Rose Behar
Contributing since August, 2018
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Latest Articles
Not long after we here at Android Police revealed that the Pixel 3 and 3 XL Lite will launch this spring through Verizon, a video review of a pre-production version of the Pixel 3 Lite has surfaced, providing us with our best look yet at the device and its specifications.
YouTube cracks down on dangerous video challenges, policy-violating links and thumbnails
Watch YouTube's Rewind 2018 video and you'd think the platform was a wholesome community inhabited by only talented, well-meaning creators. In reality, there's a massive amount of cringe-worthy and downright unethical videos that went up this past year, many of which became hugely popular. In an effort to curb one of YouTube's most dangerous genres, the platform has now updated its community guidelines to crack down on dangerous pranks and challenges.
While Google's battery-focused Wear OS 2.2 H update continues to roll out, version 2.3 of the wearable operating system is now beginning to hit smartwatches as well. The new Wear OS version comes with a Home app update from 2.20 to 2.21, which promises a more intuitive, efficient design; improved health coaching; and more proactive help from Google Assistant.
Following a slew of second-generation Material Design updates for the web over the past month or so (namely Calendar, Classroom, and Google Accounts), Google is bringing its modern design aesthetic to several more G Suite platforms on the web. Material Design is hitting Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, and Sites beginning today, January 15.
You can now reset Adaptive Brightness in Android 9 Pie without clearing all battery data [APK Download]
Android 9 Pie's Adaptive Brightness feature uses machine learning to optimize your display brightness based on past adjustments - which is great, as long as your circumstances don't drastically change in the near future. However, if you've moved recently, or changed jobs, or done something else that changed your brightness preferences and made those settings obsolete, you might be looking for an easy way to retrain the Adaptive Brightness model without clearing all your battery data. Thankfully, now there is one.
As T-Mobile and Sprint's merger sits on hold during the government shutdown, Sprint has taken a leaf from its future business partner and launched a rewards program. My Sprint Rewards, much like T-Mobile Tuesdays and the similar offerings from Verizon and AT&T, is essentially a coupon app, offering discounts on things like clothing and fast food, or allowing users to enter larger draws for free vacations.
This Google Home and Amazon Echo hack lets you change your voice AI hotword — but it's far from elegant
Google and Amazon are both constantly improving the capabilities of their voice AIs, but there are some issues that tech giants have little incentive to fix. For instance, from a branding standpoint it makes no sense to let people change their assistant hotword from "Okay Google" or "Alexa" to anything else - even if that's what users want (and it definitely, definitely is). It's this consumer desire, along with the issue of user privacy, that prompted designers Bjørn Karmann and Tore Knudsen to create a Google Home/Amazon Echo hack called Project Alias.
If the plugs at your house are getting overloaded, it might be time to grab some multi-port chargers. Conveniently, Aukey is offering coupon codes through Amazon that'll allow you to grab a few chargers for home and vehicle without losing too much of your post-holiday bank balance.In this latest round of deals, Aukey is offering coupon codes for two wall chargers and one car charger. See the full list below.
Samsung, like many other manufacturers, has been struggling with profits a bit as the smartphone market continues to stagnate. To remain competitive and appeal to millennials, its latest tactic is to introduce new features to mid-range devices first, before they reach premium handsets - a reversal of common practice in the mobile industry. The company's new Galaxy M series (now being teased on Amazon) is a prime example.
Every product with Amazon Alexa announced at CES 2019
Every product with Amazon Alexa announced at CES 2019
This was a massive year for Google Assistant announcements at CES, but Amazon Alexa had its fair share of new integrations as well - often debuting in the same product. There were so many new Alexa integrations, in fact, that the best way to comprehensively cover them is one big roundup.
Google is now rolling out activity cards in Search to let you easily revisit past results
Way back in September, Google announced a "fundamental transformation" of Search that would add several intelligent recommendation features. Among the most notable announcements was the imminent arrival of activity cards, which let you revisit results from searches you've made in the past. At the time, Google said this feature would be available later in 2018, but it's actually taken until now to begin rolling out to mobile web and the English Google app in the U.S.
When it comes to massive trade shows like CES, many companies feel the need to get extravagant with booth installations just to stand out from the crowd. Case in point: Google set up a musical, Small World-style ride for Assistant that is the very definition of over-the-top. Thankfully, even those of us who aren't attending the event can give this monstrosity a virtual ride through a 360-degree video posted on YouTube.
