Tech Nuggets with the Technology

Sunday, October 13, 2019

Dyson kills its plan to challenge Tesla with an electric car

A man in a open-collared suit speaks in front of a giant video screen.

James Dyson, the inventor and Brexiteer, revealed in 2017 that his company was planning on making an electric vehicle. The plan was to invest $3.2 billion (£2.5 billion) in the project, which would capitalize on the company's expertise with smaller electric motors—the ones in his vacuum cleaners—as well as developing solid-state batteries to power the vehicle. The battery EV was due to arrive in 2021 and would have been built not in the UK but in Singapore. But now, those plans are cancelled.

Despite developing what he referred to as "a fantastic car," in an email to his staff Dyson revealed that "[t]hough we have tried very hard throughout the development process, we simply can no longer see a way to make it commercially viable." Which is bad news for the 532 employees who have been working on the Dyson BEV for the last four years, although the company will do its best to absorb those workers into other roles.

In the email, Dyson revealed that he had been trying to find a buyer for the project but was unable to do so. This difficulty will come as no surprise to industry watchers; although Tesla has managed to establish itself as a car company, it's had a harder time making money selling those cars. Meanwhile, other more recent entrants like Faraday Future and Nio have had an ever rougher time.

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While tech journalists recently have embraced a watchdog role, they could be even more useful by focusing on solutions rather than palace intrigue and villains (Columbia Journalism Review)

Columbia Journalism Review:
While tech journalists recently have embraced a watchdog role, they could be even more useful by focusing on solutions rather than palace intrigue and villains — In March, when Mark Zuckerberg called for new regulations on internet companies, journalists rightly covered the move with skepticism.

Planting tiny spy chips in hardware can cost as little as $200

More than a year has passed since Bloomberg Businessweek grabbed the lapels of the cybersecurity world with a bombshell claim: that Supermicro motherboards in servers used by major tech firms, including Apple and Amazon, had been stealthily implanted with a chip the size of a rice grain that allowed Chinese hackers to spy deep into those networks. Apple, Amazon, and Supermicro all vehemently denied the report. The National Security Agency dismissed it as a false alarm. The Defcon hacker conference awarded it two Pwnie Awards, for "most overhyped bug" and "most epic fail." And no follow-up reporting has yet affirmed its central premise.

But even as the facts of that story remain unconfirmed, the security community has warned that the possibility of the supply chain attacks it describes is all too real. The NSA, after all, has been doing something like it for years, according to the leaks of whistle-blower Edward Snowden. Now researchers have gone further, showing just how easily and cheaply a tiny, tough-to-detect spy chip could be planted in a company's hardware supply chain. And one of them has demonstrated that it doesn't even require a state-sponsored spy agency to pull it off—just a motivated hardware hacker with the right access and as little as $200 worth of equipment.

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https://arstechnica.com

Newsletter platforms like Substack, which recently raised a $15.3M funding round, offer some writers a sustainable business model, but others see a bubble (Kaitlyn Tiffany/The Atlantic)

Kaitlyn Tiffany / The Atlantic:
Newsletter platforms like Substack, which recently raised a $15.3M funding round, offer some writers a sustainable business model, but others see a bubble — Venture capital has finally come for the least sexy communication style. — It's unclear to me whether anyone has ever fallen in love over email …

Samsung Galaxy A91 to come with Snapdragon 855, 45W fast charging

According to Sammobile, Samsung is readying the Samsung Galaxy A91 with some pretty impressive specs. The phone is expected to be a part of Samsung’s A-series 2020 lineup, meaning it would be launched in 2020, but the phone could be launched in India a little sooner.

Sammobile reports that the Samsung Galaxy A91 would sport the current Qualcomm flagship SoC, the Snapdragon 855 paired with 8GB of RAM and 128GB of storage. There will be a microSD card slot which will allow users to expand the storage up to 512GB. In terms of the camera, the A91 is said to come with a 48-megapixel main camera with optical image stabilization on-board, along with a 12-megapixel ultra-wide camera. The third camera is a 5-megapixel depth sensor to help with portraits. On the front, users will get a 32-megapixel camera with an aperture3 of f/2.2. The phone will be powered by a 4500mAh battery, but more importantly, will also come with 45W fast charging. It is not known, however, whether Samsung will provide a compatible charger in the box, or have users purchase one separately.

According to Sammobile, the Samsung Galaxy A91 is being developed with Android 10, meaning its launch should take place right after the launch of the Galaxy S11. This is because Samsung usually launches the S-series with the new version of Android first. However, it is possible that Samsung would launch the phone before the year’s end in India, but with an Android 9 base instead of Android 10. Either way, there is plenty of time before the launch of the Samsung Galaxy A91 and it is entirely possible the Samsung would re-shuffle the launch window of the phone around as they see fit.

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Riot Games warns League of Legends broadcasters against discussing sensitive topics on air

The protests in Hong Kong are not just upsetting the political status quo, but also sending some very concerning ripples across the world of Technology. Riot Games, the company behind League of Legends, is based out of the U.S., however, as of 2015, they are wholly owned by Tencent Games. The LoL developer has now told League of Legend broadcasters to refrain from speaking about “sensitive” topics.

The move comes hot on the heels of Blizzard banning a Hearthstone player after he expressed support for the Hong Kong protests. The ban came after Ng “Blitzchung” Wai Chung during a post tournament interview expressed his support for the Hong Kong protests by yelling “Liberate Hong Kong. Revolution of our age!” Ng “Blitzchung” Wai Chung is a native of Hong Kong.

