here's what's coming up in the category
five TV newsroom some of the biggest
Call of Duty overwatch and heard some
eSport leaves will be streamed
exclusively on YouTube rocket league is
ending support for Linux and steamos
we're in an Antarctica frenzy as Google
Earth as a Google Earth user has found a
2,000 foot structure emerging from the
snow and sometimes free isn't actually
free at all it's been revealed that
avast Free Antivirus is tracking users
online behavior and mining the data
stick around the full details are coming
up later in the show this is the
category five dot TV newsroom covering
the week's top textures with a slight
linux bias
sascha Rickman joined this week by Jeff
Weston and Robbie Ferguson all right
some quick honorable mentions this week
the good old 3d BCD database service
that and its services will be shut down
on March 31st 2020 now there are dozens
of applications that make it easy to rip
a music CD to your computer saving
digital versions of the tracks as mp3 or
WAV or flak or even other audio files
but one of the key services many of
those applications rely on is set to
shut down at the end of March free DB is
a free online database of track listings
of millions of CDs without this type of
database you'd either end up having to
have a bunch of nameless files or you'd
have to manually type in the album names
the artist info the song titles and
other data into your computer every time
you rip a CD while free DB isn't the
only service of its type it's been one
of the most prominent services providing
track listing data for nearly two
decades free DB data was originally
based on information from the CD DB data
service which eventually became
proprietary software and prohibited lice
unlicensed applications from using the
data so free DB Wow free DB cddb
it all runs together doesn't it but they
are a free service operated under a GPL
license and it now consists of user
generated data so service company magics
acquired free DB in 2006 and continued
to support the free service until now
it's unclear why magics has decided to
pull the plug after all of these years
fortunately there's an alternative
online music database called musicbrainz
that's operated under a Creative Commons
license that effectively places the data
into the public domain which means it
should continue to work with third-party
software indefinitely no matter what
but if you're using an old CD ripping
service or music management software
that only supports free DB it may be
time to look for some kind of
alternative in an odd turn of events
Microsoft has had to push out an update
for Windows 7
despite the operating system reaching
end of support because they need to fix
a bug that they introduced earlier this
month Microsoft and its support for
Windows 7 and released final public
security updates for computers still
running the over a decade old OS however
that final update included the addition
of a bug that affects desktop wallpapers
causing wallpapers set to stretch mode
to display as a black screen
organizations who wish to continue using
Windows 7 beyond the end of support date
must pay for extended security updates
in other words Microsoft ended support
for Windows 7 by introducing a bug that
companies would have to pay them to fix
initially Microsoft said it was
developing a fix that they would roll
out to those who purchased extended
support however they've since caved
they've changed their minds and patched
the patches being made available to
everybody running Windows 7 and Windows
Server 2008 r2 sp1 which was also
affected finally at FOSDEM this week
pine 64 have announced what they're up
to for the first half of 2020 during
this time the company hopes to review
the status of the pine phone and pine
time release the pine tab early adopter
Edition and make good on their promises
to deliver the upgrade kit for the
original pine book also rolled over from
last week's to-do list
last week's last year's to-do list
they're falling a little further behind
than just one week pine 64 is releasing
a new so pine compute module that
features a neural processing unit the so
edge is a three tops module that can be
paired with the so pine baseboard or USB
3.0 and PCI Express adapters for
development
and it can even be mixed with previous
gen a 64 modules on the cluster board
which allows clustering of up to seven
compute modules it can connect to a
single board computer such as The Rock
Pro 64 or a regular PC with a simple PCI
Express riser card now having an
encountered issues with the Sony camera
implementation and with the big devices
that they've been releasing like the
pine Book Pro and the pine phone in the
works in q4 2019 the cube camera got put
on the back burner but pine 64 also
assures us that they are once again
working on that they're gonna need to
make some modifications to the specs
though and we're gonna learn more about
that in pine 64's february community
update which is going to be posted on
February 15th so that's a lot of stuff
that has been rolled over from 2019 into
2020 which is going to keep them very
busy but at this point pine 64 is also
wanting to announce things that they are
confident they're gonna be able to
deliver early May 2020
so anything that's going to be released
