The Niantic EC-1

Few software companies have transformed the way we think about moving through physical space like Niantic. The creators of Pokémon GO and soon Harry Potter: Wizards Unite, Niantic has become an incredible unicorn success story, with a reported valuation of nearly $4 billion. One part AR, one part gaming, one part location, and many parts fun, the company has been brilliant in executing on an original product vision for what the future of our devices — and us — will be.

But the company didn’t start that way of course. Rather, the path to its present day success began almost two decades ago when a couple of engineers and product types came together to build the technology that would eventually power Google Earth. From those humble beginnings — and many learnings in between — did a might company grow.

Last month, we launched our first ever EC-1 focused on Patreon. The goal with each EC-1 is to provide a multi-angle lens to understand why certain startups have been successful. How do they think about product? What was their business strategy? How did they learn early on to build a durable and rapidly growing company?

Through extensive interviews and research, an EC-1 acts as a case study for entrepreneurs and startup executives to learn from a company’s journey as well as a thorough analysis for industry observers and public market investors eager to understand the next big companies.

TechCrunch editor Greg Kumparak wrote this EC-1. He has covered Niantic for years, and conducted many hours of interviews with Niantic’s executive team exclusively for this report.

Niantic had no say in the content of this analysis and did not get advanced access to it. Kumparak has no financial ties to Niantic or other conflicts of interest to disclose.

The Niantic EC-1 is comprised of four main articles and a bonus reading guide. Unlike with Patreon, we are going to experiment with a staggered release schedule, with part one released today and parts 2-4 and the reading guide coming over the next two weeks.

• Part 1: How a Google side project evolved into a $4 billion company (4,400 words / 18 minutes) — The long and at times turbulent founding story of one of the most successful spinouts in software history.
• Part 2: Pokémon GO and the April Fools’ joke that made billions (coming soon)
• Part 3: Harry Potter and the future of Niantic (coming soon)
• Part 4: What has Niantic learned from Pokémon GO and everything else it has built so far? (coming soon)

Niantic is a startup, and so are we here at Extra Crunch. Let us know your feedback! Let us know what you liked, what you didn’t, and what companies you think we should look at next. You can reach the author Greg Kumparak at greg@techcrunch.com and Extra Crunch Executive Editor Danny Crichton at danny@techcrunch.com.

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How to Fix Windows 10 Sleep Mode Issues

Putting your PC to sleep is a great way to save energy while still making sure you can resume without wasting power. But what can you do if your PC keeps waking up or goes to sleep automatically? With so many factors coming into play, it can be a difficult problem to diagnose.

The procedure gets complicated with different PC manufacturers. The best way to tackle this problem is to try a variety of different solutions. We’ll list out the troubleshooting steps and show you how to fix sleep mode related issues in Windows 10.

Check Your Sleep Mode Settings

When your computer doesn’t go to sleep, check all your settings and factors that prevent a sleep state. The hardware, power options, and configuration can affect the way power and sleep buttons work. If your PC has updates installed or there’s an installed app that requires a restart, then your PC may not sleep at all.

If you’re working on a shared computer or a PC that doesn’t belong to you, there’s a chance that someone else might have tweaked the power options. To access these settings, navigate to Control Panel > Power Options and click Choose when to turn off the display.

Just to the right side of Put the computer to sleep, check out the values and make sure to set them up properly. If your PC is going to sleep too soon, or taking too long to go to sleep, this should be your first port of call.

Disable Fast Startup for Old Machines

Windows 10 Fast Startup feature is a setting that helps your PC start up faster after shutdown. It does this by saving an image of the kernel and loaded drivers to the C:\hiberfil.sys upon shutdown. When you shut down and restart your PC, Windows loads the hibernation file into the memory to resume your PC.

If you have an old device and notice that your PC is not going to sleep, you can disable Fast Startup. Open Control Panel > Power Options and click Choose what the power buttons do.

Click Change settings that are currently unavailable and uncheck Turn on Fast Startup to disable this feature.

Your PC Won’t Go to Sleep

Sleep mode can save your monitor from burn-in and prevent your PC from wasting its battery life. When your PC doesn’t go to sleep, it can cause general instability, reduced power efficiency, frequent kernel hangs, and crashes.

Check Your Drivers

Check if your drivers are up-to-date. The most important ones are chipset drivers, network, audio, and BIOS drivers. It’s also a good idea to ensure that you’re running the latest version of Windows 10.

Check the version number and last modified date: Download the DriverView utility from Nirsoft. Check the version number, installation date, created or modified date, and the digital signature of the drivers.

Update Your Drivers: Windows will automatically update your drivers via Windows Update. It’s an entirely safe and reliable method because Microsoft verifies the drivers for your system and updates them when necessary.

You can also update your drivers through the Device Manager. Right-click a driver and select Update driver.

Check the Manufacturer Website: Most PC’s will include a DVD and a support website that list all the compatible drivers with their version number. Bookmark the site and check for any driver updates periodically.

Never download third-party apps that claim to update drivers. Their sources are questionable and can make your system unstable.

Check for Power Requests

The drivers and software installed on your PC might interfere with sleep mode by sending power requests that keep the system awake. To see the log of all power requests in Windows 10, press Win + X and choose Command Prompt (Admin). Type in the following command:

powercfg -requests

This will present a list of active power requests. All categories should theoretically be empty. If they’re not, make a note of what is prompting the power request.

In the screenshot, you’ll see that a “Caller_type” with process “synergyc.exe” and “request” type as “SYSTEM” is preventing the PC from entering sleep mode.

To solve this problem, you can add a request override for this process

powercfg -requestsoverride <CALLER_TYPE>“<NAME>”<REQUEST>

For example;

powercfg -requestsoverride PROCESS “synergyc.exe” SYSTEM

Check for Last Wake Events

If your PC is waking from sleep unexpectedly and you want to know which device triggered the wake up event, then use the following command

powercfg -lastwake

To see the list of devices that wake up the system, type in

powercfg -devicequery wake_armed

In the screenshot, you’ll see that Ethernet adapter is causing the PC to wake up from sleep accidentally.

Open the network adapter driver in Device Manager, right-click the driver and choose Properties.

