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* About * Privacy Policy * Terms of Use * Unsubscribing Technology and Science News * Startups * Gadgets * Sports Technology * Science * GEEK OF THE WEEK: HOW LIFELONG ENTREPRENEUR BOB CRIMMINS’ LITTLE POKER GAME BALLOONED TO A 2,300-PERSON STARTUP GROUP 1:25pm, 4th August, 2019 * HOW I UNWITTINGLY STEERED OCEANGATE’S SUB TO DISCOVERY IN PUGET SOUND’S DEPTHS 5:08am, 3rd September, 2019 * NO POOP REQUIRED: RESEARCHERS DEVISE BLOOD TEST FOR GUT MICROBIOME DIVERSITY USING DATA FROM DEFUNCT STARTUP ARIVALE 5:08am, 3rd September, 2019 * RUSSELL WILSON’S STARTUP TALLY POWERS NEW REAL-TIME PREDICTIONS GAME FOR L.A. RAMS, SEAHAWKS’ BIG RIVAL 5:08am, 3rd September, 2019 * 13 WAYS TO SCREW OVER YOUR INTERNET PROVIDER 5:03am, 3rd September, 2019 * GEEK OF THE WEEK: HOW LIFELONG ENTREPRENEUR BOB CRIMMINS’ LITTLE POKER GAME BALLOONED TO A 2,300-PERSON STARTUP GROUP 1:25pm, 4th August, 2019 * HOW I UNWITTINGLY STEERED OCEANGATE’S SUB TO DISCOVERY IN PUGET SOUND’S DEPTHS 5:08am, 3rd September, 2019 1. 1 2. 2 3. 3 4. 4 5. 5 * Previous * Next HIGH-TECH COMPRESSION SHORTS MAKER STRIVE AIMS TO MEASURE THE ‘MILES PER GALLON’ OF ATHLETES 10:35am, 3rd August, 2019 HIGH-TECH COMPRESSION SHORTS MAKER STRIVE AIMS TO MEASURE THE ‘MILES PER GALLON’ OF ATHLETES 10:35am, 3rd August, 2019 Startups NO POOP REQUIRED: RESEARCHERS DEVISE BLOOD TEST FOR GUT MICROBIOME DIVERSITY USING DATA FROM DEFUNCT STARTUP ARIVALE 5:08am, 3rd September, 2019 Researchers at the Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle developed a way to test for microbiome diversity from a blood sample. (Artist rendering courtesy of ISB) If you want to know what’s going on in your gut microbiome, the community of bacteria in our intestines that are tied to overall health, there are plenty of companies willing to help. You just have to pay them — and send in a poop sample. But it turns out that bottling feces isn’t the only way to gain insights into the gut. Researchers at the (ISB) in Seattle have devised a new way to look into the state of your microbiome with a blood test. Microbiome startups have proliferated in recent years. Some are going after drug discovery for specific diseases, such as Finch Therapeutics and Maat Pharma. Others, including Seattle-based , are selling microbiome insights directly to consumers for overall health. Given the relatively early stage of microbiome research, how useful insights from the gut can be. That’s why ISB researchers decided to focus on the diversity of microbes. “There’s not a good correlation between diversity in and of itself and clinical health. But there are specific cases in which it does seem to be a huge risk factor,” said, who worked with on the study, which was published today in Nature Biotechnology. Low microbiome diversity is a strong risk factor for patients with recurring Clostridium difficile (C. diff), Gibbons said. C. diff is a potentially life-threatening bacterium that comes back in nearly a third of patients following antibiotic treatment. ISB researchers Dr. Nathan Price and Dr. Sean Gibbons. (ISB Photos) “Getting these recurrent infections is super hard on patients,” Gibbons said. “If you could avoid that cycle, you could not only decrease the cost of healthcare, you would actually be saving lives and producing a lot less suffering.” Patients with C. diff can be treated with a fecal transplant, but those are only administered after antibiotics have failed. Gibbons thinks that a blood test could pre-screen patients at risk of recurring C. diff and avoid the painful cycle. Related: To create the test, researchers leaned heavily on data compiled by Arivale, a Seattle startup that aimed to help people become healthier and avoid disease through wellness. in April after it failed to find a market for its pricey service. But Dr. Lee Hood, who co-founded both Arivale and ISB, rescued much of the data and technology from the startup and brought it to ISB. That resource gave Price and Gibbons extensive data on hundreds of former Arivale customers who had their microbiomes sequenced and their blood tested, among other tests. The researchers were able to train a model to predict which individuals are likely to have very low microbiome diversity by looking at 11 blood metabolites. Arivale customers gave permission for their data to be used for research, and the information was anonymized. The ISB study is a “beautiful example” of how personal data clouds can give new insights into biology and disease, Hood told GeekWire in an email. They also found what they believe to be a “Goldilocks zone” of gut diversity. People with low diversity tended to have diarrhea and inflammation, whereas those with very high diversity tended to be constipated or have toxins in the blood. With the help of Arivale’s data, ISB researchers think more microbiome-related insights can be found. “We’re trying to build a real map that can lead to actionable insights of how to manipulate the microbiome,” Gibbons said. One disadvantage of the dataset is that it skewed toward white, health-conscious people, who were more likely to be Arivale’s customers. “It is a bit of a biased sampling,” said Gibbons. In the future, ISB intends to partner with Providence St. Joseph Health, which would give researchers access to a more representative population. Sports Technology RUSSELL WILSON’S STARTUP TALLY POWERS NEW REAL-TIME PREDICTIONS GAME FOR L.A. RAMS, SEAHAWKS’ BIG RIVAL 5:08am, 3rd September, 2019 Seattle Seahawks quarterback Russell Wilson, right, with Jason LeeKeenan, CEO of Tally, in Seattle in 2018. (GeekWire Photo / Kevin Lisota) When the Seattle Seahawks take on the Los Angeles Rams on Oct. 3 this season, fans might want to predict how many touchdowns quarterback Russell Wilson will throw against his division rival on that day. The best way to do so could be through a new mobile experience from the NFL team that is powered by , the startup that was founded by Wilson. The Rams launched “Pick’em” for use during a pre-season game against the Oakland Raiders. The intention is to engage fans to make real-time predictions as the action unfolds on the field. Fans, playing on the web or through the Rams’ mobile app, earn points for every correct prediction and those over 18 can compete for prizes such as game tickets, field passes and autographed merchandise. Tally is a free-to-play predictions platform, not a gambling app. But the move by the Rams, along with a , signals what’s ahead with the eventual spread of legalized sports betting in the wake of a 2018 that overturned the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act. It’s all poised to change how we watch and interact with live events. Seattle-based Tally, which employees 14 people now, is an , the company Wilson helped launch in 2017 as a celebrity content app. TraceMe shut down in 2018 and the business pivoted to the sports prediction model. Wilson was touting Tally in February. “We believe that real-time predictive gaming experiences are going to be the critical components of engaging in live sports in the years to come,” Tally CEO Jason LeeKeenan told GeekWire. “We are positioning Tally to be the leading technology provider behind this evolution.” The Tally app, showing, from left, phone authentication, dynamic odds, and a real-time leaderboard. (Tally screen shots) According to its website, Tally white labels its user interface, custom branding it for any property looking to create such content. The Rams are the first NFL team to partner with Tally. LeeKeenan said other partnerships are in the works, but he wasn’t ready to announce whether the Seahawks might be one of those teams. reported that Tally worked with the NBA’s Portland Trail Blazers and the NHL’s St. Louis Blues on similar games earlier this year. The Rams plan to use the mobile experience to present a mix of game-specific questions and micro-outcomes, according to the team’s news release. “Which team completes a passing play of 30+ yards in the opening half?” or “Which of these players racks up 10+ rushing yards first?” are example of questions posed to fans. Those playing can can track their success throughout a game and rankings are updated in real time as results are tallied live. Point values increase as the game progresses. “We are thrilled to bring our fans closer to the action with an engaging second-screen experience,” Marissa Daly, Rams VP of media, said in a statement. “We feel that our free-to-play predictions game will be a fun way for fans to compete against one another while watching their Rams compete on the field.” The Rams have leapfrogged the San Francisco 49ers to emerge as the