TikTok ramps up privacy protection for teens

SAN FRANCISCO – TikTok became the latest tech company Thursday to announce tighter protections for teenagers as social media platforms come under increased scrutiny over their privacy safeguards.

The short video-sharing app will roll out a number of features in the coming months, including a default curb for 16 and 17-year-olds on in-app messaging unless it is switched to a different setting.

Under 16s will see a pop-up message when they publish their first video, asking them to choose who can watch.

And users aged 16 and 17 will be able to receive a pop-up asking them to confirm who can download their videos. Downloads are already disabled on content posted by under 16s.

The Chinese-owned platform will also stop sending push notifications to users aged 13 to 16 from 9pm — and an hour later for 16 to 17-year-olds — with the aim of reducing their screen time at night.

The moves announced by head of child safety public policy Alexandra Evans and global head of privacy Aruna Sharma build on previous measures to protect young users from predators, bullies and other online dangers.

“It’s important to ensure even stronger proactive protections to help keep teens safe, and we’ve continually introduced changes to support age-appropriate experiences on our platform,” Evans and Sharma said.

“We want to help our younger teens in particular develop positive digital habits early on.”

Google, YouTube and Facebook-Instagram have all recently bolstered defenses for teen users, while critics have been urging Facebook to abandon plans for a children’s version of Instagram.

TikTok was the world’s most downloaded app last year, overtaking Facebook and its messaging platforms, according to market tracker App Annie.

The video app surged in popularity, according to market tracker App Annie, despite efforts by former president Donald Trump to ban it or force a sale to US-based investors.

Agence France-Presse

Big Tech booms even as lockdown living wanes

SAN FRANCISCO, United States - Big Tech goliaths like Facebook and Amazon unveiled whopping profits this week, showing their dominance in lockdown lifestyles is on course to grow well beyond the pandemic.

"Tech wins the day, the week, and seemingly the year," Futurum Research analysts said of the surging revenues, driven by digital advertising, cloud computing, gaming and booming use of smartphones and e-commerce.

"The strength of tech is clearly untethered from Covid," they added.

Powerhouses Facebook, Apple, Microsoft and Google parent Alphabet all reported higher revenues even as they face heightened scrutiny from antitrust regulators for their growing dominance of key economic sectors.

Amazon said Thursday that second-quarter profit jumped 48 percent from a year ago to $7.8 billion, even if that showing was below high Wall Street forecasts.

A growing number of consumers turned to Amazon during the pandemic to get everything from tofu to toilet paper, and its cloud computing division also grew to help businesses and consumers stay connected.

The Amazon results capped a series of earnings from the major tech firms that benefited from successive lockdowns, but also the gradual lifting of restrictions.

Earlier in the week, Apple said its profit in the just-ended quarter nearly doubled amid improving consumer spending and a "growing sense of optimism" as pandemic lockdowns eased.

Revenue from iPhone sales jumped some 50 percent and Apple posted increases for its services such as digital payments, music, streaming television and gaming.

Facebook reported its profit doubled in the recently ended quarter as digital advertising surged, but warned of cooler growth in the months ahead in an update which sent its shares sinking.

Google parent Alphabet reported quarterly profit that had nearly tripled, as money poured in from ads on its search engine and YouTube video platform.

'Not going away'

Revenue at the global video-sharing platform topped $7 billion, a leap from the $3.8 billion brought in during the same period a year earlier, according to Alphabet.

Techsponential analyst Avi Greengart told AFP that hybrid work, online entertainment and internet shopping are now facts of life.

"Those are overarching trends that got accelerated by the pandemic but aren't going away," he added.

However, a gradual resumption of in-person activities will require adjustments from Big Tech.

Amazon chief financial officer Brian Olsavsky said on an earnings call that a reason for missing revenue expectations appeared to be vaccines giving people the confidence to leave home.

"Not only shopping offline but also living life and getting out," Olsavsky said. "It takes away from shopping time. It's a good phenomenon and it's great."

Regulators' wary gaze

Alphabet chief executive Sundar Pichai credited long-term investments in artificial intelligence and cloud computing as powering the internet giant's performance.

Google's cloud computing business competes with powerhouses Amazon and Microsoft, poising them to vie for virtual terrain in an immersive online world.

Microsoft this week reported a jump in profits in the recently ended quarter, keeping strong momentum from accelerated gains in cloud computing during the pandemic.

Transition to relying on computing power and services in the internet cloud as well as working remotely are likely to last, playing to the strength of tech giants powering such platforms, according to Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives.

However, a global chip shortage has hobbled production of the wide range of devices enhanced with computing and internet capabilities, from cars to video game consoles.

And, as US tech titans gain clout and wealth, they are increasingly in the crosshairs of government regulators wary of monopolistic abuses and sidestepped taxes.

Despite political pressure, the tech companies continue to spend on bolstering and expanding their offerings.

Amazon made a deal early this year to buy iconic Hollywood studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer for $8.45 billion in a move aimed at strengthening its Amazon Prime television streaming service.

Apple is working on self-driving car technology, while Alphabet is already testing a "robo-taxi" service in the United States with its Waymo unit.

Agence France-Presse

Google to invest over $7B in US, create 10,000 jobs – CEO

Washington, United States — Google will invest more than $7 billion in the United States this year and create thousands of jobs, the tech giant’s CEO said Thursday.

“We plan to invest over $7 billion in offices and data centers across the US and create at least 10,000 new full-time Google jobs in the US this year,” Sundar Pichai said in a statement.