In the Power Management tab, uncheck Allow this device to wake the computer. Optionally, you can leave this option enabled and check the option Only allow a magic packet to wake the computer to prevent everything except Wake-On-Lan packets from waking up your PC.

Run the Power Troubleshooter

There are chances that you might tweak and customize your power plan settings for multiple tasks. It can result in various sleep-related problems.

Power troubleshooter fixes these problems by resetting the settings and suggests how to avoid them in the future.

Go to Settings > Update & Security and click Troubleshoot. Scroll down and click Power to launch Power troubleshooter.

Once the procedure is complete, you can view the detailed information of all potential issues and their solutions.

Check the Compatibility of Attached Devices

It might also happen that some device connected to your PC isn’t compatible with the latest version of Windows 10. Some manufacturers take time to release updates before they’re compatible with the newer version of Windows. It can include printers, scanners, gaming consoles, webcam, and more.

Go to the manufacturer website and check for any compatibility issues. If there aren’t any, unplug the device and check to see if the sleep problem persists.

Restart Your PC in Safe Mode

Sleep mode problems are often caused by a complication between the hardware and software during startup. To check whether this is the case, restart your PC in Windows 10 Safe Mode and see whether it can go to sleep. If it can, you’ll need to perform a clean boot to narrow down the fault.

Press Win + S to launch Windows search. Type in System Configuration to open the app. Click the Services tab, check Hide all Microsoft services and select Disable all. This will ensure that only essential services will run.

In the next step, open Task Manager and disable every app that’s set to launch at startup. Quit both System Configuration and Task Manager. Restart your PC. If your PC can enter the sleep mode, that means an app or process is causing the problem.

Your PC Goes to Sleep Without Permission

If your PC goes to sleep after a brief period of inactivity, you run the risk of losing your work in the middle of the task. This type of problems can be even more infuriating than a PC showing signs of insomnia. But it is easy to fix.

Confirm Whether Your PC Sleeps

When your PC goes to sleep randomly, ensure that the machine has entered sleep mode. Sometimes the cause of random hibernation/shutdown is overheating.

If the internal temperature reaches a level above the threshold, your PC will either enter hibernation mode or will shut down to protect the hardware components. Check out these apps on how to monitor the temperature of your PC.

Restore Plan Defaults

If you have just upgraded your PC to Windows 10 or did a major update from Windows 10 1803 to 1809, specific power-related settings might get corrupt. To fix this problem, open Settings > System and under Power & sleep settings click Additional power settings.

From here, select Choose when to turn off the display. Select Restore default settings for this plan.

If this option is not available or doesn’t work, click Change advanced power settings. From the new window that appears, click Restore plan defaults. Repeat this step for every custom power plan.

Check Screensaver Settings

A screensaver utility allows your PC to go into sleep state to preserve energy. The display gets turned off, and if you have incorrect settings configuration, your PC might go to sleep at random times.

Head to Settings > Personalization and type in screen saver in the search bar.

From the popup window that appears, choose None from the Screen saver dropdown menu.

Disable Third-Party Themes

Many third-party themes are available from the Microsoft Store. It is possible that a theme can cause your PC to sleep at random times. You can disable the theme and switch back to the default theme.

Head to Settings > Personalization and click Themes. Now click the default Windows 10 theme and restart your PC.

Remove the Battery

If all the above methods fail, and you’re working with your laptop, your battery might be the culprit. Shut down your PC and remove the battery. Wait for a few moments and re-insert it.

Check the Health of Your Windows PC

If your PC won’t go to sleep or just sleeps randomly, use these troubleshooting steps to fix your problem. However, you must remember that every PC manufacturer includes their custom apps and drivers. These are known to cause sleep mode issues in your Windows 10 PC.

Apart from these troubleshooting tips, you can check the health of your PC periodically to keep it in top shape. For example, you can run the SleepStudy command to assess your battery health and take care of your PC’s health.

Read the full article: How to Fix Windows 10 Sleep Mode Issues

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6 Reasons You Should Avoid the Dark Web

The dark web can be a great resource, providing access to information that you won’t find on the regular internet.

But it can also be an—excuse the pun—dark place. There’s plenty of undesirable content you need to avoid. At best, it can be offensive; at worst, it could be highly illegal.

Let’s take a closer look at some of the worst things you might find on the dark web.

1. Crypto Scams

If you’ve been following the news, you’ll know that crypto scams are already commonplace across the regular web. The problem even forced Facebook to issue a blanket ban on crypto ads in mid-2018 (though the ban has now been partially lifted).

It should probably come as no surprise, therefore, to learn that crypto scams are even more common on the dark web.

The scammers use the same techniques as on the regular web, but the lack of regulation means they are less likely to be shut down by ad networks, forums, and other places where the scams pop up.

Note: If you would like to learn more, we discussed some of the most common crypto scams on our sister site, Blocks Decoded.

2. Exit Scams

Oasis Dark Web marketplace goes offline. Some say it may be an exit scam. We'll just have to wait and see pic.twitter.com/aKgLTpzQiC

— Catalin Cimpanu (@campuscodi) October 14, 2016

Exit scams occur when a seller stops shipping products but continues to take orders and money.

Because the items sold on the dark web are often illegal (guns, drugs, etc.) and payments are made in Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies, the buyer has no avenues for redress or compensation.

Some of the most famous exit scams on the dark web include Olympus Market and Empire in September 2018, and the Evolution darknet market in 2015.

The owners of the Evolution market reportedly walked away with more than $12 million in Bitcoins that were in escrow.

3. Hoaxes on the Dark Web

The dark web is full of hoaxes—almost all of which want you to part with your money in exchange for nothing in return.

Understandably, the hoaxes come in many forms; people are creative.

Some of the hoaxes are on the sickening end of the spectrum. Probably the most well-known example is that of “red rooms.” The rooms purport to show live torture of animals and humans, as well as live rape and even murder.

We’re not saying they are all fake—we have no desire to do the required research, but the received wisdom among regular dark web users is that that they are at best staged and at worst a money-grabbing scam.

One particular incident in August 2015 promised the torture of seven ISIS prisoners, even claiming that the viewers could direct the action via an interactive chat. There was quite a buzz around the event on Reddit and 4chan.

