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Communication and Technology news
Less than 24 hours after allowing it, Roku bans the Infowars channel
2019-01-16

Over the course of 24 hours, the streaming service made an about-face. Yesterday, concerned cord-cutters expressed dismay about a new channel Roku allowed on its service: Infowars. This, of course, is the Alex Jones-controlled channel that has for years peddled conspiracy theories, such as that 9/11 was an inside job...

The personal side of business
2019-01-16

Photos from the Fast Company Innovation Festival show businesspeople as you’ve never seen them before. Since its inception in 1995, Fast Company has sought to portray business and businesspeople in surprising ways. Our focus on innovation–as opposed to mere scale or power–allows us to look beyond...

Portraits of 20 leading American business innovators
2019-01-16

What does innovation look like in 2019 and beyond? The speakers at the fourth annual Fast Company Innovation Festival weigh in. At a time when lack of faith in institutions—government, corporations, and, yes, the news media—seems to be at an all-time high, business and thought leaders who took the stage...

A cotton seed sprouted – and died – on China’s Lunar Lander
2019-01-16

On Tuesday, Chinese media reported that one of the cotton seeds aboard the Chang’e 4 lunar lander sprouted, marking the first time that any biological matter has ever grown on the moon. Unfortunately, the sprout died after nine days upon the beginning of the lander’s first lunar night on Sunday. That’s because...

Amazon adds its new Alexa Voice Remote to its Fire TV Stick
2019-01-16

Yup, you heard it right – Amazon has updated the remote included with Fire TV Stick. Before you throw your computer out of the window in celebration, this is actually cool. I promise. If you don’t know what Amazon‘s Fire TV Stick is, here’s a picture: And if that didn’t help, the Fire TV Stick is basically a...

Gillette triggers Twitter’s right-wing elite with ‘toxic masculinity’ ad
2019-01-15

Gillette, a company that sells razors, triggered a slew of right wing celebrities on social media yesterday with an advertisement featuring a new take on its old “the best a man can get” slogan. The video in question is nearly two minutes long and serves as a vehicle to call out toxic masculinity. It depicts men...

Ikea to release a hackable bed that could last a lifetime
2019-01-15

The Delaktig line of hackable furniture, developed with British design star Tom Dixon, is growing in a big way. In 2016, Ikea teamed up with the British designer Tom Dixon and design students at Parsons to develop the Delaktig “hackable” sofa–an aluminum daybed with swappable modular components...

Facebook and YouTube aren’t even trying to enforce the Alex Jones ban
2019-01-12

After Alex Jones was effectively banned from the internet — or at least his major distribution channels — last August, it appeared that we’d be rid of his half-baked conspiracy theories once and for all. Or, that’s what we thought, anyway. Following multiple “strikes” for content that violated its terms of...

Google killed the Chromecast Audio, so now’s a great time to buy one
2019-01-12

Google just discontinued one of its best and most underrated products, the Chromecast Audio. On the plus side, the company is offering a great deal as it gets rid of inventory: you can now buy the $35 dongle for just $15 on Google’s website. Launched in 2015, Chromecast Audio was an easy way to add casting abilities...

How rising Democratic stars are using Instagram to try to trump Trump’s Twitter feed
2019-01-11

The race to likability starts on Instagram. Even a year ago, it would have been (almost) unimaginable that a rising political star would live-stream his dental cleaning as a potential stepping stone to the White House. But that’s the reality we live in today, shaped and suffused and reconstructed by social...

Facebook may be making you feel less healthy
2019-01-11

When people compare themselves to Facebook friends they see as “better off,” they report worse physical health symptoms, says a new study. Facebook can have a serious impact on mental health: Studies show that spending time on the social network, which encourages endless scrolling and endless comparison...

Amazon is reportedly building a game streaming service to rival Google and Microsoft
2019-01-11

The Information reports that Amazon is putting together a game streaming service that will beam titles from the cloud right to your devices, so you can play without installing them, or even owning a powerful machine to run them. The service will see Amazon compete with Google – which is currently testing its Project...

