July 29, 2016 - The WAN Show Document

[LinusTech]

 

https://soundcloud.com/thewanshow/the-wan-show-nvidia-gtx-970-buyers-all-get-30-july-29nd-2016

 

Main News Topics

 

NVIDIA Settles Graphics Card False Advertising Class Action

Source 1: https://topclassactions.com/lawsuit-settlements/lawsuit-news/340705-nvidia-settle

• NVIDIA has agreed to a preliminary settlement that will resolve claims in a group of proposed class action lawsuits

  • Center around allegations that NVIDIA misled consumers about performance and storage capabilities of its product

• NVIDIA says it will pay each buyer of the graphics card $30 and will pay an additional $1.3 million in attorneys fees

  • According to settlement documents

• Overall settlement amount was not publicly disclosed within court papers

  • However, NVIDIA agreed to pay all consumers who purchased a 970 graphics card and indicated there would not be a cap on the total amount it would pay

• “The settlement is fair and reasonable and falls within the range of possible approval,” attorneys for the class said in the filing

• Initial proposed class action lawsuit in a series of lawsuits against NVIDIA was filed in Feb 2015

  • Alleged the company engaged in false advertising, deceptive business practice, unlawful practices and violated California’s business law for unfair business practices as well

• Initial claim accused NVIDIA of having a graphics card that operated on 3.5GB but was advertised as operating with a full 4GB of video access memory

  • Plus another .5GB that was separated from the rest of the memory

• Recent settlement includes a total of 15 consumer class action lawsuits that were consolidated in Northern California

  • In addition to the size of video access memory and its setup, consumers accused NVIDIA of having 64 render output processors rather than the 56 that were advertised

  • As well as having smaller specialized memory cache than advertised

• NVIDIA denied all allegations of wrongdoing, and both parties entered into the settlement and agreed upon the terms

  • Believing it to be the best for both parties involved

• $30 payout was calculated to represent a portion of the cost of the storage and performance capabilities the consumer's thoughts they were obtaining when they purchased the card

 

Microsoft Faces Two New Lawsuits Over Aggressive Windows 10 Upgrade Tactics

Source 1: http://www.pcworld.com/article/3101396/windows/microsoft-faces-t

Source 2: http://www.extremetech.com/computing/232599-microsoft-slapped-with-class-a

Source 3: http://www.seattletimes.com/business/microsoft/microsoft-sued-over-windows-10-

• Facing two more lawsuits over companies questionable upgrade tactics

  • Both suits are seeking class-action status

• First suit filed in U.S District Court in Florida

  • Alleges that Microsoft’s Windows 10 upgrade prompts “violated laws governing unsolicited electronic advertisements,” as reported by the Seattle Times

• Second suit was filed in June in Haifa, Israel

  • Alleging that Microsoft installed Windows 10 on users’ computers without consent

    • Microsoft has already paid out a $10,000 aware in a previous U.S. suit over similar circumstances

• Microsoft told the Seattle Times it believes the suits won’t succeed

  • Company says updates to Windows 10 are a choice, not a requirement

  • Also, that they offer free customer support for those who run into trouble

  • “People who update to Windows 10 can roll back to their prior system for 31 days afterwards,” Microsoft said

• Richard Chosid, lawyer that filed the Florida lawsuit said in an interview that Windows 10 appeared on his clients computers without consent

  • Also stated “Microsoft’s marketing scheme falls short of certain protections which must be afforded,” the complaint said, claiming that the damages owed to consumers who have struggled with the new software may total tens of millions of dollars.”

 

Tim Sweeney Believes that Microsoft Will Harm Steam with Windows 10 Updates

Source 1: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/632860-tim-sweeney-beli OP: Misanthrope

Source 2: http://www.overclock3d.net/news/gpu_displays/tim_sweeney_believes_that_micro

Source 3: http://www.pcgamer.com/tim-sweeney-thinks-microsoft-will-make-steam-progressi

• Tim Sweeney is the co-founder of Epic Games (Paragon, Unreal Tournament) and the Unreal Engine

• Believes that Microsoft will work to make Steam “progressively worse” with Windows 10 updates in order to force developers onto Universal Windows Platform

  • With the endgame goal of essentially closing the Open PC gaming ecosystem

• Sweeney discussed this in an interview with Edge Magazine

  • “Every PC game for the past few decades - has used Win32. It’s been both responsible for the vibrant software market we have now, but also for malware. Any program can be a virus. Universal Windows Platform is seen as an antidote to that. It’s sandboxed - much more locked down”

  • “The risk here is that, if Microsoft convinces everybody to use UWP, then they phase out Win32 apps. If they can succeed in doing that then it’s a small leap to forcing all apps and games to be distributed through the Windows Store”

