It took just 20 minutes for a model drone to locate a missing elderly Wisconsin man, a feat that helicopters, search dogs, and volunteers couldn't accomplish in three days.

Just don't tell that to the Federal Aviation Administration, whose regulatory wings are already flapping about model drones.

This weekend's discovery of the 82-year-old man in an area of crops and woods comes amid a legal tussle between flight regulators and model drone operators—the latest of which coincidentally involves search-and-rescue missions.

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The Lumia 530. Nokia

If analytics companies are to be believed, the lowly Lumia 520 and its variants have been the most popular Windows Phone handsets ever. Today, Microsoft officially announced that phone's successor, the Lumia 530. It will come in both single- and dual-SIM variants, though it's safe to say that only the single-SIM version will end up making it to the US, and Nokia expects both to be priced at around "€85 (about $114) before taxes and subsidies."

The 530 is a somewhat cut-down version of the Lumia 630 that was introduced earlier this year, and the devices share many design elements—eye-melting neon color options, software navigation buttons rather than hardware or capacitive buttons, and no dedicated camera shutter button. Microsoft has made some changes to Windows Phone to make it easier for OEMs to put it on lightly modified Android hardware, and these two Lumias showcase those changes.

On the inside, the Lumia 530 is a combination of small upgrades and small downgrades from the 520. Both phones share the same 5MP camera and 512MB of RAM. Storage is down to 4GB (from 8GB in the 520), but the phone's microSD slot will now support cards up to 128GB in size. The resolution of the 4-inch screen increases slightly to 854×480. The 530 uses a 1.2GHz quad-core Snapdragon 200 SoC rather than the 1GHz dual-core Snapdragon S4 in the 520, but overall performance may break roughly even since the S4's Krait CPU architecture is faster clock-for-clock than the 200's Cortex A7 architecture. Finally, the GPU takes a minor step down from the Adreno 305 GPU to the Adreno 302. New buyers will still get a solid budget handset, but current 520 users won't need to rush out to buy this one.

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Julien GONG Min

PCs may not be thriving the way they once were, but Microsoft has posted a strong set of financials for the fourth quarter of its 2014 financial year on the back of substantial, sustained growth in its cloud businesses.

Revenue for the quarter was $23.38 billion, up 17.5 percent on the same quarter a year ago. Operating income rose 6.7 percent to $6.48 billion, and earnings per share were down 5 percent to $0.56, with the drop largely attributed to a hefty tax adjustment.

The results for the quarter were complicated by Microsoft's purchase of Nokia's Devices and Services business, which closed in April. In the wake of the purchase, the company has adjusted the way it breaks down its earnings. The "Devices and Consumer Hardware" segment has been renamed "Computing and Gaming Hardware." This includes Surface and Xbox hardware. A new segment, "Phone Hardware," will cover the Nokia business.

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Given the recent product releases in the SSD industry, it is now a good time to do another purchase recommendation post. We did our first "Best SSDs" post in November last year and it received quite a bit of interest by providing simple recommendations instead of a several thousand word analysis like we usually do in our reviews. Quite surprisingly, our previous recommendations were still accurate until about a month ago when Crucial rolled out the MX100, so despite the fact that the article is now eight months old there was no immediate need for an updated post until now. 

Similar to the previous post, I will be splitting the recommendations in different categories by form factor and performance. Note that pricing fluctuates constantly and there may be regional differences, so I would still recommend to check the prices from several stores and use your own consideration when buying a drive. 

Enthusiast and Professional Level: Samsung SSD 850 Pro & SanDisk Extreme Pro

The Samsung 850 Pro is one unique drive. It is the first mainstream SSD to utilize 3D NAND, which gives Samsung substantial advantages in performance and endurance. As a result, the 850 Pro is the fastest SSD we have tested and is backed up by an industry-leading 10-year warranty or 150TB of writes, which ever comes first. Feature wise the 850 Pro supports both TCG Opal 2.0 / eDrive and DevSleep, meaning that the drive is suitable for mobile as well as corporate environments. The 850 Pro also has a feature called RAPID, which utilizes a portion of the system DRAM (up to 4GB) to cache reads and writes to further increase performance.

The 850 Pro's toughest competitor is SanDisk's Extreme Pro. While the 850 Pro is generally a faster drive, the Extreme Pro comes very close. It too is backed up by a 10-year warranty, although the write endurance is only rated at 80TB. Due to higher over-provisioning, the usable capacities in the Extreme Pro end up being slightly smaller compared to the 850 Pro and you also lose TCG Opal 2.0 / eDrive support.

  Samsung SSD 850 Pro SanDisk Extreme Pro Pros - Higher performance
- Higher usable capacities
- Higher endurance
- TCG Opal 2.0 & eDrive support
- RAPID - Price of the larger capacities Cons - Price of the larger capacities - No hardware encryption support
- Lower endurance

I am usually not a big fan of pros&cons tables because they tend to oversimplify things, but in this case I think the comparison does justice and provides a quick way to compare the 850 Pro and Extreme Pro. It is clear that the 850 Pro is ultimately the better drive but the Extreme Pro can be a better option if you are in the look for a high performance 1TB-class drive but do not see any additional value in the 850 Pro's features (namely hardware encryption and RAPID). 

