homepod
Smart People Seem to Agree, HomePod is an Echo and Home Competitor
Daring Fireball: HomePod’s Priorities
The difference between HomePod and Amazon Echo isn’t that they’re in different product categories. They’re in the same category. No one other than a gadget reviewer is going to put both a HomePod and Echo in their kitchen. They’re going to have one. It is, most
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The Apple Watch as a Stepping Stone to the Future
Above Avalon: Apple Watch Is a Bridge to the Future
Close to 20 million people bought an Apple Watch in 2017 because the device has become a bridge between the present and future. By including a screen, Apple Watch retains the familiarity found with smartphones, tablets, and laptops/desktops. At the same time, Apple Watch
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Why I Could Be Wrong About the HomePod
HomePod, the iPod for your home - AppleInsider:
Despite all the logically-reasoned chat about why it couldn't possibly fool buyers into paying more for a better device that made them happier than the cheapest knockoff or a previous, clunkier version of technology, Apple's iPod found a base of enthusiastic users--even
Game
State of the Game Industry 2018 Results
The Game Developer Conference does a survey of thousands of game developers every year and I always find it interesting as a way to get a pulse on the industry overall. You can get the report yourself here, but I’ve picked out some of the highlights below.
60% of devs are currently working on
ios
The iOS "Spring Edition" is Coming Soon (developer beta likely coming today)
Apple is continuing their tradition of having feature-packed spring updates to iOS:
In addition to horizontal surfaces like tables and chairs, ARKit can now recognize and place virtual objects on vertical surfaces like walls and doors, and can more accurately map irregularly shaped surfaces like circular tables.
This is a really cool addition to
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Tim Cook on What Sets the HomePod Apart
Tim Cook’s visit to Shopify all about augmented reality, as Apple CEO praises ‘profound’ emerging technology | Financial Post
“We think one thing that was missing from this market was a quality audio experience, a very immersive audio experience,” Cook said. “Music deserves that kind of quality as opposed to some kind of squeaky sound.
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DuckDuckGo Updates Their Extension and Browser, Complete with Privacy Grades
DuckDuck Go on their company blog:
Today we're excited to launch fully revamped versions of our browser extension and mobile app, extending DuckDuckGo's protection beyond the search box to wherever the Internet takes you.
I don’t know if I’ll use their iOS/Android browser, but I’ve already installed
ios
Apple Trying to Get MacBook Down to $999. Maybe They Should also Try One with iOS.
Apple Said to Release New Entry-Level 13-inch MacBook This Year, Likely Replacing MacBook Air - Mac Rumors
Apple's next entry-level MacBook will likely replace the 13-inch MacBook Air, Apple's lowest-cost notebook starting at $999. Apple's long-term aim was for the 12-inch MacBook to
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Sundar Pichai Does Not Regret Firing That One Idiot
Google CEO Sundar Pichai says he does not regret firing James Damore - The Verge
“I regret that people misunderstand that we may have made this for a political belief one way or another,” Pichai said. “It’s important for the women at Google, and all the people at Google, that we want to make an
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My Goodness, my State is Unhappy!
This Map Shows Which States Are 'The Worst Possible State To Live In' - Digg
According to this map from Gallup, 21-25% of the population living in states like Illinois, Connecticut, and Rhode Island characterize their states as "the worst possible state to live in."
Those numbers are just shocking to
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Why OnePlus’s Credit Card Data Breach is Particularly Bad
The other shoe dropped today forOnePlus, who announced they had determined as many as 40,000 customers’ card information had been compromised.
According to the internal investigation, a malicious script was running on one of the company’s payment processing servers and was able to capture customer’s full credit card numbers, expiration dates, and
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Meet the New Headphone Struggles, (mostly the) Same as the Old Headphone Struggles
You can almost set your watch by The Verge articles about how the 3.5mm headphone jack was glorious and everything is bad now that it’s gone from most of the the more important smartphones today. They had another one today and once again I’m just not sold.
It’s all with the
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Voice Assistants' Blind Spot
Smart Audio Report on Smart Speaker Adoption in the U.S. – MacStories:
To me, this suggests that either owners of smart speakers aren't familiar with smartphone assistants (I doubt it) or that there is indeed something useful about stationary speakers that smartphones can't fully replicate.
Federico Viticci nails it here. As
Game
FIFA 18 Sold Better on Switch than PS4 in Japan
FIFA 18 Switch Has Officially Outsold The PS4 Version In Japan | NintendoSoup:
FIFA 18 sales on Nintendo Switch have officially overtaken FIFA 18 sales on PS4. According to Dengeki Online, as of January 7, 2018, the PS4 version has sold 77,892 copies since launch, while the Switch version sold 89,329 copies.
This oh
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OnePlus Shuts Down Credit Card Payments on its Online Store
An Update on Credit Card Security - OnePlus Forums:
As a precaution, we are temporarily disabling credit card payments at oneplus.net. PayPal is still available, and we are exploring alternative secure payment options with our service providers.
This comes one day after dozens of OnePlus customers reported fraudulent activity on their cards right after buying
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Philips Hue App Getting a Much Needed Update Soon
Philips announced a few new things to do with their Hue line of products at CES this week, and this part stood out to me the most:
In Q2 2018, the company plans to update its iOS and Android apps to version 3.0, bringing about a redesign of the app inspired by comments and
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Titanic
The Insane True Story Of How "Titanic" Got Made - BuzzFeed
Mechanic told him, “this film is wildly out of control. Nothing is going to change that. All we can do now is contain it. So here are some scenes we’d like you to cut from the shooting schedule.” Cameron studied the list
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Lifesum health tracking app adds new AI image recognition feature for food logging | 9to5Mac
Lifesum health tracking app adds new AI image recognition feature for food logging | 9to5Mac:
Lifesum, a popular calorie counter and nutrition tracking app on iOS, is rolling out a new image recognition feature that allows users to snap a picture of their food to log ingredients and nutrition information
I've used this feature