Sadly, not all of the Pixel 2’s surprises have been the good sort since Google’s latest flagship launched. Visual Core is one of the more pleasant ones, though — a custom system-on-a-chip (SoC) that’s just been hanging out in the phone not really doing much of anything. It seemed that the component simply wasn’t ready for public consumption when the phone hit… Read More
Sadly, not all of the Pixel 2’s surprises have been the good sort since Google’s latest flagship launched. Visual Core is one of the more pleasant ones, though — a custom system-on-a-chip (SoC) that’s just been hanging out in the phone not really doing much of anything. It seemed that the component simply wasn’t ready for public consumption when the phone hit… Read More
Microsoft Office is now available for Google Chromebook users through the Google Play Store – a notable addition, given the two companies offer competing products in terms of office productivity software. Neither Google nor Microsoft are making a formal announcement about the Office applications’ arrival on Chromebooks. But we understand the Office Android apps will only be free… Read More
Microsoft Office is now available for Google Chromebook users through the Google Play Store – a notable addition, given the two companies offer competing products in terms of office productivity software. Neither Google nor Microsoft are making a formal announcement about the Office applications’ arrival on Chromebooks. But we understand the Office Android apps will only be free… Read More
One of the most untrue myths about gamers is that they’re all antisocial and awkward. In fact, gamers are some of the most social people online. Games are simply more fun when played together with others, and that’s true for both single-player and multiplayer games. Are you looking for a social network where you can meet other like-minded gamers? I’ve got good news and bad news for you. The bad news is that gaming social networks are passe. Most “Facebook for gamers”-type sites are defunct, abandoned, or gone. The good news is that there are plenty of faux social networks...
Read the full article: 3 Awesome Social Networks Just for Gamers
Google confirms it has now addressed an issue that caused the YouTube app to drain the battery excessively when running on iOS devices, even when the app was idle in the background. In some cases, users reported the device would even become heated as a result of the problem, but not everyone experienced this issue. It’s unclear to what extent the issue affected the combined iOS and… Read More
Google.org is donating $7.5 million to racial justice organizations Vera Institute for Justice, LatinoJustice, The Leadership Conference and R Street’s Justice for Work Coalition. This brings Google.org’s total amount of funding to racial justice organizations to $32 million since 2015. Google.org’s racial justice portfolio arc has focused on the three Ps: policing,… Read More
Kodi and the Amazon Fire TV Stick are two of the most popular ways to consume content at home. In case you’re not aware, Kodi is a home theater app that acts as a library and management tool for all your media, while the Amazon Fire TV Stick is a streaming device that provides access to apps such as Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime Video. To give you an idea of the numbers, at the time of writing roughly 40 million people use Kodi, and Amazon has sold more than 65 million Fire TV Sticks to date. However, although users are...
Read the full article: What Not to Do With Your Amazon Fire TV Stick and Kodi
Google announced today it’s expanding the focus of its Google Trends service – the site that lets anyone track what the world’s web searchers are looking for in both real time and non-real time. The service now includes data from more Google products beyond web search, the company says, with the addition of search data from verticals like Google News, Shopping, Images and… Read More
Windows Mobile 10, and its predecessor, Windows Phone, are dead. Updates, and support, are ending. There are no new devices on the horizon. PC-in-your-pocket system Continuum has proved to be of little interest. Mobile users don’t want a PC in their pocket, they want a phone — like an Android, for example. One of the things that Microsoft did well on Windows Phone devices was produce intuitive apps, and make mobile data management simpler. The user interface was unique and pleasing to use, too. But this is not the end for Microsoft’s mobile ambitions. They have a number of apps,...
Read the full article: How Android Became My New Windows Phone
Over the holiday weekend, The New York Times found that one of its Twitter accounts had been locked. @nytimesworld was frozen for a full 24 hours over a innocuous tweet about a story in which Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau apologized for the country’s treatment of indigenous school children. Twitter restored the account Sunday afternoon, apologizing to The Times “for… Read More
Today is November 27th. Which means it’s Cyber Monday. Thanksgiving is over, Black Friday has been and gone, and now it’s time for online retailers to drop their prices in order to dump their old stock. You could spend the day shopping online, but Mozilla is offering a tempting alternative. Experience The Firefox Download-A-Thon! Mozilla is celebrating Cyber Monday 2017 with what it has labelled The Firefox Download-A-Thon. This fun, tongue-in-cheek event is taking place today (11/27), so if you’re reading this any day after that you’ll be stuck watching the replay. Which won’t be half as much fun. As...
Read the full article: Celebrate Cyber Monday With a Firefox Download-A-Thon
As YouTube reels from a series of scandals related to its lack of policing around inappropriate content aimed at children, obscene comments on videos of children, horrifying search suggestions, and more, a new app called Jellies has arrived to offer parents a safer way to let their kids watch videos on mobile devices. Jellies was built by Ken Yarmosh, founder of Savvy Apps, which has been… Read More
With every passing year, we entrust our digital devices to store more of our personal information, with the internet turning into the backbone of the modern world. This has brought immeasurable benefit to billions of people around the world, but it’s also opened a huge opportunity for those that want to hurt us. Crime is no longer bound by geography — someone you’ve never met, from a country you’ve never been to, may be targeting you. Some threats we have become familiar with (phishing, viruses, and spam) are now staples of our online lives. However, each passing year brings with...
Read the full article: Watch Out for These New Security Threats in 2017
This is software to save lives. Facebook’s new “proactive detection” artificial intelligence technology will scan all posts for patterns of suicidal thoughts, and when necessary send mental health resources to the user at risk or their friends, or contact local first-responders. By using AI to flag worrisome posts to human moderators instead of waiting for user reports,… Read More
This is software to save lives. Facebook’s new “proactive detection” artificial intelligence technology will scan all posts for patterns of suicidal thoughts, and when necessary send mental health resources to the user at risk or their friends, or contact local first-responders. By using AI to flag worrisome posts to human moderators instead of waiting for user reports,… Read More
Have you ever wondered why your Linux operating system looks the way it does? Free and open source desktops offer numerous interfaces. The interface that appeared when you fired up your Linux USB stick for the first time didn’t come out of nowhere. Most distributions of Linux turn to one of two desktop environments to provide the crux of what their users see: GNOME or KDE. That’s because these are the two oldest desktop environments for free and open source desktops. KDE came first in 1996, with GNOME following a few years later in 1999. Of the two, GNOME appears...
Read the full article: Why Your Linux OS Ships With a Default Desktop Environment
So you’ve had a nice, calming two-day respite from all of the bargain hunting. But don’t worry, it’s almost over. It’s Cyber Monday, a holiday made up in 2005 because Black Friday wasn’t quite doing the trick. Sure it’s a crass cash-in and yet more grist for the end of year Capitalist mill — but the deals! Over the past few years, Cyber… Read More
A few years ago jailbreaking your iPhone was all the rage. The cat-and-mouse game of hackers versus Apple was great fun and some of the open source products available to jailbreakers – namely the Cydia alternative app store – added amazing features and customizability to the iPhone. Some devs even launched only on jailbroken phones, thumbing their noses at Apple’s walled… Read More
YouTube is firefighting another child safety content moderation scandal which has led several major brands to suspend advertising on its platform. Read More