Pichai said Google “wants to be a part” of America’s economic recovery from the pandemic and is investing in some communities that are new to the company, as well as expanding in others across 19 states.

The announcement comes as Google faces pressure from dozens of US states that accuse the internet giant of abusing its search dominance to eliminate competition.

Google will spend $1 billion in its home state of California.

Outside of the San Fransisco Bay Area, Google said it would add thousands of jobs in Atlanta, Washington DC, Chicago, and New York.

“This will help bring more jobs and investment to diverse communities as part of our previously announced racial equity commitments,” Pichai said.

Google’s parent company Alphabet last month reported a 50-percent jump in quarterly profit to $15.2 billion as its digital ad business thrived.

Agence France-Presse

US urges countries to suspend digital taxes

Washington – US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin is urging countries like France to suspend taxes on global computing giants such as Google and Amazon and wait for a negotiated agreement on international taxation, according to a letter released Wednesday.

As the United States is poised to impose tariffs of up to 100 percent on $2.4 billion in French products over that country’s digital services tax, Mnuchin said talks in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development are key to resolving the issue.

“We believe that it is very important that these talks reach agreement in order to prevent the proliferation of unilateral measures, like digital services taxes, which threaten the longstanding multilateral consensus on international taxation,” Mnuchin said in a letter to OECD chief Jose Angel Gurria.


“We urge all countries to suspend digital services tax initiatives in order to allow the OECD to successfully reach a multilateral agreement,” he said in the letter, which was dated Tuesday.

US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer on Monday released a report slamming France’s tax as discriminatory and designed to target American tech giants like Google, Apple, Facebook and Amazon.


He said Washington would proceed quickly with plans to impose tariffs on French products, including champagne, cosmetics, yogurt and Roquefort cheese.

The decision “sends a clear signal that the United States will take action against digital tax regimes that discriminate or otherwise impose undue burdens on US companies,” Lighthizer said in a statement on Monday.

The French tax imposes a three percent levy on the revenues earned by technology firms in France, which often come from online advertising and other digital services.


It targets revenue instead of profits, which are often reported by tech giants in low-tax jurisdictions like Ireland or Luxembourg in a practice that has enraged governments.

Lighthizer’s office said it is considering widening the investigation to look into similar taxes in Austria, Italy and Turkey.

Mnuchin said there is “broad support” for providing greater certainty on taxation.

“We look forward to working with the OECD along these lines, building on the work already done.”

A top EU official expressed concern this week that President Donald Trump’s administration was planning to pull out of the multilateral talks, so Mnuchin’s support for the talks come as a relief.

Cedric O, France’s secretary of state for the digital economy, also told AFP in Washington on Tuesday that France believed there was still time to stave off the threatened of tariffs.

“The first and foremost objective that we have is to strike a deal at the OECD,” he said, insisting that the current row was “not the end of the story.”

source: philstar.com

YouTube 'creators' fret over impact of new child protection rules

SAN FRANCISCO, United States— Samuel Rader quit his job three years ago to work full time on his YouTube channel, "Sam and Nia," featuring videos of his family life.

The channel created by the Texas-based couple -- with videos of their Hawaii vacation, setting up their backyard pool and other content about "Christian family life" -- has become one of the stars of the Google-owned video service with some 2.5 million subscribers.

But the future is now uncertain for "Sam and Nia" and other YouTube "creators" as a result of a settlement with US regulators that will make it harder to get ad revenues from videos and channels directed at children.


"I went into a minor panic attack when I heard," said Rader, whose channel has taken in a reported $2 million from ads placed along the videos.

"I thought we would have to find a new source of revenues."

YouTube earlier this month agreed to pay a fine of $170 million and change how it handles collected data from children under a settlement with the US Federal Trade Commission.

YouTube will treat data from anyone watching children's content on YouTube as coming from a child. It will also stop serving personalized ads on this content entirely, and bar features such as comments and notifications.

The new rules, set to go into effect in four months, have stoked fears in the YouTube community of creators and "vloggers" like the Raders, who live off the advertising revenue.

Shock, grief, fear 

"There's a lot of shock, grief and fear. For many creators, this is their only source of income," said Melissa Hunter of the Family Video Network, a consultancy which also operates a group of channels on YouTube.

"They are people making content in their houses, not huge companies; they're small homemade businesses."

Many questions remain as to how YouTube will define children's content -- intended for kids up to age 12 -- which will be subject to the new rules.

Rader said he has been advised that "we are a low-risk channel because our content is not targeting children."

YouTube is believed to have millions of content creators on its network, who share in the service's ad revenues, estimated to be more than $10 billion annually, though it is unclear how much of YouTube's content is directed at children.

In announcing the new policy, YouTube chief executive Susan Wojcicki acknowledged that "these changes will have a significant business impact on family and kids creators who have been building both wonderful content and thriving businesses, so we've worked to give impacted creators four months to adjust before changes take effect."

Wojcicki added that YouTube is "committed to working with them through this transition, and providing resources to help them better understand these changes," and would also establish a $100 million fund "dedicated to the creation of thoughtful, original children's content."

Critics of the internet giant said YouTube marketed itself as a destination for children and benefitted by selling advertising to toymakers and others.

FTC chairman Joe Simons said the settlement "prevents YouTube and Google from turning a blind eye to the existence of kids-directed content" on its platform.

