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'Need For Speed Hot Pursuit Remastered' arrives on November 6th
The game will land on Switch a week after it hits PC, PS4 and Xbox One.
Scientists think some supermassive black holes didn’t start as stars
Despite the fact that scientists now have a real image of a supermassive black hole, they still have plenty of questions about the objects. Now, astrophysicists at Western University may have a new explanation for how some black holes formed. In research published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters today, Shantanu Basu and Arpan Das suggest that not all black holes emerge from star remnants. Their model may help scientists explain the formation of extremely massive black holes at a very early stage of the universe's development.
Stripe will stop accepting bitcoin in April
Stripe announced today that it will stop supporting bitcoin payments in April. The company started accepting bitcoin payments in 2014, but in a blog post, it said today that the cryptocurrency has become way less useful as a method of payment, and as bitcoin revenues have declined, so has its customers' interest in it. "Bitcoin has evolved to become better-suited to being an asset than being a means of exchange," said Stripe, mirroring a belief others have expressed as well.
NSA may have spied on 122 foreign leaders
We've known for a while that the NSA has spied on German Chancellor Angela Merkel and other international leaders, but it now looks like that surveillance was just the tip of the iceberg. Der Spiegel and The Intercept have published an Edward Snowden leak revealing that the NSA snooped on as many as 122 foreign heads of state in 2009, ranging from Merkel to Ukranian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko. A custom search system, Nymrod, helped the US agency both locate transcripts of those leaders' communications as well as secret reports. The National Security Council tells The Intercept that President Obama's administration hasn't tracked Merkel and doesn't plan to start, but it also didn't deny that the German leader had once been under close watch.
Hasselblad Stellar reportedly leaked, adds aura of luxury to Sony's RX100
Hasselblad's strategy of sprucing up Sony cameras must be paying off -- that would explain Photo Rumors' apparent leak of the Stellar, a Hasselblad take on the RX100. The already high-end compact cam will reportedly switch to a tan metallic body and offer several choices of exotic grip material, including carbon fiber and padouk wood. There's no mention of functional upgrades over the Sony original, though. As with the Lunar, we're more likely to see a price hike instead -- Photo Rumors claims the Stellar should launch on July 26th for between $1,600 to $3,200, which would limit it to particularly well-heeled photographers.
Samsung Galaxy Stellar available through Verizon beginning Thursday, free after rebate
Samsung's decidedly grounded Stellar smartphone just got the official nod from Verizon, launching on Thursday with a $50 price tag (before a $50 mail-in rebate). The "free" handset packs a 1.2GHz dual-core Snapdragon, Ice Cream Sandwich, LTE connectivity, a 4-inch WVGA display an a rather modest image capture duo -- a 1.3-megapixel camera up front and an autofocus-capable 3.2-megapixel snapper on the rear. There's also 802.11n WiFi and support for microSD cards up to 32GB. As unimpressive as they may be, none of these specs comes as a surprise, following the smartphone's early debut on Best Buy's site last week. Still, if you're in the market for an upgrade with a non-existent equipment budget, this little Galaxy may be just what Big Red ordered.
More Samsung Galaxy Stellar details spill, September 6th launch appears likely
More details about the Samsung Galaxy Stellar 4G LTE, Verizon's upcoming budget offering, are now surfacing from the midst of the carrier's internal systems. Our source has confirmed that the Stellar is now expected to launch on September 6th, and has provided some documentation that reveals the vast majority of the phone's spec sheet. Starter Mode once again gets mentioned here -- according to the docs, it's a "new, simple way to interact Access apps and control device settings with ease." As far as specs go, these docs back up the details leaked on Best Buy's website earlier: Android 4.0, a 1.2GHz dual-core CPU, 3.2MP rear camera and 1.3MP front-facing cam and 800 x 480 WVGA display. Additionally, Amazon Kindle, Audible and Zappos apps are mentioned, as well as Bluetooth 4.0 and 4GB internal storage. Dimensionally, the phone will weigh 4.73 ounces and measures 121.92 x 63.75 x 11.94mm (yes, that last measurement is for thickness). Given the lower-end specs, the Stellar likely won't launch to a grand amount of fanfare -- especially if the $100 price point is accurate. Check out our gallery below to see a few more images of the crucial docs. As a sidenote, many of the images will have creatively blurred-out sections in order to protect the identity of our source. %Gallery-164042% [Thanks, Anonymous!]
O2 finally getting HTC Kaiser as "Xda Stellar" -- or "Stella" perhaps
Seems like a pretty egregious error on O2's part to throw up a promotional image of its upcoming HTC Kaiser variant with a big, fat typo up top -- but at the same time, we have an easier time believing that they're coining it the "Xda Stellar," not the "Xda Stella." The text below the picture uses the Stellar name, so that's what we're going with for the time being until we hear otherwise. Anyhoo, by all appearances, this is pretty much the same Kaiser everyone else has gotten, and with a projected release window in December, we're a little surprised to see O2 so far behind the curve here. Too little, too late, or is HTC's finest QWERTY device still going to find droves of buyers by the time it finally launches?[Via MoDaCo and Mobiholics]Update: O2's already corrected its mistake, it's officially the Xda Stellar. Makes more sense that way, eh? Thanks, Gears!
Russian scientists create the stellar battery?
There aren't a lot of details on this one, but according to the AFP news agency, Russian scientists have developed a sort of super battery that can not only harness solar power, but star power as well. Yeah, you heard us. Valentin Samoilov of the Dubna Nuclear Institute is quoted as saying that they "have successfully created a new substance... thanks to which this battery can work on earth, independently of meteorological conditions, using solar and stellar energy." Samoilov also added that the new battery would be cheaper than a traditional solar panel, which kinda started to spike our fantastical-meters. Another report from ITAR-TASS describes this new substance as a "heteroelectric" but doesn't elaborate any further; we'll need a few more deets before we place our pre-pre-orders, but anything that supposes to save us both power and money by harnessing the power of distant stellar bodies has definitely got our immediate attention.[Via Futurismic]
