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PUBG Mobile Lite 0.21.0: APK Direct Download Link India & Installation guide. PUBG Mobile Lite 0.21.0 update released with an array of interesting new updates. The update has already hit the servers & players can install the update from the Google Play Store. However, players who can’t access PUBG Mobile Lite from Google Play can go through external download links instead. You can find the download links below. PUBG Mobile Lite was introduced to gamers all over the world as the lighter version of PUBG Mobile that demands less hardware requirements. The game only takes around 600MB of storage space & can run seamlessly on 1GB RAM as well. However, the game uses Unreal Engine 4 & is different from the original game in many aspects. Resulting in a unique yet familiar blend of the best mobile battle-royale experience. Find below PUBG Mobile Lite 0.21.0: APK Direct Download Link India. Also Read: Battlegrounds PUBG Mobile India: 5 things you must know about Battlegrounds Mobile India How to download PUBG Mobile Lite 0.21.0 Update version? PUBG Mobile Lite 0.21.0: APK Download from Direct Link Follow these steps to download and install the PUBG Mobile Lite 0.21.0 version using the APK file from the official website. Step 1: Players need to visit PUBG Mobile Lite’s official website from here. (Use a VPN if you are unable to access the page). Or go through Direct Link. Step 2: Secondly, they must download the APK file by clicking on the ‘APK Download’ button available on the website Step 3: After the download has completed, they can locate and install it. However, before players proceed to install the game, they must enable the ‘Install from unknown source’ option if not enabled already. Step 4: Once the installation is complete, players can enjoy all the exciting new features in the game. Read More: PUBG Lite Terminated from today April 29th, What happens Next? About PUBG Mobile PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds (PUBG) is an online multiplayer battle royale game developed and published by PUBG Corporation, a subsidiary of South Korean video game company Bluehole. The game is based on previous mods that were created by Brendan “PlayerUnknown” Greene for other games, inspired by the 2000 Japanese film Battle Royale, and expanded into a standalone game under Greene’s creative direction. In the game, up to one hundred players parachute onto an island and scavenge for weapons and equipment to kill others while avoiding getting killed themselves. The available safe area of the game’s map decreases in size over time, directing surviving players into tighter areas to force encounters. The last player or team standing wins the round.

The US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) has published a preliminary report into last month's fatal crash involving a 2019 Tesla Model S in Texas. The crash happened at approximately 21:07 local time on 17 April this year. Two men entered the car, one in the driver's seat and the other in the front passenger seat (according to home security camera footage). The Tesla then drove off, travelled about 167 metres before leaving the road on a curve, driving over a curb, hitting a drainage culvert, a raised manhole and a tree, the report found. A fire started in the Tesla's battery, which had been damaged in the crash. The conflagration destroyed the car, including the storage device housed in the infotainment console, although the restraint control module (which records data relating to the vehicle's speed, acceleration, belt status and airbags) was recovered and is being evaluated, NTSB added. The crash and fire resulted in fatal injuries for both occupants. The driver was 59 and the passenger 69. "The NTSB’s investigation of the crash is ongoing, and investigators continue to gather information including data to analyze the crash dynamics, postmortem toxicology test results, seat belt use, occupant egress and the post-crash fire," the report added. Authorities commenting at the time remarked that the positioning of the bodies following impact indicated that nobody was driving the vehicle, although Tesla boss Elon Musk tweeted that logs recovered indicated that Autopilot had not been enabled. Musk also pointed out that lane lines were required for "standard" Autopilot. In its report, the NTSB stated: "The roadway was equipped with streetlights but did not have lines to define the travel lanes." The Tesla in question was equipped with Autopilot, which requires both the Traffic Aware Cruise Control and the Autosteer systems to be engaged. The former is a jumped-up cruise control, which deals with acceleration and deceleration while the latter assists with lane keeping. The NTSB showed in tests with an exemplar car that the latter also could not be engaged on that part of the road. Tesla's Autopilot has come in for criticism, most recently by the US Consumer Reports organisation, which found it was possible to use the system without a human sat behind the steering wheel in a Model Y. Musk's boasts regarding the self-driving capabilities of Teslas have also recently been scrutinised by the California Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV). The DMV's concern was around communication to the public regarding the true capabilities of Tesla vehicles and ensuring that customers understood the limits of the technology. A number of fatal crashes have been attributed to over-reliance on vehicle automation by drivers. As for last month's accident, the NTSB is continuing to work to determine the probable cause "with the intent of issuing safety recommendations to prevent similar crashes." The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and Tesla are supporting the NTSB with the investigation. A parallel investigation by the Harris County Texas Precinct 4 Constable's Office is also under way. ®

The manufacturer GIGABYTE presents two computers designed for AMD hipster gaming: the AORUS MODEL X, the AORUS MODEL S mini-system. Both incorporate high-end components and materials. GIGABYTE provides optimized heat dissipation and acoustic control thanks to strict verification. Very low noise levels are achieved even at full load, same for temperature. It is designed to always deliver a noise level below 40 dB without throttling. Both the AORUS MODEL X and the AORUS MODEL S incorporate the AMD Ryzen 9 5900X processor and the NVIDIA RTX 3080 VGA graphics card. They have the possibility to choose between several configurations of 32 GB of RAM memory verified by the R&D team of GIGABYTE. The MODEL X has four 8 GB DDR4 modules at 3600 MHz and the MODEL S, which does so thanks to two 16 GB DDR4 at 3600 MHz. AORUS MODEL X The AORUS MODEL X has a tempered glass chassis with a design that favors thermal dissipation very effectively. The concealed air intake, in addition to maintaining an elegant aesthetic, provides optimized thermal dissipation with a noise emission of less than 40. Access cables are installed in the chassis to provide excellent expandability. In addition, the smart plug-and-play design of the SSD offers great expandability with cabling and screws. The two metallic and clear side panel options give it a unique look and the integrated graphics card holder cover has a sleek and attractive design. AORUS MODEL S The AORUS MODEL S gaming pc with AMD chipset features a unique all-in-one thermal design that significantly improves thermal dissipation by maximizing usable space on the thermal fin within the chassis. It is helped by the hidden air intake that effects optimized heat dissipation. It is designed so that the temperature of the CPU never reaches a degree that causes damage to the computer when playing the most demanding games on the market. At the same time, the acoustics are kept below 36 dB. The AORUS MODEL S is positioned to be the first minisystem choice for gamers thanks to a system that is only 14 liters in size that also provides powerful heat dissipation, quiet operation and premium performance. Summary features of each Gigabyte AORUS gaming computer model with AMD chipset AORUS MODEL X Motherboard: X570 CPU: AMD Ryzen 9 5900X RAM: 32 GB DDR4 at 3600 MHz with RGB lighting Graphics card: RTX 3080 850 W power supply Storage: 1TB M.2 2280 4.0 or 2TB M.2 2280 NVMe AORUS MODEL S Motherboard: X550 CPU: AMD Ryzen 9 5900X RAM: 32 GB DDR4 at 3600 MHz Graphics card: RTX 3080 750W power supply Storage: 1TB M.2 2280 4.0 or 2TB M.2 2280 NVMe