Capacity 120/128GB 240/256GB 480/512GB 960/1024GB Samsung SSD 850 Pro $130 ($1.02/GB)
£90 (£0.70/GB) $200 ($0.78/GB)
£155 (£0.61/GB) $400 ($0.78/GB)
£295 (£0.58/GB) $700 ($0.68/GB)
£485 (£0.47/GB) SanDisk Extreme Pro - $210 ($0.88/GB)
£135 (£0.56/GB) $370 ($0.77/GB)
£252 (£0.53/GB) $600 ($0.63/GB)
£392 (£0.41/GB)

That said, if you want the best SATA 6Gbps drive in the market, the 850 Pro is the drive to buy. You will have to pay a small premium at the higher capacities, although the price delta may even out in the future and make the 850 Pro a better buy in all aspects. Alternatively, if the prices of the Extreme Pro come down (or you are in a region where the price difference is higher than in the US), the Extreme Pro is a viable alternative as long as you have no need for hardware encryption.

Mainstream Level: Crucial MX100 & Samsung SSD 840 EVO

In the mainstream segment, the MX100 dominates the market. The exceptional pricing alone makes the MX100 an alluring drive but the fact that the drive supports power-loss protection, DevSleep and hardware encryption (TCG Opal 2.0 & eDrive) makes it an excellent bang for the buck. With performance good enough for typical client workloads, there is simply no way you can go wrong with the MX100, unless your workload requires a higher performance drive.

Capacity 120/128GB 250/256GB 500/512GB 1TB Crucial MX100 $75 ($0.59/GB)
£54 (£0.42/GB) $110 ($0.43/GB)
£94 (£0.37/GB) $215 ($0.42/GB)
£161 (£0.31/GB) - Samsung SSD 840 EVO $90 ($0.75/GB)
£57 (£0.47/GB) $140 ($0.56/GB)
£88 (£0.35/GB) $260 ($0.52/GB)
£165 (£0.33/GB) $470 ($0.47/GB)
£300 (£0.30/GB)

The only disadvantage of the MX100 is the lack of a 1TB model, which is why I am recommending the 840 EVO as well since it comes in 1TB flavor. In terms of features and performance the MX100 and 840 EVO are very close with the biggest difference being that the EVO has no power-loss protection, although on the other hand it supports RAPID, which the MX100 does not have. As a result, the only reason I am picking the MX100 over the 840 EVO is the price but if you can find the 840 EVO cheaper (or are looking for a 1TB drive), then do not hesitate to buy the 840 EVO instead of the MX100.

Killing Off The SATA Bottleneck: Samsung XP941

PCIe has certainly been one of the most discussed topics within the SSD industry this year. While the true roll out of native PCIe SSDs will not happen until next year, there are now a couple of drives available. The only drive that I find interesting is the Samsung XP941 because it is currently the only native PCIe 2.0 x4 drive, whereas the other drives in the market are limited to x2, which does not provide that much benefit over SATA 6Gbps. As a result the XP941 is the fastest client SSD we have tested to date and is hence the ultimate drive for performance hungry enthusiasts.

The only downside is that you will need a Z97 based motherboard (or a Mac Pro) to be able to boot from the drive and even then you are limited to certain models (at this point ASRock Z97 Extreme6 is the only board with official boot support, although the drive can be made bootable in some ASUS boards as well). Thus I would only recommend the XP941 if you are running a supported motherboard because otherwise the XP941 can only be used as a secondary drive. Compared to the 850 Pro you will also lose hardware encryption plus RAPID support and the warranty drops to three years. 

Capacity 256GB 512GB Samsung XP941 $311 ($1.21/GB)
- $500 ($0.98/GB)
£400 (£0.78/GB)

The pricing is also rather high compared to the 850 Pro but that is the premium you have to pay for cutting edge technology. Interestingly enough, the 512GB XP941 is currently available in NewEgg even though the drive is an OEM product. Unfortunately the 256GB model is not but you can still find it from RamCity, which was the first vendor to sell the XP941 to consumers and also supplied us with review samples. 

All in all, if you are willing to pay the premium and sacrifice support for the opportunity to be at the edge of a new technology, the XP941 is the drive to buy. 

The Tiny, Yet Powerful mSATA: Crucial M500 mSATA, Samsung SSD 840 EVO mSATA & Plextor M6M

While the SSD and PC industries are moving away from mSATA to M.2, there is a notable upgrade market for mSATA drives. mSATA never really took off so the available SKUs are still rather limited, but fortunately there are a couple of drives that stand out. The first one is the mSATA version of the Samsung 840 EVO, which is the little brother of the 2.5" 840 EVO we already recommended above. You get the same set of features (hardware encryption, DevSleep, RAPID...) and performance as with the full size 840 EVO, so the EVO mSATA is a great value despite its small size.

An alternative to the 840 EVO mSATA is Plextor's M6M. The M6M lacks TCG Opal 2.0 and eDrive compliance and is also a bit slower than the 840 EVO, but it is still a good option for typical client workloads as long as the lack of hardware encryption is not a deal breaker. 

