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Amazon admits that a typo took the internet down this week
The Great Amazon Web Services Outage of 2017 is behind us. Now, Jeff Bezos' golden child is ready to explain what happened. Turns out, what took Giphy, Medium, Slack, Quora and a ton of other websites and services down was a typo. As Amazon explains it, some of its S3 servers were operating rather sluggish, so a tech tried fixing it by taking a few billing servers offline. A fix straight from the company's playbook, it says. "Unfortunately, one of the inputs to the command was entered incorrectly and a larger set of servers was removed than intended." Whoops. As for why the problem took so long to correct, Amazon says that some of its server systems haven't been restarted in "many years." Given how much the S3 system has expanded, "the process of restarting these services and running the necessary safety checks to validate the integrity of the metadata took longer than expected." Amazon has apologized and promises to do better in the future, at least, saying it has altered the at-fault tool (the code, not the employee) so it removes capacity slower. Beyond that, it is adding measures to stop so many being taken offline at once.
Ryan Seacrest's iPad keyboard is surprisingly good, but expensive
It's hard to expect much from Typo, a company that was co-founded by Ryan Seacrest and whose legal tango with BlackBerry has forced it to stop selling phone keyboards. But with its new iPad keyboard, Typo has at least proven it's worth keeping an eye on. For $189, you get a Bluetooth keyboard that actually feels like a decent laptop keyboard, as well as a cover to protect your iPad. There's no shortage of iPad keyboards on the market, but Typo's offering might be compelling to anyone who wants a premium laptop-like experience with their iPad. The only problem? It's far too expensive for what you get.
Typo's truce with BlackBerry stops it from selling phone keyboards
Typo started fending off lawsuits from BlackBerry almost as soon as its lookalike iPhone keyboards went on sale, but it's at last getting a break... well, sort of. The Ryan Seacrest-backed company has reached a settlement with BlackBerry that ends all lawsuits, but requires that it "permanently discontinue" selling keyboards for any device with a screen 7.9 inches or smaller (that is, phones). Effectively, the crew in Waterloo is asking Typo to drop its very reason for being -- it was formed by executives who wanted to ditch their BlackBerrys for iPhones without having to type on glass. While Typo will stick around and sell iPad keyboards, there's no doubt that it's a shell of its former self.
BlackBerry drags Typo back to court over another iPhone keyboard
Sorry, Typo, you aren't getting away with paying a fine. BlackBerry has filed another complaint against the Ryan Seacrest-backed peripheral maker over claims that the Typo 2 iPhone keyboard also infringes on patents. Not surprisingly, BlackBerry doesn't believe that a few minor design changes (such as a battery indicator and a lock key) put Typo's eerily familiar-looking keyboard in the clear -- it wants a ban on Typo 2 sales. We've reached out to Typo to see what its response will be, but something tells us that the odds of a successful courtroom defense are even lower this time around.
Daily Roundup: Microsoft leaks, lens cameras and more!
In today's Daily Roundup, we look at a Microsoft document leaked in 2012 that foreshadowed the Xbox One and HoloLens, take a look at a new lens camera for smartphones from Olympus and discuss the US Navy's new firefighting robot. All that and more can be found past the break.
Judge fines Typo for continuing to sell its BlackBerry-like keyboards
Apparently, BlackBerry took Typo to court again (and won), but not because of the latter's new product, if that's what you were thinking. A federal judge has just ruled in favor of the Canadian phonemaker after it accused Typo of making at least two bulk sales of its original BB-like physical iPhone keyboard (even processing 100 warranty replacements) despite an injunction banning it from the market. If you recall, BlackBerry sued the Ryan Seacrest-backed company due to its uncannily similar QWERTY keypad and won an injunction against it in March. The judge has ordered the accused to pay $860,000 for the violation, but the phonemaker originally wanted $2.6 million plus its lawyer's fees, so Typo really got off easy.
