Tag Archives: Univision

PTJ 96: FIFA and Apple Have The World In Motion

FIFA’s 2014 World Cup tournament is set to kickoff in Brazil  in just a few days and J.D. tracks down the apps you’ll need to stay connected to the action.

What’s that you say? You’re looking for tech news too?  And you want it chunky and packed with snark? Well look no more my friends, J.D. and El Kaiser have you covered.

Apple unveils new versions of (don’t call it Mac) OS X and iOS 8 at their annual developers convention; Samsung launches its first smartphone running the long awaited Tizen operating system; Instagram is out with a new version of its mobile app;  US authorities say they’ve caused a disruption in the GameOver Zeus botnet; Comedian John Oliver unleashes Internet trolls on the FCC; Researchers create bakable robots; and the cast of the new Star Wars sequel finally gets around to casting more women.

 

GOOOAAALLLL!

BeepsWCIt’s a major event every four years, and it gets people around the world watching intensely. No, not the Olympics, not the ever-contentious US presidential elections, and not your favorite action-franchise sequel. It’s the World Cup, the preeminent men’s soccer tournament where 32 international teams battle it out over a month of matches for a big gold trophy and bragging rights as truly the world’s best team. This year, the tournament officially gets started June 12th with a match pitting host country Brazil against Croatia, and runs to the championship match on July 13th.

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Serious fútbol fans have likely stocked up their mobile devices and browsers with everything they need to follow the trophy quest. If you’re new to the sport or just starting to follow it closely, you can find everything you need to know to keep up with the Cup on the Internet. Several third-party apps for following the sport are available in your local app store, but the people running the show (and the TV networks that will be broadcasting the event) have a bit of an edge when it comes to news, photos, and videos from the matches.

For example, FIFA, or Fédération Internationale de Football Association, is the sport’s governing body and offers its official mobile apps for Android and iOS on its site (shown below). The FIFA site also has a PDF of the match schedules you can download of you like hard copy.

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For those watching the international news, it should be noted that FIFA is having its share of controversy these days with allegations of match-fixing in the 2010 World Cup played in South Africa, and bribes made to FIFA officials to vote for Qatar as the host of the 2022 tournament. Social unrest over the cost of hosting the tournament and treatment of indigenous people are making headlines in Brazil as well, but the country’s leaders say the games will go on safely.

Here in the States, ESPN and its assorted sibling networks will be carrying the tournament in full. According to Sports Illustrated, “All 64 matches of the World Cup will be broadcast live and in high definition on ABC, ESPN and ESPN2 in English, and on Univision broadcast and cable networks in Spanish.”

If you aren’t home or near a sports bar to watch, all 64 matches on ESPN, ESPN2, ESPN Deportes and ABC will also be available on computers, smartphones, tablets, gaming consoles and connected devices through WatchESPN. If you’re not familiar with it, the WatchESPN app (shown below) is a TV streamer and you can get it for Android and Kindle Fire devices, Roku set-top boxes, iOS gadgets and the Apple TV, Amazon’s Fire TV box and Windows 8. (You do need a cable subscription and login from your service provider to make full use of the app.)

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ESPN has also spiffed up its website for the occasion, rolling out its ESPNFC.com to cover the 2014 World Cup and other international football matches. And where you’ve got desktop, you’ve got mobile apps, at least for the major platforms. You can get the ESPN FC app (shown below) for Android, iOS, Ovi, Windows 8 and Windows Phone.  The UK versions are here.

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The Univision Deportes app for Android (shown below) and iOS promises live streaming and 24/7 World Cup coverage, as well as other international league play after the big event. You can use the app in either Spanish or English.

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The World Cup tournament will be over all too soon for many fans, the beautiful game plays on. Thankfully, the Women’s World Cup is right around the corner in 2015.

PTJ 91: All is Right With the Galaxy

Before J.D. and El Kaiser head over to the Ziegfeld movie palace to queue up for tickets to Star Wars *SQUEE*, they test Domino’s updated iPad app and its 3D Pizza Builder feature. They virtually make it rain pizza toppings. *SQUEE*

In the news the Federal Communications Commission announces its latest stab at finding constitutional rules for governing the Internet; the proposed Comcast-Time Warner Cable deal continues to draw detractors; Netflix strikes a speed deal with Verizon Communications; Microsoft’s acquisition of Nokia’s phone business is finally complete and the software behemoth confirms a rather gaping vulnerability in all versions of its Internet Explorer browser;  the Heartbleed bug may affect the Internet of Things; and the official cast has been announced for Star Wars: Episode VII confirming the return of original cast members. *SQUEE*

PTJ 91 News: Old Games

Here we go again: Last week, the Federal Communications Commission announced its latest stab at finding constitutional rules for governing the Internet. Critics called the new proposal a “two-tier” system with high-speed fast lanes for those who can pay and slower connections for those who can’t — all decidedly problematic for the concept of net neutrality. In a rebuttal to detractors, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler posted a defense on the FCC’s website. Mr. Wheeler is scheduled to testify in front of the House Commerce Subcommittee on Communications this month.