Hunter said the creators of family content may collect anywhere from $30 to $100,000 per month, but that "those families are going to make almost nothing on January 1" when the new rules come into effect.

Ending targeting? 

YouTube and creators may still be able to generate revenue from video ads as long as they are not targeted based on data collected from children, although these are far less lucrative.

"Advertisers do spend more for trackable, measurable placements," said Nicole Perrin, an analyst at the research firm eMarketer.

"I'm not sure there is a way to comply with this for kids without limiting some of the revenues on that side."

Shaun McKnight, whose Dallas-based M-Star Media has created several popular YouTube channels which have attracted millions of subscribers, said he and his wife anticipated changes were coming.

"My wife and I thought it was too risky so we pulled back," he said.

source: philstar.com

Google CEO says 'important to explore' China project

San Francisco - Google chief executive Sundar Pichai has acknowledged publicly for the first time that the tech giant is considering a search engine for China, saying it could offer "better information" to people than rival services.

Speaking at the Wired 25th anniversary conference late Monday, Pichai said Google leaders "feel obliged to think hard" about China despite criticism over the possibly of cooperating with Chinese censorship.

"We are always balancing a set of values," he said, while adding that "we also follow the rule of law in every country."

Pichai described Project Dragonfly, which has drawn criticism from Google employees, lawmakers and human rights activists, as an effort to learn about what Google could offer if it resumed its search operations in China.

"It turns out we would be able to serve well over 99 percent of the (search) queries," he said onstage in a question-and-answer session.

"And there are many, many areas where we would provide better information that what is available."

Pichai offered no details on the status of the effort but said he was taking a "long-term view" on China.

"We don't know whether we would or could do this in China but we felt it was important to explore," he said.

"I think it's important for us given how important the market is and how many users there are. We feel obliged to think hard about this."

He said one area where Google's presence could help in China would be for information on medical treatments including for cancer.

"Today people either get fake cancer treatments or they actually get useful information," he said.

Google shut down its search engine in China in 2010, refusing Beijing's requirement to censor search results.

Pichai also addressed Google's decision to withdraw from a bid for a major Pentagon cloud computing project, saying the company was not opposed to working with the military but did not want to be part of automated weapons.

"We do work with the (US) military and deeply respect what they do to protect our country," he said.

Pichai added that Google continues to work on projects with the military on cybersecurity and transportation planning, for example but that "where we are being more deliberate is where AI (artificial intelligence) is used for autonomous weaponry."

source: philstar.com

YouTube penalizes Logan Paul after suicide video post

LOS ANGELES | YouTube said Wednesday it is removing popular American vlogger Logan Paul from its Google Preferred platform and putting future projects with him on hold, after Paul posted a video on the platform of a suicide victim in Japan.

“In light of recent events, we have decided to remove Logan Paul’s channels from Google Preferred. Additionally, we will not feature Logan in season 4 of ‘Foursome’ and his new Originals are on hold,” Alphabet Inc’s YouTube, said in a statement.

Google Preferred features YouTube’s most popular content in packages for sale to advertisers. Paul, 22, is one of YouTube’s top content creators, regularly drawing millions of views from his mainly youth-orientated audience.

Paul also had projects in the works with YouTube’s premium subscription service, YouTube Red, and appeared on the platform’s web series “Foursome.”

Representatives for Paul did not immediately return requests from Reuters for comment.

Paul apologized in a YouTube video titled “So Sorry” last week for posting the video that showed him and his friends laughing about the body they filmed hanging on a tree in Japan’s “suicide forest.”

Paul said he had made a “huge mistake” and was ashamed of himself, and he deleted the video after it caused a social media backlash.

YouTube in an open letter on Tuesday said it was “upset by the video that was shared last week,” saying that “suicide is not a joke, nor should it ever be a driving force for views.”

The company said Paul’s video violated its guidelines and it was “looking at further consequences.”

Paul has not posted any videos in the past week, saying he was “taking time to reflect.”

Paul’s channel, Logan Paul Vlogs, which has more than 15 million subscribers, is still active on YouTube and advertisers can still choose to advertise on his videos, or they can opt out.

source: interaksyon.com

Can Europe create the next Google?

LONDON, ENGLAND — Europe is making major strides to eliminate barriers that have held back the region from developing tech firms that can compete on the scale of global giants Alphabet Inc’s Google, Amazon.com Inc or Tencent Holdings Inc , a report published on Thursday shows.

The region has thriving tech hubs in major cities, with record new funding, experienced entrepreneurs, a growing base of technical talent and an improving regulatory climate, according to a study by European venture firm Atomico.

While even the largest European tech ventures remain a fraction of the size of the biggest U.S. and Asian rivals, global music streaming leader Spotify of Sweden marks the rising ambition of European entrepreneurs. Spotify is gearing up for a stock market flotation next year that could value it at upward of $20 billion.

“The probability that the next industry-defining company could come from Europe – and become one of the world’s most valuable companies – has never been higher,” said Tom Wehmeier, Atomico’s head of research, who authored the report.

Top venture capitalists and entrepreneurs in the region told Reuters they are increasingly confident that the next world-class companies could emerge from Europe in fields including artificial intelligence, video gaming, music and messaging.


“What we still need to develop is entrepreneurs who have the drive to take it all the way – I think we are starting to see that now,” said Bernard Liautaud, managing partner at venture fund Balderton Capital, who sold his software company Business Objects to SAP for $6.8 billion a decade ago.