Seahawks’ most heated division rival over the past couple seasons. Surely Seattle’s star QB will be more engaged with winning games on the field than worrying about predictions being generated in an app built by his company. Regardless, LeeKeenan makes it sound like Wilson has already won. “What can I say? Russell is a great entrepreneur and we hope all sports teams will be using our technology one day,” LeeKeenan said. Science HOW I UNWITTINGLY STEERED OCEANGATE’S SUB TO DISCOVERY IN PUGET SOUND’S DEPTHS 5:08am, 3rd September, 2019 POSSESSION SOUND, Wash. — Steering a five-person submersible is like playing a video game, except for the fact that you’re piloting a nine-ton piece of hardware at watery depths that are inaccessible to . I got my chance to play this week during a survey dive in a pocket of Puget Sound known as Possession Sound, courtesy of , a manufacturer and operator of submersibles that’s headquartered in Everett, Wash. During our three-hour tour, GeekWire photographer Kevin Lisota and I were taken around the sound at depths ranging as low as 350 feet, in OceanGate’s Cyclops submersible. We even played a supporting role in finding a colony of anemones in an unexpected underwater setting. The trip was part of a summertime expedition to get a better sense of the ecosystem on the bottom of Puget Sound, in collaboration with researchers from the Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. If things had turned out differently, OceanGate would just now be wrapping up a series of submersible survey dives to the wreck of the Titanic in the North Atlantic. But , the company had to delay those trips until next year. That’s why OceanGate pivoted to the Puget Sound survey, and why Kevin and I found ourselves scrunched alongside marine biologist Tyler Coleman, pilot-in-training Mikayla Monroe and OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush on Tuesday. We began the morning with a safety briefing at the dock at Everett’s marina, led by Dan Scoville, OceanGate’s director of systems integration and marine operations. One of his bits of advice had to do with keeping calm if you hear thumps and bumps on Cyclops’ hull. “If you can hear it, you’re OK,” he said. If there’s a catastrophic collision and breach, you wouldn’t be around long enough to hear it. Then the Cyclops was towed out on its launch-and-recovery platform to Possession Sound by one of the boats in OceanGate’s fleet, the Kraken. A little more than an hour later, the Cyclops was in position, and we headed out to meet it on a faster boat, the Vito. Once we were dropped off on the floating platform, we handed up our backpacks, took our shoes off and climbed into Cyclops’ 5-foot-wide cabin. Mikayla sat on a mat toward the back, flanked by video screens that showed camera views and sonar readings. Stockton sat next to her, ready to give guidance. Tyler sat in the middle. Kevin and I had front-row seats, looking through Cyclops’ hemispherical acrylic viewing window. We let our stocking-clad feet rest on the window’s bottom, even though we were warned that we might feel the chill of the water on the other side. Once all the final checks were made, the crew members on the Vito, the Kraken, the platform and in the submersible took a five-minute timeout, known as a “stopski,” just to make completely sure all systems were go. (The idea — suggested by Scott Parazynski, a former NASA astronaut — was inspired by the built-in holds that are included in space launch countdowns.) Then it was time to dive. First the launch and recovery platform blew the compressed air out of its flotation tanks, in a process that had us dipping down backward into the water at a 20-degree angle. Green-tinted water sloshed wildly over our field of view. “Is this a freakout moment for some people?” I asked Stockton. “I haven’t run across that yet,” he replied. “You could be our first.” GeekWire’s Alan Boyle takes notes as he looks out the window of OceanGate’s Cyclops submersible. (GeekWire Photo / Kevin Lisota) Within minutes, we were sinking below the photic zone, where sunlight could penetrate to fuel the green plankton that tinted the waters. The view outside was total darkness, until Mikayla turned on the floodlights on each side of our window. Even then, plankton and the other particles floating in nutrient-rich Puget Sound cut the visibility to just a few feet around us. Mikayla relied on sonar readings to determine our depth, and on GPS readings to determine our heading. Our first destination was right beneath us: We headed for a wire cage containing a pile of salmon guts, which was dropped down on a line from a buoy to attract whatever creatures were foraging at the bottom. When we pulled up to the cage, we saw a smattering of rockfish (of the quillback and canary varieties), with 4-inch-long prawns and an occasional crab skittering through the scene, looking for a meal. The prime targets for OceanGate’s survey are shark species, and especially the rare, crowd-pleasing sixgill shark. We hoped to follow in the footsteps of Seattle rap musician Macklemore, who when he went looking for Puget Sound sixgills in a different Oceangate sub. We saw no sixgills, but we did catch sight of a slim, spiny dogflsh shark as it threaded its way around the bait box. “So we had our first official shark?” I asked Tyler. “Yup,” he said. Marine biologist Tyler Coleman identified this fish as a dogfish shark. (GeekWire Photo / Alan Boyle) Then we headed off to a wide stretch of muddy bottom, punctuated by holes that provided shelter for the prawns and other bottom-feeding critters. Stockton sidled over to me, holding the modified Sony PlayStation game controller that’s used to steer the sub. “Want to drive?” he said. It took me a while to get the hang of the controls: The front buttons serve as “dead man’s switches,” which have to be pressed in order to activate the controller’s dual joysticks. The left joystick controls the up and down thrusters, and the right joystick controls horizontal thrusters for forward and back, left and right. Simple, right? Nevertheless, I occasionally rose high enough to lose sight of the bottom, and sank low enough to plop the sub into the mud and send clouds of sediment rising up in front of our window. To get ourselves out of those obscuring clouds, I had to drive the sub out of the haze into clearer waters. At least there were no rocks to run into, which is why Stockton and Mikayla brought us to a field of mud before they handed me the controller. After a few minutes of meandering, Mikayla reported that there was something showing up on the sonar, about 15 meters dead ahead. Stockton took back the controller, and guided by Mikayla’s callouts, he brought us right up to what looked like a garden of cauliflowers, plunked in the middle of an underwater desert. It turned out that a tree stump had sunk 350 feet to the bottom, heaven knows how many years ago, and a colony of anemones had taken root there. Stockton was impressed, and he told Mikayla to take note of the coordinates. “The visibility is probably 10 feet today, but we can get 5 feet away, so that’s OK,” Stockton told me. “Imagine trying to find this if you were diving. … Nobody’s ever seen this log before, I’ll bet you even money.” Toward the end of the tour, we returned to the area where bait had been dropped to the bottom. Mikayla turned the lights off, waited for a school of rockfish to swim in front of our window, and then turned the lights back on so we could snap photos. When it was time to ascend, we rose through the dark murk and back into the sunlit green haze near the surface. Kevin and I were deputized to watch for the whitish outline of OceanGate’s launch-and-recovery platform, anchored a few meters below. It took a couple of tries to get properly “locked in” on the platform, due to a balky thruster. I was feeling grateful that Mikayla and Stockton were at the controls (and hoping I hadn’t damaged the thruster during my training session). At last we were locked in and lifted up. The sun seemed unusually bright as we climbed back up through the hatch and were motored back to shore. On the way back, Stockton talked about OceanGate’s plans to bring the submersible experience to a wider audience. “Diving’s no fun after you’ve been in a sub,” he said. Taking people down to the Titanic is still OceanGate’s prime objective: The submersible that’s designed for that role, which was initially called Cyclops II but is now known as Titan, proved it could safely get to Titanic-worthy depths this year . The postponement of the means there’s not a lot for Titan to do until next summer. It’s currently being prepped for an extra round of