Since Among Us exploded in po[CENSORED]rity last year, other development studios have attempted to capitalize on the emergence of social deduction as a mainstream gaming genre. Some social deduction video games did exist before Among Us, but they were mostly confined to their own PC niche, with the only titles that broke through to any semblance of mainstream audience being Town of Salem and Garry’s Mod's Trouble in Terrorist Town game mode. The main benefit that InnerSloth brought to the genre is the streamlining of core gameplay mechanics and objectives. Both Town of Salem and Trouble in Terrorist Town can get bogged down in convoluted rules and player abilities, whereas Among Us is relatively simple. This likely helped Among Us become po[CENSORED]r on streaming platforms, since its easy-to-understand gameplay makes it especially watchable. Due to the relatively recent revival of the genre and the platform's more efficient development and distribution process, most Among Us-like games are found on PC. The following examples are all available on Steam. It's important to note that, while the similarities between these titles and Among Us are sometimes quite stark, they aren't necessarily copies, reproductions, or clones of InnerSloth's game. Each has its own unique mechanics, and many likely began development before Among Us rose to po[CENSORED]rity. Other Games Like Among Us On Steam Unfortunate Spacemen Unfortunate Spacemen, a free-to-play game released in June 2020, is very similar to Among Us in many ways, but it has a first-person perspective. It has a few other distinguishing features, such as proximity voice chat and A.I.-controlled space monsters that attack players, and it's a good option for those who enjoy FPS games. Agrou Agrou takes the easy-to-understand, Impostor-versus-innocents concept of Among Us and blends it with the purely communication-based gameplay found in Town of Salem. It takes place in a medieval-esque setting and follows the premise of traditional deduction games like Werewolf and One Night Ultimate Werewolf, with players all sitting around a campfire and attempting to find the werewolf hidden among them. First Class Trouble Two more recent games have attempted to shake up the genre and expand upon the foundation created by Among Us. The first, First Class Trouble, features a group of players trying to escape a doomed luxury airship, with robots disguised as humans seeking to stop them. The main change this game brings to the formula is requiring the help of an innocent group member to kill other players, whereas imposters are usually able to kill on their own in other games. Dread Hunger Second is Dread Hunger, perhaps the most exciting addition to the social deduction genre, as it adds many new elements and layers to the established gameplay loop. On a sea ship in the arctic, players attempt to sail to safety and survive both harsh conditions and the evil crewmen hidden amongst them. What makes Dread Hunger unique is its unforgiving survival elements, such as hunger, thirst, and warmth. The social deduction genre has seen tremendous growth thanks to Among Us, and the steady stream of new games looks promising for the future. The only factor holding the genre back is its lack of a presence on consoles, but given its current po[CENSORED]rity, that problem is almost surely only temporary.

How to personalize your iPhone iOS 14 home screen with widgets There was a time not so long ago when buying an Apple product meant buying into a very specific aesthetic, one designed by men in glass-walled offices who liked to think of themselves as high-minded futurists. Their vision for that future was almost always the same: sleek, minimalist, and above all, simple. But according to my TikTok feed over the past weekend, iPhones are now bastions of complex personal micro-identities. “How to make your iPhone home screen aesthetic AF!” begins a video tutorial with 3 million likes. On Twitter, users boast screenshots of their own creations, from Studio Ghibli to cottagecore, Mean Girls to “Katy Perry in the ‘Never Really Over’ video,” and“dirtbag Shia LaBeouf” (a personal favorite). To do so, they’re using customizable widgets with Apple’s refreshed Shortcuts app as well as other downloadable tools like Widgetsmith (The Verge has a good explainer on how to wield them). Used particularly artfully, the effects can turn the home screen of your phone into an ode to Animal Crossing or what BTS would look like in a late ’90s teen magazine — far removed from the traditional grid of rounded-edge squares with company logos. It’s not that suddenly a bunch of kids discovered a way to jailbreak the Apple system, it’s because up until a few days ago, Apple didn’t really allow for anything like this. The latest software update, iOS 14, which was announced back in June and became available to download on September 16, offers something that until now the company has been staunchly resistant to: personalization. “Simple design is dead. Welcome to Apple’s era of customization,” declared a Fast Company headline from earlier this summer. Perhaps we can expand that to the rest of the internet: On Instagram, users are no longer restricted by the handful of color correction or face warping filters built by the brand itself — as of 2019, anyone can add their own augmented reality (AR) filters to the app’s database. Meanwhile, TikTok has succeeded because it allows users to share sounds and build off of each others’ videos in a way no social media platform has ever done before. You can even make the case that by doubling the maximum characters from 140 to 280 in 2017, Twitter encouraged its users to get a little weirder on their timelines. All of these little changes are giving us greater control over what our digital lives look like, however superficially. (Privacy protections, for example, remain fully in the hands of the corporation.) It’s a delightful pivot toward the mid-2000s digital golden age of custom Buddy AIM profiles and designing your Myspace layout while accidentally learning to code in the process. Early social media platforms and blogs, for the most part, intended for users to express themselves with their tools: Tumblr and WordPress allowed people to tinker with the code to alter their appearance in infinite ways, for example, as opposed to Facebook, which restricted users to a sober palate of medium blue and sans-serif fonts. Though there’s been some debate around who should be bothered to make their home screen adorable (one rather controversial tweet read “im not customizing my home screen i am 24 years old”), I decided that it would make a perfect side activity while I half-watch 90 Day Fiancé: Before the 90 Days season two. So last night, I spent 20 minutes watching TikTok tutorials and customizing my home screen to look vaguely autumncore, with deep greens, oranges, and heavily Tumblr-ized images of old books. Is this a fully pointless way to spend 20 minutes that were already being spent utterly pointlessly? Yes. Will I spend another 20 minutes changing my home screen aesthetic to “December in a Prague Christmas market” in roughly one month? Yes! Help keep Vox free for all Millions turn to Vox each month to understand what’s happening in the news, from the coronavirus crisis to a racial reckoning to what is, quite possibly, the most consequential presidential election of our lifetimes. Our mission has never been more vital than it is in this moment: to empower you through understanding. But our distinctive brand of explanatory journalism takes resources. Even when the economy and the news advertising market recovers, your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work. If you have already contributed, thank you. If you haven’t, please consider helping everyone make sense of an increasingly chaotic world: Contribute today from as little as $3.

