MSCHF drops an ultrasonic jamming device add-on for your Amazon Echo

Smart assistants are sensitive to their wake words, but who among us doesn’t trigger the smart speakers in their house with alarming frequency? Add in some heavily detailed privacy mishaps and a general feeling of distrust and there’s plenty of reason you might want to silence your smart speaker occasionally.

A new device promises to do just that, placing a check on your Amazon Echo’s always-on microphones through ultrasonic jamming. The gadget, dubbed Alexagate, is the latest drop from hype-as-a-service startup MSCHF. Last month, the startup announced a partnership with YouTuber MrBeast and an app where users could win big bucks as long as they kept their finger on their phone. The contest ended with multiple winners as the competition stretched from hours into days.

Image Credits: Lucas Matney

Alexagate is a product for the times, encapsulating a lot of public and private fears about big tech. The device, which took over a year of planning to come to life, is a novelty item, but it does work and it required real engineering to build. The device features seven individual ultrasonic speakers that are arranged to jam the speakers on Echo devices by overwhelming them with sound so they can’t hear anything else. A flippable plastic interface allows the Alexagate to fit seamlessly to most of the Echo devices out there.

In my own experiments, the device does exactly what it says, jamming Alexa when it’s turned on. If you do want to use your smart speaker, you can clap and deactivate the Alexagate, allowing “Hey Alexa” to get a response from the Amazon smart speaker.

It was designed specifically for Amazon Echo devices, though MSCHF creative director Kevin Wiesner says they chose Amazon largely because their speakers were the most common. Nevertheless, when you open the box, you’re hit with a product guide featuring the title “BYE BYE BEZOS,” indicating that the device is in some ways meant to stick it to the world’s richest man.

MSCHF launches an internet-wide contest to see who can touch their phone the longest

The product’s manifesto page sows seeds of doubt around whether big tech is listening into user conversations. “Perhaps you don’t subscribe to the notion that Facebook always listens through your phone’s mic, but ask yourself at least this in all honesty: Do you think the Echo ‘mute’ button really does anything?”

It’s a tantalizing line, but sits at odds with what security researchers have found about these hardware kill switches, which do indeed work by cutting power directly to the device’s microphones. The fact is that these ideas take off because people generally don’t trust a Facebook or Amazon to approach their privacy responsibly. This idea was central to the creation of the device, Wiesner says.

“So, the guideline that we set for ourselves internally when we’re coming up with physical products ideas is objects that have a point of view.” Wiesner told TechCrunch in an interview. “You’re gonna put this in your living room and, in some ways, it’s almost like a virtue signal to someone who comes into your house and sees it on your end table. It’s ostentatious privacy, in that sense because it is kind of like supposed to start a discussion of what it means to have a smart device and what you’re giving up for it for that.”

Smart speakers are far from essential devices, so the argument for users who might “need” something like this might boil down to calls for them to just unplug their Echo and live without the mild conveniences it provides. Though it’s a functional device, the Alexagate is more focused on the themes its creation stands behind. In a lot of ways, products from huge tech companies are becoming unavoidable and it’s not wrong for users to like some things about them and wish that they could avoid other elements of the products.

Image Credits: Lucas Matney

It’s an argument used by decentralization advocates who want the freedom to hack around with a company’s products that they use so that they can tailor them for exactly what they want. In Alexagate’s instance, users might want the convenience of a smart speaker but want the checks and balance of an external company verifying that it can’t hear a thing.

MSCHF’s Alexagate device is available now on their website for $99. It doesn’t appear to be available for purchase on Amazon quite yet.

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Pre-orders for the Analogue Pocket retro portable game console start August 3, ships May 2021

Analogue has repeatedly proven that it’s the gold standard when it comes to retro gaming, delivering extremely faithful, but modern hardware to play original NES, SNES, Sega cartridges and more. The company revealed its forthcoming Analogue Pocket last October, and now it’s about to kick off pre-orders for the portable classic console, which can play Game Boy, Game Boy Color and Game Boy Advance games out of the box, and works with even more classic handheld game systems via adapters.

The Analogue Pocket will be available to pre-order for $199.99 on August 3, starting at 8 AM PST (11 AM EST). The actual ship date is quite a while after that, however: Analogue estimates that the hardware should actually start to be delivered to customers in May, 2021. That’s due to “the unfortunate global state of affairs and supply chain challenges outside of our control,” according to the company, and they’re hardly the only indie hardware outfit feeling the pinch of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on tech suppliers.