Dear BlackBerry, Ryan Seacrest isn't done with the QWERTY keyboard
Maybe you remember the bizarre collision of worlds at last year's CES when Ryan Seacrest touched down in Las Vegas to introduce the Typo, a physical QWERTY keyboard case for the iPhone 5/5s. If you do, then you may also recall the controversy and legal tussling over the original Typo's striking resemblance to BlackBerry's Q10 keyboard. One court ordered a sales injunction and another Typo revision later, Seacrest and his partner Laurence Hallier are back at CES to debut another physical keyboard accessory, this time it's the Typo2 for the iPad Air and iPad mini lines. The pair carved out some time during the madness of CES to speak to me about Typo's bumpy start, the impact of customer feedback on product design and the boldfaced names that swear by their QWERTY case.
Typo avoids BlackBerry lawsuit by releasing a new iPhone 6 keyboard
The original Typo keyboard case was a dream come true for many BlackBerry users who had converted to iPhone: a case which brought the tactile keyboard of your beloved old device to the best cell phone on the market. Then BlackBerry sued, and the Typo had to sit on the shelf... until now. While the lawsuit is still pending, Typo has announced the Typo 2 for the iPhone 6 and iPhone 5/5s, a reworked version of the original design which slims down the case and aims to improve typing speed for users. There is one downside to the new case -- due to the placement of the keyboard, using the case blocks the Touch ID sensor, meaning you can't use Typo 2 and things like Apple Pay at the same time. For some users this will be a major drawback; for others the glory of being able to type on a physical keyboard will outweigh the negatives. You can currently order the iPhone 6 keyboard from the Typo website for $99 and the iPhone 5/5s version for $79 directly on the company's website. Typo CEO Laurence Hallier recently told Re/Code that the company is currently developing a iPad version of the product and it should be available next year.
Square Enix launching Dargon Quest 4 on iOS today
Square Enix is bringing Dargon Quest 4 to the App Store as soon as this evening. A listing for the game appeared on the New Zealand App Store, which typically suggests the game will propagate to other regions throughout the day, including North America. Square Enix confirmed the iPhone and iPad version of Dargon Quest 4 late last week by including it in the publisher's Gamescom lineup. Dargon Quests 1-3 are, sadly, lost to time, their code consumed by the Great Dracky Infestation of '06. Ok, obviously, this is just an unfortunate typo, but we thought it was worth a chuckle. What can we say? We're easily amused. Twitter similarly found the story worth poking fun at, using the hashtag #DargonQuestMyGame to collect similar new IPs like Lara Crafting: Tome Raider, Brad, Dante's In Fresno, BioSock, and Fire Embalm.
Typo's iPhone keyboard is back and it still looks a lot like a BlackBerry
Auto-correct fails can be pretty hilarious, but if you'd rather avoid them altogether (boo!) maybe a litigious phone case's second coming is up your alley. See, earlier this year Ryan Seacrest's iPhone accessory company, Typo, found itself on the wrong side of the law when BlackBerry filed suit against it. Why? Because, well, its product looked an awful lot like something you'd find on one of the Canadian outfit's devices. But, that copyright infringement applied to Typo, not the almost identical Typo 2. As iMore tells is, the American Idol host has added a few new bits and bobs like a lock key, backlight and battery indicator to the keyboard that'll hopefully distract Chen and Co.'s attorneys. The accessory starts shipping this September, but you can pre-order now for $99 -- whether its maker is back in court by then is anyone's guess.