Then, three minutes before the action was due to begin, the site went down. Half an hour later it was back, thanking people for taking part. When the “source footage” was eventually uploaded, the camera froze every time the torture was about to start.

A suspiciously fake-looking FBI seizure notice popped up a few days later.

Other hoaxes take advantage of people who want to use illegal services (like hitmen, often referred to as the Nigerian princes of the dark web) and buy illegal products. If you ever try to procure these services and products, you’ll almost always end up out of pocket.

4. Terrorism

Anti-terrorism authorities have uncovered multiple instances of terrorist groups using the dark web to coordinate their actions.

In early 2015, it was discovered that the Al-Hayat Media Center, which is affiliated with ISIS, launched a new dark web site to disseminate information. Its regular web site even had explicit instructions on how to access the dark web content.

Rawti Shax (an offshoot of the Kurdish jihadist group Ansar al-Islam) was also found to have a dark web presence in October 2015.

After the 2015 Paris attacks, the Anonymous hacktivist group managed to gain control of one such ISIS-sympathizing site and replace it with a Prozac advert.

5. Illegal Pornography

Illegal pornography is rife on the dark web. The biggest issue is arguably that of child pornography and its associated pedophile rings.

In 2015, the FBI famously busted a massive child porn site on the dark web by using malware, exploits in Adobe Flash, and other hacking tricks. The authorities gained control of the North Carolina server and let it run for two weeks before shutting it down.

Here’s how the court filing explained the FBI’s approach:

Pursuant to that authorization, on or about and between February 20, 2015, and March 4, 2015, each time any user or administrator logged into Website A by entering a username and password, the FBI was authorized to deploy the Network Investigative Tool (NIT) which would send one or more communications to the user’s computer. Those communications were designed to cause the receiving computer to deliver to a computer known to or controlled by the government data that would help identify the computer, its location, other information about the computer, and the user of the computer accessing Website A. That data included: the computer’s actual IP address, and the date and time that the NIT determined what that IP address was; a unique identifier generated by the NIT a series of numbers, letters, and/or special characters) to distinguish the data from that of other computers; the type of operating system running on the computer, including type (e.g., Windows), version (e.g., Windows 7), and architecture (e.g., x86); information about whether the NIT had already been delivered to the computer; the computer’s Host Name; the computer’s active operating system username; and the computer’s MAC address.

In the end, the FBI compromised more than 1,000 computers, and it arrested three men.

And child pornography isn’t the only problem. Content that lies in a legal grey area—such as revenge porn—is also a massive problem that the authorities are struggling to grapple with.

6. Phishing Scams

We’re all familiar with how phishing scams work on the regular web. And if you’re semi-computer-literate, you probably back yourself not to get caught out.

On the dark web, it’s much easier to fall victim due to the way web addresses are presented. For instance, take the 2016 example of a DuckDuckGo phishing attempt.

Here’s how the site’s .onion domain should look:

• https://ift.tt/LgwySj

And here’s how the phishing domain looked:

• https://ift.tt/1LFHLbt

Are you confident that you’d spot the differences while browsing at speed?

Worse still, in some instances, the fake sites aren’t just duplicating their intended targets—they been proven to be proxies for the real sites. In practice, that means they can perform man-in-the-middle attacks and either steal or modify data as it passes through the fake site.

The Dark Web Isn’t All Bad

Look, the dark web has a terrible reputation, both for the things we have discussed in this article and a lot more besides.

But there is some good stuff out there if you know where to look. To find fun places on the dark web, why not read our articles on the best dark web sites that you won’t find on Google and the best dark web browsers for your devices.

Read the full article: 6 Reasons You Should Avoid the Dark Web

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How to Get the Linux Bash Shell on Windows 10

Want quick and easy access to Linux on your Windows PC? The best option is to use the Windows Subsystem for Linux.

This gives you a Linux bash shell, a terminal window running in Windows. But how do you get this on Windows 10?

What Is the Windows Subsystem for Linux?

First included with the 2018 Windows 10 Anniversary Update and rolled out to all users in the Fall Creators Update, Windows Subsystem for Linux basically lets you run Linux software in Windows 10.

This is a feature that has been built into Windows. Unlike installing Linux in a virtual machine, the Windows Subsystem for Linux can be instantly called from the Start menu.

For this to work, however, you first need to enable the feature.

Once the Windows Subsystem for Linux is installed on Windows 10, you can run Linux in command line mode. This gives you access to the bash shell on your Windows PC!

Linux Bash Shell: For 64-Bit Windows 10 Only

Before you get started, make sure you’re running a 64-bit version of Windows 10. Sadly, the Windows Subsystem for Linux will not work on 32-bit systems. Check if your computer is running a 32-bit or a 64-bit version of Windows.

To check your computer for 64-bit compatibility, press WIN + I to open Settings, then System > About. Under “Device specifications” you’ll see the System type listed; for Windows Subsystem for Linux, this should read 64-bit operating system.

If not, you’ll need to upgrade your Windows 10 system from 32-bit to 64-bit. However, this will only work if you have 64-bit hardware.

How to Install Linux Bash Shell on Windows 10

Ready to install Bash on Windows? Start by clicking Start and entering “turn windows”. The Turn Windows Features on or off item should be displayed, so click this to open. Wait while the list is populated, then scroll down to Windows Subsystem for Linux.

This box should be checked. If it isn’t, add a check, then click OK to confirm.

You’ll be prompted to restart Windows, so follow this instruction. Upon restarting, open Start > Windows Store. Use the search tool to find entries relating to “Linux” and select the first option, Run Windows on Linux.

Select your preferred Linux version to install. Whichever one you choose will determine the Bash experience. For example, if you select Kali Linux, you’ll be able to use commands specific to that operating system.

Install the Linux operating system, then wait. Once complete, click Launch from within the Windows Store or open it from the Start menu. On the first run, you’ll be prompted to input a username and password to create a user account.

Other methods are available to launch your chosen Linux environment. From the Start menu, you can enter:

• bash
• wsl

Both will display as a “Run command” that can be selected to instantly open Bash shell. The difference with using either of these methods is that they open in the /mnt/c/Windows/System32 directory. This means you can browse the System32 subdirectory in Windows 10.