Tech companies take notice: The copyrightability of software application programming interfaces — or APIs — is on shaky constitutional ground. Google LLC v. Oracle America Inc., the most closely watched copyright case in recent memory, called on the U.S. Supreme Court to determine whether software APIs are copyrightable and, if so, whether Google’s admitted copying of parts of the Java API constituted fair use. In its 6-2 decision on April 5, the court neatly sidestepped the question of copyrightability, finding that Google’s actions constituted fair use regardless of whether the Java API was copyrightable. However, the skepticism in the court’s analysis is hard to miss and should give pause to future parties seeking to enforce copyrights on software APIs. In finding fair use, the court looked to the four factors set out in Section 107 of the Copyright Act, which seek to balance copyright holders’ interests with society’s interest in the reproduction and transformation of scientific and artistic content. While the court’s analysis purports to apply narrowly to the facts of this case, it does suggest broader applicability to software APIs in general. Nature of copyrighted work Here, the “work” in question was the “declaring code,” which provides the “interface” element of an API. The declaring code determines the organizational hierarchy of methods and tells calling code how to invoke them. In contrast, “implementing code” provides a method’s internal functionality, and a “method call” is a particular instance of utilizing or “calling” a method. Google copied the declaring code from the Java API but wrote its own implementing code tailored to the Android smartphone platform. Likening declaring code to a filing system, the court found that “declaring code is, if copyrightable at all, further than are most computer programs (such as implementing code) from the core of copyright.” With such skeptical language, the court appears to have walked right up to the line of finding declaring code to be uncopyrightable, but it ultimately declined to step across. Purpose, character of use Google copied the Java API in order to make the Android platform more readily accessible to Java programmers. Because they were already familiar with Java, programmers could write applications for Android without needing to learn an entirely new API. Copying the Java API to Android thus facilitated the creation of new products that were not available on non-mobile platforms. Bringing that ease of creation to a smartphone platform, the court found, constituted a “transformative” use that was not outweighed by the commercial nature of Google’s endeavor. The skepticism in the court’s analysis is hard to miss and should give pause to future parties seeking to enforce copyrights on software APIs. That kind of transformation does not occur when a company copies a competitor’s API on the same platform. Therefore, if software APIs are copyrightable, then this factor could limit the scope of permissible fair use considerably. Amount, substantiality of portion used The declaring code that Google copied was a very small portion of the Java programming language: about 11,500 lines of code, constituting 0.4 percent of the total when implementing code is included. In addition, in view of the court’s analysis of the “nature” of declaring code, the copied lines of code were insubstantial in comparison to the implementing code. Google only copied what was needed to achieve the “transformative” purpose of attracting Java developers to the Android platform. Those distinctions are not unique to the Java API. Given that declaring code is a small fraction of the total code in any sizeable project, we should expect this factor to weigh in favor of fair use in nearly any case. Market effects Here, the court highlighted trial evidence suggesting that Sun (Oracle’s predecessor) was not competing with Google in the smartphone space. “Google’s Android platform was part of a distinct (and more advanced) market than Java software,” the court found. In fact, bringing the Java API to Android might have benefitted Sun by encouraging even more developers to learn the Java programming language. Meanwhile, foreclosing Google from porting the Java API to Android would amount to “a lock limiting the future creativity of new programs” by programmers who had invested their time in learning the Java API. That latter argument reflects a reality of the software industry as a whole: Denying a programmer access to the APIs they already know will limit their creative abilities, at least until they are able to learn a new API that is available on the target platform. Prior to the court’s decision, many in the software industry were concerned that a finding against copyrightability would discourage companies from developing new APIs that could then be copied by competitors. Others feared that a finding for copyrightability would be the death knell for open source projects that replicate commercial APIs. By avoiding the copyrightability question altogether and deciding the case narrowly on the specific facts of the case, the court seems to have averted either outcome. However, the court’s analysis reveals healthy skepticism toward copyrightability of software APIs generally, and its application of the fair use factors suggests that future claimants face a potentially fruitless uphill battle.

mid a new IT upgrade cycle, data center and networking hardware firm Arista Networks (NYSE: ANET) is back in growth mode. While it was once known as a high-flying growth stock, this time around Arista looks more like a reasonable value, especially after its first-quarter 2021 earnings update was released on Tuesday. The chip shortage takes a small toll Arista's Q1 financials continued the rebound the company started late in 2020 after a slow couple of years. Revenue was nearly $668 million, a 28% year-over-year increase, and free cash flow was also up 29% to $248 million. Management said to expect sales to increase about another 27% year over year in the second quarter to at least $675 million. If Arista continues on this track, it's on pace to exceed its all-time-high sales record from back in 2019. In spite of the strong showing, Q1 wasn't perfect. As with other tech hardware companies, Arista is being affected by the global chip shortage, driven by both healthy customer demand as data centers and networks get updated and also supply constraints from Arista's contract manufacturing partners. CEO Jayshree Ullal said on the earnings call that the chip supply has never been so constrained for the company. Specifically, some order lead times for certain components are a whole year out. Ullal continued by saying that the "supply chain will remain a pain point for the balance of this year as a result of all these shortages." While manufacturing shortfalls amid the pandemic have meant Arista has left some sales on the table this quarter, there's another way to look at this problem. Arista isn't alone in dealing with the global supply shortfall, so it's unlikely customers will simply shift their purchasing to one of its competitors. Instead, they're going to have to plan their projects accordingly and wait patiently. This creates a nice backlog of orders for Arista that could help it remain in strong growth mode well into next year. Plus, new networking technology like 400G will begin shipping in the second half of this year to help businesses' data centers handle the increased flow of information they're experiencing. With its strong portfolio of solutions spanning hardware itself, data center management, and security software, Arista is well-positioned to capture plenty of new customers this year and next. Why Arista stock is a top buy In spite of its supply issues, Arista stock is on the cusp of another run higher. Cloud computing is a secular trend that is showing no signs of slowing down, and though Arista was hit by first the U.S.-China trade war and then the pandemic, its growth story is far from over. After the last update, Arista trades for 32 times trailing 12-month free cash flow -- a metric that will improve this year as the company laps depressed financial results from the worst of the pandemic lockdowns last spring and summer. It's always developing new use cases for its product and software portfolio with customers and is well-positioned for further expansion. The balance sheet showed cash and equivalents of $3.03 billion and no debt at the end of March. Management said to expect growth rates to decelerate headed into the second half of 2021, but to nevertheless anticipate full-year financials to be substantially higher than last year. This small data center design and management firm is a top play on the booming cloud computing market. With growth back in double digits again, Arista Networks stock still looks like a long-term value right now.

