Technology - Google News

Amazon stops selling Echo Wall Clock over connectivity issues - Engadget
Microsoft is trying to fight fake news with its Edge mobile browser - The Verge
Behold, a smartphone devoid of buttons and ports - TechCrunch

Amazon stops selling Echo Wall Clock over connectivity issues - Engadget

Posted: 23 Jan 2019 07:25 AM PST

Back in September, Amazon held a massive Alexa event, and one of the many, many products it announced was a clock. The idea was that you'd use a connected Alexa device to control Echo Wall Clock with your voice, and set timers and reminders -- it doesn't have its own speaker or microphone. However, only a month after starting to ship the clock, Amazon has temporarily stopped selling the product because of connectivity problems.

"We're aware that a small number of customers have had issues with connectivity," Amazon told The Verge. The company is working on a fix, and plans to start selling the item again "in the coming weeks."

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Microsoft is trying to fight fake news with its Edge mobile browser - The Verge

Posted: 23 Jan 2019 02:16 AM PST

Microsoft has started warning users of its Edge mobile browser about untrustworthy news sites. The software giant has partnered with NewsGuard to provide warnings in its Edge browser for iOS and Android, and this functionality has been added this week as an optional setting. NewsGuard was founded by journalists Steven Brill and Gordon Crovitz, and rates sites based on a variety of criteria including their use of deceptive headlines, whether they repeatedly publish false content, and transparency regarding ownership and financing.

Microsoft first started offering an optional NewsGuard browser extension for Edge on the desktop version of Windows 10 last year, but the move to build this directly into the mobile version suggests the company may be looking to make this a core part of Edge in the future. The Guardian reports that Edge mobile is now warning users that the Daily Mail's website, Mail Online, "generally fails to maintain basic standards of accuracy and accountability."

Although Edge mobile isn't widely used, Microsoft's move is still significant. Experts have warned that we're heading towards an "information apocalypse" involving AI-generated fakes and fake news. A significant lack of digital literacy can make people easily vulnerable to fake news and viral hoaxes, and as technology and AI get even smarter it's going to be more difficult to spot a fake. Several companies are already trying to tackle fake imagery using browser plug-ins, and NewsGuard is trying to solve the fake news problem.

One of the big hurdles is getting people to install an add-on like NewsGuard, and Microsoft has removed that barrier with Edge mobile by building it directly in. It's unusual, as technology companies have struggled to take ownership of misinformation campaigns. NewsGuard is also stepping in to take responsibility for its ratings, and co-founder Steve Brill tells The Guardian that people can blame NewsGuard. "They can blame us. And we're happy to be blamed," says Brill. "Unlike the platforms we're happy to be accountable."

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Behold, a smartphone devoid of buttons and ports - TechCrunch

Posted: 23 Jan 2019 07:58 AM PST

Some call it madness. Others call it the next logical step in smartphone evolution. Meizu calls it, fitting, the “Zero.” It’s equal parts fascinating and maddening. And while being “totally seamless” with “a truly uninterrupted design” is probably not going to enough in and of itself to get people to purchase the thing, it’s hard to shake the idea that all handset manufactures are all heading in that direction anyway. So good on Meizu for getting there first, I suppose.

So, no Sim card slot, and no charging port — thank goodness for eSIM tech and wireless charging. There’s a fingerprint sensor under the front glass and the physical buttons have been replaced with virtual ones. As for the speaker grilles, those have been replaced by something the company calls “mSound 2.0,” which appears to utilize the screen for sound.

How well that will function versus a more traditional method remains to be seen. Honestly, it sound like a phone created on a dare, but an impressive feat nonetheless. Other specs include a 5.99 inch AMOLED screen and a Snapdragon 845 processor. The rest of the relevant info, like price and if/when it’s coming to the States are still very much up in the air.

Mobile World Congress next month seems as good a time as any to announce all of that.

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