Tech Brew Ride Home - Wed. 12/16 – Google’s Stadia Arrives on iOS and iPadOS In Beta

Episode Date: December 16, 2020

Day three of the SolarWinds hack fallout sees major investors unloading stock at a suspicious time. M1 chip support comes to some major apps. Periscope joins the Deadpool. Bitcoin crosses $20k. An AirPods Max review. And what if you could make a digital platform for board games? Sponsors: OurCrowd.com/ride VistaPrint.com/techmeme Links: Stadia comes to the iPhone and iPad with new iOS beta (The Verge) Investors in breached software firm SolarWinds traded $280 million in stock days before hack was revealed (The Washington Post) Microsoft starts rolling out native Microsoft 365 for Mac apps for Macs with M1 (ZDNet) Firefox Updated With Native Support for M1 Macs, Mozilla Touts 'Dramatic Performance Improvements' (MacRumors) Exclusive: States close to filing new Google antitrust suit (Politico) Bitcoin Hits Record Above $20K as Analysts Remain Confident of Future (Coindesk) APPLE AIRPODS MAX REVIEW: LUXURIOUS SOUND FOR A LUXURY PRICE (The Verge) I’m so excited about this board games console I just peed a little (TNW) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On April 4th, 2023, around 2 in the morning, a man was found stabbed multiple times on a sidewalk in downtown San Francisco. Hey, who did this to you? What happened next turned the story into a political firestorm. Reports have identified the victim as Bob Lee, the founder of Cash App. From Bloomberg Podcasts, this is Foundering, the Killing of Bob Lee, beginning April 16. Welcome to the Tech Meme ride home for Wednesday, December 16th, 2020. I'm Brian McCullough today. Day three of the Solar Winds Hack. Fallout sees major investors unloading stock at a suspicious time. M1 chip support comes to some major apps. Periscope joins the Deadpool. Bitcoin crosses $20,000 for the first time, an AirPods max review, and what if you could make a digital platform for board games? Here's what you miss today in the world of tech. Google Stadia. has arrived on iOS and iPadOS in a beta for the mobile web, letting users access their game library on Apple devices for the first time.

So if you want to play Cyberpunk 2077 on your iPad, you can. More on that in a second, though, do you want to? I hear that game is super, super buggy, quoting the verge. Google, like other competing cloud services, is using mobile safari due to Apple's restrictions on cloud gaming apps. That means platforms like Stadia can't exist in their current form on the App Store. You can access Stadia through its website on Safari or by creating a home screen icon that will turn the service into a progressive web app, so it acts almost identically to a native one. Unlike NVIDIA's G4Now, or the planned mobile web version of Microsoft's XCloud, however, Google Stadia has a free tier without restrictions and now offers two free-to-play games available, Destiny 2 and Super Bomber.

Summerman R with more to come. That means anyone with a Gmail account looking to try Stadia can give it a shot on an iPhone or iPad with minimal effort. I will say that you have to rely on a Wi-Fi connection to reliably play on iOS unless you happen to be the owner of a rather rare and situational Ethernet to Lightning USB adapter accessory. That means you're not going to get super smooth visuals or performance all of the time. Still, a lot of the visual hiccups you might experience from using Stadia on the average Wi-Fi connection on a larger screen are not as noticeable when playing on the iPhone or iPad. In particular, I found playing Cyberpunk 2077 on my iPad Pro to be a pretty consistent and solid experience, more so in some cases than on my PlayStation 5, where I find the game

often crashes numerous times during a single play session, end quote. By the buy, Amazon's cloud gaming service, Luna, is also now available for U.S. users. on Android, with initial support for Pixel, Samsung, and One Plus devices running Chrome 86 or later. So that whole end run around the app stores? Yeah, that sure happened fast. Now we'll see if cloud gaming gets serious traction, and then we'll see if there are any lasting repercussions for app stores. More fallout from the Solar Winds hack. Folks are reporting that Microsoft and other industry partners have seized a key command and control domain used by the hackers. Microsoft also apparently plans to forcibly block and isolate malware-infected versions of

the SolarWinds Orion app via Microsoft Defender starting today. Interesting little nugget also that some of SolarWinds top investors, including Silver Lake and Tama Bravo, sold a combined $286 million worth of stock in SolarWinds, about six days before the hack was made public, quoting the Washington Post. The timing of the trades raises questions about whether the investors used inside information to avoid major losses related to the attack. SolarWind's share price has plunged roughly 22% since the company disclosed its role in the breach Sunday night. It's unknown when SolarWinds executives and insiders first learned of the hack, but a former enforcement official at the U.S.