Image Credits: Analogue

The good news is that so long as you’re patient, the Pocket will almost certainly deliver the goods. Analogue isn’t new to this, having successfully shipped multiple products in the past, including the Nt mini, the Super Nt and the Mega Sg. Each of these more than delivered on their promises, offering fantastic performance in bringing classic games to modern TVs and displays – without relying on emulation.

Analogue Pocket has changed a bit since it was originally introduced last year, with the start and select button relocated to the base of the front of the device, a design change designed for “optimal comfort” according to the company. The Dock that you can use to connect the Pocket to your TV for a big-screen gaming experience also now features a recessed USB-C port to make the connection more stable.

True to form in terms of combining classic gameplay with modern conveniences, Analogue has designed Pocket with a sleep and wake function that’s much more like what you’d expect from today’s smartphones and tablet: Press the power button once and the console enters a low-power suspended state – press it again and it wakes to right where you left off. That’s an awesome perk for games that often lack their own internal save mechanisms.

Image Credits: Analogue

The Analogue Dock ($99.99) can support up to four controllers at once, using either wired, Bluetooth or 2.4ghz wireless connectivity. You can also use separately available multilink cables to connect up to four Pockets for local multiplayer action.

Analogue is also offering a range of other accessories for the Pocket, including a transparent hard case for storage and transportation, a USB-C fast-charging power brick, adapters to provide compatibility with Game Gear, Neo Geo Pocket Color and Atari Lynx games, and MIDI and Analog sync cables for connecting to Mac, PC and music peripherals for use with the company’s Nanoloop music creation software.

Image Credits: Analogue

The company has also revealed some new software features for the Pocket, including ‘Original Display Modes’ which provides faithful representations of the displays (quirks and all) of the original hardware consoles these games where available for. The display itself is made of Gorilla Glass for extra resilience, and offers variable refresh rates and 360-degree custom rotation control.

Analogue Pocket has a 4,300 mAh built-in rechargeable battery that offers between 6 and 10 hours of play time, and over 10 hours of sleep when not in active use.

This definitely looks like Analogue’s most impressive product yet, and one that will be truly amazing for portable console gaming.

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VCs and startups consider HaaS model for consumer devices

I’ve been following consumer audio electronics company Nura with great interest for a few years now — the Melbourne-based startup was one of the first companies I met with after starting with TechCrunch. At the time, its first prototype was a big mess of circuits and wires — the sort of thing you could never imagine shrunk down into a reasonably-sized consumer device.

Nura managed, of course. And the final product looked and sounded great; hell, even the box was nice. If I’m lucky, I see a consumer hardware product once or twice a year that seems reasonably capable of disrupting an industry, and Nura’s custom sound profiles fit that bill. But the company was unique for another reason. A graduate of the HAX accelerator, the startup announced NuraNow roughly this time last year.

Hardware as a service (HaaS) has been a popular concept in the IT/enterprise space for some time, but it’s still fairly uncommon in the consumer category. For one thing: a hardware subscription presents a new paradigm for thinking about purchases. And that is a big lift in a country like the U.S., which spent years weaning consumers off contract-based smartphones.

That Nura jumped at the chance shouldn’t be a big surprise. Backers HAX/SOSV have been proponents of the model for some time now. I’ve visited their Shenzhen offices a few times, and the topic of HaaS always seems to come up.

In a recent email exchange, General Partner Duncan Turner described HaaS as “a great way to keep in contact with your customers and up sell them on new features. Most importantly, for start-ups, recurring revenue is critical for scaling a business with venture capital (and will help appeal to a broad set of investors). HaaS often has a low churn (as easier to put onto long-term contracts).”

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6 Eco-Friendly Products You Need in Every Home Office

Around the world, there’s a growing awareness of environmental issues. From climate change to single-use plastics, the impact we have on the planet is becoming more evident.

While some of this is beyond our means to influence directly, we can make alternative purchasing choices. Switching standard products for ethical or eco-friendly substitutions is a great place to start, particularly for eco-friendly office supplies.

If you’re looking to invest in green items for your home office, we’ve found some of the best sustainable products available today.

1. The Original Paper Pen (Five Pack)

By some estimates, households and workplaces in the US throw away 1.6 billion plastic pens each year. Disposable products tend to appear cheaper than long-lasting alternatives. However, they are often made from non-recyclable, virgin (as in, not recycled) plastics. In short order, these items find their way to landfill sites across the country.

