This Week in Tech

Justice Department Says Attempts to Prevent Netflix From Oscars Eligibility Could Violate Antitrust Law – This Week in Tech – 04/07/2019

Justice Department Says Attempts to Prevent Netflix From Oscars Eligibility Could Violate Antitrust Law

The US Department of Justice has sent a letter to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences warning that any attempts to bar or limit Netflix and other streaming services from Oscars eligibility might violate antitrust law, considering the Academy’s membership includes studios and media conglomerates that compete with Netflix, Amazon, and others…


Screen Time – Even Before Bed – Has Little Impact on Teen Well-Being

Data from more than 17,000 teenagers show little evidence of a relationship between screen time and well-being in adolescents. The study, published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, casts doubt on the widely accepted notion that spending time online, gaming, or watching TV, especially before bedtime, can damage young people’s mental health…


Google Dissolves AI Ethics Board Just One Week After Forming It

Google today disclosed that it has dissolved a short-lived, external advisory board designed to monitor its use of artificial intelligence, following a week of controversy regarding the company’s selection of members. The decision, reported first today by Vox, is largely due to outcry over the board’s inclusion of Heritage Foundation president Kay Coles James, a noted conservative figure who has openly espoused anti-LGBTQ rhetoric and, through the Heritage Foundation, fought efforts to extend rights to transgender individuals and to combat climate change…


Apple Will Make a Smaller iPhone In 2020 (Report)

According to Taiwanese electronics supply chain sources, Apple plans to launch three new OLED-based iPhones in three different sizes: 6.67-, 6.06-, and 5.42 inches in 2020…


How Microsoft Found a Huawei Driver That Opened Systems to Attack

Huawei MateBook systems that are running the company’s PCManager software included a driver that would let unprivileged users create processes with superuser privileges. The insecure driver was discovered by Microsoft using some of the new monitoring features added to Windows version 1809 that are monitored by the company’s Microsoft Defender Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) service…


Oppo Designs Phone with a Secondary Pop-Up Screen Because Why Not

No, this not a belated April Fools’ joke. Oppo has patented a phone with a secondary display that pops up from the top of the device. Because, why the heck not…


Lego’s Spike Prime Brings New Programmable Bricks to the Table

Lego is announcing its new Spike Prime robotics kit, which is designed to introduce a younger, middle school-aged customer to robotics, engineering, and coding in a way that’s simpler and more goal-oriented than its Mindstorms kits…