in the first couple of quarters this
year it's been a while since pine 64 has
announced a new single board computer
and in fact with all of the other
devices that they've been bringing out
some users have even questioned if
they're going to be getting out of the
SBC industry altogether but that is not
the case pine 64 has announced the new
hardrock 60 for the hardrock 64 features
the same SP SOC it's the RK $33.99 hexa
core SOC that you find in the pine Book
Pro and the rock pro 64 it's got two USB
three two USB to ports Wi-Fi AC
Bluetooth 5.0 gig Ethernet and unlike
the Raspberry Pi 4 which only offers
microSD for storage the hardrock 64
includes the MMC also the contrast also
by contrast the hardrock 64 has a barrel
jack for power and no USB C like the
Raspberry Pi six Raspberry Pi 4 it comes
in three different Ram sizes there's one
gigabyte
two gigabytes and four gigabytes the
three implementations of the hardrock 64
will be available at around $35 $45 and
$55 respectively the board is gonna run
Rock pro 64 OS images and with a small
tweak it should even be able to run most
of the pine book pro distros as well so
if you don't need all of the rock pro 60
forest functionalities such as PCI
Express or USBC then this may be the
perfect board for you pine 64 hopes to
have the Hard Rock Pro Hart rock 64 all
of them start to run together
they hope to have it available for you
this April awesome let's get into the
top stories were following this week
some of the biggest Call of Duty
overwatch and hearthstone eSports
leagues will be streamed exclusively on
YouTube the deal scene is a big win for
the platform well which has found it
hard to compete with the game streamer
twitch it's part of a deal that the
site's signed with Activision Blizzard
the company which runs the league's
twitch exclusively streamed for the
first two seasons of overwatch league
and is seen as the go-to destination for
live gaming for sure Sony Orion head of
gaming at Google cloud says quote we've
worked closely with Activision Blizzard
for the past few years across mobile
titles to boost its analytics
capabilities and overall player
experience we're excited to now expand
our relationship and help power one of
the largest and most renowned game
developers in the world
end quote despite being the largest
video site in the world YouTube has
historically struggled to compete with
sites like twitch but in the last few
months the platform's been making some
high-profile moves
poaching a number of high profile twitch
streamers as a part of the deal the
search giant's cloud platform will power
all of Activision Blizzard's game
hosting and other technical needs Google
cloud will also host Activision
Blizzard's in Thai
your library of games that's a quite a
change in in the landscape of video game
play on online it is twitch has always
been like that's where you go for your
gameplay well yeah and I mean the fact
that they've now just secured those
three games makes me wonder could this
either force twitch to adapt or put them
on me be the end yeah like if YouTube
can start pulling away from twitch and
saying you know we've got this and if
they can show the hey we've done it
better
right then other twitch streamers are
gonna go you know what I can go here now
what's interesting that was it talked
about the fact that they pulled some of
the high profile twitch streamers so I'm
wondering if there's a different
compensation rate versus what you would
normally get on YouTube it's a really
weird landscape though because we can't
produce video on YouTube for children
correct and so because of that the so
the games are gonna have to be adults
centric or at least the the to be a
commentary to be honest with most of
these they already are yeah so so what
we're gonna see so understand what that
means is that okay so the YouTube game
like the the community of gamers on
YouTube is gonna grow into an adult
centric video service right so foul
language
probably some not necessarily yeah
necessarily I mean you're gonna get some
of it for sure mmm-hmm but I mean you
look at some of those older youtubers
like dantdm who's been around forever
yeah but how is he doing with YouTube
right now as far as I know he's still
doing videos my kids are watching them
all the time how are the ads looking i
haven't questioned notice anything I
don't know I'd have to check on on Dan
and see how things are going but to see
the thing is is that as soon as Copic
amen
it really impacted streamers who like
dan has always been very sick he's been
very centric on on children and
children's entertainment yes and because
of that that will impact his revenue
because under Coppa he is not allowed to
generate revenue
based on children viewing his stream so
he would have to generate adult centric
videos in order to generate any revenue
now I mean at the end of the day though
YouTube isn't gonna know whether it's me
on my phone watching or my kids on my
phone but even if right regardless of
Dan can't take that risk
no I hear you but I mean how does that
force the content to change because Dan
has to select so we're talking about
dantdm here yeah he has to select when
he creates a video that this is created
for children that the content is