The Original Paper Pen is a sustainable alternative to cheap plastic pens. The Paper Pen is made from recyclable and biodegradable paper. There is a choice of fine or broad tip, while the nib is made of brass for ease of use. The ink is stored in a traditional plastic cartridge. However, the Paper Pen still represents a 70 percent reduction in plastic compared to the widely-used alternatives.

The company behind the writing instrument, Paper Pens Co., is based in Australia, although worldwide shipping is available. Traditional shipping could undermine the company’s ethics, but all shipping is guaranteed to be carbon neutral.

2. Plume Labs Flow 2

One of the most critical measures of a healthy work environment is air quality. While many offices and workspaces have air conditioning, that doesn’t always mean that the air is clean. Tracking your exposure throughout the day helps you make better decisions about when to perform specific tasks and separate interventions that work and those that don’t.

To keep track of your exposure to pollutants, consider the Plume Labs Flow 2 portable air quality monitor. This Bluetooth-enabled tracker uses multiple sensors to assess the cleanliness of the environment around you. A touch-enabled button on the front activates color-coded LEDs on the front, allowing you to judge the air quality quickly.

Syncing the Plume Labs Flow 2 with the companion smartphone app allows you to track exposure over time. The results can be viewed as an overall air quality index or particulate (PM1, PM2.5, PM10, NO2, and VOC). By maintaining a cleaner environment, other areas like health, well-being, and office maintenance will likely improve.

To learn more about the device, check out our review of the Plume Labs Flow 2.

3. Bodum Chambord

If you’ve been searching for an eco-friendly office coffee machine, the truth is, there isn’t one. The materials, components, manufacture, and distribution of these machines come at an environmental cost. However, if you currently rely solely on takeout coffee, then using a machine at work means you can control the beans’ standard and reduce waste on items like disposable cups.

That said, you can minimize the impact of your daily coffee routine. Opting to brew your coffee manually using hot water and a French press significantly reduces your coffee’s energy requirement, components, and cost. The Bodum Chambord is an eight-cup French press ensuring energy-efficient brewing. The container is made of glass while the fixings, handle, and press are made from synthetic materials.

It’s always worth keeping in mind where your coffee is from and the supply chain’s ethics. Manually brewing your drinks gives you greater control over the coffee source, allowing you to choose an ethical, environmentally-conscious brand rather than accepting whatever is in the office or your local coffee shop uses.

4. KeepCup Brew Cork Black

Continuing with the coffee theme, disposable takeaway cups cause a huge environmental issue. The single-use nature of the containers makes them wasteful in any case. You’ll have noticed that most are made of cardboard. However, they can’t be recycled. To prevent spillage and leaks, the interior is often coated in a plastic film.

Rather than adding to the tally of coffee cups heading to landfills, purchase your own reusable coffee cup. One of the most popular eco-friendly options is the KeepCup Brew Cork Black. The brand is notable for being one of the first to develop containers that fit most barista-style coffee machines.

The Brew Cork Black is a premium variant of the company’s original offering. The cork grip makes the cup easy to handle, while the shaped glass vessel allows for easy pouring. The containers are machine washable, and the tops are interchangeable. KeepCup also offers custom-branded editions, should you want to invest in a set for the office.

5. method All-Purpose Lavender Wipes

In the post-pandemic age, all offices, even remote-working home offices, will need to pay close attention to their cleaning regimes. While many believe that the only way to combat bacteria is through harsh chemical cleaners, there’s an alternative.

The eco-friendly cleaning supplies producer, method, has a range of sprays, wipes, and surface cleaners that sterilize your workspace while minimizing the impact on the environment.

If you need a multipurpose cleaning wipe for the office, consider the method All-Purpose Lavender Wipes. These fragranced disposable wipes are biodegradable, not tested on animals, and ideal for wiping down keywords, mice, and other shared equipment.

6. Refurbished Computers

Image Credit: Ashkan Forouzani/Unsplash

Although it’s a consideration for most consumers, there are very few sustainable or eco-friendly computers. In fact, UK-based publication Ethical Consumer doesn’t even list any laptop available today as a Best Buy. Desktop computers and laptops, like all electronics, have incredibly complex supply chains fraught with environmental issues and human rights abuses.

As such, it’s hard to recommend any computer or eco-friendly computer mouse. However, you do still have options. The best way to create a sustainable home office is to buy second-hand computing equipment. In most cases, it’s possible to find high-end refurbished items at a significant discount. This helps you boost your environmental credentials while also saving money.