In fear of souring its Chinese business interests, Blizzard immediately banned Chung for a year and is withholding any earnings he would have made from the tournament. To justify the move, Blizzard cited a competition rule which states that players aren’t allowed to do anything that “brings [them] into public disrepute, offends a portion or group of the public, or otherwise damages [Blizzard’s] image.” Blizzard is not the first or only American company to bend to China’s will with regards to the Hong Kong protests. Riot games just joins the ranks of such companies.

Twitter users were quick to also point out how Tencent has a 40 percent stake in Epic Games as well. Tim Sweeney, CEO of Epic Games clarified that as long as he was the CEO and the controlling stake holder, political speech would never be the reason for a player or content creator to be banned.

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Apple working on having its own 5G modem in iPhone by 2022

Rumours have long suggested that Apple would release its first 5G-ready iPhone in 2020, with potentially all three models sporting the 5G chip. However, the 5G radio in these iPhones will be provided by Qualcomm. Now a new report by The Fast Company claims that Apple is working on developing a 5G modem in-house, with the goal of shipping it in devices by 2022, a rather ambitious goal for multiple reasons.

Right now, the iPhone (all models) include a System on Chip designed by Apple while the modem continues to be a separate chip on the logicboard. Ideally, having the modem be a part of the SoC would be the best case scenario when it comes to power-efficiency. Initially, Apple had plans on working with Intel to incorporate the modem right into the A-series processors, but then, things changed drastically in April 2019.

Back in 2017, Apple and Qualcomm went head-to-head in legal battles across the world due to conflict over the way Qualcomm was charging royalties. However, in an interesting turn of events, on the second day of hearings in the Federal Court of San Diego, the two companies declared that they will be dropping all lawsuits, everywhere in the world. The two companies settled and within hours, Intel issued a press release saying the company was exiting the modem business.

Apple’s ambitious timelines could be attributed to the fact that they will not be starting from scratch. After buying Intel’s modem business for $1bn, Cupertino has a significant head-start towards its goal. However, it is still going to be an uphill battle to integrate the modem in the SoC, followed by fabrication, testing and certification.

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OxygenOS Open Beta 3 update for OnePlus 7, OnePlus 7 Pro now available

OnePlus has announced that the OxygenOS Open Beta 3 builds for the OnePlus 7 and OnePlus 7 Pro are now available for download. The announcement was made on OnePlus’ official forums. As expected, the new build introduces a bunch of new features and changes, besides simple bug fixes. The build also introduces an India-only feature in the form of Work-Life Balance.

System level changes includes a hide option in Settings for Game Space as well as optimised GPS performance. Fixes include issues with power usage when connected to Bluetooth headphones, the crash issue with recent apps when using navigational gestures and with Alert Slider.

Zen Mode now features an Activity mode that lets users share their experiences with other OnePlus users. Further, the OnePlus Switch feature has been optimised in order to adapt to Android 10. The India-only Work Life Balance feature allows users to sort the notifications they receive when they are at work or leisure.

Here is a look at the complete changelog of the build:

System

Added hide option in the Settings for Game Space (Game Space - Hide Game Space) Optimized GPS performance Improved system stability and fixed known issues Repaired the crash issue with Settings caused by WhatsApp notification settings Fixed the issue with shadows when using the bottom side swipe gesture to return to the screen Fixed the issue with power usage while connected to Bluetooth Headphones Fixed the unusual display issue of screen switches between Portrait and Landscape Mode Fixed the crash issue with recent apps while using navigation gestures Recovered the Bluetooth connection icon in the status bar Fixed the blank screen issue with apps Fixed the crash issue with the Alert Slider Optimized the performance of Messages

Zen Mode

Added Activity mode to enable users to share their experience with other OnePlus users around the world

OnePlus Switch

Optimized performance and experience to adapt to Android 10

Work-Life Balance (India only)

Added Work-Life Balance Mode to enable users to sort notifications when at work or leisure, accordingly

OnePlus also reminds users that this is still beta software. As such they may not be as stable as its official OTA updates. The company has also asked users of the software to offer their feedback in its bug reporting forum.

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Saturday, October 12, 2019

Amazon and Flipkart Sales, OnePlus 7T Pro, Redmi 8, and More News This Week

Amazon Great Indian Festival: Celebration Special sale, Flipkart Big Diwali Sale, OnePlus 7T Pro price reveal, OnePlus 7T Pro McLaren Edition, Redmi 8 price in India reveal, and other top tech news of... https://ift.tt/2pm97kP

Amazon sale: TVs, ACs, washing machines at maximum discounts

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What to expect from Google on Oct. 15: Pixel 4 and Pixel 4 XL, a faster Google Assistant, a more affordable Pixelbook, new Pixel Buds, and additional devices (Jay Peters/The Verge)

Jay Peters / The Verge:
What to expect from Google on Oct. 15: Pixel 4 and Pixel 4 XL, a faster Google Assistant, a more affordable Pixelbook, new Pixel Buds, and additional devices — Pixel 4, a new Pixelbook, new Nest devices, and more — Google's annual fall hardware showcase is happening on Tuesday, October 15th, and we expect it to be a big one.

Vivo U10 Review

Vivo is hoping to take over the sub Rs. 10,000 market with the new Vivo U10, which is sold only online and boasts of some impressive specifications. https://ift.tt/32c4U1Q

Study: Xuexi Qiangguo, a propaganda app developed by China's Communist Party, enables authorities to retrieve messages, photos, contacts, and even record audio (Anna Fifield/Washington Post)

Anna Fifield / Washington Post:
Study: Xuexi Qiangguo, a propaganda app developed by China's Communist Party, enables authorities to retrieve messages, photos, contacts, and even record audio — BEIJING — The Chinese Communist Party appears to have “superuser” access to all the data on more than 100 million cellphones …

Good news for users of these Xiaomi phones

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Reliance Jio’s ‘bad news’ for customers, OnePlus’ most expensive phone, Apple’s MacBook update and more

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