Securities and Exchange Commission, and an accounting expert, both said that the trades would likely spark an investigation by federal securities watchdogs into whether they amounted to insider trading. Of course, the SEC is going to look at that, said Jacob S. Frankel, a former senior counsel in the SEC's division of enforcement. Large trades in advance of a major announcement, then an announcement. That is a formula for insider trading investigation, end quote. Meanwhile, I quoted former Facebook security chief Alex Stamos about this hack this week. And he's out today with an opinion piece in the Washington Post saying that it is a long past time for the U.S. government to create the cyber security equivalent of the National Transportation Safety Board, while at the same time elevating the CISA to the

security level of the NSA, quote, we should create a mechanism to handle cyber attacks the same way we react to serious failures in other complex industries. The NTSB offers a useful model. While voluntary transparency from technology companies such as Fire Eye has been helpful, it won't provide the kinds of detailed reporting across dozens of victims that will enable other security teams to learn from this attack and thereby make the SVR's job a bit harder. Second, Congress and the new administration can work together to put defensive cybersecurity on the same level as offensive cyber operations and intelligence gathering. The cybersecurity and infrastructure security agency or CISA was created only two years ago to coordinate defending both the public and private sectors. The size and technical competence of the agency does not yet match up to that of its offensive cousins. Third, the Biden administration can appoint individuals with practical hands-on defensive experience

to key roles in the White House and critical agencies. Official Washington has long-dispected cybersecurity expertise in a way that would be unthinkable in other complex professions. The Senate would never confirm a malpractice attorney to be a surgeon general, and the president would never ask a judge-advocate general, core officer. to serve as chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, end quote. Indeed, private industry is often woefully lax with digital security, but one wonders if the national security apparatus of the U.S. government

is not even yet on the level of competency of your average Fortune 500 company. It's Into the Deadpool for Periscope. Twitter has announced it will discontinue Periscope as a separate mobile app in March. But that's okay, Twitter says, because most. of the core capabilities of Periscope have been brought into mainline Twitter anyway, quoting the verge. Twitter bought Periscope back in March 2015 before the service even launched, back in the heyday of live broadcasting, arguably started by Mirkat, a once viral streaming service that has since pivoted over to developing House Party. Periscope would launch later that month with all the force

of Twitter's considerable social presence behind it, but for all of Periscope's popularity at the time, it wasn't a staying force, at least not in the same way that other live streaming services like the juggernaut of Twitch would become. Twitter would go on to integrate live video into the main Twitter app in December 2016 in a feature that was described as being powered by Periscope. According to Twitter, the company has since moved, quote, most of the core capabilities of Periscope into Twitter Live, with the shuddering of Periscope as a separate service, allowing it to better focus on further building out that live streaming functionality in the future, end quote. Another one of those, just so you're in the no segments, just in case. Politico is reporting that a

coalition of U.S. states might file an antitrust lawsuit against Google as soon as tomorrow, Thursday, alleging that Google has altered the design of its search engine to harm rivals, quoting Politico. The complaint led by Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser, a Democrat and Nebraska Attorney General Doug Peterson, a Republican, is expected to allege that Google has altered the designs of its search engine to the disadvantage of rivals that offers specialized search results to people close to the investigation said that differs from the antitrust suit that the Justice Department filed against Google in October with support from 11 Republican State Attorneys General. That complaint focused more narrowly on the exclusive contracts the company has signed with Apple,