Before investing, make a note of your requirements, the types of programs you are likely to use, and any hardware constraints. Then locate a second-hand item that fits the brief. You’ll also be able to increase your electronic equipment’s lifespan by choosing an easily repairable and upgradeable computer or laptop.

The Best Eco-Friendly Products for Your Needs

As more of us become aware of our purchases’ environmental and ethical implications, it’s natural to want to switch to more eco-friendly and sustainable alternatives. Fortunately, there are plenty of eco-friendly home office supplies out there to get you started.

However, there are other changes you can make, as well. Instead of upgrading to the latest flagship smartphone, consider an ethical alternative. To find out more, check out our review of the Fairphone 3 ethical smartphone.

Read the full article: 6 Eco-Friendly Products You Need in Every Home Office

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What Is a Hashtag and How Do I Use One?

If you’ve spent any time online, you will have seen a hashtag. In fact, you might have seen them in commercials on TV, on billboards, or spoken out loud too. Which may have prompted you to ask, what is a hashtag?

If so, you’ve come to the right place. We’re going to explain what a hashtag is, where hashtags originated, and how to use hashtags correctly. When you reach the end of this article you’ll be a hashtag master!

What Is a Hashtag?

A hashtag is used primarily on social network sites like Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, and LinkedIn. Most of the top social media sites use them in one way or another.

Collins Dictionary defines a hashtag as:

A word or phrase that has the hash symbol (#) in front of it, to show that it is the topic of a message on social media.

Using a hashtag is a way to mark your message as belonging to a topic or theme. Other people can then search for this hashtag to find messages about something that interests them. A hashtag is often hyperlinked, so you can click it and be taken directly to those search results.

A hashtag is formatted by a # sign followed by text. The # symbol itself is sometimes called a hashtag, but the two aren’t the same. The # symbol is actually called a number sign, pound sign, octothorpe, or hash. Its usage varies by country, but it is often used alongside ordinal numbers or as a symbol for the pound as a unit of weight.

As such, the term hashtag primarily has purpose online on social networks. Here’s an example of a hashtag being used on Twitter:

#BlackLivesMatter is happening on Twitter. We’ve created a new Topic that highlights conversations about the movement and includes Tweets from organizations and activists.

Follow the Black Lives Matter Topic: https://t.co/MrKvvETwkX

— Twitter Support (@TwitterSupport) July 10, 2020

Who Invented the Hashtag?

The idea of using a hashtag as we know it was first proposed by Chris Messina:

how do you feel about using # (pound) for groups. As in #barcamp [msg]?

— Chris Messina (@chrismessina) August 23, 2007

If you’re interested on his detailed thoughts, check out his Factory Joe blog post from 2007.

At that point, he floated the phrase “tag channels” rather than the now-ubiquitous “hashtag”. That’s because the # sign already had a specific meaning online. Internet Relay Chat (IRC), a form of text-based live messaging, is split into different chat rooms (or “channels”) that are preceded by the # sign. For example, you could have different channels like #animals and #food.

It should be noted that IRC still exists, and here’s how to create your own IRC channel.

The name hashtag came from Stowe Boyd, in his blog post response to Chris. However, despite all of this happening in 2007, hashtags didn’t immediately take off.

It wasn’t until events like the 2007 San Diego forest fires and the 2009-2010 Iranian election protests that hashtags started to gain traction. In 2009, Twitter began linking hyperlinks to the search results, and in 2010 Twitter started to display popular hashtags on its homepage.

From there the hashtag only grew, expanding from Twitter and spreading to many other websites and services.

How to Use a Hashtag

Image Credit: John Cameron/Unsplash

Anyone has the power to create a new hashtag. And they’re used by individuals and businesses alike. Simply type the # sign, followed by a word or phrase, and your hashtag is done. If someone else has used the same hashtag previously, your post will appear alongside those when people search for that hashtag.

There are some rules you should follow to ensure your hashtag displays and functions correctly:

• A hashtag should always begin with the # symbol. If it’s not the first thing in your message, ensure there’s a space beforehand. For example, “I love tech #makeuseof” is good, while “I love tech#makeuseof” is not.
• Don’t use punctuation, special characters or spaces in a hashtag because it won’t work. For example, “I love tech #make use of” would only hashtag the word “make”.
• You can use capital letters in a hashtag, but this is only for readability. For example, both #makeuseof and #MakeUseOf are the same hashtag.