  • “Slowly, over the next five years, [Microsoft] will force-patch Windows 10 to make Steam progressively worse and more broken.”
    “They’ll never completely break it, but will continue to break it until, in five years, people are so fed up that Steam is buggy that the Windows Store seems like an ideal alternative”

 

Verizon Buys Yahoo for $4.83 Billion

Source 1: http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/yahoo-verizon-takeover-confirmed-1.3693485

Source 2: https://techcrunch.com/2016/07/25/verizon-buys-yahoo-for-4-83-billion/

• Verizon, which owns AOL and TechCrunch is officially acquiring Yahoo’s core business for $4.83 billion in cash

  • Includes Yahoo’s advertising, content, search and mobile activities

• “Just over a year ago we acquired AOL to enhance our strategy of providing a cross-screen connection for consumers, creators and advertisers,” Verizon chairman and CEO Lowell McAdam said in the release

  • “The acquisition of Yahoo will put Verizon in a highly competitive position as a top global mobile media company, and help accelerate our revenue stream in digital advertising”

• Yahoo will be integrated with AOL

  • Verizon EVP and President of Product Innovation and New Businesses organization Marni Walden will lead this process

• Transaction is expected to close in Q1, 2017

 

Using a VPN in United Arab Emirates Might Get You Fined up to $545,000 USD or Imprisoned

Source 1: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/634158-using-a-vpn-in-ua OP: Napper198

Source 2: http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/if-you-get-caught-using-vpn-uae-you-will-face-fines-54500

Source 3: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/07/28/vpn_users_in_uae_face_544k_fine/

• Royal edict from the president of the UAE may have effectively made it illegal for anyone in the country to use a VPN or secure proxy server

• Those caught could face jail time and fines of between 500,000 and 2,000,000 UAE dirham

  • Announced this week by the UAE president

• Wording is ambiguous and technologically illiterate

  • Seems you’re not allowed to use systems that hide the fact you’re committing a crime or covering one up

  • If you’re routing network traffic, you could be evading the eyes of the state while breaking a law

• Tweaked law (taken from site emirates 24/7) now reads:

  • “Whoever uses a fraudulent computer network protocol address (IP address) by using a false address or a third-party address by any other means for the purpose of committing a crime or preventing its discovery, shall be punished by temporary imprisonment and a fine of no less than Dhs 500,000 and not exceeding Dhs 2,000,000, or either of these two penalties”

• Less than 15% of the kingdom’s inhabitants are locals, with the rest of the population made up of expatriates

  • Many of whom want to access private corporate networks and the internet without being limited by filtering systems the country has setup

 

7-Eleven & Flirtey Just Made the First Commercial Delivery by Drone

Source 1: http://www.ctvnews.ca/sci-tech/doughnuts-in-flight-in-first-u-s-approved-drone-del

Source 2: http://www.theverge.com/2016/7/23/12262468/7-11-first-retailer-deliver-food-drone

• 7-Eleven just made the first commercial delivery by drone

• Partnered up with drone startup “Flirtey” to make the delivery to a private residence in Reno, Nevada

• Took place on July 11th

  • Delivered a chicken sandwich, donuts, coffee, candy, and slurpees

  • Goods packaged into two containers, each separately flown to the home

• Drone flew autonomously from store to household

  • Used the vehicle's GPS system to navigate

• Company selected a store from which to deliver, and surveyed customers within a one-mile radius to see if they would be willing to take part

• This isn’t the first delivery that Flirtey has made

  • This delivery appears to be the first that a customer has placed an order with a store and had it delivered via drone

• 7-Eleven noted it plans to continue working with the drone company, but didn’t lay out a timeline for rolling out the service to a wider region

Video Showcasing This (0:30 Seconds Long)

 

Rapid Fire

 

UberCentral Lets Businesses Arrange Uber Rides for their Customers

Source 1: http://www.theverge.com/2016/7/28/12316382/ubercentral-business-rides-announced

• No Uber app required for passengers

• UberCentral lets businesses request door-to-door rides for their clients/customers

• Meant to position Uber as an indispensable convenience for any number of businesses that transport frequently to and from

 

Xiaomi Releases Their New Mi NoteBook Air With a Surprising GPU

Source 1: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/633357-xioami-releases-th OP: AluminumTech

Source 2: http://www.windowscentral.com/xiaomi-mi-notebook-air-now-offici

• At an event in Beijing, Xiaomi unveiled its first Windows 10 notebook

  • Going after the 13.3-inch MacBook Air

  • Claiming the Mi Notebook is 13% thinner and 11% smaller while managing to offer a similar sized screen