Mozilla, and manufacturers of Android-powered smartphones to set Google as the default search engine on their browsers and mobile devices. California has since asked to join that suit. The states pursuing the new Google suit expect to file it in the same federal court in Washington, D.C., as the Justice Department case, where the two can be consolidated. The judge in the DOJ suit, Amit Mehta, has scheduled a hearing for Friday to discuss the case schedule, end quote. Similarly, FYI, this segment, Bitcoin has hit another all-time high, crossing the $20,000 barrier for the very first time. after doubling in price in just the past three months. Quoting Coin Desk. The number one cryptocurrency by market value jumped over the key psychological threshold

during the early U.S. trading hours surpassing the previous peak price of $19,920 recorded on December 1st. At the current price of $20,374,000, Bitcoin is up 5.4% over 24 hours, according to CoinDesk's Bitcoin price index. Bitcoin's value has, doubled in the past three months and the institutional-led rally looks sustainable. Meanwhile, other prominent cryptocurrencies such as Ethereum, Lightcoin, and XRP are still down 58 to 88% from their respective lifetime highs reached three years ago. When this rally to near 20,000 happened

in 2017, there was a real lack of products for the new converts to experience, whereas today, there are endless uses, protocols, services across farming, lending, standard trading, etc. Saravis Serena Waccoun, CEO and co-founder of cross-chain data Oracle ban protocol, told CoinDesk, therefore, we expect to see the new adopters hang around this time, end quote. Breaking $20,000, which represented a significant hurdle in the mindset of most traders, is entirely new ground for Bitcoin and opens the doors for a climb to $100,000 over the course of 2021, according to some, end quote. If you've been sitting on the fence about moving to an M1 Mac,

I've got good news for you because a couple of big apps have added support for the new Apple Silicon chips. Microsoft is rolling out native M1 support for many Microsoft 365 for Mac apps, as well as ICloud account integration in Outlook and updated collaboration capabilities, quoting ZDNet. Last month, Microsoft made its core Microsoft 365 and Office 209 apps available for Mac devices with M1 via the Rosetta 2 translation layer. that is automatically enabled in macOS Big Sur. At the time, Microsoft execs noted they'd already started moving the Mac apps to universal binaries, thus natively supporting both Apple's new arm silicon and Intel chip sets with the same

executable. Microsoft officials also said today that the new outlook for Mac experience, with an updated Office Start experience for Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote for Mac is now available. This new look and feel uses the Microsoft Fluent UI design system, official said, support for iCloud accounts is available in the new Outlook for Mac, enabling users to bring together work and personal emails, contacts, and calendars into a single app. The ICloud account support will be rolling out via the new Outlook for Mac over the coming

weeks. Mac users also are getting new collaboration capabilities, including shared calendars, and a new commenting experience for Word for Mac. And there are also new tools like the Dictation Toolbar with voice commands coming for Word and Outlook for Mac, end quote. Mozilla also released Firefox 84. which also has native support for M1 Macs. Mozilla said the browser launches over two and a half times faster on an M1 computer,

and web apps are now twice as responsive, quoting Mac rumors. If you are using a Mac with the M1 chip, Mozilla says you will need to fully exit and restart Firefox after upgrading to version 84 in order for the browser to run natively on Apple Silicon. Mozilla promises not only faster performance but also better battery life. Firefox 84 is also the final version to support Adobe Flash, end quote. And P.S., MacOS Big Sur 11.1.1 for M1 Max, enables iPhone and iPad apps with non-resizable windows, think apps like HBO Max, to finally enter full-screen mode, which is nice.

Review time again, but this time, headphones, specifically the AirPods Max. I'll stick to one review today to stand for. all the others. So as usual, I'm going to pick The Verge with Chris Welch. Chris says the AirPods Macs have a luxury design. They have terrific sound quality. They're very effective at noise cancellation, but they are heavy. The lack of a 3.5 millimeter headphone jack means these are not headphones you can use anywhere for anything. And his words here, the included case is an abomination. First about that case and then about the headphone jack. and then his conclusions about the headphones themselves.

Quote, far in a way, the worst thing about the AirPods Max is their case. If you can call it that, which I consider generous. Look, putting aside all the memes about it looking like a handbag or bra, it's a failure on every level at functionality, and I don't know what Apple was thinking. It makes the AirPods Max easy to recognize at a distance. Maybe that was the main goal.