The proposed Comcast-Time Warner Cable deal continues to draw its own detractors. Univision exec Randy Falco said the merger of the two cable companies could be “bad for Hispanic audiences” and was a “cause for concern.” Comcast owns NBC Universal, which owns Telemundo, the second-biggest Spanish-language TV network after Univision. Comcast quickly released a statement denying any bad things will happen. As part of its preparations for acquiring Time Warner Cable, Comcast announced a deal with Charter Communications this week too. (The Comcast corporate communications department must be awfully tired these days. )

Netflix announced that it has struck a speed deal with Verizon Communications, not unlike its agreement with You Know Who. By getting direct access to Verizon’s network for a fee, Netflix streams should improve for those customers.

Microsoft’s acquisition of Nokia’s phone business is now complete. The new division is now called Microsoft Mobile, but future devices will likely get a new brand that is called neither Microsoft Mobile nor Nokia. In other Microsoft news, the company just upped its online storage allotment for its OneDrive for Business customers from 25 gigabytes to 1 terabyte. There is currently a standalone version of OneDrive for Business is available as a $5-per-month option with the Office Online Web-based productivity suite.

In hardware news, Apple has upgraded the processor in its lightweight-but-don’t-call-it-a-netbook laptops in the MacBook Air line and knocks $100 off the starting price tags.

Now for the Security portion of this blog post. Microsoft has confirmed a rather gaping vulnerability in all versions of its Internet Explorer browser. The security research firm FireEye found this latest zero-day exploit, which it said could be used with Adobe Flash files to execute remote code. As a result of all this, government computer security teams in the United States, United Kingdom and Sweden have advised users to stop using IE and switch to Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox until Microsoft addresses the issue.

The Apple Developer site recently had its own massive security issue that made the personal information of its members accessible. A white-hat found the issue and contacted the 9to5Mac.com site, which out up an in-depth post on the exploit after Apple filled in that security pothole. That is the correct sequence of events, folks.

One final note of security concern: Wired has a story about how the Heartbleed bug affects the Internet of Things and it’s worth a read if you’re into that Big Picture sort of view.

In an announcement to its investors this week, Yahoo announced its plans for a couple original long-form video programs, plus two new shows with Katie Couric and a new Live Nation channel for streaming concerts. As it did with the technology part of its site, Yahoo has also launched a digital magazine-style version of Yahoo Travel.

AT&T said it plans to launch a high-speed 4G LTE-based in-flight connectivity service for airline passengers for fast broadband in the air. AT&T said its new network could be available as soon as late next year. Hopefully, it will feel faster than dial-up on those long flights. The stock for Gogo, the current big player in inflight Internet, dropped 18 percent after AT&T made its announcement.

The executive behind Google+ is leaving the company, which has at least one tech blog setting the egg timer on Google’s often-forgotten social network. A representative for Google representative has denied the demise of Google+. In brighter news for the company, Google’s self-driving cars have now logged more that 700,00 miles on their own and according to a post on the official Google blog, the auto-autos are mastering the art of city driving, at least around Mountain View, California. A video on the blog shows a Google car navigating a variety of situations without mayhem.

flopsNews from the Land of Obsolete Technology:  60 Minutes found that that part of the computer system responsible for controlling the launch of the Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic nuclear missiles depends on data loaded from 8-inch floppy disks, which most likely makes the storage media older than some of the Air Force personnel working down in the silos. Air Force officials said the system is extremely safe and secure but some upgrades and budget request are on the way.

The Legend of the Landfill turned out to be true. Video archeologists digging in the New Mexico desert found a large festering pile of Atari’s old E.T. cartridge game, just as it had been whispered about for more than 30 years. The dig was part of a documentary called Atari: Game Over, that will be released through the Microsoft’s Xbox console later this year.

And finally, the cast of “Star Wars, “Episode VII” was officially announced this week.  The movie opens galaxywide on December 18, 2015. Until then — and as always this time of year — May the Fourth be with you.