• Picture

• Features a brushed aluminum body

• Laminated 13.3-inch full hd display with edge-to-edge glass

• Sixth-generation Intel Core i5 CPU, 8GB or DDR4 RAM, 256GB SSD, and an NVIDIA 940MX Video card

• Notebook weighs 2.82lbs

• Xiaomi claiming it has a battery life of 9.5 hours on a full charge

  • Ability to gain a 50% charge in 30 minutes

 

U.S Company Vizio Bought by Chinese Tech Company LeEco for $2 Billion

Source 1: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/633012-us-company-vizio-b OP: GoodBytes

Source 2: http://www.theverge.com/2016/7/26/12286756/leeco-buys-vizio-tv-company-2-bil

• Acquisition was announced during a press event in L.A on July 26th, 2016

• Purpose being to give LeEco a foothold in the US television market

  • Under the deal, Vizio will be operated as an independent subsidiary

    • Company's current executive team will stay in place

• Vizio founder and CEO William Wang will be leaving Vizio

  • No replacement has been named

  • Wang will be instead taking the reins as chairman and CEO of Inscape, Vizio’s data business

  • This business is being spun out into a privately held company

  • Wang will hold 51% on Inscape, with LeEco owning the other 49%

• William Wang is reluctant to let it go, but said it's the right thing to do for its employees and shareholders

 

Legal Fight Over IsoHunt and Downloading of Music Files Ends in Settlement

Source 1: http://www.ctvnews.ca/sci-tech/legal-fight-over-isohunt-and-downloading-of-music-file

Source 2:

• Music Canada says a settlement has ended a near decade-old legal fight with Isohunt

  • Isohunt was once the most popular websites for downloading songs and movies

• Gary Fung, founder of isoHunt Web Technologies, filed a petition with British Columbia Supreme Court in 2008 seeking to have BitTorrent website declared legal under the Federal Copyright Act

  • This kicked off several back-and-forth legal skirmishes between Fung and Music Canada

  • Included a lawsuit from two dozen Canadian and international music companies that alleged isoHunt and Fung committed copyright infringement

  • Music Canada says under the agreement, isoHunt and Fung are liable for $65 million in damages and punitive damages

• Settlement comes after Fung agreed in 2013 to shut down Vancouver-based isoHunt and was deemed liable by a US court for $110 million

 

Apple Sells its Billionth iPhone

Source 1: http://arstechnica.com/apple/2016/07/apple-sells-its-billionth-iphone-during

Source 2: http://www.apple.com/newsroom/2016/07/apple-celebrates-one-billion-iphones.html

• At an employee meeting in Cupertino on July 27th, 2016, Tim Cook announced that Apple had recently sold its billionth iPhone

 

Dota 2 Releases Full VR Spectator Suite - Just in Time for the International

Source 1: http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2016/07/dota-2-releases-full-vr-specta

Source 2:

• Valve has released its second piece of software for the HTC Vive VR system

  • Free spectator hub for Dota 2

• Will arrive in time for next month’s official Dota 2 tournament

• You can watch either live or archival matches within the interface

• New feature has been added: lobbies

  • Can join a public lobby or create their own, both options support up to 16 viewers with voice chat enabled

• You can walk around in one of two VR Hub interfaces

• Complete with visible hands and masks, to talk to each other about a match and point at players or moments

• Start in a “VR Theater”, which displays the giant screen of traditional Dota 2 play within a giant, blue-tinged castle

• Both sides of the screen are giant, living statues of the heroes in a match

  • They have indicators of what items players have equipped in the match

• There is a limited viewing distance

  • To enable this experience you will need to:

  • Install Dota 2 on Steam

  • In your Steam library, select Dota 2

  • Under the DLC section of the library page, click the checkbox to enable Dota VR Hub

 

NVIDIA Pascal Titan X Will Not Feature Faster FP64 or FP16 Performance

Source 1: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/632908-nvidia-titan-xp-has-s OP: marldorthegreat

Source 2: http://www.overclock3d.net/news/gpu_displays/nvidia_pascal_titan_x_will_not_fea

• Original GTX Titan had unique characteristics to make it popular for more than just gaming

  • Allowed people to access huge amounts of compute performance at a price much lower than NVIDIA’s Tesla or Quadro GPUs

• NVIDIA has confirmed that the Pascal GTX Titan X will not feature increased FP64 or FP16 rates over GPU104

  • Makes the Titan X an ultra-powerful gaming GPU and nothing more

• Titan X, 1080, 1070, 1060 Comparison

 

Sony Sued for Not Protecting Leaked Movies from Pirates

Source 1: https://torrentfreak.com/sony-sued-for-not-protecting-leaked-movie-from-pirat