stress tests, plus equipment upgrades that should smooth the way for the 2020 season. OceanGate’s Titanic customers are paying to participate in the adventure as mission specialists, and most of them are keeping their reservations despite the delay. Stockton said that OceanGate’s subs — including Cyclops and Titan as well as the two-person Antipodes — are currently certified for research missions such as the Titanic expedition, but not for more casual tourist jaunts. Another perspective: Now OceanGate is seeking waivers from the Coast Guard that would allow the company to offer submersible tours for something like $1,000 or $2,000 per person. That’s more than operators in Hawaii charge for submarine tours, but those tours go only 100 feet beneath the surface and last only 45 minutes or so. OceanGate’s tourists would get an experience even more thrilling than ours — assuming that the regulatory go-ahead is given. “It’ll probably be six to 12 months before we get approval,” Stockton told me. Stockton and his team of 27 employees are also looking into whether their subs can be used for infrastructure inspection and environmental surveys. And they’re planning to build a bigger, better submersible called Cyclops III, which could handle depths of 6,000 meters (20,000 feet). To help fund those projects, OceanGate is in the midst of a that was reported to the Securities and Exchange Commission in April. So what’s tougher? Navigating the depths of Puget Sound, or negotiating the shoals of the startup world? , Stockton Rush is clearly adept at doing both. But personally, I’d rather be steering the sub. Correction for 4:36 p.m. PT Sept. 1: In a previous version of this report, we incorrectly identified a ratfish as a dogfish shark. We’ve amended the ID for the ratfish, and added a video screengrab of the dogfish. Woof! Also, we’ve corrected the anticipated cost of a submersible tour to be $1,000 to $2,000 per person, instead of per day. Gadgets 13 WAYS TO SCREW OVER YOUR INTERNET PROVIDER 5:03am, 3rd September, 2019 Internet providers are real bastards: they have captive audiences whom they squeeze for every last penny while they fight against regulation like net neutrality and donate immense amounts of money to keep on lawmakers’ good sides. So why not turn the tables? Here are 13 ways to make sure your ISP has a hard time taking advantage of you (and may even put it on the defensive). Disclosure: Verizon, an internet provider guilty of all these infractions, owns TechCrunch, and I don’t care. 1. Buy a modem and router instead of renting The practice of renting a device to users rather than selling it or providing it as part of the service is one of the telecommunications industry’s oldest and worst. People pay hundreds or even thousands of dollars over years for equipment worth $40 or $50. ISPs do this with various items, but the most common item is probably the modem. This is the gadget that connects to the cable coming out of your wall, and then connects in turn (or may also function as) your wireless and wired router. ISPs often provide this equipment at the time of install, and then charge you $5 to $10 per month forever. What they don’t tell you is you can probably buy the exact same item for somewhere between $30 and $100. The exact model you need will depend on your service, but it will be listed somewhere, and they should tell you what they’d provide if you ask. Look online, buy a new or lightly used one, and it will have paid for itself before the year is out. Not only that, but you can do stuff like upgrade or change the software on it all you want, because it’s yours. Bonus: The ISP is limited in what it can do to the router (like letting other people connect — yes, it’s a thing). 2. Avoid service calls, or if you can’t, insist they’re free I had an issue with my internet a while back that took them several visits from a service tech to resolve. It wasn’t an issue on my end, which was why I was surprised to find they’d charged me $30 or so every time the person came. If your ISP wants to send someone out, ask whether it’s free, and if it isn’t, tell them to make it free or ask if you can do it yourself (sometimes it’s for really simple stuff like swapping a cable). If they charge you for a visit, call them and ask them to take it off your bill. Say you weren’t informed and you’ll inform the Better Business Bureau about it, or take your business elsewhere, or something. They’ll fold. When someone does come… 3. Get deals from the installer If you do end up having someone come out, talk to them to see whether there are any off the record deals they can offer you. I don’t mean anything shady like splitting cables with the neighbor, just offers they know about that aren’t publicized because they’re too good to advertise. A lot of these service techs are semi-independent contractors paid by the call, and their pay has nothing to do with which service you have or choose. They have no reason to upsell you and every reason to make you happy and get a good review. Sometimes that means giving you the special desperation rates ISPs withhold until you say you’re going to leave. And as long as you’re asking… 4. Complain, complain, complain This sounds bad, but it’s just a consequence of how these companies work: The squeaky wheels get the grease. There’s plenty of grease to go around, so get squeaking. Usually this means calling up and doing one of several things. You can complain that service has been bad — outages and such — and ask that they compensate you for that. You can say that a competing ISP started offering service at your location and it costs $20 less, so can they match that. Or you can say your friend just got a promotional rate and you’d like to take advantage of it… otherwise you’ll leave to that phantom competitor. (After all, we know there’s often little or no real competition.) What ISPs, and, more importantly, what their customer service representatives care about is keeping you on as a customer. They can always raise rates or upsell you later, but having you as a subscriber is the important thing. Note that some reps are more game than others. Some will give you the runaround, while others will bend over backwards to help you out. Feel free to call a few times and do a bit of window shopping. (By the way, if you get someone nice, give them a good review if you get the chance, usually right after the call or chat. It helps them out a lot.) Obviously you can’t call every week with new demands, so wait until you think you can actually save some money. Which reminds me… 5. Choose your service level wisely ISPs offer a ton of choices, and make it confusing on purpose so you end up picking an expensive one just to be sure you have what you need. The truth is most people can probably do pretty much everything they need on the lowest tier they offer. A 1080p stream will work fine on a 25 Mbps connection, which is what I have. I also work entirely online, stream high-def videos at a dozen sites all day, play games, download movies and do lots of other stuff, sometimes all at the same time. I think I pay $45 a month. But rates like mine might not be advertised prominently or at all. I only found out when I literally asked what the cheapest possible option was. That said, if you have three kids who like to watch videos simultaneously, or you have a 4K streaming setup that you use a lot, you’ll want to bump that up a bit. But you’d be surprised how seldom the speed limit actually comes into play. To be clear, it’s still important that higher tiers are available, and that internet providers upgrade their infrastructure, because competition and reliability need to go up and prices need to come down. The full promise of broadband should be accessible to everyone for a reasonable fee, and that’s still not the case. 6. Stream everything because broadcast TV is a joke Cord-cutting is fun. Broadcast TV is annoying, and getting around ads and air times using a DVR is very 2005. Most shows are available on streaming services of some kind or another, and while those services are multiplying, you could probably join all of them for well under what you’re paying for the 150 cable channels you never watch. Unless you really need to watch certain games or news shows as they’re broadcast, you can get by streaming everything. This has the side effect of starving networks of viewers and accelerating the demise of these 20th-century relics. Good ones will survive as producers and distributors of quality programming, and you can support them individually on their own merits. It’s a weird transitional time for TV, but we need to drop-kick them into the future so they’ll stop charging us for a media structure established 50 years ago. Something isn’t available on a streaming service? 