Update: I have added Crucial M500 mSATA to the list since it is the most affordable mSATA SSD and still offers a great set of features (hardware encryption and power-loss protection) and decent performance. Initially I left it out as I thought it had been discontinued like its 2.5" sibling but looks like it is still available and seems to be the best value. 

Capacity 64GB 120/128GB 250/256GB 500/512GB 1TB Samsung SSD 840 EVO mSATA - $100 ($0.83/GB)
£70 (£0.58/GB) $160 ($0.64/GB)
£105 (£0.42/GB) $300 ($0.60/GB)
£185 (£0.37/GB) $500 ($0.50/GB)
£330 (£0.33/GB) Plextor M6M $60 ($0.94/GB)
£50 (£0.78/GB) $86 ($0.67/GB)
£83 (£0.64/GB) $150 ($0.59/GB)
£116 (£0.46/GB) $360 ($0.70/GB)
- - Crucial M500 mSATA - $75 ($0.59/GB)
£52 (£0.43/GB) $125 ($0.52/GB)
£89 (£0.37/GB) $240 ($0.50/GB)
£168 (£0.35/GB) -

The 840 EVO mSATA does not come in 64GB flavor at all, so if you are looking for a small and cheap boot mSATA drive, then the M6M is our only recommendation, although I strogly advice that you pay $26 more for doubled capacity. At 120/128GB the M6M is a better pick due to its cheaper price, unless you see added value in the features of the 840 EVO mSATA. However, at 250/256GB and higher the EVO is certainly a better value for the money.

Given the price of the M500 mSATA, it is the best value for most consumers. While performance is not as good as with the 840 EVO, the M500 mSATA is fast enough for average consumer workloads and is thus the drive we recommend. Users who seek for more performance in an mSATA form factor may find the 840 EVO to be worth the extra money but otherwise the M500 mSATA is a better buy. The only exception is at 1TB where the 840 EVO mSATA is the only option.

The Gumstick M.2: Crucial M550 M.2

The market for aftermarket M.2 SSDs is relatively small right now since systems with M.2 have not been shipping for long but the market is constantly growing. I could not find many available on NewEgg but if I was on the market for one I would pick Crucial's M.2 version of the M550. We have not reviewed the M.2 version but it is fairly safe to assume that the performance is similar to the 2.5" version (our review). The M550 M.2 is type 2280, so make sure that it is compatible with your motherboard or laptop since some only accept smaller M.2 sizes. Like the MX100, the M550 M.2 features an extensive feature set including power-loss protection and TCG Opal 2.0 / eDrive support along with DevSleep support. 

Note: The M550 M.2 is a SATA 6Gbps drive, so before buying the drive make sure that the slot in your motherboard or laptop supports SATA. Some only support PCIe, meaning that the M550 will not work in such slot. 

Capacity 128GB 256GB 512GB Crucial M550 M.2 $100 ($0.78/GB)
£68 (£0.53/GB) $170 ($0.66/GB)
- $330 ($0.64/GB)
£228 (£0.45/GB)   To Conclude:

The last couple of months have been very interesting in the SSD industry. We have seen quite a few new SSDs and it seems like the flow will not end. From what I have heard, we should see several TLC NAND based SSDs this year, which will help to drive the cost per gigabyte down. Additionally, more PCIe SSDs should start to roll out early next year, so the XP941 should finally see some real competition.

The Federal Communications Commission will face a lawsuit if it tries to invalidate state laws that restrict the ability of cities and towns to offer Internet service, the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) wrote in a letter to FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler yesterday. Such a move would infringe on states' rights protected by the Constitution, the group claimed.

Wheeler has said he intends to "preempt state laws that ban competition from community broadband," relying on authority detailed in a court decision that overturned the FCC's net neutrality rules. These state laws make it difficult or impossible for municipalities to create their own broadband networks that compete against private Internet service providers like Comcast, AT&T, and Verizon.

The US House of Representatives has already approved a budget amendment that would prevent the FCC from invalidating these laws.

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A screenshot posted by "w0rm" showing he had dumped the user table from a Wall Street Journal database.

Dow Jones & Co. took two servers that store the news graphics for The Wall Street Journal website offline yesterday evening after a confirmed intrusion by a hacker calling himself “w0rm.” The hacker was offering what he claimed was user information and server access credentials that would allow others to “modify articles, add new content, insert malicious content in any page, add new users, delete users, and so on,” Andrew Komarov, chief executive officer of cybersecurity firm IntelCrawl, told The Wall Street Journal.

W0rm, according to Komarov, is the same individual previously known as “Rev0lver” and “Hash,” a Russian hacker who tried to sell access to the BBC’s servers last December and attacked the Web servers of Vice Media earlier this year. At 5:30pm ET on July 21, he posted a screenshot to Twitter that showed the e-mail address, username, and hashed password for the database admin on a wsj.com server. He offered to sell the full dump of the database table of authorized users for one bitcoin through an exploit marketplace at w0rm.in.

According to The Journal, Dow Jones has taken the servers offline to isolate them and prevent further intrusions into their systems. A spokeperson for the company said, “At this point we see no evidence of any impact to Dow Jones Customers or customer data.”