Note that it is not possible to damage Windows 10 using the Linux environment. Any commands you input will damage only the Windows Subsystem for Linux and the chosen operating system. Windows 10 will remain safe and secure.

Also, you no longer need to enable the Windows 10 Developer Mode in Settings to run Bash.

How Does Bash Shell Terminal Differ from the Windows PowerShell?

With the Linux Bash shell running in Windows 10, you can input a variety of command line instructions.

But how does this differ from just using the Windows command prompt or PowerShell?

Well, naturally, both systems are quite different. With the PowerShell or command prompt, you’re limited to commands that are particular to Windows. This means, for example, using the dir command to view the contents of a directory; in Linux, the equivalent is ls.

Basically, the differences between Windows and Linux are what sets these two text environments apart. The advantage of having the Bash shell in Windows 10 is that you can easily access Linux within Windows. This saves time to setting up a virtual machine or rebooting into a dual boot installation of Linux.

What Can You Do With Bash in Windows 10?

With the Bash shell set up on Windows 10, you can use it as you would on a Linux PC.

Standard commands like help will show you how to use the preinstalled apps and tools. For example, apt help will demonstrate the usage of the package manager. You can use sudo apt update to get the latest packages, as you would on a Linux PC.

Similarly, the sudo apt upgrade command upgrades Linux to the latest version of the OS.

Meanwhile, other standard commands are available. You can check your network connectivity with ifconfig, check the current directory with pwd, and change to a different directory with cd.

You can also get a quick list of the last 10 inputs with the history command.

In short, it’s just like using Linux within the Windows 10 operating system.

Windows 10 and Linux: Working Together

Setting up the Windows Subsystem for Linux and accessing the Bash shell is easy. It’s also quicker than running a virtual machine, and far less complicated than relying on a dual boot.

To recap, all you need to do to run the Linux Bash shell on Windows 10 is:

1. Check you’re using 64-bit Windows 10.
2. Enable Windows Subsystem for Linux in the Windows Features screen.
3. Install your chosen Linux environment from the Windows Store.
4. Run Linux from the Start menu.

Meanwhile, almost all Linux commands can be used in the Bash shell on Windows. Bit rusty, or need some help? Check our downloadable guide to Linux command line tricks.

Read the full article: How to Get the Linux Bash Shell on Windows 10

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What Is an IP Address and Can It Show Where You Live?

Your computer’s IP address is required for websites to know where to send their data, but is it a double-edged sword? Could someone find your physical location via your IP address alone?

Let’s look at what an IP address is and what it reveals about you.

What Is an IP Address?

The full name for an IP address is an “Internet Protocol address.” Its full name says a lot about how it works; it’s an address from which your computer sends and receives data.

It’s best to imagine IP addresses like a street address for the internet. As humans, we remember names best, which is why our streets are given names that we can easily remember. Computers, however, prefer to work in numbers, and an IP address is their ideal way of getting around.

Every site, computer, and server on the internet has an IP address. When you want to load a website, your computer sends a request to the website’s IP address for its content. The website then sends its content back to your PC using your computer’s IP address.

This is very similar to sending a letter to someone. You need their address to send them a letter, and they need yours to return the favor.

What You Can Find Out From an IP Address

Info Gathered Without Using Tools

Let’s say you have someone’s IP address on hand. What can you work out from their location from the IP address alone, without using any tools?

The numbers alone really won’t give you anything to work with. It’s not like a phone number where you can tell what country it’s from by its country code.

IP addresses are assigned to companies rather than countries, so you can’t tell what country the IP address is from unless you’re familiar with the company who owns it. As such, by itself, it’s very hard to trace a location just by looking at a string of numbers.

Info Gathered While Using Tools

Things get a little different when you call in the aid of an IP lookup tool. These have the power to extract information from the IP address and give you an estimate of where the user is.

As far as the information you’ll gain, you’ll likely be able to see the ISP that the user is using, as well as a rough idea of where they live. In rural areas, this information may be enough to locate someone, but in city spaces, the area is so wide that it’s impossible to tell where the user’s computer is.

In short, while people can definitely learn your country, ISP, and city from your IP address, they won’t be able to go so far as to learn your name, street, or house number.

What’s My IP Address’s Location?

If you’re interested in finding out what information your IP address has about you, why not try it yourself? There are plenty of tools online that let you know what information they can gather from your IP address alone.

You can read more about them in our guide to IP addresses and how to locate your own.

Dynamic IP Addresses Make Things Harder

On top of all this, most routers are set up to use dynamic IP addresses. This means every time the router is reset, it grabs a brand new IP address from the ISP.  An IP address you used in the past may not point in your direction anymore!

This is great for keeping things private, but it’s not so useful for people who want to host servers. In order to consistently connect to a server in their home, the user requires a static IP address that doesn’t change. If it’s changing after every router reboot, it’s like trying to send a letter to someone who’s always moving house!

We talked about static IP addresses in our guide to setting one up for your home servers.

Why You Don’t Type IP Addresses

It’s very possible that you’ve been browsing the internet for a long time, and yet you’ve never manually typed an IP address at all! If they’re so important for computers and servers to talk to one another, how come we don’t use them?

Remember how humans work better with names than numbers? That’s what we use when we access a website. If you want to visit Google, you don’t have to remember the website’s IP address; you just type in “www.google.com” and you’re good to go!

Of course, this does the computer no good; it needs an IP address instead of a name. When it gets a URL, it passes it to a DNS server which gives the computer the correct IP address to go to. The DNS server acts as a “middle man” between the human-friendly URLs and the computer-friendly IP addresses.

If you want to learn more about DNS servers, you can read our guide to getting the best results out of them.

How the Police Find a Person’s Address

If this is all true, however, how come the police know what houses to target during an illegal online bust? There are plenty of stories about hackers or illegal file sharers that are caught out by the police and subsequently arrested.

This is because the ISP you use has all the information needed to track your activity back to your home. You would have given them your name and address as part of the sign up process, and the ISP can use that to trace what activity comes from what household.

When the police want to catch out illegal usage, they’ll harvest an IP address that’s performing said illegal actions. They’ll then approach the ISP who owns that IP address and ask them for the home address. If the evidence is strong enough, the ISP will be obliged to legally surrender the address of the target.