100 percent chance it’s because of some dumb exclusivity deal or licensing SNAFU. Go pirate it for now, then happily pay for it as soon as it’s made available. This method is simple for you and instructive for media companies. (They always see piracy rates drop when they make things easy to find and purchase.) This also lets you avoid certain fees ISPs love tacking onto your bill. I had a “broadcast TV fee” on my bill despite not having any kind of broadcast service, and I managed to get it taken off and retroactively paid back. On that note… 7. Watch your bill like a hawk Telecoms just love putting things on your bill with no warning. It’s amazing how much a bill can swell from the quoted amount once they’ve added all the little fees, taxes and service charges. What are they, anyway? Why not call and ask? You might find out, as I did, that your ISP had “mistakenly” been charging you for something — like equipment — that you never had nor asked for. Amazing how these lucrative little fees tend to fall through the cracks! Small charges often increase and new ones get added as well, so download your bill when you get it and keep it somewhere (or just keep the paper copies). These are really handy to have when you’re on the phone with a rep. “Why wasn’t I informed my bill would increase this month by $50?” “Why is this fee more now than it was in July?” “Why do I pay a broadcast fee if I don’t pay for TV?” These are the types of questions that get you discounts. Staying on top of these fees also means you’ll be more aware when there are things like mass refunds or class action lawsuits about them. Usually these have to be opted into — your ISP isn’t going to call you, apologize and send a check. As long as you’re looking closely at your bill… 8. Go to your account and opt out of everything When you sign up for broadband service, you’re going to get opted into a whole heap of things. They don’t tell you about these, like the ads they can inject, the way they’re selling this or that data or that your router might be used as a public Wi-Fi hotspot. You’ll only find this out if you go to your account page at your ISP’s website and look at everything. Beyond the usual settings like your address and choice of whether to receive a paper bill, you’ll probably find a few categories like “privacy” and “communications preferences.” Click through all of these and look for any options to opt out of stuff. You may find that your ISP has reserved the right to let partners email you, use your data in ways you wouldn’t expect and so on. It only takes a few minutes to get out of all this, and it deprives the ISP of a source of income while also providing a data point that subscribers don’t like these practices. 9. Share your passwords Your friend’s internet provider gets him streaming services A, B and C, while yours gives you X, Y and Z. Again, this is not about creators struggling to get their content online, but rather all about big media and internet corporations striking deals that make them money and harm consumers. Share your (unique, not reused!) passwords widely and with a clean conscience. No company objects when you invite your friends over to watch “Fleabag” at your house. This just saves everyone a drive! 10. Encrypt everything and block trackers One of the internet companies’ many dirty little deals is collecting and selling information on their customers’ watching and browsing habits. Encrypting your internet traffic puts the kibosh on this creepy practice — as well as being good security. This isn’t really something you can do too much to accomplish, since over the last few years encryption has become the rule rather than the exception, even at sites where you don’t log in or buy anything. If you want to be sure, download a browser plug-in like HTTPS everywhere, which opts you into a secure connection anywhere it’s available. You can tell it’s secure because the URL says “https://” instead of “http://” — and most browsers have other indicators or warnings as well. You should also use an ad blocker, not necessarily to block ads that keep outlets like TechCrunch alive (please), but to block trackers seeded across the web by companies that use sophisticated techniques to record everything you do. ISPs are among these and/or do business with them, so everything you can do to hinder them is a little mud in their eye. Incidentally there are lots of ways you can protect your privacy from those who would invade it — . 11. Use a different DNS Bryce Durbin / TechCrunch On a similar note, most ISPs will usually be set up by default with their own “Domain Name Service,” which is the thing that your browser pings to convert a text web URL (like “techcrunch.com”) to its numerical IP address. There are lots of these to choose from, and they all work, but if you use your ISP’s, it makes it much easier for them to track your internet activity. They also can block certain websites by refusing to provide the IP for content they don’t like. TechCrunch doesn’t officially endorse one, but lots of companies offer free, fast DNS that’s easy to switch to. ; there are big ones (Google, Cloudflare), “open” ones (OpenDNS, OpenNIC) and others with some niche features. All you need to do is slot those two numbers into your internet configuration, following the instructions they provide. You can change it back at any time. is another option for very privacy-conscious individuals, but it can be complicated. And speaking of complicated… 12. Run a home server This is a bit advanced, but it’s definitely something ISPs hate. Setting up your home computer or a dedicated device to host a website, script or service seems like a natural use of an always-on internet connection, but just about everyone in the world would rather you sign up for their service, hosted on their hardware and their connection. Well, you don’t have to! You can do it on your own. Of course, you’ll have to learn how to run and install a probably Unix-based server, handle registry stuff, install various packages and keep up to date so you don’t get owned by some worm or bot… but you’ll have defied the will of the ISP. That’s the important thing. 13. Talk to your local government ISPs hate all the things above, but what they hate the most by far is regulation. And you, as a valued citizen of your state and municipality, are in a position to demand it. Senators, representatives, governors, mayors, city councils and everyone else actually love to hear from their constituency, not because they desire conversation but because they can use it to justify policy. During the net neutrality fight, a constant refrain I heard from government officials was how much they’d heard from voters about the issue and how unanimous it was (in support, naturally). A call or email from you won’t sway national politics, but a few thousand calls or emails from people in your city just might sway a local law or election. These things add up, and they do matter. State net neutrality policies are now the subject of national attention, and local privacy laws like those in Illinois are the bane of many a shady company. Tell your local government about your experience with ISPs — outages, fees, sneaky practices or even good stuff — and they’ll file it away for when that data is needed, such as renegotiating the contracts national companies sign with those governments in order to operate in their territories. Internet providers only do what they do because they are permitted to, and even then they often step outside the bounds of what’s acceptable — which is why rules like net neutrality are needed. But first people have to speak out. Startups GEEK OF THE WEEK: HOW LIFELONG ENTREPRENEUR BOB CRIMMINS’ LITTLE POKER GAME BALLOONED TO A 2,300-PERSON STARTUP GROUP 1:25pm, 4th August, 2019 Bob Crimmins with his daughters on the day they met their Kickstarter goal for the ‘Wise Walker.’ There are plenty of stories of entrepreneurs who got their start in dorm rooms and garages, but how many can trace their startup hustle back to the playground? At 12-years-old, Bob Crimmins began his education in entrepreneurship by upselling lollipops from 7-Eleven to his classmates, learning a valuable lesson in demand-based pricing. As a kid, Crimmins also worked for his family’s businesses and went door-to-door selling custom glasswork he made. Entrepreneurship and innovation often go hand-and-hand, and Crimmins was no exception. “I wrote my first program on punch cards in 1978, a time when it was neither cool nor lucrative to be a 15-year-old programmer,” he said. Crimmins founded his first tech startup in 1999 and went on to launch four more after that. Along the way, he started a poker game for friends in the startup community. That was back in 2006. Fast-forward to 2019 and what began as a casual gathering has grown into Startup Haven, a community for entrepreneurs with chapters in six cities and 2,300 members. Up until now, Crimmins estimates he dedicated about 15 percent of his time to Startup Haven. This year he decided to make it his full-time gig so he can continue to scale the organization. He plans to expand Startup Haven to three additional cities in 2019 and 10 in 2020. Members must qualify as “venture-scale” founders before they are accepted into Startup Haven. In addition to regular poker games, the group hosts founder dinners and other events each month. Crimmins still makes time for the occasional side hustle, like , a startup he founded with his daughters. Together they designed a clip-on carrying case for dog owners to stash smelly poop bags on walks. Related: “The most rewarding experience I’ve ever had as an entrepreneur and as a father was teaching my twin daughters about entrepreneurship by actually co-founding a company with them,” he said. We caught up with Crimmins for this Geek of the Week. Learn more about his journey and Startup Haven below. What do you do, and why do you do it? In 2006, I started asking folks I knew if they wanted to learn how to play poker. Since virtually everyone I knew at the time was a startup founder, exec or investor, that’s who joined in. Learning the game was fun but what fascinated me was the relationships that were formed by the folks around the table. Seeing the impact of those relationships was amazing and it inspired me to keep the game going and growing. Fast forward a dozen years and that humble monthly card game took on a life of its own and became what is now Startup Haven, a founder support community with more than 2,300 founder, exec and investor members in six cities. We still host that fun, invite-only, low-stakes poker event every month in all six of our chapter cities (we have hosted more 300 Startup Poker 2.0 events so far)! But if you’re not a Startup Haven member then the reasons we play poker are probably not what you think. I have written extensively about . If you’re a full time, venture-scale founder or an active startup investor, you might find it interesting. Over the years, Startup Haven has become much more than just a poker event. We have hosted hundreds of Founders Dinner events, dozens of special educational events. Beginning in 2019, scaling Startup Haven’s impact has became my full-time focus and over the past few months, we have launched a members-only recruiting program, an accelerator program and an investor matching program. Startup Haven started a personal passion project and it will always remain that. But scaling requires a different mindset and that makes it feel like a startup. It’s an exciting time. What’s the single most important thing people should know about your field? My “field” these days is helping founders succeed more by failing less. Startups fail so often that it’s a wonder why everyone hasn’t just stopped trying. A “Top 10” list of the reasons why startups fail would include a hundred reasons. This stuff is hard and there is no silver bullet, but I have come to believe that relationships and cogency are the two best hedges against failure. I’ll buy dinner for the first person to convince me otherwise. These principles are precisely what motivated me to keep Startup Haven going for all these years and it’s why I’m genuinely excited about the new . Where do you find your inspiration? My daughters. Humble founders. The magnitude of human experience. What’s the one piece of technology you couldn’t live without, and why? CNC lasers. I reckon I use mine three to four days a week — there’s always something to make, to fix, to experiment with. Growing Startup Haven has made that more difficult lately but it’s always on my mind and if it’s been more than a week since I’ve had the opportunity then I really miss it. What’s your workspace like, and why does it work for you? I’m a nomad. I work out of a backpack. As a community organizer and a mentor, I spend time at a variety of co-working spaces around town. I’m currently working primarily out of Thinkspace, which I love. Crimmins at the Columbia Tower Club, where he often works. Your best tip or trick for managing everyday work and life. Everyone in the startup world is perpetually overcommitted. So protecting your calendar can be a superpower. Largely, this amounts to figuring out how to say “no” respectfully, helpfully, and more often. Mac, Windows or Linux? Windows. Kirk, Picard, or Janeway? Picard. But, go Janeway! Transporter, time machine or cloak of invisibility? Philosopher’s Stone is missing from the list, so I’ll go with time machine. However, I will travel back in time to the moment the cloak of invisibility was discovered and find it myself the day before. Then I would travel forward in time to whenever the Philosophers Stone becomes and option. If someone gave me $1 million to launch a startup, I would Put the money in the bank and use the interest to fund experiments with the aim of developing a cogent startup thesis that warrants putting $1 million to work at day zero. I once waited in line for: I waited in line to see Star Wars when it first hit the theaters. Your role models: I often find myself channeling great entrepreneurs and investors I’ve known. What would Andy do? What would Dan do? What would TA do? What would Chris do? What would Dave do? Without fail, I immediately see the issue/questions/challenge/decision in a new light. It’s palpable. I don’t always take the action I think they would but I’m always informed by what I think their perspective would be. Of course, I could be terribly wrong about what they would actually do if I were to ask them, but the exercise is so effective and immediate that I wouldn’t want to break it by actually asking them. Besides, none of them have time to take speed dial calls from Bob. Greatest game in history: D&D. Viva la imagination. Best gadget ever: Staedtler 2.0mm mechanical pencil … and paper. First computer: I learned to program on VAX-11 in high school, then got excited about computers with my best friend’s TRS-80. I really wanted the Osborne 1 to be my first computer but they were so expensive that I had to eventually settle for building an IBM XT Clone. Current phone: Samsung S8+. Every time someone switches from an iPhone to an Android, an angel gets its wings. Favorite app: I love, love, love Audible. Audiobooks are a secret weapon for sure. I even read the Mueller report in less than two weeks while driving to and from meetings. Favorite cause: My “favorite” is youth entrepreneurship, which I think is an important and valuable cause and it’s something I think I am especially equipped to help with. But I don’t think it’s nearly as important as so much other work that needs to be done in the world. Most important technology of 2019: Boring old social media has proven its ability to fundamentally subvert democracy. That needs to be fixed. I can’t think of much that’s more important than that. Most important technology of 2021: AI … for as far out as our headlights go. Final words of advice for your fellow geeks: My advice is for early entrepreneurs. Having good ideas is easy. The hard part is determining whether and how some good idea or other could also be a successful business — before you sacrifice your savings account, your relationships and your emotional health. Mostly, good ideas turn out not to be good businesses. And to be clear, I’m not just talking about the ideas that only half the room thinks are good. I’m also talking about the ideas where everyone in the room thinks the idea is good, i.e., that the problem should be solved, that the product should exist and that the world would be a better place with your startup in it. If it were only the marginally good ideas that failed then the startup failure rate would not be in the neighborhood of 95 percent. Aye, the allure of an idea that everyone tells you is “such a good idea” is irresistible. Coupled with your passion, confidence and ambition, keeping an open mind about whether your good idea can also be a good business is super hard. So hard that you barely paused before jumping off the cliff. Reid Hoffman famously described entrepreneurship as the act of jumping off that cliff and building a plane on the way down. He is right. But he didn’t say you had to design the plane on the way down. You can do a lot to figure out which planes