No BlackBerry keyboard for you, and other news for March 31, 2014
Sorry folks, it looks like those of you who dreamed of having a BlackBerry-type keyboard for your iPhone will have to just keep on dreaming. The company has won a court order against Ryan Seacrest's Typo iPhone keyboard. The Typo had been expected to go on sale this Spring, but once BlackBerry got wind of it they filed a lawsuit against Seacrest's company in January. As Reuters reports: U.S. District Judge William Orrick in San Francisco said that the Canadian mobile phone maker had established a "likelihood" of proving that Typo infringed its patents, while mentioning that Typo had not sufficiently challenged the patents in question. The preliminary injunction prohibits Typo from the sale of its keyboard, which is a part of the relief sought by Blackberry. "BlackBerry is pleased that its motion for a preliminary injunction against Typo Products LLC was granted. This ruling will help prevent further injury to BlackBerry from Typo's blatant theft of our patented keyboard technology," a spokeswoman for BlackBerry said in an email. Typo said it was disappointed and plans to appeal the decision. In other news: Square has begun notifying customers that can get a new card reader for free. Apple has sent out a new letter to residents in the area of the Campus 2 HQ notifying them of updates on its construction. New Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella seems pretty pleased about Office for iPad's App Store rankings. iTunes apparently still dwarfs subscription streaming services.
Typo case marries an iPhone 5s and a BlackBerry Q10, with Ryan Seacrest officiating (hands-on)
Why Typo, of all the names for a smartphone keyboard? The company answers the obvious question with a Wikipedia quote. A typographical error (often shortened to typo) is a mistake made in the typing process ... The term includes errors due to mechanical failure or slips of the hand or finger. Well, yeah, sure, but that doesn't really answer the question we -- oh, wait, there's more: "For many of us at Typo, typing on our iPhones is a slow, tedious one- or two-finger affair. Our desire is to avoid making Typos by using the Typo Keyboard." Ah, so you named it "Typo" because you want people to use it to not make typos -- sort of a reverse Orwellian doublethink approach to product naming. You know, like the MacBook Backpain. The Typo harnesses Ryan Seacrest's deep pockets to the tune of $1 million, in order to address an issue that hardly anyone seems to talk (read: complain) about anymore: the death of the smartphone keyboard.
Daily Roundup: CES 2014 preview, new Acer tablets, Veronica Mars movie trailer and more!
You might say the day is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workday, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Daily Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past 24 hours -- all handpicked by the editors here at the site. Click on through the break, and enjoy.
BlackBerry sues Typo over its familiar-looking iPhone keyboard (update: Typo responds)
If you thought Typo's iPhone keyboard looked an awful lot like the keyboard from a BlackBerry Q10, you're not alone. BlackBerry has just sued Typo in a Northern California court for alleged patent infringement. The slide-on peripheral is a "blatant" copy of BlackBerry's signature input feature, according to the company. We've reached out to Typo for commentary, but it may not have many options -- the crew in Waterloo has patented a lot of keyboards, and it's hard to deny the strong resemblance. Update: Typo isn't going to take the lawsuit lying down; the company says that it plans to fight back, and claims that BlackBerry's accusations "lack merit." Read Typo's full statement below.
Ask Massively: Why tpyos matter
Whenever you sit down to read an article -- let's say it's an article about MMOs on your favorite MMO blog -- the author has a hidden persuasive advantage. Readers are inclined to believe what they read unless they have a compelling reason not to because believing is easier than not believing. In fact, humans have a hard time mentally readjusting if they hear a lie about a topic before they hear the truth, especially when the lie confirms comforting pre-existing beliefs. And like it or not, we grant a measure of authority to published articles, to what we see in print from people we presume are professionals. But even a lowly games writer squanders that "authoritativeness bonus" when he can't even be arsed to press the darn spellcheck button.
Research suggests that your body knows you made a typo when your conscious mind simply can't be bothered
This may or may not come as a shocker to you -- but when you make a typo, your body can tell, according to a new study at Vanderbilt University. The study monitored a group of people who could type at least 40 WPM consistently as they transcribed copy. In analyzing the typists' key strokes, researchers found that interestingly, even if a typist's mistake was immediately 'silently' corrected onscreen by those running the study, the typist's fingers fumbled or paused, signaling an 'awareness' that a mistake had been made. Essentially, this means that while the conscious mind may not know that a mistake has been made (especially if there's no visual evidence of it), the part of the brain that controls the fingers typing movements have some awareness of the mistakes. For those of us who spend our lives banging away at a keyboard, these preliminary results won't really come as any surprise -- the feeling of having made a mistake is pretty instinctual. Regardless, the results suggest a hierarchical manner of mistake detection in humans, the "lower" more instinctual part of the brain recognizing and correcting the mistake, while the conscious part of the brain assigns credit and blame. Now if we could just figure out what part of our brain is responsible for relentlessly pointing out others' typos, we'd be set.
