Dr. Bill | The Computer Curmudgeon

John Pozadzides from GeekBeat.TV posted this image on Google+! Happy Fourth of July! (Yesterday, anyway!)

The fans are definitely taking a “wait and see” attitude on the next Superman movie. I will see it, but I do wonder.

Fans are worried about yet another moody ‘Batman v Superman’ reveal

“To say that some fans aren’t exactly excited for Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, the next installment from Warner Bros. and DC, may be an understatement. Between the confusion and disappointment with the movie’s title and the sad first picture of Ben Affleck as Batman (which quickly became a meme), the film’s teases so far seem to be having the opposite effect on fans than what the studio intended. Instead of increasing excitement, fans are growing more worried about what we can expect to see when it hits theaters.

The latest reveal unfortunately doesn’t change this trend. On Thursday the first official picture of Henry Cavill’s Superman as he will appear in the movie was revealed by USA Today and simultaneously on the official Twitter account. Superman’s new design looks much like his old one and his serious expression on a gloomy, rainy rooftop keeps the depressing tone going that we saw in Affleck’s Batman reveal. The only semi-exciting part is that the background looks more like a rooftop in Gotham than Metropolis.

For the most part, fans weren’t won over by Superman’s look. On Twitter many poked fun at the once again dark imagery and expressed their boredom with the rather uninspired photo.”

Yes, they are coming! You will be able to use a Bitcoin ATM to get money out of your account!

Lamassu Introduces Open-Source Software for Bitcoin ATM Network

“Lamassu operators can now provide remittance, airport cash exchange and bill payment services via their bitcoin ATMs following the release of Rakía, the company’s new open-source software platform.

With the change, current operators of Lamassu ATMs will become independent nodes, no longer having to rely on a centralized service. In turn, they will be able to retain control of price settings, commission rates and background trading.

In a statement, Lamassu co-founder Zach Harvey said that the company doesn’t intend to become another money transfer or exchange service like Western Union or Travelex:

‘We want to create a platform for thousands of small businesses to compete against these legacy financial institutions, and against each other. These are markets in dire need of fierce competition to bring down transfer and exchange fees.’

Rakía is currently available on GitHub. The software will demo at the CoinSummit conference in London on 10th-11th July.

Rakía in the remittance market

Speaking to CoinDesk, Harvey emphasized the Rakía platform’s case for shaking up the remittance market and bridging the gap between developed and developing countries.

For the unbanked population of the world, bank-less ATMs are a viable way to convert cash in a more manageable format, he said, adding:

‘I think it’s a great transitional stage for cryptocurrencies. It’s important to the developed world because its legacy financial institutions are flawed. But it’s even more important to emerging markets since many have no access to financial institutions at all.’

Putting plans into action

Harvey further outlined a couple of ways the new software could help remittances – the first being integration with a third-party remittance service like Kipochi, BitPesa or 37coins.

Secondly, Harvey cited fiat-pegged wallet services like BitReserve, which let users send a certain amount of funds to a bitcoin wallet pegged to the receiver’s local currency. The recipient would then use either a cash-out bitcoin ATM or a bitcoin-to-cash agent to receive their funds.

The third way, Harvey described, would be for independent agents to use Lamassu’s open-source software to create tools that connect the sending and receiving parties.

Behind each of these use cases is the drive to remove the risk of volatility. ‘Otherwise, he said, ‘it’s just a matter of converting fiat to bitcoin and bitcoin back to a different fiat currency.’ He added:

‘The other main point of these services is to offer a fiat A to fiat B without the sending or receiving parties touching bitcoin, but rather having it completely behind the scenes.’

Competition heats up

The news comes amid increasing competition between Lamassu and Nevada-based Robocoin, which recently rebranded its ATM network as an online bank. In its announcement, CEO Jordan Kelley spoke at length about his company’s wider goal of tapping the potentially lucrative bitcoin remittance market.

Lamassu began taking pre-orders for its bitcoin ATMs late last year, and was one of the first entrants in what has become an increasingly competitive market.

In April, the company announced that its products would soon become portals for bitcoin services like remittance services and bill payments. One month later Lamassu introduced two-way transactions to its machines, both moves that suggests it is seeking to keep ahead of its competition.”

No. But they are banning porn advertising in their AdWords Program. Fine with me!

Google bans porn on AdWords

Daily Digest News – “Porn advertisers may soon be flocking to Bing, because starting this week, ads promoting sexually explicit content are prohibited on Google AdWords. The search engine giant informed potentially affected advertisers of the policy change by email earlier in June, according to CNBC.

‘Beginning in the coming weeks, we’ll no longer accept ads that promote graphic depictions of sexual acts,’ Google wrote in the email. ‘When we make this change, Google will disapprove all ads and sites that are identified as being in violation of our revised policy.’

Rumblings of the porn ban were present as early as March, when Google announced it would be updating its adult sexual services, family status and underage and non-consensual sex acts policy pages. At that time, the company clarified that ads for strip clubs, ‘adult and sexual’ dating sites and ‘non-intimate’ massage services would continue to be accepted, albeit subject to tight restrictions.

Despite the early warnings, CNBC reports that the policy change took at least some in the adult entertainment industry by surprise.

‘I was caught by surprise,’ Theo Sapoutzis, chairman and CEO of AVN Media Network told CNBC. ‘I was one of the very first advertisers for AdWords back in 2002. It’s something that’s been [untouched] for 12 years, so you don’t expect change is going to start happening.’

The ad ban will not affect search results, only the ads that appear at the top of the page. So the millions of porn searchers can breath a sigh of relief. CNBC reports that in the month of May alone, there were nearly 351 million searches for the words ‘sex,’ ‘porn,’ ‘free porn’ and ‘porno.'”

First IBM sold it’s PC business to Lenova, a China-based company, now they are selling their SERVER business to Lenovo. Wow!

China approves IBM, Lenovo server deal

ZDNet – By: Charlie Osborne – “China has approved Lenovo’s proposed buy of IBM’s x86 server business, leaving only US regulators to decide whether to support the purchase.

According to Reuters, the Chinese Ministry of Commerce anti-monopoly department has approved the acquisition, but Lenovo still requires approval from US authorities to go ahead.

Lenovo’s purchase of IBM’s low-end server business was announced in January. The deal, worth $2.3 billion, gives the Chinese PC maker control of IBM’s x86 servers, blade networking and maintenance operations. The acquisition will impact thousands of employees, of which have been offered places on Lenovo’s payroll.

Lenvo CEO Yang Yuanqing hopes the deal will be finalized by the end of the year, and does not believe regulatory bodies will prevent the purchase from occurring.

US security officials and members of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), however, may have a different opinion. In June, it was reported that US regulators are concerned that national security may be weakened, and ‘Chinese spies’ may be able to access the Pentagon’s servers.

The issue is servers, currently belonging to IBM, which support the Pentagon’s networks. Under the terms of the acquisition, Lenovo would take over maintenance of these servers — which may pave the way for weakened security. The US and China have exchanged criticism and blows over cybersecurity in recent years, and both sides have accused each other of spying and cyberattacks.

Yang, however, said at a press conference that ‘If you look at our history, with domestic and overseas clients, there have never been any issues regarding security.'”