might possibly be built in the distance from the top of the cliff to the bottom. Of course, certainty is impossible; but there are ways to reduce your chances of disintegrating on impact at the bottom of the cliff. Passion is helpful, even necessary; but it’s not sufficient. You also need a lot of customer development, some math and a little critical thinking. Constantly be on the lookout for assumptions you are making, i.e., what would have to be true in order for your startup to be a good business? Notice that this is a different question than “what would have to be true in order for your startup to be a good idea.” Ideas don’t come with labels that identify them as a good business or not. You have to figure that out yourself. To do that, talk to lots of customers and then identify and quantify as many of your assumptions as possible and model them in a spreadsheet. If you can’t tell a cogent and quantifiable story about how you could get from here to there (wherever you think “there” should be) then you are operating at a ridiculously high level of uncertainly and risk. Founder, meet cliff. * How I unwittingly steered OceanGate’s sub to discovery in Puget Sound’s depths * No poop required: Researchers devise blood test for gut microbiome diversity using data from defunct startup Arivale * Russell Wilson’s startup Tally powers new real-time predictions game for L.A. Rams, Seahawks’ big rival * 13 ways to screw over your internet provider * How I unwittingly steered OceanGate’s sub to discovery in Puget Sound’s depths * No poop required: Researchers devise blood test for gut microbiome diversity using data from defunct startup Arivale * Russell Wilson’s startup Tally powers new real-time predictions game for L.A. Rams, Seahawks’ big rival * 13 ways to screw over your internet provider * Geek of the Week: How lifelong entrepreneur Bob Crimmins’ little poker game ballooned to a 2,300-person startup group * High-tech compression shorts maker Strive aims to measure the ‘miles per gallon’ of athletes * High-tech compression shorts maker Strive aims to measure the ‘miles per gallon’ of athletes * Google Cloud vets launch Seattle startup Kaskada to bolster machine learning tech with real-time data * Backed by Bill Gates, Echodyne plays role in a pioneering flight of a drone on its own * Watch a Tesla Model 3 play chess against the top-ranked player in the US #1 #1044 #1111 #14 #2018 #43 #47 #52 #5minshairstyle#easyhairstyle#easyweddinghairstyle#easybridalhairstyle#hairstyle #77 #82 #abcc#exchange#best #abexercises #abs #ada #adidaswomen #aesthetics #altcoins #anastasia STARTUPS Startups NO POOP REQUIRED: RESEARCHERS DEVISE BLOOD TEST FOR GUT MICROBIOME DIVERSITY USING DATA FROM DEFUNCT STARTUP ARIVALE 5:08am, 3rd September, 2019 Researchers at the Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle developed a way to test for microbiome diversity from a blood sample. (Artist rendering courtesy of ISB) If you want to know what’s going on in your gut microbiome, the community of bacteria in our intestines that are tied to overall health, there are plenty of companies willing to help. You just have to pay them — and send in a poop sample. But it turns out that bottling feces isn’t the only way to gain insights into the gut. Researchers at the (ISB) in Seattle have devised a new way to look into the state of your microbiome with a blood test. Microbiome startups have proliferated in recent years. Some are going after drug discovery for specific diseases, such as Finch Therapeutics and Maat Pharma. Others, including Seattle-based , are selling microbiome insights directly to consumers for overall health. Given the relatively early stage of microbiome research, how useful insights from the gut can be. That’s why ISB researchers decided to focus on the diversity of microbes. “There’s not a good correlation between diversity in and of itself and clinical health. But there are specific cases in which it does seem to be a huge risk factor,” said, who worked with on the study, which was published today in Nature Biotechnology. Low microbiome diversity is a strong risk factor for patients with recurring Clostridium difficile (C. diff), Gibbons said. C. diff is a potentially life-threatening bacterium that comes back in nearly a third of patients following antibiotic treatment. ISB researchers Dr. Nathan Price and Dr. Sean Gibbons. (ISB Photos) “Getting these recurrent infections is super hard on patients,” Gibbons said. “If you could avoid that cycle, you could not only decrease the cost of healthcare, you would actually be saving lives and producing a lot less suffering.” Patients with C. diff can be treated with a fecal transplant, but those are only administered after antibiotics have failed. Gibbons thinks that a blood test could pre-screen patients at risk of recurring C. diff and avoid the painful cycle. Related: To create the test, researchers leaned heavily on data compiled by Arivale, a Seattle startup that aimed to help people become healthier and avoid disease through wellness. in April after it failed to find a market for its pricey service. But Dr. Lee Hood, who co-founded both Arivale and ISB, rescued much of the data and technology from the startup and brought it to ISB. That resource gave Price and Gibbons extensive data on hundreds of former Arivale customers who had their microbiomes sequenced and their blood tested, among other tests. The researchers were able to train a model to predict which individuals are likely to have very low microbiome diversity by looking at 11 blood metabolites. Arivale customers gave permission for their data to be used for research, and the information was anonymized. The ISB study is a “beautiful example” of how personal data clouds can give new insights into biology and disease, Hood told GeekWire in an email. They also found what they believe to be a “Goldilocks zone” of gut diversity. People with low diversity tended to have diarrhea and inflammation, whereas those with very high diversity tended to be constipated or have toxins in the blood. With the help of Arivale’s data, ISB researchers think more microbiome-related insights can be found. “We’re trying to build a real map that can lead to actionable insights of how to manipulate the microbiome,” Gibbons said. One disadvantage of the dataset is that it skewed toward white, health-conscious people, who were more likely to be Arivale’s customers. “It is a bit of a biased sampling,” said Gibbons. In the future, ISB intends to partner with Providence St. Joseph Health, which would give researchers access to a more representative population. Startups GEEK OF THE WEEK: HOW LIFELONG ENTREPRENEUR BOB CRIMMINS’ LITTLE POKER GAME BALLOONED TO A 2,300-PERSON STARTUP GROUP 1:25pm, 4th August, 2019 Startups HIGH-TECH COMPRESSION SHORTS MAKER STRIVE AIMS TO MEASURE THE ‘MILES PER GALLON’ OF ATHLETES 10:35am, 3rd August, 2019 GADGETS Gadgets 13 WAYS TO SCREW OVER YOUR INTERNET PROVIDER 5:03am, 3rd September, 2019 Internet providers are real bastards: they have captive audiences whom they squeeze for every last penny while they fight against regulation like net neutrality and donate immense amounts of money to keep on lawmakers’ good sides. So why not turn the tables? Here are 13 ways to make sure your ISP has a hard time taking advantage of you (and may even put it on the defensive). Disclosure: Verizon, an internet provider guilty of all these infractions, owns TechCrunch, and I don’t care. 1. Buy a modem and router instead of renting The practice of renting a device to users rather than selling it or providing it as part of the service is one of the telecommunications industry’s oldest and worst. People pay hundreds or even thousands of dollars over years for equipment worth $40 or $50. ISPs do this with various items, but the most common item is probably the modem. This is the gadget that connects to the cable coming out of your wall, and then connects in turn (or may also function as) your wireless and wired router. ISPs often provide this equipment at the time of install, and then charge you $5 to $10 per month forever. What they don’t tell you is you can probably buy the exact same item for somewhere between $30 and $100. The exact model you need will depend on your service, but it will be listed somewhere, and they should tell you what they’d provide if you ask. Look online, buy a new or lightly used one, and it will have paid for itself before the year is out. Not only that, but you can do stuff like upgrade or change the software on it all you want, because it’s yours. Bonus: The ISP is limited in what it can do to the router (like letting other people connect — yes, it’s a thing). 