The Epic v Apple lawsuit that began this week has given us an impressive collection of corporate documents to sift through, almost like some kind of box containing loot. Within a review of performance and strategy dated October 25, 2019, there's a section on the Borderlands 3 deal, disclosing that the looter-shooter's six-month exclusivity period cost Epic $115 million. That includes a $15 million marketing commitment, $20 million in non-recoupable fees, and an $80 million minimum guarantee—an advance paid ahead of the game going on sale. Borderlands 3 sold well enough to reach that guarantee within two weeks, with a recoupable revenue of $100 million in the period. A graph of the Epic store's daily revenue across its first 11 months peaks dramatically with its launch. Of the 1.56 million Borderlands players Epic picked up in those two weeks, 53% were apparently new to the store rather than returning customers. (Image credit: Epic) The document also shows that Epic paid $11 million for its free giveaway of the Handsome Collection, a bundle containing Borderlands 2, the Pre-Sequel, and most of their DLC (excluding Commander Lilith & the Fight for Sanctuary, released after the collection was created). That one freebie cost almost as much as Epic spent on the first nine months of giveaways, which it paid more than $11 million for. RECOMMENDED VIDEOS FOR YOU... video playing Borderlands 3 Q&A - PC Gaming Show 2019 10/06/19 The PC Gamer Show 161: Borderlands 3, Sea of... 09/05/19 The PC Gamer Show 158: Borderlands 3, Risk of... 04/04/19 The PC Gamer Show - Battlefront 2's loot box... 17/11/17 The PC Gamer Show: Loot boxes, Shadow of War,... 12/10/17 Among the other revelations the court case has brought, we learned that Epic has spent at least $1 billion on exclusives so far, Tim Sweeney apologized to Ubisoft for the amount of fraud related to The Division 2 on Epic's store, and if you don't check the settings on your conference call you might end up with a bunch of Fortnite kids going nuts in a court case.

Software industry's impact in 2020: 15.8 million jobs and $933 billion to the US economy This one hour, free session will help you better understand: What is Paragon? Where are we going? How to apply automation for network provisioning, management and orchestration? Join us for our first session May 11, 2021 where we will introduce the full Paragon Automation suite. Registration is free. White Papers provided by Juniper Networks Victoria Espinel, president of Software.org: the BSA Foundation and president and CEO of BSA | The Software Alliance, said in a press release that software played a key role during the pandemic by powering remote work, helping manufacturers shift to producing medical and personal protective equipment, and helping small businesses connect with customers online. "During a difficult year, software supported more than 15.8 million jobs across sectors," Espinel said. "Meanwhile, the need for software skills continues to increase, further underscoring the need for retraining programs that will equip more Americans with the skills to take advantage of growing opportunities in the digital economy." The total number of jobs is up 5.9% since 2018. The report also found that in 2020, 3.3 million people worked directly in software jobs in the United States which is a 7.2% increase over 2018. This year's update builds on earlier reports with an analysis of 2020 data to quantify the scope of software's impact and to show change in job totals and economic impact over time. The report also tracked software jobs and economic activity in all 50 states. Between 2018 and 2020, the software industry's economic impact grew by double digits in more than half of states and the District of Columbia. Growth was up by more than 25% in Idaho, Nevada and Washington. Direct jobs in the industry went up 18.7% in New Mexico, 12.9% in New York, 10.9% in Texas and 10.1% in Florida. Chris Hopfensperger, executive director of Software.org: the BSA Foundation, said in a press release that the benefits of the software industry aren't limited to large cities or traditional tech hubs. "In 2020, software job growth surged in several states that we don't usually associate with the tech industry, including Colorado, Florida, and Wisconsin," Hopfensperger said. "As tech industry employees embrace remote work, we anticipate continued software job growth across the country." The report measures the software industry's impact on the U.S. economy with data and analysis from The Economist Intelligence Unit. The research explores the growth of the software industry between 2018 and 2020 and measures its contributions to value-added GDP, job growth, and wage growth in 50 states and the District of Columbia.

Graphics cards are hard to come by these days, though in my daily hunt for deals, I'm seeing several prebuilt desktops sporting the latest generation GPUs from Nvidia (GeForce RTX 30 series). Most are grossly overpriced, save for this Alienware Aurora R12—it's in stock (at the time of this writing) at Best Buy for $1,899.99. It's not on sale, but it does have that elusive 'Add to Cart' button lit up, at least for now. Part for part (including the cost of Windows), you're looking at a markup of a few hundred bucks, at least in normal times—at the heart of this system is a GeForce RTX 3070, which commands around $1,400 on eBay. The system also rocks an 11th Gen Core i7 11700F, which is one step above the Core i5 11600K, one of the best CPUs for gaming. It is an 8-core/16-thread CPU based on Intel's latest generation Rocket Lake architecture, with a 2.5GHz base clock, 4.9GHz max turbo frequency, and 16MB of L3 cache. It also has 16GB of RAM, which is the sweet spot, and a 256GB SSD + 1TB HDD for storage chores. The storage allotment is a buzzkill, in that a 256GB SSD is not the least bit exciting, but it's something you can upgrade easy enough if the need arises.

