AMD is on the ball about as much as any company can be when it comes to trying to patch hardware flaws in their processors. The good news is that they've patched the Spectre issue that cropped up with the second variant, but the bad news is that you'll have to wait for a BIOS update for your mainboard - or system board in your laptop in order to apply the patch. Hopefully things get figured out sooner rather than later.

AMD's update has been made available to its hardware partners, with patches designed for processors going back to CPUs built on 2011's "Bulldozer" architecture. While that's likely most in current operation, it's not clear exactly which processors have received the patches. It's also not clear when end users will see the fix, as you'll have to wait for the maker of your desktop or motherboard to release a new BIOS with the patch wrapped in.

Source: Engadget

BlackBerry was pretty much out of the fight for a few years, but with TCL at the helm of the hardware ship, they are once again making pretty compelling hardware. The Passport was their big (emphasis on BIG) return to the physical keyboard and was followed up by the KEYone. Now they are following up the KEYone with the Athena. I've got a big of a soft-spot for physical keyboards and with a name like Athena, well, I'm sure it going to be great!

The rear looks to be made from a different texture from the KEYone and you can also see that Athena will have dual camera sensors and an LED flash. Furthermore, the physical buttons like the power, volume rocker, and convenience key - have all been moved to one side. The Athena will still have a 3.5mm headphone jack, USB Type C, and downward firing speaker. While things look good, we still do not have any information about a release date or a price.

Source: Neowin

Not surprisingly, Facebook has admitted that their Cambridge Analytica data mining/breach was worse than the 50 million users that they originally thought claiming the number could be now closer to 87 million. 

Chances are good it'll probably end up being even more, seeing as they don't really know how many accounts were used chances are good this number will continue to grow. BGR has the story.

Facebook’s ongoing charm offensive following the Cambridge Analytica scandal took a hit this week as the company revealed in a blog post that far more users than originally reported may have been affected by the breach.

Initial reports, such as this one from the New York Times, estimated that more than 50 million users had their private information harvested by the political data firm. But now Facebook says that up to 87 million people may have been affected. We don’t have to do any complicated math to see how shocking of a correction that is.

We have just posted up Episode #430 of Weekly Tech Update! In this episode we will be discussing Facebook still hasn't fixed its problem, Apple contemplates life after Intel and goodbye Steam Machines - the gaming system that never really was. We have those stories and more...

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Analysts are scratching their heads on Tesla right now and some are even predicting that Tesla might be bankrupt in a matter of months. Tesla has had major issues getting their Model 3 cars to market in a timely matter, has seen their demand for their higher end vehicles decrease, and overall just keep losing money.

Interestingly enough, with Tesla's current stock prices, they are currently valued more than Ford. Here's another fun fact, in 2017, Ford produced 6 million vehicles and made $7.6 billion profit. Tesla produced 100,000 vehicles and lost 2 billion.

Marketwatch has the full story. 

Unless Elon Musk “pulls a rabbit out of his hat,” Tesla will be bankrupt within four months, says John Thompson of Vilas Capital Management.

“Companies eventually have to make a profit, and I don’t ever see that happening here,” he told MarketWatch. “This is one of the worst income statements I’ve ever seen and between the story and the financials, the financials will win out in this case."

Here's a recipe for success:

• Add 1 part Mario Kart - The video game that has ruined many friendships
• Then mix in 1 part Monopoly - The board game that ends in a fight and the board being flung across the room

And BAM!! You've got the new Mario Kart version of Monopoly that will most likely end with a fist fight and quite possibly multiple black eyes. 

Seriously, this is a bad idea and needs to be stopped.

Gameinformer has the detals.

We have just posted up Episode #429 of Weekly Tech Update! In this episode we will be discussing the Facebook crap-tacular, Apple's upcoming release event and Uber suspended from Autonomous vehicle testing in Arizona. We have those stories and more...

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We have just posted our evaluation of the LG V30 64GB Smartphone. This is a solid device that packs in the Snapdragon 835 processor, enough ram and storage to get pretty much every job done. The camera quality is stellar and the overall fit and finish is fantastic. If you need a new wireless device and can score a good deal on one of these, you should seriously consider the LG V30. It's the first device I've used that could happily replace my S8.

It's been a few years since I've ridden the LG Smartphone wagon and I got to say, it was good to be back. The V30 is everything you need in a smartphone and then exceeds your needs and gives you a truckload of things that you want. Great battery life. Check. Amazing wide-angle camera. Check. Fantastic screen. Check. Excellent audio quality thanks to Quad DACs. Check. Smooth, plain interface that doesn't lag - and the list goes on and on.

This week has pretty much just been Facebook news thanks to a couple scandals that they are involved from and the fact that shareholders are dumping stock causing their value to plummet.

The guys over at TechCrunch look at the issues that Facebook is faceing and ask the question, whether it might be the time for Mark Zuckerberg to resign?

I've got a funny feeling this will be a topic of conversation on an upcoming WeeklyTechUpdate episode....

Facebook is at the center of a dozen controversies, and outrage is peaking. The social network has failed again and again at expanding beyond a handful of core features. Doubts of its usefulness, and assertions of its uselessness, are multiplying. A crisis of confidence at multiple levels threatens the company’s structure and mission. Now is the time for Mark Zuckerberg to spare himself the infamy and resign — for Facebook’s sake and his own.

I’m not calling for his resignation, and I don’t say this out of any animus toward Zuckerberg; I personally believe him to be genuine and driven in his stated desire to connect the world — but likely increasingly frustrated by the unexpected consequences of this naive ambition and the haste with which he has pursued it. I just think that it has come to the point where the best way for him to advance that ambition is to leave.

Thanks to Facebook's privacy crisis, shareholders have been dumping stock and so far in just 2 days Facebook has seen a $60 billion dollar drop in their value. To put that drop in perspective, Tesla is worth $52 billion.

Bloomberg has the details.

Facebook Inc.’s privacy crisis has turned into a shareholder crisis.

The social media giant has lost over $60 billion in market value over the past two days, following revelations that personal data of millions of users was obtained by a data analytics firm. That’s more than the market capitalization of Tesla Inc. at around $52 billion or three times that of Snapchat owner Snap Inc. at about $19 billion.