Each service will also have its own rules on using hashtags. For example, Instagram only allows up to 30 hashtags on a post. There are also unwritten social network rules, such as do keep the hashtags specific, don’t overload your post with them, don’t use irrelevant ones, and don’t be vulgar.

When to Use a Hashtag

You can use a hashtag whenever you want. There’s nothing to stop you—type a # sign followed by some text and you’ve created a hashtag.

Using Hashtags for Events

Generally, the best use of a hashtag is when you want to create or join a discussion around a specific topic. Let’s say your local town of Springfield is having a fun run. You could put a message on social media like:

Best of luck to my friend Homer today! As long as you get across the finish line, that’s all that matters. #SpringfieldFunRun

Other people could then use the same #SpringfieldFunRun hashtag. Then, when others click that hashtag or search for it, they will see all the messages related to that event.

Using Hashtags for Businesses

Equally, hashtags can be used on a global level by businesses. Here’s an example from the Star Wars Twitter account, which used multiple hashtags to promote The Mandalorian on Disney Plus:

Watch as the Oscar-winning composer @ludwiggoransson performs the theme from #TheMandalorian. The Mandalorian is streaming on #DisneyPlus. pic.twitter.com/UkBnh5DEkr

— Star Wars (@starwars) July 9, 2020

You might also notice hashtags appear offline in all sorts of places, like movie trailers, billboards, and TV commercials. That’s because these businesses want you to go online, discuss their product or service, and use the hashtag to create a buzz.

Using Hashtags for Comedy

Hashtags can also be used ironically or sarcastically. This is often when the user isn’t interested in grouping their message to a discussion, but instead trying to be funny. For example:

Just ate a huge cake all to myself. I feel great! #DietStartsNow

This comedic application of the hashtag also applies when it’s spoken out loud because, obviously, the group and search functionality of a hashtag isn’t possible to achieve in speech.

Using Hashtags for Causes

Some hashtags have transcended their online origin. This can be seen in the phrase “Je suis Charlie”, meaning “I am Charlie”, which was a slogan created to show solidarity after the shootings at the Charlie Hebdo magazine in 2015.

The statement began as #jesuischarlie on Twitter before being used in music, cartoons, and newspapers. The hashtag then morphed into the more general #jesuis, which was used globally as a sign of alignment to different causes.

Use Hashtags to Get Noticed on Social Media

Now you know what a hashtag is, how the term originated, and how to use hashtags. So get out there and start using hashtags to your heart’s content!

Hashtags are also a good way to get noticed on social media. For more tips, our guide will help you get noticed on Instagram.

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How Hackers Spread Malware Using COVID-19 Contact-Tracers

As the COVID-19 pandemic spreads around the globe, governments are banding together to track the rate of infection. Unfortunately, hackers are keen to exploit the fear and confusion to spread malware via fake contact-tracing apps.

Let’s look at how a hacker can use the coronavirus panic to deliver malware onto people’s phones.

What Is a Contact-Tracing App?

With the coronavirus making a huge impact across the globe, it’s important to know how the virus spreads amongst communities. Due to COVID-19’s ability to stay low on the radar, people can spread it without realizing that they are. As such, it’s crucial to inform potential victims that they may be infected before they spread it further.

To achieve this, governments around the world are investing in a contact-tracing app. This app harnesses the internet to deliver lightning-fast reports to prevent further infections. As soon as an infection risk becomes apparent, everyone that’s affected can be notified instantly, thus reducing the spread.

A contact-tracing app achieves this by keeping tabs on who you were near. It does this by sending out a small Bluetooth signal and listens out for signals from other phones. Once your phone finds someone else’s, both phones log that you two were near one another.

Then, should someone come down with COVID-19, their app is informed of this. The app goes through the list of phones it came close to and warns them about a potential COVID-19 infection. Recipients of this message can then self-isolate to stop the spread.

The Problem That Contact-Tracing Apps Face

The theory behind contact-tracing apps is sound; if implemented correctly, they can help people self-isolate and prevent further infections.

Unfortunately, the implementation of the app is the tricky part. The app needs to log every phone it comes close to, then warns them all when a positive diagnosis occurs. Not only that, but a lot of people need to download the app for it to be effective.

As such, countries around the world are hard at work at developing, testing, and deploying this app. This creates a lot of anxiety amongst people who are keen to download the app so they can stay safe. This delay then opens the door for scammers, who can create fake apps to prey on the fear of others.