The Atomico report is being published in conjunction with the annual Nordic technology start-up festival taking place in Helsinki this week and set to draw some 20,000 participants.

Stronger fundamentals

Capital invested in European tech companies is on track to reach a record this year, with $19.1 billion in funding projected through the end of 2017 – up 33 percent over 2016, according to investment tracking firm Dealroom.co.

The median size of European venture funds nearly tripled to around 58 million euros (£51.1 million) in 2017 compared with five years ago, according to Invest Europe’s European Data Cooperative on fundraising investment activity.

Beyond the availability of funding, Europe has a range of technical talent available to work more cheaply than in Silicon Valley, enabling start-ups to get going with far less funding.

With a pool of professional developers now numbering 5.5 million, European tech employment outpaces the comparable 4.4 million employed in the United States, according to data from Stack Overflow, a site popular with programmers.

London remains the top European city in terms of numbers of professional developers, but Germany, as a country, overtook Britain in the past year with 837,398 developers compared with 813,500, the report states, using Stack Overflow statistics.

While median salaries for software engineers are rising in top European cities Berlin, London, Paris and Barcelona, they are one-third to one-half the average cost of salaries in the San Francisco Bay Area, which is more than $129,000, based on Glassdoor recruiting data.

Pushing up against the limits

Big hurdles remain. A survey of 1,000 founders by authors of the report found European entrepreneurs were worried by Brexit, with concerns, especially in Britain, over hiring, investment and heightened uncertainty in the business climate.

Although Europe has deep engineering talent, many big startups focus on business model innovation in areas such as media, retail and gaming rather than on breakthrough technology developments that can usher in new industries, critics say.

Regulatory frameworks in Europe put the brakes on development on promising technologies such as cryptocurrencies, “flying taxis” and gene editing, while autonomous vehicles and drones face fewer obstacles, the report says.

A separate study by Index Ventures, also to be published on Thursday, found that employees at fast-growing tech start-ups in Europe tend to receive only half the stock option stakes that are a primary route to riches for their U.S. rivals. Yet their options are taxed twice as much.

The Index report said employees in successful, later-stage European tech start-ups receive around 10 percent of capital, compared with 20 percent ownership in Silicon Valley firms.

“There is quite a gap today between stock option practices in Europe and those in Silicon Valley,” Index Ventures partner Martin Mignot said in an interview. “There are other issues where Europe is behind, but we think stock options should be at the top of the agenda.”

Another factor holding back Europe is that regional stock markets encourage firms to go public prematurely, Liataud said.

“Europe has markets for average companies. In the U.S., going public is hard. You have to be really, really good. You have to be $100 million, minimum, in revenue,” the French entrepreneur-turned-investor said. “Nasdaq and the New York Stock Exchange have not lowered their standards.”

source: interaksyon.com

Tech executives head to US Congress under harsh spotlight

WASHINGTON – Facebook Inc, Twitter Inc and Alphabet Inc’s Google head before US lawmakers on Tuesday for two days of grueling hearings on how Russia allegedly used their services to try to sway the 2016 US election.

At stake for the Silicon Valley companies are their public images and the threat of tougher advertising regulations in the United States, where the technology sector has grown accustomed to light treatment from the government.

Facebook, the world’s largest social network, added fuel to the debate on Monday when it told Congress in written testimony that 126 million Americans may have seen politically divisive posts that originated in Russia under fake names.

That is in addition to 3,000 US political ads that Facebook says Russians bought on its platform.

Google and Twitter have also said that people in Russia used their services to spread messages in the run-up to last year’s US presidential election.

The Russian government has denied it intended to influence the election, in which President Donald Trump, a Republican, defeated Democrat Hillary Clinton.

US lawmakers have responded angrily to the idea of foreign meddling, introducing legislation to require online platforms to say who is running election ads and what audiences are targeted.

“The companies need to get ahead of the curve here,” said James Lewis, senior vice president of the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies. If they can, he added, they might avoid regulation.

Lewis, speaking during the Reuters Cyber Summit in Washington, said he expects European officials to watch the US hearings closely.

The US Senate’s crime subcommittee will be the first of three committees to hold hearings on Russia. Its hearing is set for 2:30 p.m. ET (1830 GMT).

Facebook and Twitter are dispatching their general counsels, Colin Stretch and Sean Edgett, to appear before the subcommittee, while Google is sending its director of law enforcement and information security, Richard Salgado.

“Our goal is to bring people closer together; what we saw from these actors was an insidious attempt to drive people apart. And we’re determined to prevent it from happening again,” Stretch will tell lawmakers, according to an advance copy of his remarks.

Facebook and Twitter have taken steps toward self-regulation, saying they would create their own public archives of election-related ads and also apply more specific labels to such ads.

Google followed on Monday, saying it would create a database of election ads including ones on YouTube.

The companies have meanwhile disclosed new details about the extent of Russia-based material, raising alarms about a sector that once inspired idealism.

“The internet was seen as a great engine for promoting democracy and transparency. Now we are all discovering that it can also be a tool for hijacking democracy,” said Karen Kornbluh, a senior fellow for digital policy at the Council on Foreign Relations.

source: interaksyon.com

Google relaxes rules on free news stories, plans subscription tools

SAN FRANCISCO — Google announced on Sunday that subscription news websites would no longer have to provide users three free articles per day or face less prominence in search results, relaxing its rules following complaints from media giants like News Corp that their sales were suffering.

