This week, Russia wants your face, Google has canceled censorship, and Netflix is leaning into Originals.
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.
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.
Every week, there is a trend on the internet. Whether it be memes of moths or eating Tide pods, almost everyone is exposed to these short-lived trends. Normally they are harmless, including the Tide pod thing, as long as you didn't swallow the detergent. Sometimes the trends are beneficial, such as the fundraising campaign that was the Ice Bucket Challenge.
The past 2 weeks have been big for Nintendo announcements. It started last week with the announcement of the Nintendo Switch Lite, a smaller version of the existing Switch. The new model has been anticipated for months and hit all of the expected notes. The most important change is the price, dropping $100 off of the standard model, coming in at $199. A 33% price reduction is a big benefit for many who have held off on the current generation Nintendo console.
Since word broke on Google's censored search engine Dragonfly, intended for China, the response has been incredibly negative. The product, which has been in development for over a year, immediately began raising questions about user privacy, government censorship, and corporate culture. China has demanded that search engines remove results about human rights, democracy, peaceful protest, and more. Years ago, Google pulled out of China over censorship concerns, and Dragonfly indicated a change in corporate responsibility.
Over the past year or so, the number of streaming video services has expanded dramatically. Not long ago, we had Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime Video. Today we've got new services like CBS All Access, DC Universe, and more. In the near future, we'll see the addition of Disney+, NBC's new service, AT&T's new service, and more.