How the Fake Contact-Tracer Attack Works

The fake contact-tracer app attack has two stages to it. The first is tricking people into thinking that the hacker’s app is the real deal. The second is delivering a payload once the fake app tricks the user into downloading it.

Setting the Stage for a Contact-Tracing Scam

To start a contact-tracer app attack, a hacker will target a country to base their fake app on. Ideally, it’s a country that is either working on an app or already has one. This ensures their targets know about, and want to download, a contact-tracing app.

Once the attacker selects their target country, they get to work on creating a fake website. They can’t upload it to Google Play, as it runs the risk of detection from Google’s defenses.

That’s not to say that Google Play is free of threats; after all, it has been home to cryptojackers in the past. However, it’s a safer option for the hacker to host it themselves and avoid detection.

The hacker designs the fake website to look like an official governmental webpage. They’ll take assets from the real website and re-create it on their fake website to help enhance the illusion.

They will then register a domain name that looks official so people don’t get suspicious. This includes URLs that look similar to the real deal or replacing letters with look-alike alternatives to fool someone who doesn’t check the address.

Delivering the Payload to Complete the Scam

Now that the hacker has set the stage, it’s time to design the payload that the visitors download. From here, the hacker has two options for their malware. They can design it to hide away and harvest data, or go in guns blazing and make demands from the victim.

If the hacker chooses the first option, they’ll create an app that looks like the real thing. Anomali Threat Research identified fake coronavirus tracing apps paired with banking Trojans. These Trojans carried the most infamous mobile malware strains available, such as Anubis.

This method is harder to develop, as the hacker needs to create an app that looks like the real thing. Sometimes they may use the legitimate contract-tracer app’s code and add a hidden payload to it.

Once the user downloads and installs it, the malware can hide without the user’s knowledge and collect data. If the app is particularly convincing, the victim may share the malicious app with friends and family, thus spreading the net even further.

Alternatively, the hacker can choose the destructive route. This includes using malware that’s noticeable, such as ransomware. After all, the entire premise of ransomware is that you notice it!

ESET discovered a strain in the wild that took this route. It appeared in Canada after the government announced the development of an official app. This contained the CryCryptor malware that locked away important files and demanded payment.

While this method of attack sets off alarm bells, it’s the easiest to distribute between the two. As such, hackers use it for a quick payout instead of a long con like banking malware.

How to Avoid a Fake COVID-19 Tracer Scam

To avoid this scam, keep tabs on how your government’s contact-tracing app is progressing. Check reliable news sources and visit your government’s website for updates.

If your country already has a contract-tracing app, download it from official sources only. If you search Google Play for the app, be sure you’re getting the real deal instead of downloading a phony. Look at the number of reviews as well as the rating to find the real app.

When you install a contact-tracing app, be sure to double-check the permissions that it asks for. If the app asks for every permission it can get, or one of its permissions looks a little suspicious, don’t install it. Mobile malware depends on users conceding too many permissions to operate, so always double-check the source if an app asks for something unusual.

If you do download a fake app and get hit by CryCryptor ransomware, all is not lost. ESET, the reporters of the ransomware-based scam, released a decryption tool that can unlock your phone.

Staying Safe Against Coronavirus

With coronavirus causing panic around the world, hackers exploit this fear for profit. If your country has announced a COVID-19 tracing app, don’t fall for any traps and only follow trustworthy sources.

If you’re struggling to identify what’s real and what’s fake, be sure to check out the websites you can trust for coronavirus information.

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Cloudflare launches Workers Unbound, the next evolution of its serverless platform

Cloudflare today announced the private beta launch of Workers Unbound, the latest step in its efforts to offer a serverless platform that can compete with the likes of AWS Lambda.

The company first launched its Workers edge computing platform in late 2017. Today it has “hundreds of thousands of developers” who use it and in the last quarter alone, more than 20,000 developers built applications based on the service, according to the company. Cloudflare also uses Workers to power many of its own services, but the first iteration of the platform had quite a few limitations. The idea behind Workers Unbound is to do away with most of those and turn it into a platform that can compete with the likes of AWS, Microsoft and Google.

“The original motivation for us building Cloudflare Workers was not to sell it as a product but because we were using it as our own internal platform to build applications,” Cloudflare co-founder and CEO Matthew Prince told me ahead of today’s announcement. “Today, Cloudflare Teams, which is our fastest-growing product line, is all running on top of Cloudflare workers and it’s allowed us to innovate as fast as we have and stay nimble and stay agile and all those things that get harder as you as you become a larger and larger company.”