How to Hide an IP Address

If the idea of someone learning your home city and country is enough to give you the shakes, you can get around this! The best way to hide your IP address online is with a good VPN service.

VPNs work by skipping your ISP mostly out of the equation. Your computer encrypts the data it sends, then passes it through your ISP to the VPN service. The VPN then passes your request onto the website you want to visit.

If anyone tries to work out where you live by your IP address, they’ll see the VPN’s address rather than your own. They may be able to work out that you’re hiding behind a VPN, but they won’t be able to see where you’re hiding from!

We’re always on top of the best VPN services out there. MakeUseOf readers get an exclusive 49% off on our top recommended VPN, ExpressVPN.

Getting to Know Your IP Address

While an IP address is your computer’s location on the internet, it doesn’t give away much about your physical location. If you live in an urban area, it’s almost impossible for someone to track you down using an IP address alone!

While you’re exploring your own IP address, why not read about how to find it on your mobile phone?

Read the full article: What Is an IP Address and Can It Show Where You Live?

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Are Mac Cleaning Apps Worthless? 7 Factors to Consider

Many third-party utilities for macOS claim to offer you a quick and easy way to perform a variety of maintenance tasks. These include freeing up disk space by removing caches, logs, and other unneeded files. They also supposedly remove remnants of uninstalled apps, fix startup issues, correct disk problems, and more.

Although maintenance apps are useful, they can also harm your Mac if used carelessly. You should exercise some skepticism and caution when dealing with these. We’ll show you what factors you should keep in mind before considering them.

1. Free Disk Space Is Not a Cure-All

macOS requires a certain amount of breathing room for temporary files, virtual memory, application support-related data, and more. When your disk gets nearly full, your system performance may deteriorate sharply. You’ll also notice symptoms like application hangs, crashes, and even kernel panics.

A good rule of thumb is to keep free space of at least 10-15 percent of your startup drive or twice the amount of RAM installed; whichever is larger. To check your remaining disk space, open Apple menu > About This Mac and click Storage. You’ll see an overview of your space used by different type of files.

Many people will look for a utility cleaner app to free up disk space. But this is the wrong approach. When disk space gets critically low, it’s true that you can gain some space with a thorough cleaning. But this gain is temporary as system processes and apps recreate those files again.

Instead of relying on these tools, use the Optimize Storage utility built into macOS and our tips to free up disk space.

Once your free disk space is above a certain threshold, there’s no direct correlation between unused space and performance. For example, with a 2TB drive, there’s no noticeable performance difference whether you have 500GB or 750GB occupied.

There’s no point in using a cleaning utility, and you won’t notice a performance improvement at all. Any issues with your Mac requires a different troubleshooting technique and approach.

2. Watch Out for Useless Features

All cleaning utilities use carefully designed marketing tactics to sell you their paid apps. They make the app seem amazing with an impressive set of features to attract you. But you should not judge an app based on these attributes. Some features are useless and have no benefit at all.

Memory Cleaner

This is the most frustrating and persistent myth about how memory works: memory cleaners are totally pointless. The developers take advantage of inexperienced users and make false promises about boosting memory performance. The truth is entirely different: macOS knows how to manage RAM and cache your frequently used data for faster access.

Even if your RAM is full, the OS knows when to discard or save the cached data for another application. Just keep a watch on apps that leak memory and if you notice any dip in performance, either quit that app or restart your Mac.

Defragmentation

Fragmentation isn’t a problem on macOS. The HFS+ and APFS file systems that Macs use automatically defrag files using two processes named Hot File Adaptive Clustering and on-the-fly-defragmentation.

These two mechanisms prevent data from becoming fragmented. Note that this only applies to older Macs with an HDD. Newer Macs use SSDs and thus don’t need to be defragmented.

Removing Language Files

Mac apps come with files for every language they support. Language files live in the package contents of applications and end with the LPROJ extension. Most cleaner utilities recommend you remove language files to gain a few gigabytes.

But remember, the amount of space you earn is not significant enough for the risks involved. You can’t predict which apps will crash, freeze, or stop working altogether.

3. Don’t Get Fooled by Redundant Features

macOS has a fantastic set of built-in tools. Because of this, for the most part, maintenance utility apps replicate features already included in your Mac. Let me give you some examples.

Startup Optimization

Login items are apps and services that launch automatically when you boot your Mac. The more apps you have running at once, the higher your RAM usage and CPU load. Every maintenance utility has a feature to let you disable startup items. But you don’t need a dedicated app to do this.

Go to System Preferences > Users & Groups. Select your account in the list on the left and click the Login Items button. Here, scan the list and click minus to remove anything you don’t want to run at startup.

Clearing Browser and App Caches

Cleaner utilities offer to scrub the cache of your browser and other apps. Every utility app has this feature and recommends you use it to periodically clean your Mac.

However, you can clear old data right from your browser itself. Many apps also have built-in options to clear the cache when it does not function properly.

Remove Large and Old Files

While this is a useful and convenient feature to have in a utility app, macOS easily lets you set up smart folders with a property or series of properties.

Press Cmd + F in Finder to bring up the search bar. Then click on Kind filter and select File Size or Date created from the attribute list. Enter the size of the file in the third space, either in MB or GB.

This will let you easily locate large or super-old files so you can remove them.

4. Don’t Unnecessarily Clean Cache and Log Files

It’s normal for macOS to use disk space for day-to-day operations. Your browser downloads new data, apps create cached content for optimal performance, and log files capture information to help you troubleshoot issues when they arise. All cleaning utilities lets you clean cache, logs, and unnecessary files.

The utility developers want you to believe that all this is nothing but clutter and you should delete them frequently. However, clearing cache and log files often makes your Mac run slower than normal. But apart from the performance issues, you’re losing vital information:

• A corrupt cache can cause strange effects in an app. Although macOS can delete the corrupted cache, sometimes this fails to work. If you have an app that often hangs or crashes, cleaning the cache will delete the information needed for troubleshooting. The utility app does not try to address the underlying problem.
• If your Mac is facing certain issues, then log files can be of great use. Unfortunately, utility apps see them as junk. This can hinder your ability to diagnose problems. If you can’t read log files, you can submit the file to a developer for support.

