As long-term Android users know all too well, it’s common for trendy apps to hit iOS first. We get them on Android later, sometimes with some platform-specific tweaks. After making an impression on iPhone, Molskin Actions (like the notebooks) has finally come to Android, but you can only download it in a few countries right now. […]
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Inside Sirin Labs’ first blockchain smartphone retail store
Way back in March 2016, an Israeli stealth startup called Sirin Labs unveiled the premium privacy-focused Solarin smartphone. The catch? The device would cost a hefty $14,000 — somewhat outside the price range of the average consumer. Fast-forward nearly three years, and Solarin is no more. Sirin Labs actually announced […]
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Alexa can now read your news like a newscaster
Alexa can now deliver the news with the tenor and tone of a professional newscaster, thanks to a new artificial intelligence (AI) technique. Starting today for customers in the U.S., as first spotted by TechCrunch, Alexa will brief you on the day’s events and narrate snippets from Wikipedia with a “more […]
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Project Alias feeds smart speakers white noise to preserve privacy
Smart speakers have a problem: They occasionally record things they shouldn’t. In May of last year, a woman claimed that her Amazon Echo taped a private conversation and forwarded it to a person she didn’t know. And in December, a technical error resulted in Amazon sending an Alexa user 1,700 […]
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Pew: 74% of users don’t know Facebook records their ad preferences
Facebook has been in the news quite a bit for its ad targeting over the past year, most notably with reports that the now-defunct Cambridge Analytica used improperly obtained data to develop “personality” profiles on U.S. voters and target ads toward them during the 2016 U.S. presidential election. But many […]
Read More19 temporarily free and 36 on-sale apps and games for Wednesday
Article Contents Another week is about half done, so that means it’s time for another round of app sales. Today’s list is small and features more questionable items. Have fun and see you all on Friday. Free Apps Clipboard Manager Pro $1.99 -> Free; Sale ends in 9 hours Side Protect: Auto Touch Guard $0.99 […]
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Perceptin’s visual perception system for trains has a 1,000-meter range
Lidar — laser-based sensors that produce depth data by measuring the distance between themselves and objects — are the cornerstone of self-driving systems from Google parent company Alphabet’s Waymo, Uber, and others. They’ve been employed for decades in space travel (during the Apollo 15 mission) and military reconnaissance, most recently […]
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Bold Commerce raises $16.5 million to bring AI to ecommerce stores on Shopify and elsewhere
Bold Commerce, a software development company that builds tools, integrations, and enhanced functionality for ecommerce stores, has raised CDN$22 million ($16.5 million) in a series A round of funding from Whitecap Venture Partners and Round13 Capital. Founded out of Winnipeg, Canada, in 2013, Bold Commerce currently develops 20 apps that can […]
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Facebook to bring stricter ads rules to countries with big votes in 2019
(Reuters) — Facebook told Reuters on Tuesday that it would extend some of its political advertising rules and tools for curbing election interference to India, Nigeria, Ukraine and the European Union before significant votes in the next few months. As the largest social media service in nearly every big country, […]
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YouTube is cracking down on dangerous pranks and stunts like the Bird Box challenge
YouTube has published new policies for its video platform that state it won’t allow content depicting dangerous pranks and stunts like the Bird Box and Tide Pod challenges. Good. The company wants to prevent creators from engaging in these activities and from encouraging viewers to participate. Its updated Community Guidelines […]
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VLC For The Nintendo Switch Is Being Considered
VLC’s media player has been around for awhile already, and it is widely used across devices like smartphones, tablets, and computers. However it seems that VideoLan isn’t content with just those platforms and are looking to expand the app’s availability. This is according to the president and lead developer of […]
Read MoreTwitter’s chronological timeline rolls out to Android app
Twitter announced last year that it was bringing back the fully chronological timeline. It didn’t launch the feature right away, and even when it did, iOS got it first. Oh well, such is life (and you should be used to it by now). Today is the big day for Android, though. Head to your Twitter […]
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Mozilla kills its experimental Firefox Test Pilot program 3 years after launch
Mozilla has revealed that it’s closing Firefox Test Pilot, an experimental program that has allowed early adopters and the perennially curious to try out fledgling features that are still works-in-progress. The Test Pilot program is available as a browser extension for Windows, OS X, and Linux, and first launched back in […]
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Netflix raises U.S. subscription prices by up to 18%
(Reuters) — Netflix is raising monthly fees for its U.S. subscribers by between 13 percent and 18 percent, the video streaming pioneer’s first price increase since 2017 as it spends heavily on original content and international expansion. Prices for its popular standard plan, which allows streaming on two devices at […]
Read MorePandora app gets voice controls powered by SoundHound
OAKLAND, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Pandora (NYSE:P), the largest streaming music provider in the U.S., today introduced Voice Mode, a new, native smart assistant that allows listeners to control Pandora’s mobile app and enjoy new music discovery using simple voice commands, providing an intuitive, hands-free experience tailored for the unique tastes of each user. Starting today, Pandora will […]
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Bringg raises $25 million to facilitate last-mile deliveries
The delivery logistics market is enormous. A recent study projects it will reach $29.06 billion by 2027, driven by increasing commercial and industrial demand. One company that’s riding the wave pretty skillfully is Bringg, a Tel Aviv and Chicago startup cofounded in 2013 by Lior Sion, previously CTO of Gett and […]
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Boxy’s macOS app is like Gmail, but sexier
I started using a MacBook nearly 3 years ago and since then I’ve been hunting for a perfect desktop Gmail client. I’ve tried clients like Apple Mail and Thunderbird but somehow I kept going back to the now-defunct Google Inbox or Gmail on the web. But almost two months ago […]
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TikTok owner Bytedance unveils Snapchat clone Duoshan
On the heels of teen-focused social app TikTok’s skyrocketing popularity, parent company Bytedance today announced Duoshan, a standalone video-messaging app that borrows a page from Snapchat’s playbook. Duoshan, which is Chinese for “flashes,” allows users to record and send each other short videos that disappear after 72 hours. The company says […]
Read More37 temporarily free and 29 on-sale apps and games to start the week
Article Contents Good evening. Despite it being a bit later than usual, I have the first round of app sales for the week. Today’s list has a few notable items and we see the return of the ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ section — I know that some of you are very excited about this. Free Apps inches to centimeters or […]
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Pinterest misses 2018 hiring goal for underrepresented minorities in tech roles, hits other targets
In its annual diversity report, Pinterest continues to hit its hiring goals for women in engineering and underrepresented minorities in non-technical roles, while struggling to reach its goals for underrepresented minorities in engineering roles. At the end of 2018, Pinterest’s employee base was 47 percent female, compared to 45 percent female […]
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WriteMapper 2 is a flexible, dead-simple desktop app for mind mapping
I’ve been using mind maps more often lately, to plan feature stories, as well as for household maintenance and hobby projects. While pen and paper work great, software tools are more flexible and can accommodate detailed information better. I tested a bunch of web apps like Mindmeister and Bubbl over […]
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Automattic announces Newspack, a next-gen news publishing platform backed by Google
WordPress.com parent Automattic has announced a new publishing platform for news sites, designed to help small to medium-sized publications generate more revenue. The initiative, which is called Newspack by WordPress.com, is launching in partnership with News Revenue Hub and Spirited Media. Interestingly, Newspack is backed by $2.4 million in funding from […]
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