For the last decade, Google’s “first click free” policy helped ensure that non-subscribers wouldn’t be stifled by paywalls when they clicked on news articles from searches.

Google, the largest component of Alphabet Inc, had contended that free samples would lead to increased subscriptions.

But apart from a few publications, online subscriptions haven’t taken off as intended, and media companies such as Wall Street Journal parent News Corp. increasingly complained that freeloading users were cutting into sales.

This year, the Wall Street Journal stopped abiding by Google’s policy, corresponding to a drop in search rankings but an increase in subscriptions.

“Over the last year, we got clear indications that, yes, it was going to be important for publishers to grow subscription revenues,” said Richard Gingras, Google’s vice president for news.

He said the number of news outlets with paywalls had reached a critical mass in the last year, to the point that it made sense for Google to start developing tools for them.

Google is now counting on the relaxed rules and subscription software that is under development to stop the Wall Street Journal and other publishers from holding back valuable content.

From hereon, publishers will be able to choose how many, if any, free articles they want to offer to Google searchers.

Google also plans to launch free software in the coming months for publishers that enables users to pay for content with credit card information that they’ve previously supplied to the search giant.

The goal is to facilitate fast purchases that could take as little as a single click, Gingras said. Customers’ names and emails would be shared with the publishers.

A separate tool would give publishers data on how to maximize sign ups with personalized offers. Gingras said Google hasn’t determined whether it may charge a fee to recoup costs of that program.

“Google search is valuable because there’s a rich ecosystem out there,” Gingras said. “To the extent the web is healthy, that’s very good for our core business. Our objective is not for this to be a new line of business.”

Facebook, Alphabet’s top rival in online advertising, is working on similar subscriber registration tools. Apple released support for subscriptions within its News app last year.

source: interaksyon.com

Augmented reality: A battle between Apple and Google

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA — Alphabet Inc’s Google on Wednesday unveiled tools to make augmented reality apps for mobile devices using the Android operating system, setting up its latest showdown with Apple Inc’s iPhone over next-generation smartphone features.

Phone-based augmented reality (AR), in which digital objects are superimposed onto the real world on screen, got a huge boost from the popularity of the Pokémon Go game. The game, launched in the United States in July last year, sent players into city streets, offices, parks and restaurants to search for colorful animated characters.

Analysts expected the game to make $3 billion for Apple over two years as gamers buy “PokéCoins” from its app store.

Google’s take on the technology will first be available on the Samsung Galaxy S8 and Google’s own Pixel phone. The company said in a blog post that it hoped to make the system, called ARCore, available to at least 100 million users, but did not set a date for a broad release.

Apple in June announced a similar system called ARKit that it plans to release this fall on “hundreds of millions” of devices.

Google and Apple will jockey for the attention of customers and software developers who will build the games, walking guides and other applications that would make AR a compelling feature.

Many tech industry leaders envision a future in which eyeglasses, car windshields and other surfaces can overlay digital information on the real world. Google and Microsoft Corp have already experimented with AR glasses.

“AR is big and profound,” Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook told investors earlier in August. “And this is one of those huge things that we’ll look back at and marvel on the start of it.”

Apple and Google have had to make compromises to bring the technology to market.

In Apple’s case, the Cupertino, California-based company decided to make its AR system work with devices capable of running iOS 11, its next-generation operating system due out this fall.

This means it will work on phones going back to the iPhone 6s, which have a single camera at the back and standard motion sensors, rather than a dual camera system found on newer models such as the iPhone 7 Plus or special depth-sensing chips in competing phones. That limits the range of images that can be displayed.

Google initially aimed to solve this problem with an AR system called Tango that uses a special depth-sensor, but only two phone makers so far support it. With ARCore, Google changed course to work on phones without depth sensors.

But the fragmentation of the Android ecosystem presents challenges. To spread its AR system beyond the Galaxy S8 and Pixel phone, Google will have to figure out how account for the wide variety of Android phone cameras or require phone makers to use specific parts.

Apple, however, is able to make its system work well because it knows exactly which hardware and software are on the iPhone and calibrates them tightly.

Michael Valdsgaard, a developer with the furniture chain IKEA, called the system “rock solid,” noting that it could estimate the size of virtual furniture placed in a room with 98 percent accuracy, despite lacking special sensors.

“This is a classic example of where Apple’s ownership of the whole widget including both hardware and software is a huge advantage over device vendors dependent on Android and the broader value chain of component vendors,” said Jan Dawson, founder and chief analyst of Jackdaw Research.

source: interaksyon.com

Google faces hefty EU fine in shopping case by August: sources

BRUSSELS, BELGIUM | EU antitrust regulators aim to slap a hefty fine on Alphabet unit Google over its shopping service before the summer break in August, two people familiar with the matter said, setting the stage for two other cases involving the U.S. company.

The European Commission’s decision will come after a seven-year investigation into the world’s most popular internet search engine triggered by scores of complaints from both U.S. and European rivals.

The EU competition authority accused Google in April 2015 of distorting internet search results to favor its shopping service, harming both rivals and consumers.

The Commission and Google declined to comment. The U.S. company has in the past rejected the charges, saying that regulators ignored competition from online retailers Amazon and eBay Inc.

Fines for companies found guilty of breaching EU antitrust rules can reach 10 percent of their global turnover, which in Google’s case could be about $9 billion of its 2016 turnover.