5. Maintenance Tasks Need a Human Touch

Every utility cleaner app has numerous options selected by default. Most people assume that the app will take the right action and solve all your Mac problems. You should not trust any app blindly, though. If you’re a novice user, start by turning off all the automatic options and then selectively turn on the features you need.

Ask yourself these questions when in doubt:

• Does this app launch automatically on startup?
• Does it have any settings that let you schedule automatic maintenance?
• How deep is the scan?
• Can I review the items before deleting them?
• Can you exclude any items from scan results?

CleanMyMac does a lot of different tasks. The interface offers you a complete suite of cleanup tools.

It’s worth taking your time to go through CleanMyMac’s Help so that you understand what each option does. For beginners, the Smart Scan recommendations are excessive. Instead, choose Deselect all and prefer to scan one category at a time.

OnyX is a free utility app available since the early days of OS X. The interface has four panes: Maintenance, Utilities, Files, and Parameters. Each option is subdivided into multiple views.

Because OnyX has many options, it makes the app somewhat difficult for newcomers. Help is also non-existent and has a few annoying quirks.

6. Look Into the App’s Reputation

Not all utility cleaner apps have a good reputation. There are some apps that can not only damage your Mac but also steal your browsing data, as the Malwarebytes Blog reports. You might have heard of two such utilities: MacKeeper and Advanced Mac Cleaner. Both of these tools use extensive and aggressive marketing to scare you into thinking that your Mac has lots of issues.

After running a scan, the app will highlight an alarming number of problems on your Mac. These tools don’t create a good impression, as the very first screen you see is designed to scare you into paying up. Indeed, we’ve looked at why you should stay far away from MacKeeper.

If you’re unsure about an app, search for it on Google and see what people say about it. You can also browse the Mac forums and ask other users about the app.

However, don’t trust the reviews on the app’s website. They’re often sponsored, as they pay people money in exchange for a good review. They could also be outright fake.

7. Pricing and Long-Term Benefits

Most Mac cleaner apps are rather expensive. For example, CleanMyMac offers a year-long subscription for $35. If you don’t like subscriptions, then you have to pay $90 as a one-time purchase. Ask yourself these questions to find out if you need such apps:

• Do you maintain a healthy amount of free disk space?
• Are you an enthusiast Mac user?
• Are you willing to learn and accept macOS’s strength and weakness?
• How much are you actually going to use the app?

If you’re a novice user, these type of apps can help you to understand how macOS works and also save your time. But after a few months, chance are you’re not going to use the app frequently.

Be Suspicious of Mac Cleaner Apps

Just like any machine, your Mac can and will have issues from time to time. Apple provides plenty of system utilities for security, anti-theft, backups, and diagnostics. One common aspect in all utility cleaner apps is they give you a one-step approach to fix your Mac problems.

But you should remember that these tools do not address all the possible Mac issues you can have. They add convenience, but you have to pay a premium price every year to get few benefits. Instead, why not learn more about your Mac and utilize free tools when your Mac doesn’t work properly?

Read the full article: Are Mac Cleaning Apps Worthless? 7 Factors to Consider

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What Is a VPN Kill Switch? Here’s Why You Need One

Sidewalk Labs launches an app to crowdsource public space surveys

Alphabet’s urban planning subsidiary announced today the launch of CommonSpaces. The new app was created to give park operators and community members a place to enter and organize observations about parks and other publics spaces.

Interested parties can create a web portal for a space. The organizer defines the parameters of a study, outlining what sort of data they’re looking to collect, and users are then given shifts to go about recording data. The goal is discover how people utilize various public spaces, information that can be used to determine future changes.

“The app records data in accordance with the Public Life Data Protocol, an open data standard (published by the Gehl Institute and founding municipal and private partners) that makes it possible to compare data from public spaces,” Sidewalk senior engineer Ananta Pandey says in a blog post. “The data collected with CommonSpace can be easily exported into visualization and analysis tools that communities and space managers alike can use to see patterns, generate insights, and develop evidence-based approaches to advocating for change.”

For obvious reasons, Sidewalk is quick to note the privacy parameters it set up for the app. The company says it’s adhering to Privacy by Design, and won’t be collecting any personal information about bystanders who are observed for CommonSpaces.

After being piloted at a Toronto park in Fall of last year, the app is now available for both Android and iOS.

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Focaldata thinks it has some answers for campaigners in the age of Trump and Brexit

Political parties, campaigns, and brands can’t get an accurate and cost-effective understanding of opinion in small geographic areas, like the constituencies of lawmakers. This is a big problem in political campaigning. And all political campaigning now has a huge online element, as we know. We also know political turbulence is one of the defining themes of our age.

But one thing is clear. All the players want faster, cheaper, more accurate and a more granular understanding of consumers and voters. In the age of AI, survey predictions are influenced as much as so many other machine-learning technology products.

Focaldata is a UK-startup that thinks it has some of the answers to these quandaries. Their integrated consumer analytics and survey workflow application claims to give customers a more accurate and granular picture of consumers than traditional polling using machine learning. At the same time, they say their workflow software cuts down on the cost and time market research takes.

The idea is that they employ a new machine learning based technique (MRP) to generate survey ‘results’. This new methodology can use more information (such as old survey data or public statistics) than conventional methods, which lets them get accurate predictions in small geographic areas from the same sample sizes.

Founder Justin Ibbett had done MRP manually on his laptop a few times for some existing market research firms and realized how fiddly it was. “I felt a dedicated software application would reduce the complexity whilst making the results more accessible and useful- our early incarnations just delivered a spreadsheet!” he told me.

Much of Focaldata’s business has been in politics. They have worked with the pro-Remain group Best for Britain and the anti-Racism charity Hope not Hate on combating Far Right sentiment. However, most demand is now from large brand owners, such as ABInBev, a recent client.
They now have over 10 paying clients including big brands like M&C Saatchi.

Competitors include YouGov, Survation, Dalia Research (a Balderton-backed company), and standard market research agencies like Kantar, Ipsos Mori.

But against traditional agencies, Ibbett says their ML-based data processing engine sets them apart, allowing them to go very granular and get more accurate over time.

The market research market is £5bn in the UK alone (PwC report, 2016) and global market research is a $40bn market.