Video title: 25 FUNNIEST MOMENTS IN MMA AND BOXING Content creator ( Youtuber ) : Hyperloop Official YT video:

A document released as an exhibit in the Apple v. Epic lawsuit that got underway Monday reveals that Epic dropped more than $11.6 million dollars on free games in the first nine months of its operation, between December 2018 and September 2019. GameDiscoverCo founder Simon Carless, who tweeted the image earlier today, explained that the document in question was one of several that were released prematurely: They weren't meant to go public until later in the trial, but were mistakenly included with Epic's documents, which were released today. All of the documents were quickly removed from the archive, but appear to have been restored since. The full doc paints a very interesting picture of the early days of the Epic Store, and reveals a remarkable disparity in what it paid for various games in order to be able to give them away. Edmund McMillen's The End is Nigh earned him $200,000, for instance, while Annapurna's What Remains of Edith Finch only drew $125,000. Epic paid PlayDead $350,000 for Limbo and $800,000 for Inside, but Alan Wake only warranted $150,000. The top getter was Batman: Arkham trilogy, which cost Epic $1.5 million, followed closely by Subnautica, at $1.4 million; the best bargain (for Epic, that is) was Metro 2033 Redux, which Deep Silver apparently decided to throw in for free. More interesting than the amount of money Epic threw around for these freebies, though, is the "UA Cost" column (aka user acquisition), which is the buyout price divided by the number of new Epic Store accounts that each game attracted. That metric, indie developer Rami Ismail said on Twitter, demonstrates that indie games are a very big part of attracting audiences: Big releases like the Arkham games draw huge raw numbers, but games like Oxenfree, Hyper Light Drifter, Super Meat Boy, and Fez add up—and at a fraction of the cost, too. In spite of all that expense and the number of users who have created accounts in exchange for free games, the actual impact of the regular givaways seems relatively minimal. The document indicates that only about 7% of EGS users who have acquired at least one free game have also made a purchase through the storefront, which does not strike me as a very impressive conversion rate. The numbers only go to mid-2019, which mean the doc doesn't tell us how much Epic spent for some of 2020's high profile giveaways, like Grand Theft Auto 5, and whether Epic's UA costs started to climb noticeably over time. If the chief goal is to attract new users, diminishing returns means it's going to become increasingly difficult to do so—and, you'd have to think, too costly to continue doing so at some point. Regardless of how it decides to proceed with weekly giveaways in future years, there's still a long way to go before the Epic Games Store stops burning money: CEO Tim Sweeney acknowledged in April that the Epic Store isn't currently profitable because "it has front-loaded its marketing and user acquisition costs to gain market share." He doesn't expect it to start making money until 2027.

Continental to leverage Amazon Web Services for software development Continental and Amazon Web Services (AWS) are to work together on a development cooperation, with a long-term goal of AWS serving as the preferred cloud provider for Continental Automotive Edge (CAEdge) – a modular hardware and software platform that connects the vehicle to the cloud. CAEdge features a virtual workbench offering numerous options to develop, supply and maintain software-intensive system functions. This, says Continental, will allow drivers to integrate the functions they want going forward during the entire service life of their vehicles by downloading software updates. With the platform, Continental states it is strengthening its role in developing vehicle architectures and software. This will allow it to provide future vehicle manufacturers and partners with a development environment for software-intensive vehicle architecture that they can use to implement software, sensor and big data solutions in a fraction of the development time needed before. As a result, vehicle software can be developed and tested more efficiently and securely and rolled out directly to vehicles. The company notes that the CAEdge platform is already being tested in an automotive manufacturer’s series development and will be available to other customers at the end of 2021. “Software is at the forefront of innovation in cars,” explained Dirk Abendroth, CTO at Continental Automotive. “With our CAEdge platform, we are establishing a new approach to developing vehicle architectures and software in the automotive industry. We have found a strong collaborator in AWS to help us accomplish this task and will continue to expand our leading role in the field of automotive software.” Within the scope of the first project, camera and radar data of a vehicle fleet will be imported into the CAEdge platform and subsequently used for virtual simulations of highly automated driving. When it comes to processing this data in particular, Continental claims the CAEdge platform offers a high-performance development environment that supports all steps in the development of highly automated and autonomous driving systems: from sensor data collection and processing, through data management, model training and virtual simulations, to vehicle software updates. This, says Continental, means that individual development steps that used to take several weeks, due to the work involved in transferring data and training algorithms, can now be completed in just a few hours. This is made possible via the scalable computing capacity offered by AWS, as well as machine learning. As a first step, Continental and AWS will train more than 1,000 of Continental’s 20,000 software and IT engineers in AWS cloud technologies, with a focus on machine learning. “Continental is providing the mobility experts and its in-depth understanding of the automotive sector, while AWS – as the leading provider of cloud computing – is bringing with it access to the latest machine learning and other innovative cloud services,” noted Bill Vass, VP of engineering at AWS. “Backed by the expertise of Continental and its customers, we are creating a development environment that will speed up the development of highly automated and autonomous driving systems.” Continental says that going forward all developers and participating companies will work in a standardized and automated development environment with the same tools, testing procedures and safeguards. Customers will also benefit from AWS data centers and a network that was developed to protect their information, identities, applications and devices. In practice, this means that when automotive manufacturers develop new product solutions, only they will have access to the data and can grant access rights to other companies, for example to Continental or another development partner.

Kingston is the latest memory manufacturer to announce the development of its DDR5 memory and more specifically, memory modules with overclocking support. Kingston Readies Overclocking Ready DDR5 Memory Modules, Will Start Shipping In Q3 2021 The memory manufacturer revealed that it has started the development of overclocking-ready DDR5 memory modules and has already sent out the first samples to motherboard partners (ASUS, MSI, Gigabyte, ASRock, etc). The Kingston DDR5 memory modules are designed in compliance with XMP profiles but also opened up motherboard partners to allow manual adjustments to the PMIC (Power Management Integrated Circuit) beyond 1.1V. Following is the press release from Kingston: Kingston Technology DDR5 Overclockable Modules One Step Closer to Reaching Market Kingston Technology Company, Inc., a world leader in memory products and technology solutions, today announced it has sent overclockable DDR5 modules to its motherboard partners to begin qualification on the next-generation memory platform. Kingston engineered its DDR5 modules with a preset XMP profile, but also enabled our motherboard partners to manually adjust the power management integrated circuit (PMIC) beyond the 1.1V DDR5 spec, thus allowing maximum flexibility to overclock. Kingston expects to ship its DDR5 solutions in Q3. As stated above, the overclocked kits are expected to feature much faster speeds and tighter timings with the help of binned DDR5 DRAM ICs. There will also be faster memory modules in the future with other manufacturers reporting speeds of over 10,000 MHz in the research phase. We are expected to get 32, 64 and up to 128 GB memory capacities this year with speeds between 4800 MHz and 5600 MHz. TeamGroup previously reported that the voltages on DDR5 memory can be pushed up to 2.6V with LN2 cooling.DDR5 memory is expected to bring over twice the performance increase over DDR4 as seen in the previously leaked benchmarks. We have already seen DDR4 hitting speeds of over 7 GHz with OC so 10 GHz doesn't sound like a big deal for the next-gen memory as SK Hynix and Micron deliver faster DRAM chips to vendors.

