the right places.

The government could rely on the fast-expanding network of sensors, microphones, and cameras that have broken free from their usual homes in computers, tablets, and smartphones, and taken up residence in smart TVs and intelligent thermostats, networked security cameras and children’s toys, car dashboards, and kitchen appliances.

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/02/why-the-government-might-subpoena-your-toaster/459696/

 

Scammers and Spammers: Inside Online Dating's Sex Bot Con Job

the widespread use of sexbots — artificially-intelligent programs, posing as real people, intended to seduce lonely hearts into paying for premium service. Bloggers poured over the data, estimating that of the 5.5 million female profiles on the site, as few as 12,000 were real women — allegations that Ashley Madison denied.

A whopping 59 percent of all online traffic — not just dating sites — is generated by bots, according to the tech analyst firm, Are You a Human.

Keeping the automated personalities at bay has become a central challenge for software developers. "It's really difficult to find them," says Ben Trenda, Are You Human's CEO.

The fact that AI con artists are up to such tricks isn't surprising or new. But what's truly phenomenal is the durability of this online hustle, and the millions of saps still falling for it.

http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/features/scammers-and-spammers-inside-online-datings-sex-bot-con-job-20160201

The government likes to wail that encryption is the devil and is causing its surveillance efforts to go dark, but a new report by Harvard University debunked that notion; at worst encryption might cause some dim spots, but overall surveillance opportunities are brighter than ever and will even grow. In part, that’s thanks to the Internet of Things.

the "going dark" encryption debate rarely includes discussions of the “ever-expanding ‘Internet of things,’ where telemetry from teakettles, televisions and light bulbs might prove surprisingly, and worryingly, amenable to subpoena from governments around the world.”

The report said “If the Internet of Things has as much impact as is predicted, the future will be even more laden with sensors that can be commandeered for law enforcement surveillance; and this is a world far apart from one in which opportunities for surveillance have gone dark.”

http://www.computerworld.com/article/3028077/security/going-dark-debunked-boundless-surveillance-opportunities-via-the-internet-of-things.html



The paper is the result of more than a year of work by a panel of 12 authors, including an esteemed cryptographer, a former federal judge, and a former NSA general counsel.

The authors run down four main factors that will keep those new areas from going dark without state intervention. First, they argue that end-to-end encryption is incompatible with the data collection needed to make money from online services like Gmail and Facebook. They also argue that the modern web is too fragmented for comprehensive encryption to exist at a broad scale. Even if content encryption became widespread, it wouldn't protect metadata, the so-called "front of the envelope" information that can't be encrypted and provides crucial information to investigators looking to map criminal networks. Finally, the authors point to networked sensors and the so-called "Internet of Things," as persistent sources of surveillance data that police can tap into in the future.

http://www.theverge.com/2016/2/1/10887838/criminals-going-dark-terrorism-berkman-center

 

The clock is ticking on a time bomb that could blow up a free internet: the TPP

After years of secrecy, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement has finally been released to the public. The shadowy process and overreaching scope of the deal have sparked an international outcry; it’s been roundly condemned as an attack on worker’s rights, the environment, public health, small businesses and startups.

But perhaps the biggest concern is over the impact that it will have on the internet.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/nov/06/clock-ticking-time-bomb-blow-up-free-internet-tpp



Text of the Trans-Pacific Partnership

http://tpp.mfat.govt.nz/text



Download a Zip file of all 30 Chapters (excluding Annexes) [ZIP, 3.15MB]

http://www.mfat.govt.nz/downloads/trade-agreement/transpacific/TPP-text/TPP_All-Chapters.zip

 

Find the Home and End buttons on a Mac - How to - Macworld UK

Find the Home and End buttons on a Mac - How to - Macworld UK: ""

(Via.)

Opinion: 6 years after its introduction, iPad remains a long play for Apple

Opinion: 6 years after its introduction, iPad remains a long play for Apple: ""

(Via.)

Senior Correspondent Arnold Woodworth's Weekly Web Wrap-up for January 30, 2016

Moving Your iTunes Library to a New Mac and burning iTunes play list to a CD

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/26/technology/personaltech/moving-your-itunes-library-to-a-new-mac.html?emc=edit_ct_20160128&nl=personaltech&nlid=11893479

 

 

 

How to Reset Apple's Thunderbolt Display

 

http://www.macrumors.com/how-to/reset-thunderbolt-display-smc-nvram/

 

 

 

Use this clever trick to see your iPhone's true signal strength

 

http://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-see-iphones-true-cell-signal-strength

 

 

 

4 email apps that are better than the one that comes with your iPhone

 

http://www.techinsider.io/the-4-best-email-apps-2016-1

 

 

 

Apple asks FCC to recognize Made For iPhone hearing aids to encourage accessibility innovation

 

http://9to5mac.com/2016/01/30/apple-fcc-mfi-hearing-aid/

 

 

 

Let’s get this out of the way first: Despite what you may have heard, the iPhone is not dying. Neither, by extension, is Apple.