The startup has raised a £1.1m seed round from notable UK angels including Alex Chesterman, founder of Zoopla and Martin Bolland, founder of Alchemy Partners. Previously they had raised a small pre-seed round from 3 other angels, including Xen Lategan (backer of Magic Pony and ex-Google, former CTO of News International)

CTO and co-founder Calvin Dudek was at Google for 5 years as a product manager, and ran Data Science Innovation at the DWP. Chief Data Scientist Takao Noguchi is a cognitive scientist.

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Google pulls controversial anti-gay religious app from the Play Store

The same day the Human Rights Campaign downranked the company in its index of the best LGBTQ-friendly employers, Google decided to yank from the Play Store a controversial app accused of promoting conversion therapy.

On that list, known as the Corporate Equality Index, the HRC, a prominent LGBTQ rights organization, included a footnote that it was aware of the conversion therapy-style app by Living Hope Ministries in the Google Play Store. The app’s removal was first reported by Axios. TechCrunch confirmed that links to the Living Hope Ministries app are no longer functional.

“… Conversion therapy can lead to depression, anxiety, drug use, homelessness, and suicide,” the HRC wrote in its index. “Pending remedial steps by the company to address this app that can cause harm to the LGBTQ community, the [Corporate Equality Index] rating is suspended.”

TechCrunch has reached out to Google for details about its decision and what specific rules the Living Hope Ministries app was found to violate.

Living Hope Ministries, based in Arlington, Texas, denies that it promotes conversion therapy, an institutionally denounced practice in which a usually religious group tries to “correct” an individual’s same-sex attraction. Living Hope Ministry’s website states that it “speaks to thousands of people each year about how they, as Christ-followers, might respond redemptively to those who are struggling with same gender attraction.” The group also notes that it specializes in supporting the “wives of men who struggle with same gender attractions.”

Apple pulled the Living Hope Ministries app in December after facing public pressure and a campaign against the app by the organization Truth Wins Out. Amazon soon followed suit, but the app remained live in Google Play until today.

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Industry Nicknames

Industry Nicknames

Snap CEO’s sister Caroline Spiegel starts a no-visuals porn site

If you took the photos and videos out of pornography, could it appeal to a new audience? Caroline Spiegel’s first startup Quinn aims to bring some imagination to adult entertainment. Her older brother, Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel, spent years trying to convince people his app wasn’t just for sexy texting. Now Caroline is building a website dedicated to sexy text and audio. The 22-year-old college senior tells TechCrunch that on April 13th she’ll launch Quinn, which she describes as “a much less gross, more fun Pornhub for women”.

TechCrunch checked out Quinn’s private beta site, which is pretty bare bones right now. Caroline tells us she’s already raised under a million dollars for the project. But given her brother’s success spotting the next generation’s behavior patterns and turning them into beloved products, Caroline might find investors are eager to throw cash at Quinn. That’s especially true given she’s taking a contrarian approach. There will be no imagery on Quinn.

Caroline explains that “There’s no visual content on the site– just audio and written stories. And the whole thing is open source, so people can submit content and fantasies, etc. Everything is vetted by us before it goes on the site.” Caroline is building Quinn with a three-woman team of her best friends she met while at college at Stanford including Greta Meyer, though they plan to relocate to LA after graduation.

“His dream girl was named ‘Quinn'”

The idea for Quinn sprung from a deeply personal need. “I came up with it because I had to leave Stanford my junior year because i was struggling with anorexia and sexual dysfunction that came along with that” Caroline tells me. “I started to do a lot of research into sexual dysfunction cures. There are about 30 FDA-approved drugs for sexual dysfunction for men but zero for women and that’s a big bummer.”

She believes there’s still a stigma around women pleasuring themselves, leading to a lack of products offering assistance. Sure, there are plenty of porn sites but few are explicitly designed for women, and fewer stray outside of visual content. Caroline says photos and videos can create body image pressure, but with text and audio, anyone can imagine themselves in a scene. “Most visual media perpetuates the male gaze . . . all mainstream porn tells one story . . . You don’t have to fit one idea of what a woman should look like.”

That concept fits with the startup’s name “Quinn”, which Caroline says one of her best guy friends thought up. “He said this girl he met — his dream girl — was named ‘Quinn.'”

Caroline took to Reddit and Tumblr to find Quinn’s first creators. Reddit stuck to text and links for much of its history, fostering the kinky literature and audio communities. And when Tumblr banned porn in December, it left a legion of adult content makers looking for a new home. “Our audio ranges from guided masturbation to overheard sex, and there’s also married stories. It’s literally everything. Different strokes for different for folks, know what I mean?” Caroline says with a cheeky laugh.

To establish its brand, Quinn is running social media influencer campaigns where “The basic idea is to make people feel like it’s okay to experience pleasure. It’s hard to make something like masturbation cool, so that’s a little bit of a lofty goal. We’re just trying to make it feel okay, and even more okay than it is for men.”

As for the business model, Caroline’s research found younger women were embarrassed to pay for porn. Instead Quinn plans to run ads, though there could be commerce opportunities too. And since the site doesn’t bombard users with nude photos or hardcore videos, it might be able to attract sponsors that most porn sites can’t.

Evan is “very supportive”

Until monetization spins up, Quinn has the sub-$1 million in funding that Caroline won’t reveal the source of, though she confirms it’s not from her brother. “I wouldn’t say that he’s particularly involved other than he’s one of the most important people in my life and I talk to him all the time. He gives me the best advice I can imagine” the younger sibling says. “He doesn’t have any qualms, He’s very supportive.”

Quinn will need all the morale it can get, as Caroline bluntly admits “we have a lot of competitors”. There’s the traditional stuff like Pornhub, user generated content sites like Make Love Not Porn, and spontaneous communities like on Reddit. She calls $5 million-funded audio porn startup Dipsea “an exciting competitor” though she notes that “we sway a little more erotic than they do, but we’re so supportive of their mission.” How friendly.

Quinn’s biggest rival will likely be outdated but institutionalized site Literotica, which SimilarWeb ranks as the 60th most popular adult website, 631st most visited site overall, showing it gets 53 million hits per month. But the fact that Literotica looks like a web 1.0 forum yet has so much traffic signals a massive opportunity for Quinn. With rules prohibiting Quinn from launching native mobile apps, it will have to put all its effort into making its website stand out if it’s going to survive.