[Update: Rolling out again] Facebook Messenger's massive UI redesign is widely rolling out and people aren't loving it
If you weren't among the select few that began seeing Facebook Messenger's massive redesign (otherwise known as Messenger 4) in late September, you should see the changes shortly. Facebook is now rolling out Messenger's new, simplified UI more widely through a server-side update.
Over the past few years, Nanoleaf has become the go-to source for a very particular kind of home decor: wall-mounted LED smart lights. It was only a matter of time before that industry started getting more crowded though, and thus we now have LaMetric Sky, a smaller version of Nanoleaf that differentiates itself by broadcasting information including social media counts, sales figures, and the weather.The LaMetric Sky - which is on view at CES 2019, but hasn't got a launch date yet - offers up panels with 32 triangular patches of light. While a single set won't cover as much space as most Nanoleaf configurations, the size of the triangles does offer a pleasing, stained glass-like quality to the Sky creations.Like Nanoleaf panels, LaMetric Sky panels connect to Wi-Fi and are controlled via mobile app. In the app, users can create their own designs or choose from an option in the open-source library. The lights can also be controlled via Siri, Amazon Alexa, and Google Assistant, or through LaMetric's first product, Time (a Wi-Fi clock).What's really interesting, though, is the data broadcasting function mentioned above, which puts Sky somewhere between Nanoleaf and products like Smiirl, a social media counter gizmo. As is possible with the LaMetric Time, users can create their own data sources, making it possible to get creative with the data they're throwing on the wall.With the ability to broadcast live data and positive reports from CES bloggers, Sky might have a fighting chance of winning over some Nanoleaf buyers - that is, if it launches in a timely fashion, and at the right price. For now, there's no information on either of those important factors, so all we have is a (pretty) prototype.Source: LaMetric
I think it's fair to say that we've seen some questionably useful Google Assistant integrations this CES, and will no doubt see a great many more in the near future. That's why it's a special occasion when a heavily-demanded, long-due integration is announced, as is the case with Google Assistant for the Sonos One and Sonos Beam.
Google Assistant gains flight check-ins, hotel booking, Interpreter Mode, and broadens lockscreen support
Google Assistant is the belle of the ball at CES 2019, with hardware partnerships popping up left, right, and center. What better time, then, for Google to announce a slew of shiny new features for the increasingly (artificially) intelligent helper? Among the updates comes flight check-ins, hotel booking, a new language interpreter mode, and the extension of Assistant on the lockscreen to all Android phones.
Samsung and LG warn of profit decline in fourth quarter as smartphone market stagnates
Turns out Apple is not the only company expecting to disappoint investors with its next set of quarterly results — Samsung and LG are in the same boat. Whether or not it's for precisely the same reasons is unclear, but it seems a plateauing smartphone market is at least partially to blame for all three companies' guidance misses.
After roughly six months of slow and steady rollout, the YouTube TV app is now available on all Vizio SmartCast TVs. The $40 per month cable alternative first arrived on a selection of newer, high performing Vizio models about half a year ago, with a YouTube engineer on Reddit noting that the company would add more models after monitoring and fine-tuning playback quality. That process seems to be complete now, as Google has just updated its YouTube TV app help page confirming the support.
G Suite updates: Embeddable Google Drawings in Docs and more colorful graphs in Sheets
In an announcement that would have seemed at home in the year 1990, Google has announced that you can make a design element in your Sheets chart a unique color. For instance, in a bar graph where all the bars are blue, you can make one red (see above). Before you rush to your personal computing machine to try out that innovative new feature, though, note that there's another G Suite update coming as well. You can now embed a Google Drawings file into a Doc, and easily update the content of the linked drawing if and/or when it changes.
JBL introduces Google Assistant-enabled Live headphones starting at $100, portable speakers for kids, and more
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As the proliferation of AI-enabled headphones continues, Harman's JBL is adding to its collection with three headsets from the newly-announced Live series, beginning at $100. The Samsung-owned audio subsidiary also revealed several other new mid-range products at CES 2019, including a $30 portable speaker for kids that comes in colors including "Spider Red" and "Froggy Green," and the JBL Flip 5 portable speaker, which features a 4,800mAh rechargeable battery and starts at $100. Finally, Harman is showcasing an app called Personi-Fi that aims to bring personalized audio settings to any streaming device.