 

But if Apple is now hitting a plateau, it’s important to remember that it’s one of the loftiest plateaus in the history of business. The $18.4 billion profit that Apple reported on Tuesday is the most ever earned by any company in a single quarter.

So this column will try to do something tricky: explore what’s ailing Apple without going off the deep end. Here’s my ice-cold take: Apple is doing quite O.K.

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/28/technology/no-need-to-fret-apple-is-doing-fine.html?_r=0

 

 

 

Here’s why the news about Apple is so bad

The author has confidence in this bad-news forecast, but NOT because he has any special insight into Apple’s business. It instead derives from the all-too-predictable ways in which Wall Street analysts revise their forecasts: A downward revision is far more likely to be followed by another downward revision than it is by an upward one.

research has shown that analysts are both slow to react to new information (especially bad news) and loath to deviate far from the consensus of their fellow analysts. Both factors conspire to make it look as though analysts are piling on when bad news begins to mount.

Needless to say, this avalanche of downward revisions causes a stock to decline even further. And that, in turn, often leads analysts to downwardly revise their forecasts yet again. The picture that emerges is of a downward spiral of bad news, downward revisions and price declines.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/heres-why-the-news-about-apple-is-so-bad-2016-01-26

 

you're going to see a lot of tech pundits spewing doom and gloom over the next few days now that Apple's most important, profitable product is no longer growing the way it used to. 

But the iPhone is far from in trouble ...... because of iOS.

 

Developers make more money by making and selling apps for iOS than for Android.

http://www.businessinsider.com/why-the-iphone-always-wins-2016-1

 

 

 

Tim Cook: Apple Seeing 'Extreme Conditions Unlike Anything We've Experienced Before' in the Global Economy

What’s keeping Tim Cook up at night?  The economic challenges all over the world.

 

“Notwithstanding record results, we began to see some signs of economic softness in Greater China earlier this month, most notably in Hong Kong,” he said.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-01-27/tim-cook-we-re-seeing-extreme-conditions-unlike-anything-we-ve-experienced-before-in-the-global-economy

 

 

Tim Cook, who last week told Wall Street that the company’s sales growth is being constrained by “an environment now that is dramatically different from a macroeconomic point of view” than a year earlier. Apple’s forecast for revenue this quarter was about $4 billion below what analysts had been expecting. “It is clear that the economic piece is large” as a factor in Apple’s outlook, Cook said. 

Unfortunately, Apple’s customers, people who buy iPhones, are probably the last ones to realize global economic weakness is spreading. Cook’s remarks simply confirmed what everyone has known or suspected for months—namely, there’s a breakdown occurring in commodity-dependent economies and a broad repricing of currencies.

 

The path to prosperity doesn’t lie in resigning the company to being a dividend payer. Tech companies that do so end up becoming irrelevant. Nor is it the business of a company to engage in dubious M&A for the sake of appearing to do something in order to satisfy people who are impatient and scared. 

The true job of Apple, or any technology company, is to use components such as chips and software to solve complex problems, and by so doing make the world a better place. That is their mission, and that is all that matters. Profit, and stock price appreciation, dividends, and buybacks, flow from that and only that. 

http://www.barrons.com/articles/apples-tim-cook-is-smarter-than-you-think-1454129603

 

 

Apple: The Beginning Of The End

 

The author places Apple in the category of iconic growth stocks covering the past 50 to 60 years. 

 

The author names several other companies that had meteoric runs of a decade or more.

 

He then wrote:

The takeaway is nothing lasts forever. Academics rightly point out that the average lifespan for a growthie is 5 years.

 

Then he wrote about how many “iconic" companies eventually flamed out.  Nearly all of them.

 

Nobody wants to face clear indicators of market saturation of the worldwide iPhone market.

 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/martinsosnoff/2016/01/29/apple-the-beginning-of-the-end/#6f5bacf21c82

 

 

 

But this author is still very optimistic about Apple.  He wrote:

 

I own Apple stock because it's a Revolutionary Company. And that's why we go back and think about why the Apple Platform/Ecosystem is so key to the long-term.

 

Apple's earnings report covered just the last 90 days and their guidance is for the next 90 days ... 90 days. We're here to build our portfolios over the next 10,000 days.

Enterprise, Cloud, App Store, iTunes, Software Services revenues are a large part of why I've long said that Apple and Google are a couple of the best ways to invest in the App Revolution.

 

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-feds-going-to-cut-rates-not-raise-them-2016-01-28

 

 

 

5 Best (and Easy) Open Source Website Builders

http://www.smallbusinesscomputing.com/slideshows/5-best-and-easy-open-source-website-builders.html

 

Video:
Hidden Facebook tricks you need to know

http://www.businessinsider.com/hidden-facebook-tricks-you-need-2016-1

Facebook has officially made its live-streaming feature available. It improves upon Periscope by being directly integrated into Facebook, as opposed to Periscope being a separate app.

 

The guy in the video says its another way to keep you still annoyed with Facebook.

 

http://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-live-streaming-feature-periscope-twitter-2016-1



Facebook's best-kept secret is a second website that's amazing for talking to your friends

 

Facebook launched Messenger.com back in April. But almost no one seems to know it exists.