Don’t overestimate AI’s understanding of human language
2019-01-11

This article is part of Demystifying AI, a series of posts that (try to) disambiguate the jargon and myths surrounding AI. It’s very easy to misread and overestimate achievements in artificial intelligence. And nowhere is this more evident than in the domain of human language, where appearances can falsely hint at...

Sharing your children’s bad behavior on social media is making it worse
2019-01-11

Matt Cox knew he would be criticized when he forced his 10-year-old daughter to walk 5 miles to school in 36-degree weather as her punishment for being suspended from the school bus twice for bullying. “I know a lot of you parents are not going to agree with this, but that is alright, because I’m doing what I feel...

These Chrome tab shortcuts will help you handle your tab addiction
2019-01-11

Welcome to TNW Basics, a collection of tips, tricks, guides, and advice on how to easily get the most out of your gadgets, apps, and connected services. Google’s Chrome is arguably the world’s most popular desktop browser. If you’re anything like me, you might have a huge number of tabs open all the time. So,...

Google’s Doodle contest for kids returns with $80K in prizes
2019-01-11

The “Doodle For Google” contest is open for submissions from US children in grades K-12 again, this year with more than $80K in prizes for the national winner. The annual contest kicked off earlier this week with a performance by everyone’s favorite muppet… and a felt frog. If you’re a kid, this happened way...

Trump Jr.’s deleted Instagram post likened border wall to zoo fencing
2019-01-10

Donald Trump Jr. recently likened his father’s proposed border wall with Mexico to that of a zoo fence meant to contain animals. “You know why you can enjoy a day at the zoo?” the now-deleted Instagram post asks? “Because walls work. At face value, the comment is insensitive. But given the administration’s...

6 podcasts that Google and PRX will help bring to your ears
2019-01-10

You’ll want to add these six shows to your playlist. Google Podcasts and PRX kicked off a podcast creator program back in October, and thousands of would-be podcasters from over 100 countries answered the call. Now, Google has announced the first round of shows selected to take part in the podcast boot camp run...

This device is an open rebellion against everything that smartphones have become
2019-01-10

Could Punkt’s high-design, low-tech “dumbphone,” the MP02, really help me digitally detox? I decided to find out. Did your 2019 New Year’s resolutions include spending less time with your smartphone? You could activate Apple’s “Screen Time” functionality on your iPhone...

What happened when I replaced my iPhone with a dumbphone for a week
2019-01-10

Could Punkt’s high-design, low-tech “dumbphone,” the MP02, really help me digitally detox? I decided to find out. Did your 2019 New Year’s resolutions include spending less time with your smartphone? You could activate Apple’s “Screen Time” functionality on your iPhone...

The Cambridge Analytica revelations are only beginning
2019-01-10

SCL pleaded guilty to U.K. data laws. And we may soon learn a whole lot more about all the data it collected. The Cambridge Analytica saga has been going on now for more than a year. The long and the short of what we’ve learned thus far is that the company tried to hoover up as much user data as it possibly...

An EU official just gave Google a huge legal win
2019-01-10

A top court adviser argued that the “right to be forgotten” doesn’t need to be applied globally. Google just got a huge European legal boost. Maciej Szpunar, an adviser to the European Union’s top court, argued that search companies like Google should not have to enforce the “right...

Your sweet old grandma might be inadvertently spreading Russian propaganda
2019-01-10

Older Americans are more likely to share fake news on Facebook, researchers say. A study of American Facebook users has found that older Americans are more likely to share fake news on the social network than its younger users. The study was conducted by researchers at Princeton University and New York University and...

Instagram now lets you easily share your posts across multiple accounts
2019-01-10

TechCrunch reports that Instagram has introduced a handy new feature in its iOS app that lets you share the same post from multiple accounts that you run. That should make it easy for content creators looking to promote their work on their personal and brand accounts, as well as businesses with multiple profiles for...

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