Cloudflare co-founder and CEO Matthew Prince

Prince noted that Cloudflare aims to expose all of the services it builds for its internal consumption to third-party developers as well. “The fact that we’ve been able to roll out a whole Zscaler competitor in almost no time is because of the fact that we had this platform and we could build on it ourselves,” he said.

The original Workers service will continue to operate (but under the Workers Bundled moniker) and essentially become Cloudflare’s serverless platform for basic workloads that only run for a very short time. Workers Unbound — as the name implies — is meant for more complex and longer-running processes.

When it first launched Workers, the company said that its killer feature was speed. Today, Prince argues that speed obviously remains an important feature — and Cloudflare Workers Unbound promises that it essentially does away with cold start latencies. But developers also adopted the platform because of its ability to scale and its price.

Indeed, Workers Unbound, Cloudflare argues, is now significantly more affordable than similar offerings. “For the same workload, Cloudflare Workers Unbound can be 75 percent less expensive than AWS Lambda, 24 percent less expensive than Microsoft Azure Functions, and 52 percent less expensive than Google Cloud Functions,” the company says in today’s press release.

As it turned out, the fact that Workers was also an edge computing platform was basically a bonus but not necessarily why developers adopted it.

Another feature Prince highlighted is regulatory compliance. “I think the thing we’re realizing as we talk to our largest enterprise customers is that for real companies — not just the individual developer hacking away at home — but for real businesses in financial services or anyone who has to deal with a regulated industry, the only thing that trumps ease of use is regulatory compliance, which is not sexy or interesting or anything else but like if your GC says you can’t use XYZ platform, then you don’t use XYZ platform and that’s the end of the story,” Prince noted.

Speed, though, is of course something developers will always care about. Prince stressed that the team was quite happy with the 5ms cold start times of the original Workers platform. “But we wanted to be better,” he said. “We wanted to be the clearly fastest serverless platform forever — and the only number that we know no one else can beat is zero — unless they invent a time machine.”

The way the team engineered this is by queuing up the process while the two servers are still negotiating their TLS handshake. “We’re excited to be the first cloud computing platform that [offers], for no additional costs, out of the box, zero millisecond cold start times which then also means less variability in the performance.”

Cloudflare also argues that developers can update their code and have it go live globally within 15 seconds.

Another area the team worked on was making it easier to use the service in general. Among the key new features here is support for languages like Python and a new SDK that will allow developers to add support for their favorite languages, too.

Prince credits Cloudflare’s ability to roll out this platform, which is obviously heavy on compute resources — and to keep it affordable — to the fact that it always thought of itself as a security platform first (the team has often said that the CDN functionality was more or less incidental). Because it performed deep packet inspection, for example, the company’s servers always featured relatively high-powered CPUs. “Our network has been optimized for CPU usage from the beginning and as a result, it’s actually made it much more natural for us to extend our network that way,” he explained. “To this day, the same machines that are running our firewall products are the same machines that are running our edge computing platform.”

Looking ahead, Prince noted that while Workers and Workers Unbound feature a distributed key-value store, the team is looking at adding a more robust database infrastructure and distributed storage.

The team is also looking at how to decompose applications to put them closest to where they will be running. “You could imagine that in the future, it might be that you write an application and we say, ‘listen, the parts of the application that are sensitive to the user of the database might run in Portland, where you are — but if the database is in Ashburn, Virginia, then the parts that are sensitive to latency in the database might run there,” he said.

 

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How To Uninstall iCloud From Windows 10

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With iCloud for Windows, you can access all your data saved on your iCloud account. That is, you can access your photos, videos, bookmarks, mail & calendar right from your computer. The iCloud setup offers you configure and install iCloud Drive, iCloud Photos, Mail, Contacts, Calendars, and Tasks and Bookmarks. You can select what you […]

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The Best Wedding Websites for Save the Date Cards and Magnets

Starting in the mid-2000s, “Save the Date” announcements for weddings have grown in popularity. These types of notifications let brides and grooms inform their guests of their upcoming nuptials way ahead of time.

By sending a Save the Date card, postcard, or handy magnet, your guests have plenty of notice to make sure they’re free. These are especially convenient for weddings during peak times like the holiday season or if the ceremony will require travel.

If you’re planning your wedding, here are the best websites for buying Save the Date products, in no special order.

1. The Knot

The Knot is a terrific wedding planning website. You can set up a free custom website, get a personalized spending plan, create your registry, see vendor recommendations, and much more. So along with these planning tools, you can buy products as well.

