This week, Pokemon GO takes over the world, HummingBad takes over your phone and Amazon takes a chance with Warner Bros.
Scott is a developer who has worked on projects of varying sizes, including all of the PLUGHITZ Corporation properties. He is also known in the gaming world for his time supporting the rhythm game community, through DDRLover and hosting tournaments throughout the Tampa Bay Area. Currently, when he is not working on software projects or hosting F5 Live: Refreshing Technology, Scott can often be found returning to his high school days working with the Foundation for Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST), mentoring teams and helping with ROBOTICON Tampa Bay. He has also helped found a student software learning group, the ASCII Warriors, currently housed at AMRoC Fab Lab.
Daniele is a student at Florida Polytechnic University who is studying Computer Science with a concentration in Cyber Security. In High School, she was introduced to the science and technology world through the Foundation for Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST), a robotics foundation where students of varying ages can compete through tasks that their robots perform. With help from mentors she met through FIRST, she became interested in programming and developing. Today, Daniele is a special events host for F5 Live: Refreshing Technology and PLuGHiTz Live Special Events and a co-host for both The New Product Launchpad and FIRST Looks.
Avram's been in love with PCs since he played original Castle Wolfenstein on an Apple II+. Before joining Tom's Hardware, for 10 years, he served as Online Editorial Director for sister sites Tom's Guide and Laptop Mag, where he programmed the CMS and many of the benchmarks. When he's not editing, writing or stumbling around trade show halls, you'll find him building Arduino robots with his son and watching every single superhero show on the CW.
One of the words that is becoming most synonymous with Android is malware. It seems every few months we hear about another major piece of malware that is rooting Android devices by the millions and serving up disaster. In November we were informed about 3 new ones that were present in at least 20,000 Android apps in Play Store.
The most anticipated mobile game of the year, and possibly in the industry's history, was released this week: Pokémon GO. The title is an augmented reality game, combining mythical creatures and artificial locations with the real world. While walking around in reality, you can encounter Pokémon, allowing you to try and catch them with your phone. This is done with an AR screen, which puts the creature directly into your real environment.
The US Department of Justice has filed a lawsuit against Facebook over their lack of cooperation with an IRS investigation. Facebook transferred some if its intellectual property to a wholly-owned subsidiary located in Ireland. The transfer was made because of more favorable tax rates in Ireland versus the United States. This is a fairly common practice, so why are the IRS and DoJ involved?
The battle for video streaming dominance is a heated one, and it is set to get worse with time. This week, Amazon announced a new partnership that will add 33 new exclusive titles to Prime Instant Video. The partnership is with Warner Bros. and includes some of their largest titles, including Lethal Weapon and the Matrix franchise.