Apart from the fine, the Commission will tell Google to stop its alleged anti-competitive practices but it is not clear what measures it will order the company to adopt to ensure that rivals get equal treatment in internet shopping results.

The regulator could set out general principles or specific instructions for Google to follow, said an observer.

The Commission’s tough line is in sharp contrast with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission which settled its own web search case with the company in 2013 by requiring Google to stop “scraping” reviews and other data from rival websites for its own products.

Google made three unsuccessful attempts to settle the case with the previous European Competition Commissioner Joaquin Almunia in a bid to stave off a possible fine and a finding of wrongdoing.

May’s lead falls to 3 percentage points, YouGov poll shows a week before election
Almunia’s successor Margrethe Vestager, however, has shown no willingness to settle with Google.

The company has also been charged with using its Android mobile operating system to squeeze out rivals and with blocking competitors in online search advertising related to its “AdSense for Search” platform.

The platform allows Google to act as an intermediary for websites such as online retailers, telecoms operators or newspapers. The Commission has warned of massive fines in both cases.

source: interaksyon.com

Google challenges Apple’s Siri by opening digital assistant to iPhone

Alphabet Inc’s Google said on Wednesday it would make its digital assistant available on Apple Inc’s iPhone, making a play for the higher end of the smartphone market and challenging Apple’s Siri feature on its own devices.

The announcement heralds a step by Google, whose Android system runs on the majority of the world’s smartphones, to get a foothold on Apple’s phones, which have smaller market share but are used by people who tend to spend more on technology.

It comes as Google, Apple and Amazon.com Inc are competing to establish the dominant voice-powered digital assistant, which many in the industry believe will supplant keyboards and touch screens as a primary way that users interact with technology.

Speaking at an annual developer conference in Mountain View, California, Google Chief Executive Sundar Pichai touted the company’s progress with the Google Assistant, which allows users to complete various tasks through voice commands.

“Humans are interacting with computing in more natural and immersive ways,” he said. “We’ve been using voice as an input across many of our products. We’ve had significant breakthroughs.”

The Assistant debuted last year on Google’s own hardware, and the company has gradually extended the tool to devices from other manufacturers running on its Android operating system.

Google, which gets most of its revenue from its dominant search engine, also released a host of new features for Google Home, a speaker released last year. Users will soon be able to make phone calls using the device, and the HBO Now streaming service, owned by Time Warner Inc, will be integrated as well.

In addition, the company announced that it will offer physical photo albums through its photo app.

source: beta.interaksyon.com

Google takes on Apple, Amazon with new hardware push

SAN FRANCISCO — Alphabet Inc’s Google on Tuesday announced a new “Pixel” smartphone and a suite of new consumer electronics products for the home, planting itself firmly in the hardware business and challenging Apple Inc’s iPhone at the high end of the $400 billion global smartphone market.

The string of announcements – including the $649 Pixel, a smart speaker for the living room dubbed “Home,” a virtual reality headset, and a new Wi-Fi router – is the clearest sign yet that Google intends to compete head-to-head with Apple, Amazon.com Inc and even manufacturers of phones using its own Android mobile operating system.

Company executives, echoing Apple’s longstanding philosophy, said they were striving for tighter integration of hardware and software.

“The thinking is that if we can work on hardware and software together, we can innovate much better,” Google hardware chief Rick Osterloh said in an interview with Reuters, citing a recent reorganization that united once-disparate hardware teams.

Under the new structure, the company has begun to take a much more integrated approach to things like supply chain management and design, added Mario Queiroz, a vice president of product management.

“The learnings from one product are benefiting another product,” he said.

Unlike earlier Google phone efforts under the Nexus brand, the Pixel devices are designed and developed by Google from the start, although Taiwan’s HTC Corp will serve as the contract manufacturer.

Swipe at Apple

Taking another page from the Apple playbook, Google said it would work exclusively with a single carrier in the United States, Verizon Communications Inc, on the Pixel, emulating Apple’s agreement to launch the original iPhone with AT&T Inc. That deal gave Apple unprecedented control over the look of the phone and how it worked.

Shares of Alphabet closed up 0.3 percent, while Verizon fell 1.2 percent.

The phone comes in two sizes, and its high-end camera is one of few distinguishing features, analysts said. The phones come in black, blue and silver and will be able to get up to a seven-hour charge in 15 minutes. Pre-orders begin on Tuesday.

“Aside from the camera, the new Google Pixels are pretty undifferentiated compared to Samsung and iPhone seventh generation phones,” industry analyst Patrick Moorhead said.

While the new phones are clearly aimed at competing with the iPhone – Google executives took several swipes at Apple in their on-stage remarks – analysts said Android rivals like Samsung Electronics (005930.KS) could be the biggest victim if the Pixel takes off.

Google’s strategy of licensing Android for free and profiting from embedded services such as search and maps made Android the dominant mobile operating system with some 89 percent of the global market, according to IDC.

But Apple still rules the high end of the market, and Google has long been frustrated by the emergence of many variations of Android and the inconsistent experience that has produced. Pushing its own hardware will likely complicate its relationship with Android licensees, analysts said.

 All-purpose assistant

Google Kicked off the event Tuesday by touting the Google Assistant, the company’s voice-activated artificial intelligence system and its answer to Apple’s Siri and Amazon’s Alexa. The presenter showed how a customers could make a restaurant reservation with a few phrases spoken into the phone.

The assistant will be embedded into the Pixel and Home products and is being positioned as the central feature in a family of integrated hardware and software products.