In the absence of physical conventions, videogame publishers are continuing to announce online events as a way of revealing and demonstrating future products. The latest is Slitherine, publisher of strategy and tactics games like War in the East 2, Shadow Empire, Panzer Corps 2, and Battlestar Galactica Deadlock. Slitherine's Home of Wargamers 2021 Live+ will be "a full day of presentations, insights, announcements, and gameplay sessions" streaming on May 11 over its Twitch channel. The publisher, which apparently has 15 unannounced games currently in development, will announce four new games on the day. It'll also showcase games scheduled for a release this year including Starship Troopers: Terran Command, Distant Worlds 2, Warhammer 40,000: Battlesector, and others. I got to play Battlesector recently, and found a promising turn-based tactics game that does justice to the setting, especially its goth space marines the Blood Angels.Jody is that guy who will try to convince you to play some indie game you've never heard of with a name like Extreme Meatpunks Forever. He is also on a doomed quest to play every Warhammer game

Google is warning developers it won’t allow misleading or hyperbolic app descriptions by year-end, in an attempt to make the world’s biggest app bazaar feel less like the feedback section of an eBay profile. Per the new guidelines, Google will limit app names to just 30 characters, with developers banned from using ALL-CAPS, multiple sequential special characters (“!!!), and emojis to promote their wares. Among the soon-to-be-verboten practices, Google said it will no longer allow developers to imply performance or po[CENSORED]rity through the app’s metadata. Software houses will be prohibited from describing themselves as “#1” or “top,” according to examples given by the Chocolate factory. As part of its spring cleaning, Google also said it plans to ban developers from indicating pricing through the app’s metadata (such as by describing the app as “free” or ad-free in the title, or with elements in the app’s icon). Additionally, the crackdown has seen Google take a firm line on apps that mislead users to obtain downloads, such as by including a call to action in the name (such as “download now”) or through visual touches in the app icon. JavaScript developers left in the dark after DroidScript software shut down by Google over ad fraud allegations Spotlight on Apple, Google app stores: What happened to Tile, Spotify, Match – and that proposed law in Arizona Google halves Android app fee to 15% for lower-earning devs... who aren't responsible for majority of revenue anyway Oops: Google admits failing to wipe all Android apps with location-selling X-Mode SDK from its Play Store Google has promised to boot apps that fail to meet these standards from the Play Store, although it hasn’t offered any detail on when this policy change will take effect, or how it will enforce the rules in practice. And the company is taking a firmer line on preview assets (pictures, videos, and screenshots that aren’t part of the metadata, but are nonetheless used to promote the app), and plans to take action against apps that use misleading content to entice punters. This addresses an issue that’s proven endemic within the free-to-play gaming sphere. Developers of microtransaction-hungry titles will often use promotional materials that ultimately bear no resemblance to the staid, rapacious experience the game offers. Because let’s face it, if you’re the type of moral vacuum that would create a free-to-play game in the first place, you’re unlikely to draw the line at using deceptive marketing tactics. In this case, Google has to take action. By announcing the new rules in advance, Google said it hopes developers will start complying ahead of time. It plans to start enforcing these rules in the second half of this year. While it doesn’t plan to boot titles that fail to comply, it said it may refuse to promote or recommend them. The Register notes that Google launched the Play Store 13 years ago, when it was called the Android Market. Still, it's never too late to grow up, eh gang? ®

Ñ Save $55 on EVGA's SuperNova 550W PSU with 80 Plus Gold certification and a long 10-year warranty. (Image credit: EVGA) I'm fully aware that now is not the best time in the world to build a PC, with so many parts being difficult to come by at fair market value. It gets a little easier if you're piecing together a mid-range gaming PC (at least on the CPU side of things), though, and if that's your goal, EVGA's SuperNova 550 GA power supply is worth a look. It's on sale at Amazon for $64.99, down from its $119.99 list price. This model was selling for its full list price for the past couple of weeks, and before that, it typically fluctuated between around $75 to $105, depending on the day. The current discount is the least expensive it has ever been. GO FOR THE GOLD EVGA SuperNova 550W PSU | 80 Plus Gold | Fully Modular | $119.99 $64.99 at Amazon (save $55) This is a great option for a build based on, say, a GeForce RTX 3060. It's a high-efficiency unit with fully modular cabling, and is backed by a long 10-year warranty.VIEW DEAL There's a lot to like about this PSU. For one, it's a name brand unit. It is also 80 Plus Gold certified, which means it is a high-efficiency model, and EVGA backs it with a generous 10-year warranty. It's always nice to see a long warranty, not just for the extended coverage, but because it reflects confidence in the model on the part of the manufacturer. This is a fully modular unit too. That's great for cable management, and being fully modular rather than semi-module (where the main power cables are permanently attached) can sometimes make building inside tight confines a little easier. Whether 550W is enough depends on your build. You're not going to want to try and power a GeForce RTX 3090 with this PSU, though it should be able to handle at least a GeForce RTX 3060 with no issue. Nvidia recommends a 600W PSU for the Ti variant and a 650W for the GeForce RTX 3070, though I've seen the latter run just fine on a 550W PSU (your mileage may vary, of course). Get notifications from PC Gamer Paul Lilly Paul has been playing PC games and raking his knuckles on computer hardware since the Commodore 64. He does not have any tattoos, but thinks it would be cool to get one that reads LOAD"*",8,1. In his off time, he rides motorcycles and wrestles alligators (only one of those is true)