appealing to children and if he selects
that he is not allowed to monetize it so
whether it's you or whether it's a child
watching it there are no ads that are
monetizing it for him so he's not me
he's not making any money off of those
videos it just says for adults somebody
came in to but if a child is Mithen he's
taking a risk because it's not and they
could shut him down very very quickly
right very okay and this is a legal
issue it'll be interesting to see with
with this switch then because you're
right a lot of the viewers are teens I
mean that I mean when it comes to teen
Plus is okay well then their fault yeah
fine yeah but as soon as any anyone
under 13 is watching that that has to be
selected by the streamer right and if it
is selected by the streamer we're not
allowed to monetize it so that I mean
with a switch from twitch to youtube I
don't think it's gonna have much of an
impact because all of those games at the
end of the day when you look at the was
that ER T rating yes but but right now
on Twitch
nobody's monitoring Coppa hasn't cracked
down on twitch so those those streamers
are still making money off of the 10
year olds which I I'm not saying whether
I agree or don't agree I'm just saying
that so though that is going to be a
strange shift because in oh in order to
monetize they have to specifically make
their programming for 13 plus they
cannot create programming that is
appealing to 10 year olds right to 11
year olds to 12 year olds but the
difference between a 10 year old and a
13 year old not really that that's
saying that's what I'm saying ah I guess
I'm just viewing it from a different
lens than you Eisen I can say I'm
gearing it to 13 year olds at a potato
roll watch it so be it no time here for
13 because they law will crack down on
you with that out of date it's so weird
but but if that's the case I mean how
many kids do you like I mean I remember
getting movies rented that were 18 a no
sorry are are you like church boy like
14 so like you can't stop well yeah
we're not gonna be able to solve that
moment that cannot account for your
crimes
yeah I think this is fine I really don't
I think you're gonna be able to stream
on YouTube and I think we'll be fine
we'll see okay we'll be dreamer driver
are you a game streamer on Twitch what
are your opinions let us know comment
below yeah please just three and a bit
years after it debuted on the platform
rocket League is ending support for
Linux and steamos psionics the
development team behind the popular cars
meets football game announced the end of
Mac OS and Linux support in a short
statement posted on their website they
say quote as we continue to upgrade rock
rocket League with new technologies it
is no longer viable for us to maintain
support for the Mac OS and Linux Linux
or steam OS platforms as a result the
patch for the OS and the Linux versions
of the game will be in March this update
will disable online functionality such
as in-game purchases for players on Mac
OS and Linux but offline features
including local matches and split-screen
play will still be accessible end quote
last year's psionics was acquired by
Epic Games who announced plans to stop
selling the hit game on Steam though
without impacting players who had
already purchased it but it's not all
bad news
if you already own the game you can
continue to play it on Linux without any
limitations until the March update
arrived
after this you can also continue to play
it just without any of the online
capabilities don't forget that if you
bought rocket League for Linux on Steam
you can still access full functionality
including online play by installing it
on a computer running a supported
version of Windows not an ideal solution
but at least you don't totally lose your
purchase burn Linux users what I agree
however how many avid gamers are Linux
users all of them yes I like to believe
but you don't see people using Linux for
the purposes of gaming is maybe it's
true maybe that's part of this - is that
ok my kids play that on the switch
rocket league is like the Nintendo
switch all the way now right now yeah
yeah I'd say the switch is where it's at
so I will say that we had to install
window windows on early for gaming
because of gaming yeah because you got
the VR headset and everything yeah yes
that makes sense that's why I have
Windows on my computer like I have steam
with my turkey nerd games on it yeah
fair enough and so for that reason that
I need nails can I have access to your
account 100 games I have 3 games I sign
up for steam with an initially chemo
after the show in the credits
watch for we're gonna have Jeff I don't
think this is such a big deal I mean do
you typically don't see gamers running
on Linux and here's the thing I wish
that it was a big deal I wish that there
was more of a wave toward Linux sure
face yeah we but you're looking at it in
the currents in the current like this is
now yep not a lot of gamers on Linux ok
so think about this well the products
already on Linux
let's keep supporting it and let's
continue supporting Linux as a gaming
platform because it's a great gaming
platform if there's team OS from
Terry standpoint they're finding that
the return on investment for having
programmers that will deal with it on a