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Four days after a forensics expert warned that undocumented functions in iOS could leak personal user data, Apple has documented three services it says serve diagnostic purposes.

"iOS offers the following diagnostic capabilities to help enterprise IT departments, developers, and AppleCare troubleshoot issues," the support article published Tuesday stated. "Each of these diagnostic capabilities requires the user to have unlocked their device and agreed to trust another computer. Any data transmitted between the iOS device and trusted computer is encrypted with keys not shared with Apple. For users who have enabled iTunes Wi-Fi Sync on a trusted computer, these services may also be accessed wirelessly by that computer." As Ars reported Monday, three undocumented services include a packet sniffer dubbed com.apple.mobile.pcapd, a file downloader called com.apple.mobile.file_relay, and com.apple.mobile.house_arrest, a tool that downloads iPhone and iPad files to an iTunes folder stored on a computer.

Jonathan Zdziarski, the forensics expert who brought the undocumented functions to light on Saturday, published a blog post in response that criticized Apple's characterization of the services. He continued to maintain that at least one of the capabilities—stemming from the file relay service—constitutes a "backdoor" as defined by many security and forensics practitioners. He also took issue with Apple's suggestion that the purpose of the services was limited to diagnostics. He reiterated his previous stance that he doesn't believe Apple added the functions at the request of the National Security Agency.

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Nokia has had a lot of success with Windows Phone in the more budget-oriented segment of the market. The Lumia 630, which we recently reviewed, does well in its position in the $150-200 device bracket. But Nokia is hoping to target buyers at even lower price points with the new Lumia 530 which positions itself to take on other Android devices at the $100-150 segment of the market. At least in its name it is a successor to Nokia's Lumia 520 which was the most popular Windows Phone, and the two are compared down below.

Lumia 520 and 530   Lumia 520 Lumia 530 SoC 1GHz Dual Core Krait (MSM8227) + Adreno 305 1.2GHz Quad Core Cortex A7 (MSM8212) + Adreno 302 Memory 512MB LPDDR2 512MB LPDDR2 Storage 8GB NAND + MicroSDHC 4GB NAND + MicroSDXC  Display 4” 800x480 WVGA LCD 4” 854x480 FWVGA LCD Cellular Connectivity GPRS/EDGE/HSPA+ GPRS/EDGE/HSPA+ Dimensions 119.9 x 64 x 9.9 mm, 124g 119.7 x 62.3 x 11.7 mm, 129g Camera 5MP Rear Facing w/ F2.4 aperture 5MP Rear Facing w/ F2.4 aperture Battery 5.291Wh 5.291Wh OS Windows Phone 8.1 Windows Phone 8.1 Other Connectivity 802.11b/g/n + BT 4.0, USB2.0, GPS/GNSS 802.11b/g/n + BT 4.0, USB2.0, GPS/GNSS SIM Size Micro-SIM Micro-SIM (dual SIM variant)

As you can see, the Lumia 530 has many similarities to its predecessor. Inside it makes the move from Qualcomm's Snapdragon S4 platform to the newer Snapdragon 200 platform. It'll be interesting to see how the quad core 1.2GHz Cortex A7 implementation fares against the 1GHz dual core Krait implementation. The GPU takes a performance hit, going from the Adreno 305 to the 302. Storage similarly takes a small step down with half the internal NAND of the Lumia 520, but with support for MicroSDXC up to 128GB rather than 64GB in the 520. RAM and connectivity remains the same with 512MB of LPDDR2 memory, single stream 802.11n WiFi, Bluetooth 4.0, and 21.1Mbps HSPA+. The battery chemistry remains the same as well at 1430mAh and 3.7V.

The front of the device sports an 854x480 LCD display, with the extra 54 pixels compared to the Lumia 520 being used for the on-screen buttons in a similar fashion to the Lumia 630. The move from a 15:9 display aspect ratio to a 16:9 ratio allows for a small decrease in the width of the device. The 530 has an appreciable increase in thickness compared to its predecessor with a thickness of 11.7mm at its thickest point compared to 9.9mm on the 520. No apparent changes to the camera have been made with a 5MP F2.4 sensor on the back and there's no front-facing camera.

The 530 seems like a mixed bag of upgrades and downgrades compared to the 520. At 4GB of storage it really necessitates buying a MicroSD card even for users who rarely use apps, while the 8GB in the 520 leaves more breathing room. The increase in thickness is also disappointing but in the 530's price bracket there's no pressure to battle it out for the title of thinnest smartphone. In many ways it feels less like an upgrade and more like a device of its own. It will be interesting to see how users feel it compares to the original Lumia 520.

The Lumia 530 will be launching in single and dual-sim variants in August with a target price point of €85. Ignoring differences in taxes and market situations that translates to rougly $114 in the US or £67 in the UK. 

A rare dwarf galaxy that initiated a burst of star formation within the last billion years. NASA

Large galaxies such as the Milky Way appear to have been built by repeated mergers of smaller ones, but not every small galaxy has ended up being swallowed completely by a large one. The Milky Way is orbited by dozens of dwarf galaxies, some of which have been disrupted and stripped of stars, while others may have slipped into orbit largely intact. Similar dwarf galaxies orbit our nearby neighbors, including Andromeda.