From start to finish, check out The Knot’s Save the Date and Change the Date cards as well as invitations and thank you’s.

You can browse through pages upon pages of Save the Date cards and postcards in every color and style imaginable. If you want to narrow down the choices, use your wedding colors. If you prefer a seasonal card, pick spring, summer, fall, or winter. You can also select the style and number of photos you want and then filter the choices further by card or postcard.

To see a few cards in person, you can order samples to help you decide. And be sure to check out the Free Samples section along with any discount codes displayed on the site.

The Knot is not just a great place to order your wedding products, but also a wonderful spot to help you plan that big day. And for more help, check out these mobile wedding planners.

2. Zazzle

Zazzle offers all sorts of customizable products from posters and mousepads to mugs and wall clocks. And the site has a neat Weddings section with everything you need for the day you say, “I do.”

Check out place cards, napkins, and menus for the reception along with gifts for the bridesmaids, groomsmen, and parents. As for the stationery products, Zazzle has wedding announcements, invitations, RSVP cards, thank you cards, and of course, Save the Date cards.

You can browse Save the Date photo cards and postcards or narrow down the options. Pick from things like the foil, type, format, orientation, shape, or size. Once you see the results, you can sort by popularity or price.

Want a unique Save the Date? There are magnets and calendars to let your guests know about the upcoming ceremony. The magnet selection is impressive with all shapes and sizes. As for the calendars, you’ll find postcard, magnet, and wall calendars, with tons of styles and colors.

If you’re looking for excellent chocies, affordable prices, and regular discounts on not just Save the Dates but other wedding products, check out Zazzle.

3. Basic Invite

Basic Invite is a site offering invitations for occasions like weddings, graduations, new baby celebrations, and other special events.

For weddings, you can look through the enormous collection of announcements, invitations, enclosure cards, and thank you’s. You’ll also find bridal shower products, items for your reception, and gifts for the bridal party. And if your wedding date has changed, be sure to check out the Change the Date cards.

For Save the Date options, you can pick from cards, postcards, and magnets. Like other sites, you can filter your choices. Pick the size, color, orientation, number of photos, or a theme.

And speaking of theme filters, there are more to choose from than you can imagine! If you’re having a beach, floral, country, or nautical wedding, you’re covered. Looking for a New Orleans, Hawaiian, roaring 20s, or Vegas theme? They’ve got it!

Another great option for your Save the Date announcement is uploading your own design, which is available for both cards and magnets.

So, if your wedding has a distinctive theme or design, make sure you look at the Save the Date options on Basic Invite.

4. MagnetStreet

Don’t let the name fool you, MagnetStreet sells many wedding, business, life moment, school-related products that go beyond magnets.

The Weddings section of the site is packed with invitations, programs, reception products, thank you cards, and wedding gifts. You’ll also find helpful items in the Wedding Blog & Ideas area like wedding color trends, a planning checklist, budget calculator, and wedding quotes.

Now for those Save the Date products; you can pick from magnets, cards, or postcards. With each type of Save the Date, you can narrow your options by foil color, the number of photos, collection, style, color, or orientation. You also have an option to upload your own design, like on a Basic Invite.

Make sure that you head to the Free Samples section of MagnetStreet as well. You can currently choose from two sample kits to try out their products. You can also get free Save the Date samples making MagnetStreet definitely worth a visit!

5. Zola

Zola is a wedding-specific site, like The Knot. It offers free planning tools, wedding websites, a registry, and stationery products including Save the Dates and Change the Dates.

You’ll find a beautiful selection of cards, postcards, and magnets in the Save the Date section. And as you may have guessed, you can use filters to narrow down your choices. Pick a style, color, and the number of photos. Then choose if you want only those designs available as magnets, with foil, or that offer letterpress printing.

Zola has another filter that you may find interesting which is for items designed by featured artists. This is a great way to add something distinctive to your Save the Date product or even something more creative for your wedding invitation.

For another excellent website that gives you wedding planning and products all in one spot, head to Zola. And be on the lookout for special pricing and free shipping offers!

Send Your Save the Date

Save the Date products are becoming a norm when planning weddings. Make sure you give your guests enough time to plan to attend your ceremony and celebration by sending a Save the Date card.

With the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020, Change the Date products are not just popular but essential, and all these sites offer those too if you need them.

Best of luck planning your big day! And for more help doing that, check out these apps for wedding invitations on a budget.

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