Having a pet helps counteract feelings of isolation and experience less anxiety and stress, especially in difficult situations such as those experienced in times of pandemic. Many people who seek the company of a dog feel lonely for some reason and trust that this affectionate and playful pet can improve their mood. For the scientist Frank Nestmann this is by no means a far-fetched idea. "There is no doubt that people who have pets are less lonely," said the specialist, who is part of a group of researchers at the Technical University of Dresden, in Germany, that studies the relationship between animals and humans . Pets structure everyday life. According to Nestmann, these are good company and bring joy. "But, above all, they structure daily life, because the animal must be fed and cared for." "In this way, the person feels useful and that, in turn, increases their own self-esteem," said Nestmann. Also for Annette Rost, from the Berlin Animal Protection Association, it is very enriching that a lonely person lives with a domestic animal. This idea now comes up very frequently during the coronavirus pandemic. Rost revealed that a large number of shelters, especially smaller ones, put up many animals for adoption at the start of the coronavirus pandemic. Demand increased in times of pandemic One of the animal shelters that has been in great demand is located in the town of Fulda Hünfeld, in the center of the country. "The demand for cats has increased above all," explained its director, Eva-Maria Stollberg. According to Petra Karolewicz, a feline expert, this is because many people think that cats are easier to raise than dogs. "But this is not true, especially if a cat is kept exclusively inside an apartment," said the expert from the consulting firm Catissimio in the city of Hamburg. Your pet needs more than food, water, and regular vet visits. "Owners must meet the animal's needs for exercise, play and adventure," Karolewicz stressed. Otherwise, he adds, behavioral problems, illnesses, or even depression can arise. Rost agrees with this statement. The pet owner also has to consider veterinary costs and who will be in charge of changing the cat litter for older people. The bonding hormone Although Nestmann is reluctant to compare the bond between humans and animals with the relationship between people, he believes that there is a similar phenomenon to the bond between mother and child: a bonding hormone is also released when a person cares for an animal. In addition, the act of stroking and entertaining an animal is beneficial to health, for example, in the case of an older adult who has no other possibilities of experiencing the closeness and affection of another person. But does this replace the closeness of another human being? “Yes and no!”, Responds Karolewicz. "Surely there are people who feel that. As long as that person and the animal feel comfortable this way, that's fine, ”he stressed. Don't treat animals like humans Rost, however, stressed that it is important to respect the needs of the animal. It must be treated like an animal and not like a human being. “After all, a cat is still a cat and a dog is still a dog. And it would be sad if someone had their pet as their only social contact, "she added. However, the animal shelter adds that just a pet can promote interpersonal communication. When you walk with the dog, you come into contact with other people much faster than when you walk alone.

Alors que Max Verstappen a dominé la majorité du Grand Prix d'Espagne, c'est finalement Sir Lewis Hamilton qui a remporté la course. Découvrez la réaction de Max Verstappen en vidéo ci-dessous. Zapping Autonews racing Autonews Daily #35 : l'actu auto de la semaine en vidéo Dès le départ du Grand Prix d'Espagne, Max Verstappen a pris la tête de la course grâce à la rapidité de sa Red Bull. Au 28e tour, le pilote néerlandais a fait le pari de l'undercut, qu'il a brillamment réussi. Seulement, Sir Lewis Hamilton a effectué une incroyable remontée au 60e tour de la course. Il est parvenu à prendre la tête du Grand Prix d'Espagne et a remporté la 98e victoire de sa carrière. Une déception pour Max Verstappen, qui aurait aimé monter sur la première marche du podium de son 100e Grand Prix avec l'écurie Red Bull.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons released over a year ago in March 2020 and continues to be incredibly po[CENSORED]r. New Horizons is on its way to becoming the best-selling Switch game, surpassing Mario Kart 8. There are likely many people who bought a Switch just to play Animal Crossing, and are looking to find other games that might interest them. Luckily, Nintendo is prolific in the video game industry, boasting many quality franchises and releasing plenty of titles. The exact development team behind Animal Crossing: New Horizons is called Nintendo Entertainment Planning & Development Division, or Nintendo EPD for short. Nintendo EPD is the largest division within the video game giant, and likely has many different teams working on many different projects at once. Not only does Nintendo EPD develop its own games, but also co-develops with other studios inside and outside of Nintendo, as well as produces games it has no part in developing. Nintendo EPD is the product of two separate divisions merging in 2015, and since then has been solely responsible for the development of such titles as Miitopia, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, Splatoon 2, Super Mario Odyssey, Ring Fit Adventure, and more. Nintendo is a massive company, and Nintendo EPD is a massive division within that company, so it isn't always helpful to look solely at the development team responsible for a Nintendo title. Many Nintendo games, including Animal Crossing: New Horizons, have well-known developers in key roles who have worked at the company for quite a while, and are strongly attached to other projects. Important Developers Of Animal Crossing: New Horizons Game director of Animal Crossing: New Horizons, Aya Kyogoku, has been at Nintendo since 2003. She began work there as a scriptwriter for the Zelda series on Four Swords Adventures and Wii launch title Twilight Princess. Since working on those games, she has almost exclusively been filling major roles in the Animal Crossing series. She was the sequence director for Animal Crossing: City Folk, and then director of New Leaf and New Horizons. Animal Crossing: New Horizons' producer is Hisashi Nogami, who has been at Nintendo for even longer. He began his career at Nintendo as a character designer for Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island, which released on the Super Nintendo in 1995. He had a hand in the development of major titles such as Mario Kart 64, Banjo-Kazooie, and Super Smash Bros. Melee before being the director of the first, second, and third Animal Crossing games. While directing the Animal Crossing series, he also served as a supervisor for Super Smash Bros. Brawl and Super Smash Bros. 4. Since becoming a producer, Nogami has helped develop Splatoon and its sequel, and all Animal Crossing spin-off and mobile titles.

Download YouTube videos for offline viewing the easy way Downloading YouTube videos is easy, and there are lots of reasons to give it a try. For example. it lets you watch them without an internet connection, which is ideal for keeping yourself entertained on planes, trains, and trips to places without reliable mobile internet access. Downloading YouTube videos is also great if you have a mobile plan with a limited data allowance. You can download them to your phone using your home Wi-Fi, and watch them on the move without risking going over your data allocation. Best of all, you can do it free. YouTube itself provides some free tools for the job (on both desktop and mobile), and there are third-party free YouTube downloaders that you can use as well. Read on to find out how. If you only want to save music from videos, or strip out the audio to turn it into a podcast, check out our guide to the best YouTube to MP3 converters and the best free video editors for Windows, macOS and Linux. Using a mobile device? The best video editor for iPhone might be more your thing. Is downloading YouTube videos legal? Using third-party apps to download YouTube videos is against Youtube’s terms of service – which state that you are only able to stream videos directly from its servers. Downloading YouTube videos also opens you up to potential copyright infringement unless you have permission from the copyright holder, it’s in the public domain, or you own the video yourself. That said, YouTube does offer some ways to download videos through its web service and its own apps. In this guide we’ll explain how to do this, and take you through the other options available for iPhone, Android, Mac and PC. 4K Video Downloader is a free YouTube video downloader that's very simple to use 1. Get 4K Video Downloader To download YouTube videos to a Windows PC, start by downloading and installing 4K Video Downloader. This versatile software is completely free, and can download whole playlists, as well as 360-degree and 3D videos. When it's done, check the box marked 'Launch' and click 'Finish'. Once you've copied the video's URL from your browser, click the green 'Paste' button in 4K Video Downloader 2. Copy and paste the video URL Open your web browser, find the video you want to download from YouTube and copy its URL from the address bar. Then return to 4K Video Downloader and click the green 'Paste Link' button at the top left. The software will retrieve information about the video and give you a choice of quality options. These will vary depending on the quality of the original video, but the software can download YouTube videos in 4K if it's available. The download options will vary depending on the quality of the original video on YouTube 3. Choose the quality and format 4K Video Downloader will allow you to download whole YouTube videos, or just rip the audio. Choose your preferred selection using the drop-down menu on the left, then choose a format using the menu on the right. We prefer MP4 for our videos, because it gives a good balance of quality and file size – and will play on basically every device. Then, choose your quality. For playing back video on your TV or PC, we recommend picking the highest resolution, but bear in mind that this will take longer and will take up more space. Luckily, you can check the estimated file size on the left to see how much space it will take. You can also choose where the downloaded video should be saved using the 'Browse' button at the bottom. Once you're happy, click 'Download'. When you download an individual video, 4K Video Downloader will give you the option of downloading the entire channel 4. Download the YouTube video The YouTube video will now be downloaded for you. If there are other videos in the creator's channel, 4K Video Downloader will ask whether you want to download those as well. It can download up to 24 videos at once. Once the video has finished downloading, you can find it in the destination folder, or right-click it in 4K Video Downloader and select 'Play'. Unless you adjust the settings, the video will stay in this list until you choose to remove it – even if you close and restart the software. With Smart Mode, you can download YouTube Videos with a single click. It saves your settings so you don't have to re-enter them each time 5. Try Smart Mode If you often download videos in the same format, check out Smart Mode. This saves your download preferences and loads them automatically. Click the lightbulb icon at the top right and next time you paste a URL into 4K Video Downloader, it will be downloaded instantly with the last settings you used.

