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Communication and Technology news
Google’s new all-encompassing Google Travel features make you your own travel agent
2019-05-15

Google Maps, Trips, Hotels, Flights, and Search now all live in one place. Tell the boss that you’re escaping the relentless rain and taking all your vacation days, because Google is making it easier than ever to book a vacation. The company announced today that Google Maps, Trips, Hotels, Flights, and Search...

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle criticized for promoting pricey “emotional workout”
2019-05-15

The new parents highlighted more than a dozen accounts in the wellness sphere, ranging from meditation to fitness. In honor of Mental Health Awareness Month, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex shared a few of their favorite brands that promote mental well-being, but not everyone is feeling better.Read Full Story

Pixel phone owners: Google may owe you $500
2019-05-15

Google settles a class-action lawsuit over faulty Pixel microphones. Google will pay original Pixel owners up to $500 after settling a class action lawsuit over phones with defective microphones. As Fast Company first reported last year, the lawsuit alleged that Google knowingly sold the faulty phones, even after...

Sonos finally supports Google Assistant voice control (and it plays nice with Alexa)
2019-05-14

I’ve been trying to avoid the word “finally” in my headlines, but I think this one gets a pass: Over a year and a half after it was originally promised, Sonos has brought the Google Assistant to its voice-powered speakers – namely the Sonos One and Beam. Finally. The timing isn’t entirely a surprise; the...

The Google Assistant has finally come to Sonos speakers
2019-05-14

The multi-room music system now works with your voice assistant of choice from Amazon or Google—but only one at a time. Back in October 2017, Sonos unveiled a new speaker called the Sonos One. It aimed to meld the company’s traditional strength—great-sounding music with a multi-room...

The WhatsApp hack proves security should trump consumer choice
2019-05-14

The discovery of a zero-day vulnerability in WhatsApp, one of the world’s most widely used messaging apps, is nothing short of frightening. This vulnerability allowed an adversary, who is yet to be identified (but I’d bet my left kidney that it’s some flavor of nefarious state actor), to install sophisticated...

This isn’t the job I signed up for: What now?
2019-05-14

The low unemployment rate has some employers overselling themselves–and new hires are winding up in roles that aren’t exactly as advertised. It’s a longstanding cliché that job hunters bend the truth on their résumés to portray themselves in a better light, but with unemployment at...

Google is opening a privacy engineering hub in Europe
2019-05-14

With the opening of the Google Safety Engineering Center in Germany, Google is showing that it’s willing, if not eager, to play by the rules. Google CEO Sundar Pichai has announced that the company is set to double the number of its privacy engineers and is opening a privacy engineering hub in Munich....

You’re probably being tricked by “health washing” at the grocery store
2019-05-14

Here’s how to avoid this sleight-of-hand move by packaging designers. Organic. All natural. High protein. Such tantalizing words seem to adorn every package at the grocery store. Even Lucky Charms, a cereal that’s largely dyed candy, promises that it has “whole grains” and is “gluten...

PSA: Update WhatsApp now to prevent spyware from being installed on your phone
2019-05-14

WhatsApp, the messaging app used by more than 1.5 billion worldwide, says it’s patched a critical security vulnerability which allowed attackers to secretly infect phones with malicious spyware by just calling phone numbers over an in-app audio call. The Facebook-owned company said the attack targeted a “select...

9 things you need to know about the WhatsApp spyware attack
2019-05-14

The spyware allowed the attacker to take over iPhones and Android phones by simply placing a WhatsApp voice call to them. Facebook-owned WhatsApp is urging all of its users worldwide to update the app to the latest version of the software after it discovered that the app’s integrity had been compromised. The...

Twitter bug accidentally shared location data of some iOS users
2019-05-14

Twitter says it has fixed a bug that resulted in a user’s approximate location information being shared with an unnamed Twitter partner. “We have discovered that we were inadvertently collecting and sharing iOS location data with one of our trusted partners in certain circumstances,” the company said. According...