It is one of a handful of similar assistants that are vying for supremacy as more people search the web and make purchases online using voice commands, which may eventually supplant keyboards and touchscreens as the primary means of controlling digital devices.

While Google is often cited as the leader in artificial intelligence, Amazon stole a march on the company with its Alexa-powered Echo home speaker system, a surprise hit. The Home device and the Echo have many of the same features.

Google’s “Daydream View” virtual reality headset, meanwhile, puts the company in competition with Facebook Inc, owner of Oculus. The device, which works with an Android phone, is far cheaper and simpler. It will be available in November for $79, in time for the end-of-year shopping season.

Home will also be available in November for $129, including a six-month trial of ad-free YouTube.

Google also unveiled a new version of its Chromecast digital media player and a router dubbed Google Wifi, both boasting the same sleek, minimalist design as the Home product.

“These look like products from a single company,” said Queiroz, the Google executive.

source: interaksyon.com

New version of Android crowned ‘Nougat’

SAN FRANCSICO, California — Google’s newest mobile operating system will be called Nougat, continuing a tradition of naming Android software after sweet treats, the tech giant said Thursday.

Google had invited people to send in suggestions at its annual developers conference in May, and revealed the winning Android name at a playful ceremony at its campus in the Silicon Valley city of Mountain View.

Nutella was thought to be a favorite, but Nougat won the day.

Google shared the event in a Twitter message tagged #AndroidNougat and containing a looped snippet of video of the undraping of an Android statue standing atop giant nougat and nut bars.

The technology giant has been letting developers work with the new mobile operating system, which is expected to be released later this year.

Alphabet-owned Google’s Android operating software is a computing phenomenon that powers the vast majority of smartphones sold across the world.

There were 1.16 billion smartphones shipped in 2015 that are powered by Android, according to research group Gartner. That accounted for 82 percent of the market, dwarfing the 225.85 million for Apple’s iOS.

Cupcake, the first version of the operating software to carry the name of an enticing desert, was released in 2009.

It was followed by Donut, Eclair, Froyo, Gingerbread, Honeycomb, Ice Cream Sandwich, Jelly Bean, KitKat, Lollipop and current-generation Marshmallow.

source: interaksyon.com

Google autonomous car project teams with FiatChrysler

SAN FRANCISCO, California — Google parent Alphabet on Tuesday announced that it has partnered with Fiat Chrysler in a major expansion of its fleet of self-driving vehicles.

The Google autonomous test fleet would be more than doubled with the addition of 100 new 2017 Chrysler Pacifica Hybrid minivans, with the companies aiming to have some on the road by the end of this year.

The collaboration with Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA) marks the first time that the California-based Internet giant has worked directly with an automaker to build self-driving vehicles.

“FCA will design the minivans so it’s easy for us to install our self-driving systems, including the computers that hold our self-driving software, and the sensors that enable our software to see what’s on the road around the vehicle,” the car team said in a post at the Google+ social network.

The minivan design also provides opportunity to explore the potential of large self-driving vehicles that could be used mass-transit style with features such as hands-free sliding doors for getting in or out, according to the post.

Alphabet said it was not licensing its autonomous car technology, nor would it be selling the self-driving minivans.

The move signals that Google has a particular interest in “people mover type vehicles” with the potential to autonomously shuttle passengers about in settings such as college campuses, cities or shopping districts, Kelley Blue Book analyst Karl Brauer told AFP.

“I’m confident that Google feels that is where the greatest mission potential for the autonomous vehicle is.”

Google began testing its autonomous driving technology in 2009, using a Toyota Prius equipped with the tech giant’s equipment. It now has some 70 vehicles, including Lexus cars adapted by Google and its in-house designed cars unveiled in 2014.

FCA will design and engineer minivans uniquely built for self-driving technology that Google will integrate into vehicles, according to the carmaker.

Accelerating efforts

The companies will position engineering teams at a facility in Michigan to accelerate the design, testing and manufacturing of the self-driving Chrysler Pacifica.

“The opportunity to work closely with FCA engineers will accelerate our efforts to develop a fully self-driving car that will make our roads safer and bring everyday destinations within reach for those who cannot drive,” said Google Self-Driving Car Project chief executive John Krafcik.

The US agency in charge of highway safety early this year provided feedback indicating that a bubble-shaped autonomous car built by Alphabet could qualify as being its own driver.

In a written response to a query from the Silicon Valley-based technology firm, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said that since the self-driving cars lacks steering wheels or other controls for humans, it is “more reasonable to identify the driver as whatever (as opposed to whoever) is doing the driving.”

While the administration’s response didn’t change rules of the road, it is seen as a green light of sorts for getting autonomous vehicles to market.

Packed starting line

Google has been testing self-driving cars on California roads for a while, and an array of automobile makers including Audi, Ford, Mercedes, Lexus, Tesla and BMW are working on building self-driving capabilities into vehicles.

FCA chief executive officer Sergio Marchionne said the partnership may help boost innovation in the sector.

“The experience both companies gain will be fundamental to delivering automotive technology solutions that ultimately have far-reaching consumer benefits,” he said.

The US administration pledged in January to help clear the way for autonomous vehicles with an investment of $4 billion to fund research and testing projects.

A Chinese auto firm revealed last month that it was buying two foreign companies and their self-driving technologies for more than $1 billion.

Ningbo Joyson Electronic Corp. said it signed an agreement to buy US-based Key Safety Systems (KSS) Holdings Inc.