Based on what we know about these mergers and computer modeling of galaxy formation and growth, the collection of dwarfs should be an unruly lot, having approached the galaxy they orbit from directions that are essentially random. Yet the dwarfs orbiting the Milky Way largely inhabit a single plane, orbiting in a manner analogous to moons around a giant planet.

It's easy to dismiss that as a fluke of chance, but that became a bit harder to do as evidence built over the past several years that most of Andromeda's dwarf galaxies were also organized into a single plane. Stranger still, that plane's edge is oriented toward the Milky Way. Now, a French-Australian team of astronomers has figured out a way to search existing data for the presence of planes farther out from the Milky Way, finding that Andromeda's setup is actually quite common.

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This is Yosemite. Andrew Cunningham

CN.dart.call("xrailTop", {sz:"300x250", kws:["top"], collapse: true});It's not difficult to get your hands on pre-release Apple software. For a mere $198 a year ($99 each for OS X and iOS) you can download beta versions of operating systems from Apple's developer site even if you've never written a line of code in your life.

This year, Apple is taking things a step further. The new public beta program for OS X Yosemite officially launches Thursday, taking software that has traditionally been protected from the public by a $99 paywall and distributing it to the first million users who sign up on Apple's site. It's a very Microsoft-esque way to roll out an OS: you give enthusiasts a chance to work with an early-but-reasonably-stable build in exchange for valuable bug-squashing feedback. Ideally, it will keep Yosemite from suffering from some of the general bugginess that affected iOS 7.0 when it launched last year.

In advance of the public beta, we've been given about a week of time to use the third developer preview and get a sense of what Yosemite brings to the table. Beta subscribers will get a slightly newer build of the operating system, but at this point most of the features are locked down and ready for evaluation by the public.

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Exploring Grado Labs' manufacturing space and creating our own pair of headphones. Shot and edited by Jennifer Hahn. (video link)

Buried in a packed townhouse on a quiet street in south Brooklyn is a manufacturing operation that produces some of the most renowned headphones in the business. Despite Yelp reviews for the business, Grado Labs doesn't sell directly from its location to consumers, though it does take the occasional walk-up request for repairs. For the most part, its long-time employees, including owner John Grado and his son Jonathan, tinker away through four crowded floors on audio gear that hasn't appeared in advertising since the 1960's.

In the building, the company assembles and ships models that range from the flagship PS1000, priced at $1,700, to the $79 SR60s. As of early June, Grado has evolved the drivers for the second time in 23 years, from the I-series to the E-series.

The average New York City apartment building is narrow to begin with, but Grado's space is like a house eternally in the middle of moving day. You get around by edging your way around boxes, through the halls, on the stairs, and in the rooms. During the holiday season, Jonathan says, the boxes are stacked high enough to effectively move the walls in.

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With every new chipset release, a large part of the community is always interested in the smaller form factor builds. Building a small yet powerful system seems to be an expanding niche, and for Intel’s Z97 platform we took three of the cheaper mini-ITX motherboards to see how they compare. The ASRock Z97E-ITX/AC, the MSI Z97I AC and the GIGABYTE Z97N-WIFI are all between $130 and $140, all feature 802.11ac support but vary in other connectivity, ease of use and their packages. We compared all three.

Today Apple announced its Q3 results for the period ending June 2014, and sales of the iPhone once again dominate revenue and earnings for the company.

Revenue for the quarter came in at $37.4B – a 6% increase year-over-year, and a down sequentially from the previous quarter.

Net profit was $7.7B for the quarter which is up 11.6% from the same period last year, and earnings per share came in at $1.28, also up over last year’s $1.07. Gross margin was up as well at 39.4% compared to 36.9% in Q3 2013.

Apple Q3 2014 Financial Results (GAAP)   Q3'2014 Q2'2014 Q3'2013 Revenue (in Billions USD) $37.432 $45.646 $35.323 Operating Income (in Billions USD) $10.282 $13.593 $9.201 Gross Margin (in Billions USD) $14.735 $17.947 $13.024 Net Income (in Billions USD) $7.748 $10.223 $6.900 Margins 39.4% 39.3% 36.9% Earnings per Share (in USD) $1.28 $1.66 $1.07

Once again, the iPhone is the dominate force for Apple right now, accounting for $19.75B in revenue for this quarter with 35.203 million iPhones sold. The device numbers and revenue are both down over last quarter, but sales are up 13% year-over-year with revenue close behind at a 9% gain. Apple doesn’t break down numbers for each model, but using some math we can see the revenue per unit sold at $561 which is a great number.

Software, Services, and App/Music store sales came in at $4.485B for the quarter which is down 2% compared to last quarter but up 12% year-over-year.

Mac sales were up again with 4.4 million Macs sold which accounted for $5.5B in revenue. Sales were up 18% and revenue was up 13% compared to Q3 2013, with an increase in sales of 7% over last quarter with revenue remaining flat.

iPad sales have definitely slowed, with the second quarter in a row of decline. Total sales were 13.2 million units for a revenue of $5.9B, but the device sales are down both year-over-year (9%) and sequentially (19%).