Cancel Netflix for Disney? Only 7% say they would
2019-05-14

It’s a very limited survey, but analysts are already declaring it proof that Netflix will be able to ride out Disney+’s impending arrival. In a new survey from investment banking firm Piper Jaffray, 73% of Netflix users say they won’t subscribe to Disney+.Read Full Story

Elon Musk shows off SpaceX’s Starlink internet satellites before launch
2019-05-13

The satellites will provide internet access on earth where there’s currently a lack of reliable broadband. SpaceX CEO has taken to Twitter to show off a couple of pictures of the first 60 Starlink internet satellites headed to low Earth orbit later this week. The satellites are “flatpacked” into...

Here’s why I’m genuinely excited about GitHub’s new package registry
2019-05-13

Fridays are frequently used by companies to bury bad news. By announcing dismal sales figures and privacy SNAFUs when everyone has left the newsroom (either in body or in mind), they can avoid the attention and scrutiny they’d otherwise get on literally any other day of the working week. I mention this because on...

HTC’s new $300 blockchain phone will double as a Bitcoin node
2019-05-13

Taiwainese mobile phone manufacturer HTC is launching a more affordable blockchain phone with full Bitcoin node capabilities. Originally announced last month, the Exodus 1S will be launching in Q3 this year and will have an extra SD card to support its blockchain capabilities. For what it’s worth, HTC was gunning to...

POWr can outfit your site with a full set of growth tools for only $35
2019-05-12

For new businesses with a small staff (or in many cases, a staff of one), that’s a lot of critical real estate that can go untended. Thankfully, services like online digital marketing aide POWr are stepping up to fill some of those gaps. Right now, you can land a lifetime subscription to POWr Website Plugins Starter...

Twitter tears into Delta for its tone-deaf anti-union, pro-video game poster
2019-05-11

Delta Airlines is passing around anti-union posters comparing union dues to the price of a new console, implying the latter will bring employees more joy than the former. And this particular message is uniting both gamers and pro-union labor leaders in a single message: WTF, Delta? The message, a poster emblazoned...

Rihanna’s new brand will sit alongside Dior, Givenchy, and Celine
2019-05-10

Rihanna will create a new brand for the world’s largest luxury conglomerate, LVMH. Rihanna Robyn Fenty–better known as simply Rihanna–is finally getting the recognition she deserves as a designer. Today, LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, the world’s largest luxury group, which is...

Elon Musk trolling Jeff Bezos is the ridiculous space race 2019 deserves
2019-05-10

Why can’t the two space companies just get along? In the wake of Jeff Bezos’s announcement that Blue Origin will shoot for the moon, Elon Musk is shooting off his mouth on Twitter, again.Read Full Story

How the founder of Google Creative Lab turned it into a juggernaut
2019-05-10

The Google Creative Lab lives in a murky space between culture, tech, and marketing. But cofounder Robert Wong has a clear North Star. For the past 11 years, Robert Wong has run the Google Creative Lab. At a company known for its engineering efficiency, the NYC lab was an early bright spot for quirky thinking inside...

This supercut of Mark Zuckerberg promising Facebook growth is literal art
2019-05-10

The artist Ben Grosser watched hundreds of interviews to create his latest project, a video spanning 14 years of the Facebook CEO’s statements on growth. “I’m angry that his focus on growth led him to sacrifice security and civility for clicks.” In a recent op-ed for the New York Times,...

Android Q’s new gestures are an iPhone rip-off–and a missed opportunity
2019-05-10

The iPhone X’s gesture navigation could use improvement. Too bad Google just copied it wholesale. In the grand tradition of tech companies shamelessly imitating one another, the next version of Android includes a straight-up copy of the gesture navigation Apple introduced with 2017’s iPhone X.Read Full...

Google’s Cassie Kozyrkov on why we shouldn’t fear AI
2019-05-10

At TNW2019, Google’s Chief Decision Scientist Cassie Kozyrkov took to the main stage to share her thoughts on humans’ responsibility behind creating and using AI tools. In a talk titled “Automating Beyond Human Expression,” Kozyrkov explained why she believes we shouldn’t fear AI, but the humans building it....

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