Linux base is not viable on the long
term based on subscribership then it
totally makes sense it's a business
decision I can't I can't fault somebody
for that I don't know I feel like it's a
build it and they will come sort of
situation they just need for their car
they're not coming Costner and we're not
dealing with ghosts all i care is that
Unreal Tournament runs on Linux I don't
care about anything else in this entire
world yeah yeah but that's how you know
that's that's yeah it's unfortunate that
Ameen they're not investing in Linux
anymore but it doesn't surprise me
mm-hmm I mean it's not like you go it
breaks my heart jack yeah I still I wish
that I could choose a different
operating system but I need Windows to
play my games I need okay I need psycho
so dual booting is a dual booting for
the win
so Windows 10 for gaming Linux for
everything else everything else but it
doesn't have to be that way a game
developers need to realize that's right
we could just have Linux and then make
this world a better place
DaVinci Resolve is on Linux so just
bring bring rocket leak back oK we've
gotta take a quick break more of this
week's top tech news tech stories are
coming up don't go anywhere
[Music]
you
we're
in Antartica French is Google and Google
Earth user has found a 2,000 foot
structure emerging from the snow
Google Earth users have claimed for
years that there are mysteries lying
beneath the Antarctica ice and now
Google use Google Earth user mr. M BB
333 thinks he may have discovered a
gigantic building in Antarctica in
footage shared a couple of weeks back he
zooms in on the location to find what
seems like a huge square emerging from
the ice the narrator explains quote from
the top to bottom it's nearly 2,000 feet
unbelievable I didn't think it was that
big it's six football fields long that's
massive it's very large
very symmetrical and looks like a
building this could be a random piece of
ice I suppose it is kind of offshore
maybe it's some sort of building but
that is huge end quote
well many are speculating what the shape
could be others are less convinced
suggesting it was nothing more than an
unusual shaped block of ice Antarctica
is often the center of conspiracy
theories it was so-called truth seekers
believing that beneath the layer of snow
and ice lies remnants of everything from
ancient civilizations to Nazi bases
back in August another Google Earth user
believed that they had spotted a
gigantic statue of a face and just two
weeks ago one person claimed to have
spotted a huge two mile long ancient
wall rising above the ice the so called
monolith was compared to Azeroth a
massive structure built in ancient
Mesopotamia and Iran isn't that cool
that we live in a time right now that we
as like just average users at home can
look from the satellite basically down
on the area like like that's sci-fi from
the 80s right there yeah okay but here's
what I have to say about this and I I
don't know whether or not these
structures actually exist but to me it's
reminiscent of like gazing at the clouds
and being like I see
I hippopotamus I don't know it looks
pretty much like a structure to me it
could be a structure good great Google
Earth murder mystery no never heard of
the doc with the blood splatter and the
trail into the water No and everybody
was freaking out about this murder scene
you know about this yes this happened
probably five six years ago and
everybody's freaking out that they had
that Google Earth had taken a snapshot
of a murder scene and because you see
the doc you see the the trail of blood
to the water this has gotten really
morbid right but arms that wooden turns
out yeah it was a guy with his dog and
the dog was jumping in the water running
around running across the dock and it
was the wet dock and it made it look
like what so the point of this is just
cuz you see it on Google Earth doesn't
mean it is what you think it is that's
true but there's not a whole lot of
action going on in Antarctica it doesn't
matter you can't look at something as a
topographical view it's a 2,000 feet
tall
look at that it's the it's actually the
shadow of a penguin right like come on I
will say I spend some time in Google
Earth on my VR like if I sometime I mean
on the daily because I love to travel
around and just see places so I now need
to go to Antarctica because I haven't I
just I mean I don't first off it's
Antarctica so no matter where where you
are in the world at the end of the not
the world but like this time of year
you're always gonna have the Sun at a
very horizontal angle so it's good to
create different shot that's why that
penguin looks like a giant exactly yeah
I'm not buying it I don't think so I
don't think it's a 2,000 foot structure
the amount of planes it's not gonna
happen
I think the only valid use for Google
Earth is to see where viewers are
watching from right now right and and so
by clicking on to map
at five dot TV we can start to see just
outside of the royal town of Sutton
Coldfield we've got viewers and we
should be able to zoom all over the
place yeah viewers all where are we
right now
no you're quite zoomed in I know oh
there's Denmark yeah we know Denmark so
this is this is a valid use for do we
maybe we can find our viewers in
Antarctica oh it's gonna I'm Mary
