Hasta La Gadget!

Google has sued Sonos, alleging that its new voice assistant violates seven patents related to its own Google Assistant technology, CNET has reported. It’s the latest salvo in a long-running smart speaker battle between the companies, with each suing and countersuing the other following a period when they worked together. 

“[Sonos has] started an aggressive and misleading campaign against our products, at the expense of our shared customers,” a Google spokesperson said in a statement. 

Sonos’ Voice Control assistant arrived in June, letting users give commands with the phrase “Hey Sonos,” much like Amazon’s Alexa or Google Assistant. In the complaint, Google said it “worked for years with Sonos engineers on the implementation of voice recognition and voice-activated devices control in Sonos products… even providing its Google Assistant software to Sonos for many years.” 

The fight erupted in early 2020 when Sonos sued Google for alleged patent infringement after the companies had collaborated for several years. Sonos claimed that Google gained knowledge of its technology when they worked together and used that information to develop its own smart speaker line. The company filed another suit in September 2020, claiming that Google infringed on five more patents. 

Google countersued, alleging that Sonos was using Google’s search, software, networking, audio processing and other technology without paying a license fee and made “false claims” about their work together

In 2021, the US International Trade Commission ruled that Google infringed on five Sonos patents. That forced Google to change the way its speakers were set up to avoid an import ban. Most of those were related to the way speaker groups are controlled — for instance, users can no longer change the volume of a group of speakers and must adjust them individually instead. 

“Google previously sued us all over the world and Sonos has prevailed in every decided case,” Sonos’ chief legal officer Eddie Lazarus told CNET. “[The latest lawsuits] are an intimidation tactic designed to retaliate against Sonos for speaking out against Google’s monopolistic practices.” 

OtterBox is trying to differentiate itself from its rivals by offering up to $150 toward the repair of your iPhone screen if it breaks while using the Amplify or Alpha OtterBox screen protectors, the company said in a press release spotted by 9to5Mac. It’s available with the updated OtterBox Protection Program that also covers the case and screen protector, for a price bump of around $5 over the same product with Antimicrobial protection only. 

“Our robust limited lifetime warranty program already covers your case and screen protector, and the OtterBox Protection Program extends that protection to your device screen as well,” said OtterBox CEO Jim Parke. 

The extra protection is valid up to 12 months after purchase, and Otterbox promises that you can “easily activate and track coverage, and file a claim through the OtterProtect app.” The eligible Amplify and Alpha screen protectors with the coverage range from $40 to $55 — just choose the “Antimicrobial + OtterBox Protection Program” when checking out. 

The insurance won’t cover the full cost of an iPhone screen replacement, but it’ll certainly make it less painful if you don’t have AppleCare. As far as I can see, there aren’t many other (if any), screen protectors with similar coverage, other than a few niche offerings. The execution will also be key, but we should see soon enough if filing a claim and receiving payment is as easy as OtterBox says. 

When Intel introduced the Arc branding last year for its high-performance consumer graphics products, it demonstrated what the line’s GPUs can do using video games. The company’s latest Arc GPUs, however, aren’t for gaming at all: They were designed for desktop and mobile workstations running apps like Adobe Premiere Pro, Handbrake and DaVinci Resolve Studio. Intel has launched its Arc Pro lineup with three models, starting with the Arc Pro A40 that has a “tiny, single-slot form factor.” The Arc Pro A50 is a step up and has a larger dual-slot form, while the A30M was made specifically for laptops. 

All three models offer built-in ray tracing and machine learning capabilities, but their key specs differ a bit from each other. The A40 and the A30M, for instance, have 3.50 teraflops of graphical power, while the A50 has 4.80 teraflops. Both desktop models come with 6GB of memory, wheres the one for laptops comes with 4GB. Plus, all models support AV1 hardware encoding acceleration in what Intel says is an industry first. The new GPUs also have four mini-display ports for multiple screen setups and can support two 8K displays with a refresh rate of 60Hz, one 5K 240Hz display, two 5K 120 Hz displays or four 60 Hz 4K displays.

Intel has yet to reveal how much these new discrete GPUs for workstations will cost, but it said they will be available starting later this year “from leading mobile and desktop ecosystem partners.”

“They even broke into my safe!” the former president said after the FBI raided his Mar-a-Lago residence.

A white Mississippi Highway Patrol officer was seen on video putting a handcuffed Black man into a chokehold and wrestling him into a ditch.