Going to the movies was a thing we used to do -- and may do again in the future. However, if you’re going to an AMC theater anywhere in the world, you won’t find any Universal films. The theater chain declared war once NBCUniversal execs told The Wall Street Journal that they plan on continuing a premium VOD release strategy even after the coronavirus pandemic subsides and theaters reopen.

The folks at Universal figure they can do that because Trolls World Tour made a reported $95 million since its straight-to-digital rental debut earlier this month. Warner Bros. has lined up a similar strategy for Scoob! next month, and AMC is clearly trying to scare off others from moving in that direction. Meanwhile, the Academy announced that, this year only, movies scheduled for a theatrical release that went straight to streaming instead are still eligible to win the Oscar for Best Picture. And the battle continues.

-- Richard

How to buy a monitor in 2020

It’s one of the trickiest components to get for your PC.

Shopping for a new PC monitor? Do you need it to be 4K compatible? Does it work with HDR? How much are you willing to spend? Steve Dent lays out what you need to know (there are more questions...) and offers several recommendations, from sub-$200 up to $4,000 options for the pros and the one-percenters. Oh, and you can’t always trust the listed specs.

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Ford pushes back its self-driving taxis to 2022

COVID-19 has put autonomous driving on hold.

Ford

Ford revealed during its quarterly earnings that plans for a commercial service based on autonomous vehicles have been delayed. This is apparently due to the effects of the coronavirus, shaking up where self-driving cars will exist in a world hit by a pandemic. Ford COO Jim Farley warned that it could influence society for “many years to come,” with people seeking out more ways to avoid unnecessary human contact.

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Pentagon officially releases 'UFO' footage

They’re still unidentified.

US Navy

The Department of Defense has officially released three video clips showing “unidentified aerial phenomena” (aka UFOs) darting around the skies above US military bases. The footage had previously been released in 2007 by a private company. The department decided to release the clips "in order to clear up any misconceptions by the public on whether or not the footage that has been circulating was real, or whether or not there is more to the videos."

In the clips, you can hear the pilots who captured the footage express surprise at how quickly the objects are moving. These reports resulted in the Pentagon running an official UFO identification program for five years until 2012, when funding ran out.

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Apple will pay $18 million to settle broken-FaceTime suit

Each class action member is only getting $3, though.

Apple

Apple has agreed to pay $18 million to settle a case accusing the company of intentionally breaking FaceTime on iOS 6. The class action lawsuit, filed in 2017, argued that the tech giant disabled the video-calling application on the iPhone 4 and 4S as a cost-saving measure.

Due to a patent dispute involving the peer-to-peer method with VirnetX, Apple had to rely more on third-party servers, costing it millions of dollars. Apple eventually released new peer-to-peer tech with iOS 7, and the plaintiffs claimed that the company broke the app on purpose, forcing users to upgrade their platforms.

None of the plaintiffs will have a massive payout -- each class action member is only getting $3 per affected device. Don’t spend it all at once.

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