• In 2014, Sony was subjected to a massive cyberattack

  • Resulted in the leak of huge quantities of data

  • Contained several movies, appearing online for anyone to download for free

• After more than 18 months after the hack, Possibility Pictures, owner of the unreleased movie “To Write Love on Her Arms’, sued Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions in a Florida court

  • They spent $3.38 million producing the movie

• Claims the company failed in its obligation to protect the movie from Internet pirates

  • Also said that the hack resulted from an “entirely foreseeable and avoidable failure of internal security” following many earlier security incidents at Sony

• Possibility says the due to Sony’s negligence, their movie was released four months in advance of its release

  • Appearing on multiple sites, the audience demand for the title was “destroyed”

• “Total number of illegal downloads is unknown and unknowable”

  • “Likely it was many times the nearly 20,000 downloads they recorded in six days following the leak,” they added

• In the wake of the leak, Sony allegedly “lost all interest” in promoting and marketing the movie

  • Also paid no further distribution revenues to Possibility beyond an initial $800,000 advance

• Possibility claims it is almost $2.6 million out of pocket with its production costs

• To support the claim, Possibility highlights a section of its distribution agreement with Sony titled “Anti-Piracy Authorization”

  • Company says text shows Sony was obliged to “protect the movie worldwide” using “appropriate technical measures or other techniques” to assist efforts to “remove, disable or otherwise prevent” unauthorized versions of the movie being pirated on the internet

• Screenshot of the agreement text

 

Vaio Launches New Laptops, High Prices, High Fashion, Low Performance

Source 1: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/632944-vaio-formerly-sony-vaio OP: goodtofufriday

Source 2: http://www.theverge.com/circuitbreaker/2016/7/26/12283780/vaio-c15-spe

• Main selling point is that it comes in unique color combinations

  • white/copper, navy/gray, yellow/black, orange/khaki

  • yellow/black picture

• VAIO describes it as a “fashionable PC”

• Specifications

  • 15.5-inch 1366x768 display

  • 4GB RAM

  • Intel Celeron 3215U processor

• Priced out at around $640 USD from Sony

• Priced out at around $910 USD from other stores

• You can upgrade the navy/gray and white/copper models to:

  • 1080p display

  • 8GB RAM

  • Intel i3 processor

• No pricing announced for the upgraded model

 

 

[handymanshandle]

First?
Seriously though, I kinda forgot today yesterday was Friday. Well good thing the archive is up now, eh?

Edited July 30, 2016 by wcreek
It's like 1:30a where I am. Maybe I should go to bed sooner than later.

[b.macpherson]

Any one know what mic they're using? Love the new sound and I want one

 

EDIT: I should have just waited 3 minutes for the stream to get to them talking about the mic...

[Ronda]

Microsoft are a malicious bunch? Some real far fetched theories from Sweeney there!
 /s 

[Emillionaire]

How to redeem my 30$?

[Snadzies]

Luke clean shaven?

What madness is this?!

[zezam krizu]

If you get Xiaomi Mi laptop, will you do a review for us, even though it will not be available for buying outside of China, people will order it from different internet websites (banggood, gearbest, etc.)?

[SmartGamer278]

its not JULY 29nd .. But its JULY (29th)

[royd123]

So I bought an MSI geforce gtx 970, would I still get a 30$ compensation?

 

[Mr. Swede]

Could you be so kind to make a video on how to redeem the 30$ when it becomes possible? Would be win-win, easy money for you and easy tutorial for us  

[Ichi]

Who is that with Linus?

[willylortiz]

What capture cards do they have on the stream pc?? 

[Pawn]

Well, if microsoft is going down that route of forcing steam to their platform. Might as well have users move to linux. It will expand the community, users picking up new skills, and etc...

[ltguy]

5 hours ago, willylortiz said:

What capture cards do they have on the stream pc?? 

I listened to that part of the video 3 times and i cant still understand what brand of capture card he was saying.

[7850OC]

always impress me how n fanboys forgive the nvidia "RamGATE" problem from the GTX 970 with 3.5gb ram instead the 4GB that "they did pay" 

[R0ADK1LL]

Fixed audio is MUCH appreciated.

 

As an owner of two 970s, I'm a little disappointed that the payout is only in the States but they're still great cards & very few games actually use more than 3GB VRAM, even at 1440P. I do love detailed textures though, maybe when the 1100 series cards are out it might be worth an upgrade.

[7850OC]

and now... we find that all GTX 1060 cards that the reviews have received, was "already overclocked" and "not" on stock clock numbers, oh nvidia... 

 

 

[Bapplemonster]

All 970s worldwide? Got mine from Amazon Italy.