watching from a 2,000 foot structure
yeah
oh we're yeah there's somebody in
Iceland no no no not the same listen to
you okay I'm trying to I'm trying to
circumnavigate here and it doesn't it's
in live mode so it doesn't like
interactivity but hey map cat five TV
alright Jeff doesn't buy it is it a
penguin or is it a structure it's that's
the question comment below it turns out
free security solutions may come at the
cost of all of your browsing data avast
Free Antivirus track tracker tracks
users online behavior and Minds the data
for companies like Microsoft Pepsi and
Google Windows users should know by now
that you're walking into a field of
landmines if you run your computer
without protection from malware so most
people use antivirus software to make
sure that they get some much-needed
privacy and security protections while
using their computers online and many to
the tune of about a half billion users
turn to free antivirus products thinking
that there's no reason to pay for
protection since there are programs
available for free however free security
suites can sometimes hoard your browsing
data and other details and sell them to
third parties this is the case with the
popular free antivirus from Avast which
is putting the privacy of around 400
million people at risk
at a time when high-profile tech
executives are calling on governments to
impose more stringent privacy rules
there is nothing like another reminder
that everyone is fighting to get a hold
of your habits preferences and pretty
much any other data that can be used by
advertisers to target you more easily
according to a joint investigation by
vice and PC Mag that involves leaked
contracts and other company company
documents Avast along with its AVG
subsidiary have been keeping track of
what users did online while using the
free software they distribute the scheme
involves jumpshot a company that
provides insights into consumers online
journeys by measuring every search click
and buy across 1,600 categories from
more than 150 sites including Amazon
Google Netflix and Walmart end quote
installing avast's free antivirus
automatically adds in a browser
extension that collects information on
your internet activity and sends it to
jump shot packed and tagged with the
unique identifier Avast data collection
includes searches on Google and Google
Maps YouTube videos LinkedIn searches
and profile visits and even what users
view on adult web sites this gets sent
to jump shots customers like Google
Microsoft Pepsi Sephora Home Depot Yelp
Intuit and many others Avast says it
doesn't track any sensitive information
like personal identification phone
numbers or email the company also
insists that as of july 2019 they've
begun implementing an explicit opt in
choice for all new downloads of their AV
and are now prompting existing free
users to make an opt-in or opt-out
choice a process which they claim will
be completed in February 2020 ok opt in
like do you like yes yes yes yes ok I'm
installing this free antivirus
yes yes yes yes next next next next next
ok you just opted in yeah BAM we have
all your stuff and we're selling it to
everyone mm-hmm why does this come as a
surprise to people no it's not a
surprise Jeff it's just proven free is
never free well exactly I learned that
as a kid nothing comes for free if it's
free there's always something attached
to it has Facebook not talked as
anything they've taught us a lot Jeff
you know what you know what I've learned
by Facebook hmm that people just Jeff
you're still on Facebook yeah I am still
on Facebook it's a necessary evil but ya
know I I don't use Avast for this reason
any time I see a free virus software I
go antivirus antivirus yeah like I'm not
touching it that's why I do use
subscription-based services because when
you're putting money behind it there's a
company that's gonna actually stand
behind their product as opposed to
collecting your user data yeah but
there's Kaspersky and McAfee - sure well
exactly yes but you could also get free
versions of them okay all right but
putting money on it doesn't necessarily
mean it's good but it's much better than
hey get this for free yeah yeah because
you're paying for it somehow yeah so
yeah three versions of these products
are definitely gonna have some some
caveats to them for her I'm just
wondering how long before we see some
sort of lawsuit yeah because the thing
you opted in and it's a cop-out because
yeah Austin was until 2000 and was in
nineteen yeah but they've retroactively
Lee added another pop okay I'm the guy
that reads the fine print before I sign
up for something yeah you're not you're
not the average user though do I know
I'm not the average matter
I'm just the size just one so many
people are doing this so many people
don't really realize what's happening
and that now you know though folks now
you know yeah big thanks to Roy W Nash
and our community of viewers for
submitting stories to us this week
thanks for watching the category-five TV
newsroom don't forget to Like and
subscribe for all your tech news with a
slight Linux bias and if you appreciate
what we do become a patron at
patreon.com slash newsroom from the
category 5 kb newsroom and sasha Rickman
and i'm robi ferguson and i'm jeff west
[Music]