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It’s been two years in development, but the next big release for Kodi is nearly here.

Today the hugely popular home theater software hits a major milestone, with the arrival of the first Release Candidate for Kodi 18 'Leia' -- RC1. This release should be much more stable that the five previous betas, and the Kodi Foundation shares the following stats:

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Apple has a four-day shopping event running from today until Monday, promising shoppers "special offers when you buy select products". Running from the day that is a celebration of commercialism and capitalism, Black Friday, through the weekend and up to Cyber Monday, the Apple Shopping Event is -- unfortunately -- nothing to get excited about.

This is not entirely unexpected. Apple has form when it comes to disappointing Black Friday offers. If you were hoping for massive discounts, prepare to feel let down.

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The latest feature update of Windows 10, the October 2018 Update, or Windows 10 1809 if you prefer, has been something of a disaster for Microsoft, and even more so for some early adopters.

The list of problems users have encountered with it -- so far -- include data loss, file association issues, Apple iCloud not working, mapped drives not reconnecting, Edge problems, and much more. Microsoft pulled the update for a considerable amount of time to fix a bunch of problems, but even more new ones are emerging on a regular basis.

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Gaming is a big business these days, and some companies offer special branding for such products. For instance, Kingston's gaming offerings are typically sold under the HyperX brand. It is sort of similar to car companies that have luxury brands, like Ford to Lincoln, or Honda to Acura. It's the same company, but it signals that the product is a cut above its "normal" vehicles.

ADATA is yet another tech company that has a special brand for its gaming and enthusiast-grade products -- "XPG." This week, there are two new gaming accessories to fall under that umbrella -- the XPG INFAREX K10 keyboard and M20 mouse. Both products look well made and full of great features. And of course, they both have RGB lighting, because... gaming!

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As Thanksgiving day gets under way in the US, it’s time for reflection on what it is we are most grateful for. If your list doesn’t begin with family and friends, I urge you to rethink your priorities. Though that doesn’t mean you can’t be grateful about other things as well, from accomplishments in life to even inanimate objects.

We also should not forget that today most of us celebrate in a warm home with an abundance of food to choose from and, for those interested, some good sports to watch. I was trying to think out of the box for a bit and one of the non-traditional things that immediately occurred to me was the 3.5 years I have spent without my old satellite TV service. Cutting the cord saved money and, in some ways, provided more options.

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With Apple shares down more than 20 percent from their all-time highs of only a few weeks ago, writers are piling-on about what’s wrong in Cupertino. But sometimes writers looking for a story don’t fully understand what they are talking about. And that seems to me to be the case with complaints that Apple is too far behind in adopting 5G networking technology in future iPhones. For all the legitimate stories about how Apple should have done this or that, 5G doesn’t belong on the list. And that’s because 5G isn’t really about mobile phones at all.

Just to get this out of the way, I see Apple shares currently presenting a huge buying opportunity. A good Christmas quarter will regain that lost 20 percent, and I don’t see any reason why Apple shouldn’t have a good Christmas quarter.

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LinkedIn has quietly launched new privacy settings that block users from exporting the email addresses of their contacts.

This is not something that many LinkedIn users would have even considered to be a problem, but it was previously possible for anyone -- from individuals to marketing firms -- to export the contact details of their connections and use it however they wanted. In what will be seen as a big win for users in general and privacy advocates, you now have to explicitly enable the setting for people to be able to export your email address.

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For many years, Virtual Reality was seen as just a futuristic concept, but in 2010, the prototype of the Oculus Rift was released, before eventually being rolled out for general consumption in 2012. Since then, other companies have followed suit, including Samsung, Sony (PlayStation) and HTC (Vive). The use of Augmented Reality has also started to rise, both in the gaming world and in many other sectors. Both technologies are now being referred to as Extended Reality (XR), and there are huge plans afoot to develop them for a range of industries.

Here are the industries that will be utilizing XR technology the most in the next four years:

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If you have an iPhone, you use Siri; if you have an Android phone, you use Google Assistant. Right? Thanks to Siri Shortcuts -- and an update from Google -- it's now easier than ever to access Google Assistant on your iPhone with a voice command.

With iOS 12, Apple introduced Siri Shortcuts giving users the opportunity to record their own voice triggers that can then be used to perform different actions. Now Google Assistant supports Siri Shortcuts, so you can access it via Siri.

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Last week, Apple's latest iPad Pro was put through its paces by JerryRigEverything. We're not talking benchmarks of speed here, we're talking durability tests -- the iPad Pro was scratched, burned and bent to see what sort of punishment it could take.

In short, Apple's tablet was found to be extremely bendy. Actually, scratch that… it basically folded like a wet tissue. Now JerryRigEverything has turned its attention to the Surface Pro 6, finding that it is far more durable and able to withstand a bend test much more impressively.

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When Apple abandoned the home networking business by discontinuing its popular AirPort routers, there was a huge void left behind. Sure, there are plenty of router manufacturers out there, but Apple's offerings were fast, stable, and super easy to set up and maintain. Also important was the AirPort designs -- they didn't look out of place in a living room or bedroom. There really wasn't much like them. Rest in Peace!

Seeing there was an opportunity in the market, popular company Ubiquiti Networks set its sights on the home with its AmpliFi HD mesh networking system. Not only did it match Apple's AirPort excellence, but it exceeded it with features like an LCD touch screen. Last month, Ubiquiti launched the AmpliFi Instant for shoppers on a budget, but today, it goes in the opposite direction -- the high end. Its newest product, the "AmpliFi HD Gamer's Edition," features NVIDIA GeForce NOW QoS which should provide lower latency when playing games like Fortnite and PUBG.

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How many of us have time to keep an eye on every website, especially when you need to track the latest news, promotions, offers and deals? Some of us dislike all-in-one apps such as iTunes, but at least they bring together a range of sources within one handy tool.

With this in mind, we’ve created an Update Scanner for our Downloadcrew website, which enables you to follow the latest software releases, check for updates against your installed desktop apps, the latest news, store promotions and whether there’s a full software Giveaway available.

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As more and more of us rely on mobile devices to access the internet, traditional endpoint security solutions don’t always provide the protection we need.

Cybersecurity company BullGuard is partnering with VPN specilaist NordVPN  to launch a new consumer anonymity solution.

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There once was a time not all that long ago when security teams could plead ignorant to IT security risks, with minimal possible consequence in terms of any significant damage coming to the company. Those days are long gone. We’ve reached an era where the "I see nothing" perspective no longer works for network security. In today’s era of advanced cyberattacks, information security is too important an element of business success to dismiss.

In fact, ignorance of information security matters is prohibitively costly, as regulators can use it to justify the imposition of fines. Take GDPR’s penalty scheme, for example. Is ignorance of digital security worth €20 million or 4 percent of an organization’s global annual revenue? That’s just one data protection standard -- others such as Australia’s Notifiable Data Breaches (NDB) scheme and the NY Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) Cybersecurity Requirements for Financial Institutions come with their own fines and penalties. Given that we’re also in the era of insufficient resources, the challenge for security teams is how to deploy limited resources to have the greatest impact. As the title of this post makes clear, the obvious answer is to stop spending time on the wrong things.

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Everyone needs a password manager to surf the web safely -- they enable you to set virtually crack-proof passwords for all your online accounts, plus store a range of other sensitive data too, all locked behind a single master password.

If you’re unsatisfied with your current offering, or looking to support an open source alternative, then look at 8bit Solutions LLC’s Bitwarden 1.10.0 and Bitwarden for mobile 1.19.4.

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