Aug 18
Sigh. Just… sigh.
Aug 18
While portable gaming devices have long been in existence, the Nintendo Switch sparked the imagination of many makers and modders. While some of those have resorted to replicating the experience using a Raspberry Pi as the base, modder Banjo Kazooie went down a road less trodden. What he did was to basically stuff an Intel Compute Stick inside the shell … Continue reading
Aug 18
Apple’s iPad sales were surprisingly good last quarter, but a lot of critics (including us) thought there was still no way the iPad Pro could replace a proper PC. The release of iOS 11 next month will change some minds, however. A new series of Apple…
Aug 18
The Nokia 8 was announced a couple of days ago and while its 5.3-inch display isn’t exactly small, it’s not particularly big either, at least compared to some of the other brands out there. However it seems that there is a chance that we could see a larger Nokia phone in the future, according to a report from Russian website 4Pda.
The report is in Russian but the folks at Nokiapoweruser managed to translate it into English and part of the report reads, “Well, as a cherry on the cake representatives of HMD Global made a hint that in the future we are waiting for another smartphone – with a larger screen than in Nokia 8, to meet the needs of absolutely all users.”
As to why HMD chose the size they did, the company’s head of product marketing told the publication, “The design of the Nokia 8 was the result of an excellent dialogue between us and consumers. We really got completely satisfactory feedback from users from our surveyed group who liked the display in the form that we did. So we believe that our decision regarding the display is absolutely correct.”
Prior to the Nokia 8’s launch, there were rumors suggesting that there could be more than one flagship, and that the other device is the Nokia 9 which obviously was not announced, so perhaps this alleged device could indeed be the Nokia 9, but take it with a grain of salt for now.
HMD Reportedly Teases Larger Nokia Phone, Possibly The Nokia 9 , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.
Aug 18
Voice assistants like Siri, Cortana, and Google Assistant (previously known as Google Now) have been around for a while, but it’s safe to say that Amazon’s decision to launch Alexa and open it up to third-party developers and manufacturers has really helped it become more mainstream.
This is why it doesn’t really come as a surprise to learn that Monster will be introducing a voice assistant to its series of headphones. However this voice assistant isn’t made by Monster, but rather the company will be teaming up with music platform Speak Music to integrate its voice assistant “Melody” into its headphones.
Basically users will have to download the Melody app onto their phones and pair it with Monster’s headphones and they’re good to go. From there users just need to tap their headphones to activate Melody, after which they can ask it to play a specific song or album, skip/pause tracks, adjust the volume, and so on.
Monster says that Melody relies on data connectivity to work, meaning that you can use it anywhere your phone has a signal. The only downside to that is that if you’re in an area with bad coverage or no signal, you’d be out of luck. At the moment Melody will only work with certain Monster headphones which includes Elements, Clarity HD, and iSport Freedom V2.
Monster Brings Voice Assistant Services To Its Headphones , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.
Aug 18
While hate groups in general are not tolerated on most websites and services, the recent events in Charlottesville has led quite a few tech companies to publicly denounce these groups and also ban them from using their services. This includes Apple and PayPal, Spotify, Deezer, Google, and GoDaddy, just to name a few.
All the tech companies basically state that these groups violate their policies, which is why they have been blocked, banned, and/or removed. It actually seems like a good thing, but the Electronic Frontier Foundation doesn’t seem to think so. However the group isn’t protesting this because they believe that these groups should exist, but rather the implications behind tech companies picking and choosing who they ban.
Basically they are claiming that regardless of what rhetoric the other side is putting out there, it should be protected as free speech. “Protecting free speech is not something we do because we agree with all of the speech that gets protected. We do it because we believe that no one—not the government and not private commercial enterprises—should decide who gets to speak and who doesn’t.”
They also add that this could set a troubling precedent because in the future, “there’s always a risk that others—including governments—will use the opaqueness of the takedown process to silence legitimate voices,” but what do you guys think? Were these tech companies within their rights to block these websites?
EFF Not Thrilled With Tech Companies Blocking Hate Groups , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.
Aug 18
Take a look at our before and after 4K EIS update video. Even the liveliest of puppies can now be filmed with glorious stability! 🐶 pic.twitter.com/FS9MK9M6nq
— OnePlus UK (@OnePlus_UK) August 16, 2017
When it comes to video recording on our smartphones, having high-end phones feature some kind of image stabilization is almost a necessity. However for some reason the OnePlus 5 was launched without the feature, even though the feature was present in older handsets like the OnePlus 3 and 3T.
However the company made up for it by releasing an update last week that added the feature, and if you’ve yet to update, then the video above should be a good enough reason to. OnePlus has recently posted a video onto its Twitter page in which they compare video recordings taken with and without image stabilization.
The differences are pretty much night and day, where the footage recorded with image stabilization was cleaner and crisper and does not make you want to throw up. We’re not sure why the company only released the feature after the phone was launched, since it almost feels like a no-brainer to include it, but maybe they did not have time to finish it, or maybe they forgot, but either way we suppose it’s better late than never.
So if you have been prompted to update your phone but have been holding off, then perhaps this video will convince you to.
OnePlus 5 Video Stabilization Update Shown Off In Video , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.
Aug 18
It’s no secret that social media platforms like Facebook have been changing its News Feed to better deliver content that they think is relevant to you, which is why different people’s News Feeds look different from yours. Now it seems that Facebook is taking that customization further by testing out a new feature called “Featured Topic”.
In a report from Reuters, the feature is being tested on the News Feed, where basically Facebook will post customized links, a short description on the subject, and a photo. The idea is to help people discover new stories that might be relevant to them and that they might potentially miss when scrolling through their News Feed.
When asked if this was indeed a new feature, Facebook confirmed to Reuters that they are testing it out, but stopped short of confirming if it would become an official feature. This isn’t the first time we’ve seen Facebook test out new ideas, and sometimes they don’t always come to fruition, so there’s a chance that this could happen too.
However like we said, social media platforms are indeed trying to make posts more relevant to users to improve on engagement and also time spent on its website, so this move shouldn’t really be too surprising.
Facebook Testing Out ‘Featured Topic’ Customized Links , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.
Aug 18
It’s a tad difficult to define Reddit in a simple sentence. Internet veterans will compare it with electronic bulletin board systems (BBS) or the younger Internet forums. Others might classify Reddit as a news aggregation site. While many will simply call Reddit a big mess. Soon, however, the site might have a new name under its belt: video sharing site. … Continue reading
Aug 18
Xiaomi arguably started this whole bezel-less trend when it put out the Xiaomi Mi Mix last year, a smartphone that was meant to be more of a commercial concept design. Now, however, everybody (except Sony) seems to be jumping on that train. So what is Xiaomi to do? It could try to do one better. The Mi Mix 2, which … Continue reading
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