Unsurprisingly, iPod sales continued their decline with 2.9 million devices sold – down 36% year-over-year. Revenue for the iPod was $442M which was down 40% from Q3 2013. Somewhat surprising was that iPod sales ticked up 6% from last quarter, but revenues declined 4%.

Finally, accessories now account for about three times the revenue of the once ubiquitous iPod, with revenue for the quarter of $1.3 billion which is up 12% over last year’s numbers.

Apple Q2 2014 Revenue by Product (billions)   Q3'2014 Q2'2014 Q3'2013 Revenue for current quarter iPhone $19.751 $26.064 $18.154 52.8% iPad $5.889 $7.610 $6.374 15.7% Mac $5.540 $5.519 $4.893 14.8% iPod $0.442 $0.461 $0.733 1.2% iTunes/Software/Services $4.485 $4.573 $3.990 12% Accessories $1.325 $1.419 $1.179 3.5%

During this quarter, Apple performed a 7-1 stock split, and returned $8 billion to shareholders through dividends and the share repurchase program. Apple will pay a dividend of $0.47 per share on August 14 for this quarter’s results.

Analysts were hoping for 36 to 38 million iPhones to be sold this quarter, with sales missing that mark. iPad sales were also lower than expected. With the new iPhone likely not being released until Q1 of fiscal year 2015, outlook for the next quarter is also lower. With the new iPhone not expected until late in  Fiscal Year Q4 (ending September), revenues are not expected to be bumped from new iPhone sales much until Q1 2015 results are available in January 2015. Revenue outlook for the next quarter is $37 to $40 billion.

Apple Q3 2014 Device Sales (thousands)   Q3'2014 Q2'2014 Q3'2013 iPhone 35,203 43,719 31,241 iPad 13,276 16,350 14,617 Mac 4,413 4,136 3,754 iPod 2,926 2,761 4,569

While sales were still strong for the iPhone, the iPad has now declined in numbers for the second straight quarter. Mac sales were up a healthy 18% year-over-year which means the Mac is almost back to being the number two revenue stream for Apple. We seem to have hit some maturity in the tablet market, and upgrade cycles aren’t quite as quick as they are in the smartphone space. The waiting game is now on for new product announcements from Apple to keep the sales strong.

Amazon's first phone isn't without its charms, but is it good enough to replace the iOS or Android stuff you already have? Andrew Cunningham

CN.dart.call("xrailTop", {sz:"300x250", kws:["top"], collapse: true});It took other companies a long time to respond to the iPad. Early efforts like the first Samsung Galaxy Tabs, the Motorola Xoom, and Barnes & Noble's Nook Color had their fans, but compared to Apple's tablets, they all had major flaws. Amazon's first Kindle Fire had its problems too, but Amazon's name recognition and the tablet's $199 price made it one of the iPad's first semi-credible competitors. It opened the door for even better tablets at the same price point, and Android's tablet market share is largely built on the cheap tablet foundation that Amazon helped establish.

Amazon's first smartphone is taking the opposite path. It's jumping into the high-end smartphone market surprisingly late in the game. The market started showing signs of saturation, and its competitors are entrenched. At $649 unlocked for a 32GB phone ($199 with a two-year contract), it doesn't have a price advantage. It's also not being subsidized by Amazon's media storefronts or by "Special Offers"-style advertisements.

Because it's 2014, because the phone costs what it does, and because there are dozens of great phones to be had at (and well below) this price bracket, it's going to be much more difficult for users to overlook flaws or shortcomings when compared to those first Kindle Fire tablets. Amazon's phone brings unique features, like its Dynamic Perspective head tracking cameras and its Firefly scanning software, but can the phone get by on a couple of cool features if it has other problems?

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Google has begun the rollout of an update to the Google Play application on Android. At first glance the update doesn't seem to have any big changes. The sliding menu is the same, and the Play Store home page is the same as it has been for a while. Once you actually navigate to the page for an app it's very clear that this is a bigger update than a quick glance lets on. Google has redesigned the app pages with new animations and a new design to fit in with their new Material Design style.

Old Google Play on the left, new on the right.

As you can see, the new design is much different and this applies to almost every aspect of the design from the colors to the shapes to the animations. The first thing that stands out is the change in background color from grey to white. While this is a matter of personal preference, I find the white much more appealing than the grey. Google has also shifted around many parts of the application. The positions of app screenshots and the app changelog have been moved to put better focus on the actual information on the page. Apps that have a video trailer will have it prominently displayed at the top. The changes to animations are difficult to describe in photos but what can be said is that they take advantage of the idea of layers and objects in Material Design. As you scroll downward the page gradually begins to cover up the space where the trailer was as it is pushed offscreen. When selecting "read more" in the app changelog the top and bottom sections of the app are pushed offscreen and the user is greeted with a fullscreen view containing only the relevant information about the app description, changes, and developer info.

Upon scrolling down you can see that Google has increased the size of the application photos. With the video trailer moved to the top of the application there's also much more space to display screenshots which is good for developers hoping to show off their application. Google has also added more color to the application by color coding the bars that represent the ratings given by users. The overall app itself also has fewer horizontal lines separating sections which leads to a much cleaner look, particularly in the reviews section of the app page. Finally, Google has moved the share and Google+ buttons down beneath the reviews section from its previous position right underneath the app screenshots.