Software industry's impact in 2020: 15.8 million jobs and $933 billion to the US economy This one hour, free session will help you better understand: What is Paragon? Where are we going? How to apply automation for network provisioning, management and orchestration? Join us for our first session May 11, 2021 where we will introduce the full Paragon Automation suite. Registration is free. White Papers provided by Juniper Networks Victoria Espinel, president of Software.org: the BSA Foundation and president and CEO of BSA | The Software Alliance, said in a press release that software played a key role during the pandemic by powering remote work, helping manufacturers shift to producing medical and personal protective equipment, and helping small businesses connect with customers online. "During a difficult year, software supported more than 15.8 million jobs across sectors," Espinel said. "Meanwhile, the need for software skills continues to increase, further underscoring the need for retraining programs that will equip more Americans with the skills to take advantage of growing opportunities in the digital economy." The total number of jobs is up 5.9% since 2018. The report also found that in 2020, 3.3 million people worked directly in software jobs in the United States which is a 7.2% increase over 2018. This year's update builds on earlier reports with an analysis of 2020 data to quantify the scope of software's impact and to show change in job totals and economic impact over time. The report also tracked software jobs and economic activity in all 50 states. Between 2018 and 2020, the software industry's economic impact grew by double digits in more than half of states and the District of Columbia. Growth was up by more than 25% in Idaho, Nevada and Washington. Direct jobs in the industry went up 18.7% in New Mexico, 12.9% in New York, 10.9% in Texas and 10.1% in Florida. Chris Hopfensperger, executive director of Software.org: the BSA Foundation, said in a press release that the benefits of the software industry aren't limited to large cities or traditional tech hubs. "In 2020, software job growth surged in several states that we don't usually associate with the tech industry, including Colorado, Florida, and Wisconsin," Hopfensperger said. "As tech industry employees embrace remote work, we anticipate continued software job growth across the country." The report measures the software industry's impact on the U.S. economy with data and analysis from The Economist Intelligence Unit. The research explores the growth of the software industry between 2018 and 2020 and measures its contributions to value-added GDP, job growth, and wage growth in 50 states and the District of Columbia.

EU Explores Massive Local Semiconductor Alliance and Fab In a move that echoes the whole endeavor of the European Union in general, the conglomeration of nations is exploring the idea of a semiconductor alliance as an alternative (or a complement) to a leading-edge fab built by a multinational chip company, according to a Reuters report. The general idea here is if one company (or country) can’t afford a leading-edge semiconductor production facility, a number of companies can do it with assistance from 27 national governments. Europe is home to semiconductor companies like Infineon, NXP, and STMicroelectronics, as well as lithography equipment giant ASML. The EU is considering building an alliance consisting of these companies in a bid to reduce Europe's dependence on foreign chipmakers. U.S.-based GlobalFoundries, which operates Europe's largest fab in Dresden, Germany, could also be a part of the alliance, according to the report that cites four sources. EU politicians think that the project could be backed using a pan-European scheme called an Important Project of Common European Interest (IPCEI), which enables national governments to fund it under simpler state aid rules. GlobalFoundries (Image credit: GlobalFoundries) This also fits with the European Union's plan to increase the bloc's share in the global semiconductor market. The EU wants to produce 20% of the world's chips and processors (by value) by 2030, up from 10% today. There are several ways for the EU to catch up with Taiwan, South Korea, and the U.S. when it comes to leading-edge fabs and fabrication technologies. One approach is to attract Intel, Samsung Foundry, and/or TSMC to Europe with various incentives. Intel has operated a leading-edge fab in Ireland for decades, so European politicians have to make sure it stays there going forward and perhaps to persuade the CPU giant to build another fab in another European country. An EU Commissioner is set to meet with Intel's CEO Pat Gelsinger on Friday. Meanwhile, TSMC is not particularly interested in building a fab in Europe as there are not many customers (i.e., chip designers) or consumers (i.e., high-volume factories like those operated by Foxconn) there. Furthermore, not everyone in Europe is happy with the idea of a foreign fab in the EU. "Politicians like shiny things and sometimes tend to sacrifice long-term industrial policies for short-term announcements," a senior French official is reported to have said. "If we step on the toes of European players, then I am not sure our sovereignty will gain anything from it." Another approach is to consolidate local chipmakers, fund development of both bleeding-edge and specialty fabrication processes, and then provide financial assistance to build advanced fabs in Europe. Modern process technologies cost billions of U.S. dollars, whereas a leading-edge fab costs tens of billions and requires regular upgrades. Semiconductor market analysts say that governments will need to spend at least $150 billion over the next five years to have a serious go at catching up with companies like Samsung or TSMC. So in many ways, pooling the resources (both financial and technological) of several resources makes sense. Still, this would be a huge, long-term undertaking, even for a large collection of nations.