But in terms of doing case things, it's a joke that offers virtually no protection for your $550 headphones. I wouldn't feel good about throwing this into a packed bag. The ear cups could get scratched since there are so many slits in the case, and something could poke through that exposed mesh canopy. And the case also picks up dirt and smudges in no time. This is a bad enough misfire that it drags down the entire product. Everyone else gets this right, and it's baffling that Apple could get it so wrong.

I'd expect to see many third-party cases for the AirPods Macs very soon, and I predict Apple will sell some of those directly, because this thing is just untenable. Another downside? No, 3.5 millimeter jack. The AirPods Macs only have a lightning connector, so if you want higher quality wired audio or to plug them in on a plane,

you've got to get a $35 cable. No, putting an ox cord between two iPhone, headphone dungles won't work. Ouch, I can live without the 3.5 millimeter jack, but to not include the cable in the box at this price, rude. Also, it's worth mentioning that there's no passive mode for the AirPods Max when they're out of juice, they stop working altogether, even if you're wired. You can't use the very good, clear-sounding voice mics on the

headphones when plugged in either, but the cable is good for eliminating all latency if you want to use the AirPods Max for recording or monitoring purposes, end quote. Then to his wrap-up, quote, these headphones might end up a hit, like the earbuds they share a name with, but they could also just coast by in the same vein as something like the HomePod, another Apple product that was priced higher than the competition when released and hurt by it. If you're the kind of person that knows you'll love the AirPods Max, you shouldn't hesitate to go for it. They sound killer for music and movies alike, and they feel like they should cost even more money. They're about as luxurious as noise-canceling headphones get, but not as expensive as they come. But there's still

no world where I would recommend the AirPods Max to your average headphone shopper, especially when the AirPods Pro offer a lot of the same features for less. Many consumers will be perfectly happy sticking with the tried and true options from Sony, Bose, Microsoft, and elsewhere. At the very least, it's probably worth waiting for Apple Music HD or spatial audio on the Apple TV or, for God's sake, a better case, end quote. Finally today, not an interesting raise, but an interesting Kickstarter. This is one of those ideas where when I heard it, I was like, of course, why do you?

Didn't anyone slash I think of this sooner? You love board games? You might find it annoying that each board game requires, you know, its own board. Tends to take up a lot of shelf space in your closet, right? Well, what if someone designed a piece of digital hardware that could offer interchangeable boards for tabletop games? Would be super convenient, but also potentially a very good business because you'd be a literal platform for board games. quoting the next web. The Square One board game console has a large touchscreen display that changes depending on what you're playing.

It wouldn't be very impressive otherwise, right? The hardware is also connected to the pieces you're using in the game, meaning the Square One can track and recognize specific cards, dice rolls, and the figures you're using to play. I'll have to judge how this operates in reality, but I'm a huge fan of the concept. Effectively, WISMA, the company behind the Square One, wants the console to do. be a blend between computer and board games, cherry-picking the best of both worlds to try and provide a new experience. This is why the board games console has a number of features that should elevate the usual tabletop experience, including online play with friends, dynamic tutorials, and the option to save and resume games. At the moment, the main games on the console

include titles like air hockey, snake and ladders, Chinese checkers, and ludo. In other words, quite generic titles that don't really have the deeper board game experience of classics like Settlers of Catan or Ticket to Ride. But it won't be this way for long. Wisma has partnered with Ravensberger, a German games publisher, to bring more titles to the Square One while Urban Rivals and Chathulu Wars are on their way to the board games console soon. Excitingly, Wisman has also announced it's opening up the Square One to independent developers in 2021, end quote. Wismah is currently running a Kickstarter for the Square One, and the console is expected to debut also sometime next year.

Snow is coming, everybody. I've been living north of the Mason-Dixon line for more than 20 years. Actually, I think it's 20 years this year, and yet I still get excited by snowstorms. You can't take the Florida out of this Florida boy, considering I was in my 20s before I experienced my first real snowfall for the first time. Anyway, 10 inches is what we're supposed to get, but then I always get my hopes up and we never quite get as much as they say we will. We shall see. The kids are absolutely the ideal age for some snow fun right now, so I'm excited.

We've got a sled, picked up some salt for the stoop, need to find my super warm gloves for packing snowballs and snowmen. We shall see. Talk to you tomorrow.