Facebook wasn’t the first social network – remember MySpace and Friendster? And it’s not exactly the last one standing. Twitter’s still a thing. But Facebook is the biggest, most influential social network in the US, at least… and according to new lawsuits filed by the FTC and 48 attorneys general, Facebook abused its market dominance […]
Tag: amazon fire tv
Lilbits: Getting what you pay for with enthusiast-grade hardware
Pine64 has produced some of the most interesting hardware aimed at open source enthusiasts over the past few years. They’re not exactly high-performance machines, but what they are is cheap – among other things, Pine64 sells Linux smartphones for as little as $150 and Linux laptops for as little as $100. Those low prices, combined with […]
Amazon introduces $30 Fire TV Stick Lite and new $40 Fire TV Stick
Amazon’s Fire TV Stick 4K continues to be the company’s most powerful media streamer. But if you’re looking for something a little cheaper than that $50 device, starting later this year there will be two options, where there used to be one. The new $40 Amazon Fire TV Stick is a 1080p model with support for HDR and […]
Lilbits: Computing convergence, another streaming platform, and DDR5
It’s been 7 years since Canonical failed to raise meet its crowdfunding goals for the Ubuntu Edge smartphone that was supposed to be a phone you could also use as a desktop computer thanks to “convergence,” which is a fancy way of saying you could plug in a keyboard, mouse, and display and use it like […]
Lilbits 7-9-2020: Wink will require subscriptions later this month
Up until recently one of the key selling points for using Wink’s smart home products was that you didn’t also need to sign up for a subscription service to use them. But a Wink hub, motion sensor, or other products and you could just use them. Then Wink announced in May that it was going […]
Lilbits 6-16-2020: First look at the Chuwi LarkBox mini PC
The Chuwi LarkBox is a desktop computer stuffed into a tiny box that measures just 2.4″ x 2.4″ x 1.7″. Chuwi will begin taking pre-orders through an Indiegogo campaign set to begin on June 23rd for $169 and up, but the company sent me a demo unit to try out ahead of launch and it […]
YouTube comes to Fire TV, Amazon Video to Chromecast
For years if you wanted to watch YouTube on an Amazon Fire TV device, you needed to use an unofficial app, a web browser, or some other workaround. And if you wanted to watch Amazon Video on a Chromecast, your best bet was screen mirroring. Google and Amazon announced a truce ages ago, and promised […]
Lilbits 353: Dropbox Basic drops support for unlimited devices
Dropbox is one of the most popular online storage services around and the company probably has its freemium business model to thank for part of its popularity. Paid plans start at $10 per month or $99 per per year for 1TB of cloud storage… but if your needs are more modest, you can get by […]
2nd-gen Amazon Fire TV can be rooted (again)
It’s been a few years since hackers discovered how to root Amazon’s 2nd-gen Fire TV the first time. But Amazon patched the vulnerability used to gain root access with a software update, starting a bit of a cat and mouse game (another root method was later discovered and then lost due to another over-the-air software […]
Amazon launches Fire TV Stick 4K for $50
Amazon is launching its first Fire TV Stick to support 4K HDR content. The new Fire TV Stick 4K is up for pre-order for $50 and it should begin shipping October 31st. The new model seems to be the latest flagship Fire TV — while Amazon is continuing to sell the Fire TV 4K pendant for […]
Amazon’s first DVR: Fire TV Recast is coming this year for $230 and up
Amazon’s Fire TV devices let you stream internet content to a TV. When the company started working with TV makers on Fire TV Edition sets, Amazon also added support for live video to its user interface. Now the company is adding DVR functionality to the mix. The Amazon Fire TV Recast is a digital video […]
Amazon Fire TV Game Controller doesn’t support newest Fire TVs anymore
Good news for folks looking to play games on their Amazon Fire TV devices: the Amazon Fire TV Game Controller in on sale for $20, marked down from $50. That’s the lowest price ever on this wireless game controller. Bad news for folks that have recent Fire TV devices: Amazon’s official game controller only works […]