Ningbo, which provides driver control systems to auto giants such as General Motors and Mercedes-Benz, also plans to buy the car navigation business of Germany’s TechniSat Digital GmbH.

Chinese tech giant Baidu, which has opened a California research center for autonomous driving, has said it is planning to produce driverless cars by 2020.

The Alphabet-FCA collaboration could “easily encourage an Apple, an Uber or another technology company to follow the same path and work more closely with an auto maker,” according to Kelley Blue Book’s Brauer.

source: interaksyon.com

Google developing virtual reality headset — WSJ

Google is developing a virtual reality headset that works without a smartphone or computer, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

The headset will include a screen, high-powered processors and outward-facing cameras, the Journal reported, citing one person.

Alphabet Inc’s Google currently sells a virtual reality device made of cardboard into which users slide in their mobile phones.

Since the launch in 2014, Google has shipped five million Google Cardboards.


The company declined to comment on the Journal report.

source: interaksyon.com

Ford in talks with Google to build self-driving cars — Automotive News

Google is said to be in talks with automaker Ford Motor Co (F.N) to help build the Internet search company’s autonomous cars, Automotive News reported, citing a person with knowledge of the project.

The contract manufacturing deal, if finalised, is expected to come during the annual International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas during the first week of January, Automotive News said.

A Google spokesman told Automotive News that the company would not comment on speculation, although Google officials confirmed that the company is talking to automakers.

Earlier this year, Google began discussions with most of the world’s top automakers and assembled a team of traditional and nontraditional suppliers to speed efforts to bring self-driving cars to the market by 2020.

In June, Google began testing tiny, bubble-shaped self-driving prototype vehicles of its own design on public roads around Mountain View. The company has also started testing self-driving prototypes in Austin.

Google is expected to make its self-driving cars unit, which will offer rides for hire, a stand-alone business under its parent company, Alphabet Inc (GOOGL.O), next year, Bloomberg reported earlier.

Ford, although lagging behind most competitors, ramped up its pace to develop self-driving cars earlier this year and said it would expand advanced safety technology, including automatic braking, enabling hands-free operation of cars under certain conditions by automating such basic functions as steering, braking and throttle.

This was to be included across its global lineup over the next five years.

Reuters could not independently reach Ford Motor and Google for comment outside regular U.S. business hours.

soure: interaksyon.com

Google opens online window on toll of climate change

SAN FRANCISCO, California — As world leaders gathered in Paris on Monday in the hope to stopping catastrophic climate change, Google Maps provided online views of remote locations where wildlife is struggling for survival.

A “Street View” feature at the free online map service has grown from simply showing scenes outside of business or residential addresses to allowing arm chair adventurers to virtually explore mountains, rain forests, ocean depths and more.

Some settings find creatures in dire straits, such as polar bear in the Canadian Arctic appearing to desperately wait for bay ice that doesn’t form because temperatures are too warm.

“From polar bears in the Canadian Arctic, to communities in the Brazilian Amazon, to blue oak trees in Central California, the impacts of climate change are being felt by plants, animals and people across the planet,” said Google Earth outreach program manager Karin Tuxen-Bettman.

“With Street View, you can get a window into some of our world’s changing ecosystems, and learn how nonprofit and other organizations are working to keep our planet healthy.”

Polar Bears International (PBI) borrowed Street View Trekker 360-degree camera and location-pinpointing gear to enhance maps with scenes of polar bears in Manitoba as the sea ice on which they depend vanishes.

PBI incorporated the Street View scenes into its website and a lesson plan for schools to help children learn about the habitat.

Brazilian nonprofit Amazonas Sustainable Foundation (FAS) used Trekker Gear to capture scenes in the Amazon forest and put isolated local communities on the map.

FAS captured imagery from three reserves in the Amazon and uses it for education about rain forest protection and sustainable ecosystem management, according to Google.

- Visualizing climate change -The initiatives aims to make climate change more real for people and inspire them to act by allowing them to virtually explore remote areas, and see beauty lost or under threat due to climate change.

Street View imagery also allows for comparisons over time to show how environments are changing along with the climate.

“Street View is great for visualizing the impacts of climate change, but we’re also using our Street View platform to measure climate data, which can be used by scientists, policymakers, businesses and citizens to drive better decisions,” Tuxen-Bettman said.

Google Earth has worked for several years with the Environmental Defense Fund to map methane leaks from natural gas lines under an array of US cities by equipping Street View cars with special gear, according to Tuxen-Bettman.

Street View cars will begin measuring more pollutants, such as climate change culprit carbon dioxide, in an alliance with environmental sensor network specialty firm Aclima, according to California-based Google.

“Essentially, we’re turning Street View cars into environmental sensing platforms,” Tuxen-Bettman said, noting that they will first be put to work in California communities.

source: interaksyon.com

Google’s two OSs to become one

BEIJING — Two operation systems(OSs) operated by Google are to be combined into one.

The Internet company is reportedly planning to build its Chrome operating system for personal computers into its Android mobile-operating system.

Google sets such plans as Android has emerged as the dominant operating system by quite a long stretch. It is also regarded as a sign of the growing dominance of mobile computing.

Combining the two operating systems means setting up Android to run on laptops and desktop computers, which would require big changes.

For instance, Android will have to support the Google Play Store. Chromebooks will reportedly receive a new name to reflect the new OS.

The new operating system is expected to be ready sometime in 2017.

source: interaksyon.com