But more than competition, Caroline fears that Quinn will have to convince women to give its style of porn a try. “Basically, there’s this idea that for men, masturbation is an innate drive and for women it’s a ‘could do without it, could do with it’. Quinn is going to have to make a market alongside a product and that terrifies me” Caroline says, her voice building with enthusiasm. “But that’s what excites me the most about it, because what I’m banking on is if you’ve never had chocolate before, you don’t know. But once you have it, you start craving it. A lot of women haven’t experienced raw, visceral pleasure before, [but once we help them find it] we’ll have momentum.”

Most importantly, Quinn wants all women to feel they have rightful access to whatever they fancy. “It’s not about deserving to feel great, You don’t have to do Pilates to use this. You don’t have to always eat right. There’s no deserving with our product. Our mission is for women to be more in touch with themselves and feel fucking great. It’s all about pleasure and good vibes.”

Read Full Article

Snap CEO’s sister Caroline Spiegel starts a no-visuals porn site

If you took the photos and videos out of pornography, could it appeal to a new audience? Caroline Spiegel’s first startup Quinn aims to bring some imagination to adult entertainment. Her older brother, Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel, spent years trying to convince people his app wasn’t just for sexy texting. Now Caroline is building a website dedicated to sexy text and audio. The 22-year-old college senior tells TechCrunch that on April 13th she’ll launch Quinn, which she describes as “a much less gross, more fun Pornhub for women”.

TechCrunch checked out Quinn’s private beta site, which is pretty bare bones right now. Caroline tells us she’s already raised under a million dollars for the project. But given her brother’s success spotting the next generation’s behavior patterns and turning them into beloved products, Caroline might find investors are eager to throw cash at Quinn. That’s especially true given she’s taking a contrarian approach. There will be no imagery on Quinn.

Caroline explains that “There’s no visual content on the site– just audio and written stories. And the whole thing is open source, so people can submit content and fantasies, etc. Everything is vetted by us before it goes on the site.” Caroline is building Quinn with a three-woman team of her best friends she met while at college at Stanford including Greta Meyer, though they plan to relocate to LA after graduation.

“His dream girl was named ‘Quinn'”

The idea for Quinn sprung from a deeply personal need. “I came up with it because I had to leave Stanford my junior year because i was struggling with anorexia and sexual dysfunction that came along with that” Caroline tells me. “I started to do a lot of research into sexual dysfunction cures. There are about 30 FDA-approved drugs for sexual dysfunction for men but zero for women and that’s a big bummer.”

She believes there’s still a stigma around women pleasuring themselves, leading to a lack of products offering assistance. Sure, there are plenty of porn sites but few are explicitly designed for women, and fewer stray outside of visual content. Caroline says photos and videos can create body image pressure, but with text and audio, anyone can imagine themselves in a scene. “Most visual media perpetuates the male gaze . . . all mainstream porn tells one story . . . You don’t have to fit one idea of what a woman should look like.”

That concept fits with the startup’s name “Quinn”, which Caroline says one of her best guy friends thought up. “He said this girl he met — his dream girl — was named ‘Quinn.'”

Caroline took to Reddit and Tumblr to find Quinn’s first creators. Reddit stuck to text and links for much of its history, fostering the kinky literature and audio communities. And when Tumblr banned porn in December, it left a legion of adult content makers looking for a new home. “Our audio ranges from guided masturbation to overheard sex, and there’s also married stories. It’s literally everything. Different strokes for different for folks, know what I mean?” Caroline says with a cheeky laugh.

To establish its brand, Quinn is running social media influencer campaigns where “The basic idea is to make people feel like it’s okay to experience pleasure. It’s hard to make something like masturbation cool, so that’s a little bit of a lofty goal. We’re just trying to make it feel okay, and even more okay than it is for men.”

As for the business model, Caroline’s research found younger women were embarrassed to pay for porn. Instead Quinn plans to run ads, though there could be commerce opportunities too. And since the site doesn’t bombard users with nude photos or hardcore videos, it might be able to attract sponsors that most porn sites can’t.

Evan is “very supportive”

Until monetization spins up, Quinn has the sub-$1 million in funding that Caroline won’t reveal the source of, though she confirms it’s not from her brother. “I wouldn’t say that he’s particularly involved other than he’s one of the most important people in my life and I talk to him all the time. He gives me the best advice I can imagine” the younger sibling says. “He doesn’t have any qualms, He’s very supportive.”

Quinn will need all the morale it can get, as Caroline bluntly admits “we have a lot of competitors”. There’s the traditional stuff like Pornhub, user generated content sites like Make Love Not Porn, and spontaneous communities like on Reddit. She calls $5 million-funded audio porn startup Dipsea “an exciting competitor” though she notes that “we sway a little more erotic than they do, but we’re so supportive of their mission.” How friendly.

Quinn’s biggest rival will likely be outdated but institutionalized site Literotica, which SimilarWeb ranks as the 60th most popular adult website, 631st most visited site overall, showing it gets 53 million hits per month. But the fact that Literotica looks like a web 1.0 forum yet has so much traffic signals a massive opportunity for Quinn. With rules prohibiting Quinn from launching native mobile apps, it will have to put all its effort into making its website stand out if it’s going to survive.

But more than competition, Caroline fears that Quinn will have to convince women to give its style of porn a try. “Basically, there’s this idea that for men, masturbation is an innate drive and for women it’s a ‘could do without it, could do with it’. Quinn is going to have to make a market alongside a product and that terrifies me” Caroline says, her voice building with enthusiasm. “But that’s what excites me the most about it, because what I’m banking on is if you’ve never had chocolate before, you don’t know. But once you have it, you start craving it. A lot of women haven’t experienced raw, visceral pleasure before, [but once we help them find it] we’ll have momentum.”

Most importantly, Quinn wants all women to feel they have rightful access to whatever they fancy. “It’s not about deserving to feel great, You don’t have to do Pilates to use this. You don’t have to always eat right. There’s no deserving with our product. Our mission is for women to be more in touch with themselves and feel fucking great. It’s all about pleasure and good vibes.”

Read Full Article