Hey, Google: failing to spellcheck Android 2.0 can have 'undesireable consequences'
Add this into the December patch, won't you, Google? [Thanks, Yosef]
Lenovo's ThinkPad X301 now with $9,969 multi-touch trackpad option
About a year ago Lenovo's ThinkPad X300 launched as a direct competitor to Apple's slinky MacBook Air. Over that time, the ultra-slim Thinkpad with a face for business has come to either match or dominate the MBA in nearly every category except the sexy. Now you can tick off one more as the X301 brings a new multi-touch trackpad option with fingerprint reader. In the typical befuddlement that seems to greet every new on-line spec on the Lenovo store, the new TouchPad is listed as a $9,969 option. Too rich? They maybe the $8,402 bump from a 1.4GHz to new 1.6GHz Core 2 Duo SU9600 processor will interest you?[Thanks, James C.]
Someone at Legends of Norrath has been playing too much WoW
File this under "Hilarious", and "Fairly Embarrassing". Featured at Cuppytalk, we see a screenshot taken from Legends of Norrath (click the picture for a full-sized version). It appears an epic battle has just been won, and upon close examination of the stirring victory message, something isn't quite right:You have defeated the Bridge Keeper and all three of the Royal Family of Di'zok to become the rulers of the castle of Chardok! The bards and troubadours of Azeroth will sing your praises for years to come!That's right, your great deed is so immense that it transcends game universes. Now all that's left is to find out where the portal between the two is, so that you can meet up with your new fans in distant lands.
Beep, beep! I'm a Jeep!
I woke up this morning, started reading through the LJ World of Warcraft community, and there was a post there that made me stop and stare. I just couldn't believe my eyes. After all, I have a druid, and I enjoy playing her -- but if my eyes were working correctly, things were about to get very interesting! True, it wasn't quite as good as the suggested Octopus on a Motorcycle form, but it at least had the potential to be really interesting! As Taishokao pointed out, when you go to the WoW Europe forums here, select druid, and then check out the Gladiator set, you can verify the above screen shot. The druid set 4-piece bonus does indeed currently list a car form. (I don't know how long that's going to take Blizzard to fix, but for now, it still says "car." hehe) For all the potential funny in that, we know it's a typo. (There again, it's probably just as well, because if we had car forms, I'm relatively sure my noob-feral-druid-self would probably wind up as a Geo Metro. :P ) But that led me to thinking about typos in game. I know I've seen them here and there on quest givers, but I think by far the worst ones I've seen have been from other players. I know I'm guilty of accidentally mis-typing "1 sec" wrong while in the middle of instances which has gotten me picked on a lot. (No, I'm not saying what I typo it as -- this is a family blog!) Personally, I think the one that gets me irked the most is "rouge" for "rogue." Of course, I suspect that's because my main is a rogue, and I can never get the image of the "Moulin" Dark Legacy strip out of my head when someone says that, but I digress... Are there any typos that have gotten you harassed, picked on, or just irked you when they were repeated over and over? I know I can't be the only one who has messed that kind of thing up. The fact that someone made a comic strip about the rouge/rogue typo tells me I'm not also the only one who's been somewhat amused yet frustrated by it, either. So share yours with the rest of the Insider crew! Have you ever noticed a hilarious typo on an NPC? How about personal typos? Any that get you in trouble with your guilds or that you make you crazy? Vent to the rest of us, or share with us your own personal moment of lol. [via the WoW LJ]