2. Avoid service calls, or if you can’t, insist they’re free I had an issue with my internet a while back that took them several visits from a service tech to resolve. It wasn’t an issue on my end, which was why I was surprised to find they’d charged me $30 or so every time the person came. If your ISP wants to send someone out, ask whether it’s free, and if it isn’t, tell them to make it free or ask if you can do it yourself (sometimes it’s for really simple stuff like swapping a cable). If they charge you for a visit, call them and ask them to take it off your bill. Say you weren’t informed and you’ll inform the Better Business Bureau about it, or take your business elsewhere, or something. They’ll fold. When someone does come… 3. Get deals from the installer If you do end up having someone come out, talk to them to see whether there are any off the record deals they can offer you. I don’t mean anything shady like splitting cables with the neighbor, just offers they know about that aren’t publicized because they’re too good to advertise. A lot of these service techs are semi-independent contractors paid by the call, and their pay has nothing to do with which service you have or choose. They have no reason to upsell you and every reason to make you happy and get a good review. Sometimes that means giving you the special desperation rates ISPs withhold until you say you’re going to leave. And as long as you’re asking… 4. Complain, complain, complain This sounds bad, but it’s just a consequence of how these companies work: The squeaky wheels get the grease. There’s plenty of grease to go around, so get squeaking. Usually this means calling up and doing one of several things. You can complain that service has been bad — outages and such — and ask that they compensate you for that. You can say that a competing ISP started offering service at your location and it costs $20 less, so can they match that. Or you can say your friend just got a promotional rate and you’d like to take advantage of it… otherwise you’ll leave to that phantom competitor. (After all, we know there’s often little or no real competition.) What ISPs, and, more importantly, what their customer service representatives care about is keeping you on as a customer. They can always raise rates or upsell you later, but having you as a subscriber is the important thing. Note that some reps are more game than others. Some will give you the runaround, while others will bend over backwards to help you out. Feel free to call a few times and do a bit of window shopping. (By the way, if you get someone nice, give them a good review if you get the chance, usually right after the call or chat. It helps them out a lot.) Obviously you can’t call every week with new demands, so wait until you think you can actually save some money. Which reminds me… 5. Choose your service level wisely ISPs offer a ton of choices, and make it confusing on purpose so you end up picking an expensive one just to be sure you have what you need. The truth is most people can probably do pretty much everything they need on the lowest tier they offer. A 1080p stream will work fine on a 25 Mbps connection, which is what I have. I also work entirely online, stream high-def videos at a dozen sites all day, play games, download movies and do lots of other stuff, sometimes all at the same time. I think I pay $45 a month. But rates like mine might not be advertised prominently or at all. I only found out when I literally asked what the cheapest possible option was. That said, if you have three kids who like to watch videos simultaneously, or you have a 4K streaming setup that you use a lot, you’ll want to bump that up a bit. But you’d be surprised how seldom the speed limit actually comes into play. To be clear, it’s still important that higher tiers are available, and that internet providers upgrade their infrastructure, because competition and reliability need to go up and prices need to come down. The full promise of broadband should be accessible to everyone for a reasonable fee, and that’s still not the case. 6. Stream everything because broadcast TV is a joke Cord-cutting is fun. Broadcast TV is annoying, and getting around ads and air times using a DVR is very 2005. Most shows are available on streaming services of some kind or another, and while those services are multiplying, you could probably join all of them for well under what you’re paying for the 150 cable channels you never watch. Unless you really need to watch certain games or news shows as they’re broadcast, you can get by streaming everything. This has the side effect of starving networks of viewers and accelerating the demise of these 20th-century relics. Good ones will survive as producers and distributors of quality programming, and you can support them individually on their own merits. It’s a weird transitional time for TV, but we need to drop-kick them into the future so they’ll stop charging us for a media structure established 50 years ago. Something isn’t available on a streaming service? 100 percent chance it’s because of some dumb exclusivity deal or licensing SNAFU. Go pirate it for now, then happily pay for it as soon as it’s made available. This method is simple for you and instructive for media companies. (They always see piracy rates drop when they make things easy to find and purchase.) This also lets you avoid certain fees ISPs love tacking onto your bill. I had a “broadcast TV fee” on my bill despite not having any kind of broadcast service, and I managed to get it taken off and retroactively paid back. On that note… 7. Watch your bill like a hawk Telecoms just love putting things on your bill with no warning. It’s amazing how much a bill can swell from the quoted amount once they’ve added all the little fees, taxes and service charges. What are they, anyway? Why not call and ask? You might find out, as I did, that your ISP had “mistakenly” been charging you for something — like equipment — that you never had nor asked for. Amazing how these lucrative little fees tend to fall through the cracks! Small charges often increase and new ones get added as well, so download your bill when you get it and keep it somewhere (or just keep the paper copies). These are really handy to have when you’re on the phone with a rep. “Why wasn’t I informed my bill would increase this month by $50?” “Why is this fee more now than it was in July?” “Why do I pay a broadcast fee if I don’t pay for TV?” These are the types of questions that get you discounts. Staying on top of these fees also means you’ll be more aware when there are things like mass refunds or class action lawsuits about them. Usually these have to be opted into — your ISP isn’t going to call you, apologize and send a check. As long as you’re looking closely at your bill… 8. Go to your account and opt out of everything When you sign up for broadband service, you’re going to get opted into a whole heap of things. They don’t tell you about these, like the ads they can inject, the way they’re selling this or that data or that your router might be used as a public Wi-Fi hotspot. You’ll only find this out if you go to your account page at your ISP’s website and look at everything. Beyond the usual settings like your address and choice of whether to receive a paper bill, you’ll probably find a few categories like “privacy” and “communications preferences.” Click through all of these and look for any options to opt out of stuff. You may find that your ISP has reserved the right to let partners email you, use your data in ways you wouldn’t expect and so on. It only takes a few minutes to get out of all this, and it deprives the ISP of a source of income while also providing a data point that subscribers don’t like these practices. 9. Share your passwords Your friend’s internet provider gets him streaming services A, B and C, while yours gives you X, Y and Z. Again, this is not about creators struggling to get their content online, but rather all about big media and internet corporations striking deals that make them money and harm consumers. Share your (unique, not reused!) passwords widely and with a clean conscience. No company objects when you invite your friends over to watch “Fleabag” at your house. This just saves everyone a drive! 