This update isn't quite the complete Material Design overhaul that users are excited for. That will likely come closer to the time that we see Android L released in the fall. But for now it gives good insight into where Google is headed with app design and what can be looked forward to for all of Google's apps going into the future. As with all of Google's app updates, it may take some time for the new application to reach your device.

Flickr user: TWM Labs

Polls relating to publicly controversial scientific issues often trigger a great wailing and gnashing of teeth from science advocates. When large proportions of a population seem poorly informed about evolution, climate change, or genetically modified foods, the usual response is to bemoan the state of science literacy. It can seem obvious that many people don’t understand the science of evolution, for example—or the scientific method, generally—and that opinions would change if only we could educate them.

Research has shown, unfortunately, it's not that simple. Ars has previously covered Yale Professor Dan Kahan’s research into what he calls “cultural cognition,” and the idea goes like this: public opinion on these topics is fundamentally tied to cultural identities rather than assessment of scientific evidence. In other words, rather than evaluate the science, people form opinions based on what they think people with a similar background believe.

That shouldn’t come as a shock, especially given the well-known political or religious divides apparent for climate change and evolution.

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Michelle Phan, a very popular YouTube user, demonstrates the stretchiness of hair ties. Michelle Phan

Popular YouTube user Michelle Phan is being sued for alleged copyright infringement on songs she has used in her videos, according to reports from the BBC. Ultra Records claims that Phan has used 50 of its songs in her YouTube posts and on her website illegally despite one of the label's own artists objecting to the legal action.

Phan's YouTube channel centers around using and buying makeup, and her videos are often backed by upbeat music with the artist credited in the video's description. Artists whom Phan has used in her videos include Kaskade, deadmau5, and Calvin Harris.

Kaskade spoke out on Twitter about the lawsuit, condemning Ultra for pursuing Phan for copyright infringement. "Copyright law is a dinosaur, ill-suited for the landscape of today’s media," he wrote. "We can’t love (& won’t buy) music we haven’t heard." If it's exposure artists are looking for, Phan's audience isn't a bad target. She boasts over six million subscribers and videos that consistently crack a million views each.

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This afternoon Microsoft held an earnings call to announce the results of their fourth quarter for fiscal year 2014.

Strong growth in Microsoft’s cloud offerings offset a loss by the recently acquired Nokia Devices and Services to contribute to an overall GAAP revenue of $23.4B, up 18% from Q4 2013, and up 15% from Q3 2014. Gross Margin came in at $15.8B which is 67.5%, with an operating income of $6.5B and net income of $4.6B for the quarter. Operating income was up over Q4 2014, but net income was down due to an additional $785M set aside for income taxes. Diluted earnings per share was $0.55, which missed analysts’ expectations of $0.60. For the quarter, $3.4B was returned to shareholders which was a 17% increase from last year.

Microsoft Q4 2014 Financial Results (GAAP)   Q4'2014 Q3'2014 Q4'2013 Revenue (in Billions USD) $23.382 $20.403 $19.896 Operating Income (in Billions USD) $6.482 $6.974 $6.073 Gross Margin (in Billions USD) $15.787 $14.462 $14.294 Net Income (in Billions USD) $4.612 $5.660 $4.965 Margins 67.5% 70.8% 71.8% Earnings per Share (in USD) $0.55 $0.68 $0.59

The Devices and Consumer lines came in with good results for the quarter, with the caveat that Q4 2013 included the $900M write down of Surface RT inventory which skews the results somewhat.

Devices and Consumer Licensing contributed $4.7B to the overall revenues and $4.4B to Gross Margin with both values being higher both sequentially and year-over-year. Windows OEM revenue was up 3% with a split of an 11% increase in Pro revenue combined with non-Pro revenue being down 9%. The non-Pro decrease can likely be at least somewhat attributed to offering Windows free for certain devices now. Office Consumer revenue was up 21% compared to Q4 2013, and Windows Phone revenue was up 95% due to no longer having to pay for the commercial agreement with Nokia.

As for consumer hardware, revenue was up 23% from Q4 2013 at $1.44B but down from the $1.97B last quarter, and Gross Margins increased 103% year-over-year to $0.02B which is also down from $0.26B last quarter. The large increase in Gross Margin is attributed to the Surface RT right off last fiscal year and Microsoft also took a hit for not shipping a new form factor this quarter which is likely the rumored Surface Mini, which didn’t ship as expected with the Surface Pro 3. Overall Surface revenue was $409 million for the quarter. Xbox sold 1.1 million consoles this quarter, and had a 14% increase in revenue driven by increased console revenue. The new segment to Devices and Consumer hardware is the Phone Hardware, which contributed $1.99 billion in revenue but the new Nokia division came in at a $692M loss. Microsoft reported sales of 5.8 million Lumia Smartphones, and 30.3 million other phones.

