As reported by Variety, the company began testing a ‘Netflix Direct’ channel in France that offers curated content in a scheduled, TV-like manner. The test began rolling out November 5, and will roll out more widely in the country starting December. The company says it chose France because “in France, watching traditional TV remains hugely popular with people who just want a ‘lean back’ experience where they don’t have to choose shows....

The first test the streaming giant is performing is a free weekend-long trial. The company will start this experiment in India, where it’ll offer its service for free on the weekend of December 4, as reported by Protocol. India is the first of many countries where Netflix will test this two-day “Streamfest” to hopefully gain more subscribers. The company would want to compete with Disney+ Hotstar in the market, which has more than 8 million subscribers in the country....

A little over a century ago he came up with this big idea that it would take more energy than there is in the entire universe to make an object travel faster than the speed of light. That’s a big bummer for anyone who’s ever dreamed that humankind would one day “explore strange new worlds” and “seek out new life and new civilizations.” We’re going to need warp engines, or something similar, to “boldly go” much further than the confines of our own solar system....

Researchers from the European Space Agency (ESA) spent a decade developing the map from data collected by two Mars orbiters. They found hundreds of thousands of areas containing aqueous mineral deposits, which are created though interactions between rock and water. As the minerals still contain water molecules, they could show locations where we can extract water for human bases on the planet. These outcrops may also provide ideal sites for exploring whether life once began on Mars....

Now 12 days later, the world is in a different place. Almost every single conference has been canceled or postponed, while the few that are holding out think… uhm yeah, what are they thinking actually? (are they waiting to governmental intervention so they can rely on the Force Majeure clause???) Travel restrictions are common as most governments have cracked down on people going to and from countries. It’s only a matter of time before most of the population will be WFH (working from home)....

Nvidia’s legal counsel also claimed that investors can’t rely on “speculative expectations of third-party analysts” as the basis of their suit, which should be dismissed, Law360 reports. Spurned investors have alleged that Nvidia’s financial reports misled them into believing that high-demand for its gaming chips was entirely separate from the cryptocurrency boom. Their suit claims the firm had told analysts that most of its cryptocurrency-related sales came from its Crypto SKU, a cryptocurrency-mining chip released in May 2017....

It’s a hot AI summer out here for everyone who has even the slightest interest in putting the “art” in artificial intelligence. I’m talking about DALL-E 2 and OpenAI’s announcement that its incredible text-to-art generator would be entering a closed-beta. Most exciting of all: an additional one million people will gain access to DALL-E 2. Woohoo! Let’s do a cartwheel. Up front: There would be no cartwheels in the Neural offices at TNW that day....

Currently in beta, these branded stations are auto-populated and then listed within the ‘Stations You Might Like’ section of the app. Initial partners for the new solution include Kleenex, Skechers, StubHub, Taco Bell and Toyota. It’s difficult to predict what each station will look like though. The company said Promoted Stations will “drive Pandora listeners to custom content”, before suggesting they’ll all offer a slightly different blend of brand-related tunes....

The website — called Big Box Collection — is actually quite well done. The little spinning game box in lieu of a loading circle is quite a nice touch. The collection boasts over 600 titles, from the C64 to modern PCs — one of the standouts is a Broken Age sealed Kickstarter box. You can search for a particular game or just take a walk through a past with the entire collection....

The company is going to offer the Polestar 2 fastback in three variants. There will be three powertrain options: based on either a single or dual motor setup, and a long or standard range battery. While offering customers more choice, the changes also help knock about €5,000 ($6,000) off the starting price of the EV. Polestar 2 vehicles now start from €40,000 ($48,000), and can top out at around €60,000 ($71,000)....

According to PornHub’s blog, models can now use cryptocurrency wallet TRONlink to withdraw money in Tether, a stablecoin pegged one-to-one with the US dollar. [Read: Pornhub says less than 1% of users buy subscriptions with cryptocurrency] “USDT transactions can be done globally within a few seconds and there are no fees,” said PornHub. This marks the second cryptocurrency adopted by the site, which began supporting payments in niche cryptocurrency Verge in 2018....

