Tech News 2Night 186 (Transcript)

[Top TN2 Animation ] Tonight! Apple might announce new iPads on October 16th, Facebook is getting into healthcare, and it seems everyone is interested in mobile messaging... Tech News 2Night is Next! [TWiT Open] [Main TN2 Open] This is Tech News 2Night Episode #186, for Friday October 3, 2014 Citrix GoToAssist the #1 Global Market Leader in Remote Support. Sign up for GoToAssist before October 10th to get another Citrix product FREE for 6 months! Visit GoToAssist dot com and get started! I'm Jason Howell, Let's get right to the Tech Feed! Re/Code is reporting that Apple will hold its next special event on Thursday, Oct. 16 — not the 21st as previously rumored - citing sources familiar with the company's plans. The event will likely include the latest updates to its iPad line such as a gold iPad model and TouchID, new retina iMacs, and OS X Yosemite. The event will reportedly be held at the company’s Town Hall Auditorium in Cupertino.. .though Apple has officially declined comment. US District Judge Yvonne Gonzales Rogers has given the go-ahead for an antitrust lawsuit against Apple, over accusations it used digital rights management, or DRM, to unlawfully maintain a stronghold in the iPod market. The plaintiffs are a class of consumers who bought iPods between 2006 and 2009, and are asking for $350 on the grounds that Apple used its FairPlay DRM system to "lock in" its customers and make it costly to switch to technology built by competitors, such as Real Networks. Because Apple kept updating iTunes, it ensured songs bought from Real's competing digital music store couldn't be used on iPods. Almost ten years ago, US District Judge James Ware ruled for Apple in an initial version of the case, finding there was nothing illegal about installing software that made their product incompatible with competitors. The plaintiffs returned in 2010 with a new complaint, focused on RealNetworks' specific work-around for the Apple DRM and Apple's counter-attack. Judge Ware retired in 2012, and the case moved to Gonzales Rogers. Apple now has a choice to either strike a deal or face a costly trial in front of a jury, which has been set for November 17 in Oakland, California. / The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Yahoo plans to reinvest some of the cash it made from Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba's IPO into....Snapchat. The Journal is citing 3 anonymous people familiar with the matter, who say the investment hasn’t yet closed, but would value Snapchat at $10 billion. When Yahoo paid $1 billion for a 40% stake in Alibaba back in 2005, the investment grew to be worth tens of billions of dollars and offered Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer some time and money to reinvent Yahoo's core business. Snapchat, whose 3-year old app lets people send messages, photos and video that disappear after several seconds, has more than 100 million users, and the company is planning to debut a new service for vanishing news articles and advertisements in the coming weeks, people familiar with the matter told the Journal in August. The Yahoo funding would define Snapchat as one of the most valuable startups in the world, and one of the highest valued startups in history to have no revenue stream. / Facebook is joining Apple and Google by getting into the healthcare business, three anonymous sources tell Reuters. The company is reportedly considering creating online "support communities" that would connect Facebook users suffering from various ailments, and also considering new "preventative care" standalone applications that would help people improve their lifestyles. Any advertising built around these health initiatives wouldn't be as targeted as it could be on television or other media, though. For example, pharmaceutical companies are prohibited from using Facebook to promote the sale of prescription drugs, in part because of concerns surrounding disclosures. Facebook declined to comment on its health care plans. / Today, the Federal Communication Commission announced that Marriott will pay $600,000 in penalties, after it was determined the hotel chain blocked mobile hotspots so that guests would have to pay for its own WiFi services. The FCC fine comes after staff at the Gaylord Opryland Hotel and Convention Center in Nashville, Tennessee were found to be jamming individual hotspots, then charging people up to $1,000 per device to access the Internet. The center has been under Marriott operations since 2012, when the interruption scheme apparently began. The first complaint came to the FCC March 2013, when one guest told the Commission they suspected their hardware had been jammed. The FCC investigated, and through its Enforcement Bureau found that a WiFi monitoring system installed at the Gaylord Opryland would target access points with de-authentication packets, disconnecting users so that their browsing was interrupted. Then Marriott would offer its own wireless internet service to attendees and exhibitors, charging between $250 and $1,000 per connected device. This violates Section 333 of the Communications Act, which states that "no person shall willfully or maliciously interfere with or cause interference to any radio communications of any station licensed or authorized by or under this chapter or operated by the United States Government." Along with the fine, Marriott will be barred from using Wi-Fi blocking technology and must file regular reports with the FCC for three years detailing its efforts to comply with the law. / Coming up... Google is developing displays that look a lot like Lego.. we've got all the details... and next I'll chat with Engadget's Billy Steele about the big push for mobile messaging from Facebook, Google and Yahoo. AD But first, let's thank Citrix GoToAssist for supporting TN2. Managing your company’s IT support needs can be challenging, especially when you have remote or mobile employees… That’s why I highly recommend Citrix GoToAssist, the #1 Global Market Leader in Remote Support This easy to use, cloud-based remote support solution allows you and your IT team to solve problems faster And if you sign up for GoToAssist before October 10th – you’ll get another Citrix product of your choice FREE for 6 months! GoToAssist Remote Support lets you provide live and unattended remote support to any computer or mobile device Screen share to diagnose and fix support problems faster and more effectively… And use GoToAssist apps to easily deliver support anytime, anywhere If you work in IT, I want you to try GoToAssist… [Call to Action]] Sign up for GoToAssist today and get another Citrix tool FREE for 6 months Visit Go To Assist dot com and get started! But Don’t Wait – This special offer ends October 10th Visit Go To Assist dot com and sign up to receive this special offer TODAY" [Segment #2] Billy Steele, Associate Editor Engadget Facebook wins EU approval for its $19 billion WhatsApp bid -This is more than just mobile messaging. Why is this significant for Facebook? -Google was out-bid for WhatsApp by Facebook. Now there seems to be some movement from the company into the mobile messaging space. What is going on? -Would this be a stand-alone or part of the Google eco-system? -The Economic Times says Google sent product manager Nikhyl Singhal to India. What was he doing there (allegedly)? -When would Google’s messaging app launch? -Now we can’t leave out Yahoo. It appears Yahoo has acquired mobile messaging app MessageMe. What do we know about this deal? ## Thanks Billy Steele, Associate Editor Engadget [Kicker!] Finally, what *isn't* Google doing these days? Self-driving cars, balloons that beam Internet from the sky.... next up, really really big TVs. Wall Street Journal sources say that Google’s secretive advanced-projects lab, Google X, is developing a display composed of smaller screens that plug together like Legos to create a seamless image. The project is led by Mary Lou Jepsen, a former Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor best known for co-founding the One Laptop Per Child project. Jepsen now heads the display division inside Google X, and her team reportedly includes veteran engineers from Samsung and Qualcomm. The project is said to seek to make display modules that are “seamless” so that people looking at a giant screen wouldn’t see the borders between the modules while absorbing a variety of content sources. Google X is the department behind Google Glass, Google’s self-driving car project, a futuristic contact lens for diabetics to measure blood-glucose levels, a project to deliver Internet access from balloons in the stratosphere, and a new life sciences team collecting data to understand human health. [good bye] That's it for this edition of Tech News 2Night. Subscribe to this show at Twit.tv/tn2, and write us at tn2@twit.tv Don't miss our morning news program, Tech News Today, every weekday at 10am Pacific, 1 pm Eastern. I'm Jason Howell, thanks for watching.