Judy’s Tech News Digest

Amazon Knows What You Want Even Before You Do

The Wall Street Journal reported that Amazon has received a patent for “anticipatory shipping.”

Products could start making their way to your door before you even order them.    Amazon could use your searches, previous orders and, yes, the time your cursor hovers over a listing (creepy) to determine whether to ship something your way.   Packages would be waiting at your nearest delivery hub or even on a delivery truck.

Pretty cool.  But, then again, kind of creepy.

Intel Hit by Shrinking PC Market

The downturn in the PC market has hit chipmaker Intel.  It plans to reduce its workforce for 107,000 jobs, or 5 percent, this year.

The announcement followed its fourth-quarter earnings report that reinforced previous concerns about the PC market.   Intel intends to reprioritize its efforts towards faster growing areas.

Google Announces Contact Lens That’s A Glucose Monitor

Google announced that it has developed a contact lens that could be used by diabetics to monitor their blood glucose level.   The lens would use tears to determine glucose levels.  A wireless chip and glucose sensor would be imbedded into the lens.  Developed in their Google X lab, the lens could offer a much better alternative to monitoring glucose levels than finger pricks.   However, it is not close to being commercially available.

China Mobile Finally Has iPhone

China Mobile, the world’s largest wireless carrier, has finally started selling iPhones.  China Mobile is expected to sell at least 20 million iPhones this year.  It remains to be seen if this comes to fruition.  China’s cell phone market thus far has been primarily lower priced Android devices.

Apple has been in negotiations for years with China Mobile. The world has now been conquered.

Xbox 1 Sales Outstrip PS4 in U.S.

In an ongoing battle of the numbers between Microsoft and Sony, the former has just announced that sales of its Xbox One console in the U.S. during December totaled 908,000, outstripping those of the rival PS4.  It’s obvious that both Microsoft and Sony are keen to gain the upper hand for bragging rights in this department but, as is often the case, the numbers can be misleading.

By the end of 2013, the latest Playstation console had sold 4.2 million units to Microsoft’s 3 million sum total. However, the PS4 was actually released a little before the latest Xbox. Conversely, the Xbox was released in a total of 13 countries, 11 more that the Playstation.

For the moment, it appears Sony retains its lead in global sales, but that could easily change during course of 2014.

Microsoft Security Essentials: XP Gets 15 Month Reprieve

In a reversal of its previous stance, Microsoft has announced that its free ant-virus solution, known as MSE, will now continue supporting signature updates in XP until July 2015. However, XP users should not get overly enthused by the prospect, Microsoft’s announcement also includes a warning that its research “shows that the effectiveness of anti-malware solutions on out-of-support operating systems is limited.” <source>

Coincidentally, leading anti-virus vendors have also announced ongoing support for XP users. Kaspersky, BitDefender and Avira, for example, have pledged to support consumers until 2018, January 2016 and April 2015, respectively. Again, this does not necessarily mean XP will be any less vulnerable.

To quote Andreas Marx, CEO of AV-Test: “Antivirus cannot patch the underlying vulnerability. There’s nothing that AV can do to close those vulnerabilities, it can only limit malware spreading from one machine to another. AV products will lose these battles [with malware makers] on XP sooner or later, XP will be like Swiss cheese“.