The final piece of the consumer division is D&C Other, which includes Office 365 Consumer, Resale, Windows Store, Xbox Live, Bing, and a few other offerings. Revenue for this segment was up $20% year-over-year at $1.88B, but down from the $1.95B in Q3. Gross Margins were also up 21% from last fiscal at $0.45B. Microsoft added an additional 1 million new subscribers to Office 365 Home and Personal, which now totals 5.6 million subscribers. Bing advertising revenue was up 40% due to higher revenue per search, higher search volume, and an expiration of payments to Yahoo from last year. Bing search share is now at 19.2% in the US, up 130 basis points from the same time a year ago.

The commercial side is where Microsoft makes the majority of its revenue, and this quarter is no different with overall revenue coming in at $13.48B for the quarter which is an increase of 11% year-over-year. Gross Margin was also up 10% at $10.99B for the quarter. Commercial is broken down into Commercial Licensing and Commercial Other, with the former being up 6% to $11.22B in revenue and the latter up 44% to $2.26B. Commercial Licensing includes revenue for on premise offerings such as Server 2012, SQL Server, and System Center, while the Other segment is for cloud offerings and services which grey 147% from the same period last year.

Microsoft Q4 2014 Segment Overview (in Billions USD)   Q4'2014 Q3'2014 Q4'2013 Percentage for quarter D&C Licensing Revenue $4.69 $4.38 $4.29 20.1% D&C Licensing Gross Margin $4.41 $3.91 $3.88 27.9% D&C Hardware Revenue $1.44 $1.97 $1.17 6.2% D&C Hardware Gross Margin $0.02 $0.26 -$0.65 0.1% D&C Other Revenue $1.88 $1.95 $1.56 8.0% D&C Other Gross Margin $0.45 $0.54 $0.37 2.9% Phone Hardware Revenue $1.99 NA NA 8.5% Phone Hardware Gross Margin $0.054 NA NA 0.3% Commercial Licensing Revenue $11.22 $10.32 $10.58 48.0% Commercial Other Revenue $2.26 $1.90 $1.57 9.7% Commercial Gross Margin $10.99 $9.91 $10.00 69.6%

So what can we learn from this quarter? Clearly Microsoft is well positioned going forward to continue its play in the enterprise, with cloud services in particular being a strong point. No other cloud provider has the product offerings which can compete for the hybrid cloud model of on premise servers running alongside cloud offerings, and they are leveraging this strength to make substantial gains in this sector. As for the consumer offerings, we now see why such drastic action was taken last week with the downsizing of the Nokia division in particular, which lost almost $700 million this quarter. A lot of the job cuts were aimed at manufacturing, and those will likely be aimed towards locations that created the non-Lumia smartphones. Earnings for the quarter were right in line or slightly over the projected results provided last quarter, assuming the Nokia earnings and loss are excluded because they were not a part of Microsoft when the projections were made. Microsoft as a company has traditionally been used to the high margin software business, and the recent push to be a hardware manufacturer has shown that this is a low margin, high risk playground with all of the major losses being in hardware. With a new CEO at the helm for the full FY 2015, we’ll have to see what his vision and patience are for the hardware segment.

A defendant accused of illegally downloading porn on BitTorrent argued it was like having a pirated CD slipped in his bag on the way out of the store. The judge didn't buy it. zen Sutherland

Porn studio Malibu Media files more copyright lawsuits than anyone else in the US since the fall of Prenda Law; hundreds of suits against "John Doe" defendants have been filed in just the last few months. Nearly all of those cases settle before the case is decided on the merits.

However, in a rare development yesterday, a Malibu lawsuit proceeded to a judgment—and it was a slam dunk for the porn studio. In a terse five-page order (PDF), US District Judge Robert Jonker tore apart defendant Don Bui's arguments that using BitTorrent and the site Kickass Torrents to get porn files didn't violate Malibu's copyright.

In the case, the defendant admitted he had 57 unauthorized copies of Malibu Media movies on his hard drive and had used BitTorrent technology to get them. Bui tried to shift the blame to the Kickass Torrents website, but it didn't work. He also tried to distinguish the technology he used from earlier technologies found to violate copyright laws, like Grokster. That didn't sway Jonker, who wrote:

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Satya Nadella and former Nokia CEO Stephen Elop in a photo-op. View Liveblog2014-07-22T16:30:00-05:00

Last week, Microsoft announced that it would be making the largest set of staff cuts in the company’s history, axing as many as 18,000 jobs over the next fiscal year. This week, CEO Satya Nadella will be delivering Microsoft’s fourth-quarter earnings results, and according to his corporate-speak-filled layoff e-mail, Nadella will take the opportunity to "share further specifics on where we [Microsoft] are focusing our innovation investments."

This likely means elaboration on both the specific nature of the cuts (which Microsoft EVP and former Nokia CEO Stephen Elop discussed at length in his own e-mail last week) and some details on where and how Microsoft plans to expend effort to improve itself. There will also likely be a barrage of questions from analysts wanting to know about how the cuts will affect Microsoft’s business strategy, since Nadella’s e-mail contained language indicating that he wanted to (among other things) flatten the organization’s notoriously thick management layer cake.

Shares of MSFT actually jumped a few points when trading commenced after the layoff announcements on the morning of July 17; revenues are expected to be up from last fiscal year’s fourth quarter, and analyst expectations are that Microsoft’s Q414 performance will come in at about $0.60 per share, down from $0.66 last year.

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