 

http://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-secret-second-website-messenger-com-app-desktop-2016-1

A Computer Has Beaten a Human Champion at Go. What Next?

On May 12, 2014, Wired magazine ran an article headlined “The Mystery of Go, the Ancient Game That Computers Still Can’t Win.”

At that time, computer experts said it would take 10 years to make a computer better than the human world champion.

Go is a board game that’s orders of magnitude more complex than chess.

On January 27, 2016, Google announced that AlphaGo, a program built by its DeepMind artificial intelligence lab, had defeated the European Go champion, without a handicap, in a five-game match last October. The score: 5-0.

The next test will come in March, when AlphaGo challenges the world champion, Lee Sedol, in a five-game match in Seoul.

Go is a constrained environment (as is Chess), albeit a vast one, in which both contestants have access to perfect information, albeit too much information to fully process, and share the same perfectly defined goal. Real life is not a game, and no algorithm yet devised could begin to approach the mental flexibility required to navigate it in the way that humans do.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2016/01/28/a_computer_google_s_alphago_has_beaten_a_human_go_champion_what_s_next.html

Even the best antivirus likely can't save your files from a ransomware infection

One of the most prevalent forms of malware out there right now is called ransomware, a virus that encrypts a user's files, leaving them scrambled unless the victim pays for the decryption key.

It’s a criminal business model that has proven extremely profitable. 

http://www.businessinsider.com/fighting-ransomware-with-antivirus-2016-1

NSA's Hacker-in-Chief: We Don't Need Zero-Days To Get Inside Your Network

 

many security experts have suggested that the role of "zero-day vulnerabilities" in government-sponsored hacking has perhaps been overstated.

Including, now, the head of the NSA's most elite and secretive hacking unit.

In an unprecedented talk on Thursday at the USENIX Enigma security conference in San Francisco, Rob Joyce, chief of NSA's Tailored Access Operations (TAO), downplayed the importance of zero-days and the degree to which nation-state hackers like those in his unit depend on them.

 

“I will tell you that persistence and focus will get you in, will achieve that exploitation without the zero-days,” he said.  “There's so many more vectors that are easier, less risky and quite often more productive than going down that route.”

 

Joyce suggests that the more powerful weapon in the NSA's hacking arsenal isn't some stockpile of secret bugs, but superior resources and patience.

 

http://motherboard.vice.com/read/nsas-hacker-in-chief-we-dont-need-zero-days-to-get-inside-your-network-rob-boyce

 

 

 

NSA’s top hacking boss explains how to protect your network from his attack squads

“If you really want to protect your network you have to know your network, including all the devices and technology in it,” Rob Joyce said. “In many cases we know networks better than the people who designed and run them.”

 

“Well-run networks really do make our job hard,” Joyce said.

Once you use a cloud company you are essentially handing your data over to them and relying on their security, so he warned due diligence is even more important than usual.

AW comment:  That includes even Apple’s iCloud.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/01/28/nsas_top_hacking_boss_explains_how_to_protect_your_network_from_his_minions/

Mom Thanks Apple Store Employee Who Helped Her Son With Special Needs

Mom Thanks Apple Store Employee Who Helped Her Son With Special Needs: ""

(Via.)

Problems getting Yahoo! Mail through Apple Mail. Here are three free alternatives

I recently got an e-mail from a fellow MacValleyite complaining that Apple Mail would not receive Yahoo! Mail any more. They use Snow Leopard 10.6.8. 

I then checked my own Apple Mail running under 10.11.2. I found that Apple Mail had stopped receiving Yahoo! Mail early in January. I could find nothing to fix the problem. So I knew I needed an alternative to access Yahoo! Mail.

I need Yahoo! Mail because I have ATT U-Verse and Wireless service. ATT has contracted with Yahoo to use their e-mail as ATT’s e-mail. That’s how I get my notification each month that my U-Verse bill is ready to be paid. 

I can’t ditch Yahoo! Mail without switching Internet Providers. That’s a hassle for the future.

So, what alternatives did I find to Apple Mail for receiving Yahoo! Mail. I found three of them.

 

The first was to use Yahoo!’s Web client. I just used Safari to log into Yahoo.com and Yahoo! Mail came right up. 

The second was to download and install Mozilla’s Thunderbird e-mail client.  Thunderbird has the advantage of working with both IMAP and POP3 e-mail providers. It has many add-ins. The only criticism I’ve read about concerns its esthetic appearance. It still looks the same as it did 10 years ago. 

If you want an e-mail client with an up to date appearance, may I suggest Nylas N1?  It is advertised as an “extensible, open source mail client”. If you want to try the latest e-mail client, this is it. 

Right now, it’s free. It’s easy to set up your e-mail accounts. It only supports IMAP from what I could tell. Right now the developers want to encourage as many other developers as possible to make plug-ins for this app. It is NOT compatible with the Thunderbird plug-ins, though. 

 

That’s my off the cuff suggestions for getting Yahoo! Mail if Apple Mail has stopped working on this account for you. 

 

Tom Briant

Editor, MacValley Blog