10. Encrypt everything and block trackers One of the internet companies’ many dirty little deals is collecting and selling information on their customers’ watching and browsing habits. Encrypting your internet traffic puts the kibosh on this creepy practice — as well as being good security. This isn’t really something you can do too much to accomplish, since over the last few years encryption has become the rule rather than the exception, even at sites where you don’t log in or buy anything. If you want to be sure, download a browser plug-in like HTTPS everywhere, which opts you into a secure connection anywhere it’s available. You can tell it’s secure because the URL says “https://” instead of “http://” — and most browsers have other indicators or warnings as well. You should also use an ad blocker, not necessarily to block ads that keep outlets like TechCrunch alive (please), but to block trackers seeded across the web by companies that use sophisticated techniques to record everything you do. ISPs are among these and/or do business with them, so everything you can do to hinder them is a little mud in their eye. Incidentally there are lots of ways you can protect your privacy from those who would invade it — . 11. Use a different DNS Bryce Durbin / TechCrunch On a similar note, most ISPs will usually be set up by default with their own “Domain Name Service,” which is the thing that your browser pings to convert a text web URL (like “techcrunch.com”) to its numerical IP address. There are lots of these to choose from, and they all work, but if you use your ISP’s, it makes it much easier for them to track your internet activity. They also can block certain websites by refusing to provide the IP for content they don’t like. TechCrunch doesn’t officially endorse one, but lots of companies offer free, fast DNS that’s easy to switch to. ; there are big ones (Google, Cloudflare), “open” ones (OpenDNS, OpenNIC) and others with some niche features. All you need to do is slot those two numbers into your internet configuration, following the instructions they provide. You can change it back at any time. is another option for very privacy-conscious individuals, but it can be complicated. And speaking of complicated… 12. Run a home server This is a bit advanced, but it’s definitely something ISPs hate. Setting up your home computer or a dedicated device to host a website, script or service seems like a natural use of an always-on internet connection, but just about everyone in the world would rather you sign up for their service, hosted on their hardware and their connection. Well, you don’t have to! You can do it on your own. Of course, you’ll have to learn how to run and install a probably Unix-based server, handle registry stuff, install various packages and keep up to date so you don’t get owned by some worm or bot… but you’ll have defied the will of the ISP. That’s the important thing. 13. Talk to your local government ISPs hate all the things above, but what they hate the most by far is regulation. And you, as a valued citizen of your state and municipality, are in a position to demand it. Senators, representatives, governors, mayors, city councils and everyone else actually love to hear from their constituency, not because they desire conversation but because they can use it to justify policy. During the net neutrality fight, a constant refrain I heard from government officials was how much they’d heard from voters about the issue and how unanimous it was (in support, naturally). A call or email from you won’t sway national politics, but a few thousand calls or emails from people in your city just might sway a local law or election. These things add up, and they do matter. State net neutrality policies are now the subject of national attention, and local privacy laws like those in Illinois are the bane of many a shady company. Tell your local government about your experience with ISPs — outages, fees, sneaky practices or even good stuff — and they’ll file it away for when that data is needed, such as renegotiating the contracts national companies sign with those governments in order to operate in their territories. Internet providers only do what they do because they are permitted to, and even then they often step outside the bounds of what’s acceptable — which is why rules like net neutrality are needed. But first people have to speak out. Gadgets WATCH A TESLA MODEL 3 PLAY CHESS AGAINST THE TOP-RANKED PLAYER IN THE US 4:25pm, 1st August, 2019 Gadgets WATCH A TESLA MODEL 3 PLAY CHESS AGAINST THE TOP-RANKED PLAYER IN THE U.S. 2:15pm, 1st August, 2019 SPORTS TECHNOLOGY Sports Technology RUSSELL WILSON’S STARTUP TALLY POWERS NEW REAL-TIME PREDICTIONS GAME FOR L.A. RAMS, SEAHAWKS’ BIG RIVAL 5:08am, 3rd September, 2019 Seattle Seahawks quarterback Russell Wilson, right, with Jason LeeKeenan, CEO of Tally, in Seattle in 2018. (GeekWire Photo / Kevin Lisota) When the Seattle Seahawks take on the Los Angeles Rams on Oct. 3 this season, fans might want to predict how many touchdowns quarterback Russell Wilson will throw against his division rival on that day. The best way to do so could be through a new mobile experience from the NFL team that is powered by , the startup that was founded by Wilson. The Rams launched “Pick’em” for use during a pre-season game against the Oakland Raiders. The intention is to engage fans to make real-time predictions as the action unfolds on the field. Fans, playing on the web or through the Rams’ mobile app, earn points for every correct prediction and those over 18 can compete for prizes such as game tickets, field passes and autographed merchandise. Tally is a free-to-play predictions platform, not a gambling app. But the move by the Rams, along with a , signals what’s ahead with the eventual spread of legalized sports betting in the wake of a 2018 that overturned the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act. It’s all poised to change how we watch and interact with live events. Seattle-based Tally, which employees 14 people now, is an , the company Wilson helped launch in 2017 as a celebrity content app. TraceMe shut down in 2018 and the business pivoted to the sports prediction model. Wilson was touting Tally in February. “We believe that real-time predictive gaming experiences are going to be the critical components of engaging in live sports in the years to come,” Tally CEO Jason LeeKeenan told GeekWire. “We are positioning Tally to be the leading technology provider behind this evolution.” The Tally app, showing, from left, phone authentication, dynamic odds, and a real-time leaderboard. (Tally screen shots) According to its website, Tally white labels its user interface, custom branding it for any property looking to create such content. The Rams are the first NFL team to partner with Tally. LeeKeenan said other partnerships are in the works, but he wasn’t ready to announce whether the Seahawks might be one of those teams. reported that Tally worked with the NBA’s Portland Trail Blazers and the NHL’s St. Louis Blues on similar games earlier this year. The Rams plan to use the mobile experience to present a mix of game-specific questions and micro-outcomes, according to the team’s news release. “Which team completes a passing play of 30+ yards in the opening half?” or “Which of these players racks up 10+ rushing yards first?” are example of questions posed to fans. Those playing can can track their success throughout a game and rankings are updated in real time as results are tallied live. Point values increase as the game progresses. “We are thrilled to bring our fans closer to the action with an engaging second-screen experience,” Marissa Daly, Rams VP of media, said in a statement. “We feel that our free-to-play predictions game will be a fun way for fans to compete against one another while watching their Rams compete on the field.” The Rams have leapfrogged the San Francisco 49ers to emerge as the Seahawks’ most heated division rival over the past couple seasons. Surely Seattle’s star QB will be more engaged with winning games on the field than worrying about predictions being generated in an app built by his company. Regardless, LeeKeenan makes it sound like Wilson has already won. “What can I say? Russell is a great entrepreneur and we hope all sports teams will be using our technology one day,” LeeKeenan said. Sports Technology HIGH-TECH COMPRESSION SHORTS MAKER STRIVE AIMS TO MEASURE THE ‘MILES PER GALLON’ OF ATHLETES 10:35am, 3rd August, 2019 Sports Technology NEW GUY ON LINKEDIN, SEAHAWKS COACH PETE CARROLL RACES SCOOTERS DURING MICROSOFT ‘MINDSET’ TRAINING 3:39am, 31st July, 2019 CATEGORIES * Startups * Gadgets * Sports Technology * Science MUST READ! Copyright © 2017-2022 by gapscult.com All rights reserved. All articles, images, product names, logos, and brands are property of their respective owners. All company, product and service names used in this website are for identification purposes only. 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