After offering free subscriptions in Italy, Spain, and France, adult entertainment site Pornhub is making its subscription free for everyone across the world — with a view to help to flatten the curve amid lockdowns around the world. The company said it’s extending the free Pornhub premium support, which unlocks select content to everyone across the world until April 23. — Pornhub ARIA (@Pornhub) March 24, 2020 In a statement, Corey Price, Vice President of Pornhub, said the company wanted to provide a way for people to pass the time under lockdown: The adult entertainment firm is also donating 85 percent of its video sales to performers who had to stop working due to the COVID-19 pandemic....

The e-commerce giant has been testing a system that provides real-time monitoring of the roads and drivers. The company told Reuters that it recently started rolling out the tech across its delivery fleet: The system, called Driveri, was developed by transport tech startup Netradyne. It’s comprised of four separate HD cameras: a road-facing view, a driver-facing view, and two side views. [Read: How much does it cost to buy, own, and run an EV?...

Writing is usually a pretty solitary business. Sure, the end result is hopefully spread far and wide, read and considered, and the catalyst for all kinds of talk and thoughtful examination. But the process of sitting down, opening a digital document or uncapping a pen, then letting the words flow out almost always happens alone in a quiet space with little to no safety net beyond the author’s own thoughts and feelings....

Gamers have been hit particularly hard. Users of the PlayStation Network, Steam, and Fortnite have all reported network issues. DownDetector, which tracks outages around the world, is still going strong though: — Ken Nalbone (@KenNalbone) July 22, 2021 The source appears to have been caused by an issue at the Akamai Edge DNS service, and some sites are now slowly coming back online. — Akamai Technologies (@Akamai) July 22, 2021 We’ll let you know when we have an update....

Long story long: for those of you who have never used AirTags before, what makes them so good at finding stuff is the fact that Apple leverages its entire ‘Find My’ network to keep track of an object. Almost every iOS and Mac device can ping Apple’s network when it comes within Bluetooth range of an AirTag. Considering there are over 1.8 billion active Apple devices as of January 2022, it’s rare an AirTag will go long without sending its location to a nearby iPhone or MacBook in a densely populated area....

If you’re interested in the world of mobility tech, EVs, self-driving cars, and have no idea where to start, let me point you in the right direction with some recommendations from the experts. 1. Sensors in Automotive Earlier this year, we interviewed human-machine interaction PhD researcher, Liza Dixon. Her field of research specifically examines how drivers and automated vehicle systems can work together. Hopefully, the insights gained through her research will help lead to the design of safer autonomous vehicles....

South Korea’s KRAFTON Inc, which holds rights for PUBG, announced that it’s going to make a new game, PUBG Mobile India, to alleviate security and privacy concerns. Last week, KRAFTON signed a global deal with Microsoft to host the game on Azure. “With privacy and security of Indian player data being a top priority for PUBG Corporation, the company will conduct regular audits and verifications on the storage systems holding Indian users’ personally identifiable information to reinforce security and ensure that their data is safely managed,” the company said....

Stellar’s consensus architecture is relatively centralized when compared to Bitcoin. While this does allow it to process transactions with low fees and fast confirmation times, it does require users to place more trust in the validators on the network. Regardless of this sacrifice, Stellar is almost always listed in the top cryptocurrencies. XLM’s market cap is currently $1.19 billion, and ranked 14th — just behind Monero. XLM/USD 2019 Q3 performance recap As with the rest of the cryptocurrency market, Stellar had a pretty tough third quarter....

Now, one of the interesting elements about this generation of consoles is the lack of an obvious graphical wow factor. In other upgrade cycles there’s been a clearer visual upgrade, while with the Series X and PS5, improved graphics is something you notice more when you go back to the previous machines. This means that, for a lot of people, there’s not a clear reason to get a new machine....