Spaces beat tabs, a new ISP anti-piracy plan, and more news

Evil headphones and the security corner round out the news. Read on...

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Spaces beat tabs. When it comes to money, at least. Developers who use spaces make more money than those who use tabs, according to Stack Overflow. (For the record, tabs are better, because of the flexibility.)

The App Store is more flexible. Apple has relaxed their App Store approval guidelines. The new guidelines allow executable code to be downloaded and run in apps - but only in “apps designed to teach, develop, or test executable code.”

You didn’t say the magic word. A surprisingly-thorough glimpse of the source code visible on screen in the famous logic bomb sequence from Jurassic Park. Check it out:

Netflix changed their mind about the whole “we don’t need Net Neutrality” thing. See this report from the Washington Post, which is basically Netflix officially saying “Oh, crap, we do want those Deutschie Markies.” (bonus points to anyone who understands that reference.)

A new ‘anti-piracy’ plan. Shakedown artist Rightscorp has come up with a brilliant new plan to try to get people to pay them money for nothing. The new plan is to start an “ISP Good Corporate Citizenship” program, the purpose of which is to “drive revenue associated with [their] primary revenue model.”

Yep, that’s the announced, public motivation. Not to protect content creators or anything like that, but to make Rightscorp money. Being a good citizen, by the by, would require the ISPs to forward extortion letters (which are generally based on the flimsiest possible evidence) to alleged pirates and to require that their ISPs then suspend service or redirect subscribers to the notice until they pay up.

Which is faster, the keyboard or the mouse? Well, it depends on what program you’re using, but it’s often the keyboard. This is the conclusion from a sort-of-scientific test done by Dan Luu.

Context switches lead to burnout. In a software engineering job, context switches create irritation and slow down performance. They can also cause developers to burn out and become unmotivated and less productive. Design Manager Sophie Shepherd writes about how this happens and how to prevent it in this piece.

Who invented e-mail? Not the person who’s screaming the loudest saying that they did, according to this piece from Ars Technica. An interesting read about the history of a system that you almost certainly use every day.

Google Fiber: not dead yet. DSLReports reports that Google Fiber has begun construction in my hometown of Louisville, Kentucky – interestingly, the area targeted for the initial build is the decidedly un-trendy Portland neighborhood, suggesting Google may be trying a different strategy in Louisville than it has in other launched markets, which often ended up targeting high-income neighborhoods or the downtown core first.

In the security corner this week: electronic voting remains insecure, evil headphones can take over a Nexus 9, and it’s possible to track down an Android user over VoLTE.

• In news I’m certain surprised absolutely nobody, electronic voting remains insecure. Politico’s clickbait-titled post reports on a combination of error, negligence, and apathy that leads to the conclusion that Georgia’s upcoming special election may not have full integrity thanks to the use of direct-record electronic voting machines. (The special election in question is tomorrow.)
• Evil headphones can wreck your Android. The 3.5mm jack on the Nexus 9 has additional capability that enables debugging through a 3.5mm to serial debugger cable… that was left with wide open access to the FIQ debugger initially, leading to an easy potential exploit. The bug has been fixed, but check out the vulnerability details here.
• Android phones can be remotely located thanks to VoLTE. Scary headline, but totally true. Check out how it was done in this article (PDF) from researchers at P1 Security.

Thanks for reading – as always, if you have feedback, or think there’s something I should cover next time, leave a comment!

Cover photo: This kitty doesn't appear to be listening to evil headphones. Image ? Monty Fresco / Stringer / Getty