Microsoft is making it easier to view your photos in File Explorer. The latest Windows 11 developer preview rolling out today includes Gallery, a new feature that lets you view the Photos app’s image library while browsing files and folders.

The Gallery view, the shortcut to which is found in the File Explorer’s navigation panel, arrives in Windows Insider Build 23435. After selecting Gallery, the main file-browsing window will show thumbnails of the same images from the All Photos view of the Photos app. Microsoft says it’s optimized for accessing your most recent photos if you have OneDrive Camera Roll Backup activated on your phone; they’ll display right up top.

It should also make it easy to find content from specific folders. “You can choose which folders are shown in Gallery through the Collection dropdown,” Microsoft’s announcement reads. “You can also add subfolders of existing sources to filter to a subset of your content, such as desktop backgrounds and SD card/camera imports.” In addition, Gallery will appear as an option in the file-picking dialog, which should simplify attaching images to emails, PowerPoint presentations or social posts.

Microsoft

Microsoft says the feature is rolling out gradually and won’t be available to all Dev Channel Insiders immediately. Instead, the company will “monitor feedback and see how it lands before pushing it out to everyone.” Although it seems like a feature that will make its way to future stable releases, it’s still in beta and could (theoretically) end up on the cutting-room floor if the company receives negative feedback or changes course.

Microsoft has begun integrating Bing AI capabilities into its popular keyboard app SwiftKey. While the third-party tool already includes some AI features, like learning from users' writing styles to make suggestions. Once a user clicks on the Bing button, which is located on the top left side of the keyboard, it offers three options: Search, Tone and Chat. 

Say you want to know which dessert pairs best with lasagna, just type that in to the search bar as you converse. Chat will suggest responses that it feels are in keeping with the messages or emails it's responding to. Tone, however, can help keep things more formal if you're replying to a work email and need a hand making things appear a little more professional.

Any iOS and Android users can set SwiftKey as their default keyboard across apps, like social media and email. Basically, if an app allows a third-party keyboard, you can use SwiftKey on it. Aside from AI technology, SwiftKey's other features include correcting spelling mistakes, task saving and a personalized toolbar. The Bing button lives on the left side of the keyboard and also autosuggests across the top as a person types.

SwiftKey can also access up to five chosen languages and, in the same release, Microsoft revealed updates to its translation services in the Bing App. Users translating words and phrases from English to French, Spanish or Italian will now see the masculine and feminine versions, versus the chatbot making assumptions.

Bing's inclusion into SwiftKey follows the lead of other Microsoft programs like Skype and Microsoft Start. Skype lets users message directly with Bing in a group chat or on-on-one, while Microsoft Start provides access to Bing across the app. 

You no longer have to be a developer to see the benefit of an Android 14 preview. Google has released the first Android 14 beta, and there are a few slight but meaningful improvements for early adopters. Apps can now add custom actions and shortcuts to Android's share sheets. In other words, cross-app functionality should be considerably more powerful once enough software takes advantage of the feature.

You'll also see a "more prominent" back arrow in the gesture-based navigation interface. The arrow also complements your device theme or wallpaper. It's a minor touch, but it theoretically helps users understand how gestures work.

Additional upgrades are behind the scenes. Apps can now limit accessibility services' ability to see sensitive data. This prevents malicious services from peeking at information, and reduces the chances of performing critical actions by mistake. Android 14 Beta 1 also supports new vector-based visual effects in apps, such as interpolation and morphing.

Earlier Android 14 previews improved accessibility, battery life and security. There's also stronger support for foldable phones and tablets as well as regional personalization on a per-app basis.

You'll still need either Android Studio's emulator or a recent-enough Pixel device (the Pixel 4a and newer) to try the Android 14 beta. It's easier to install, however, as you now just have to enroll your Pixel in the Android Beta Program to download this and future updates. We still wouldn't use the beta on a mission-critical phone, but it's now reliable enough that you might want to try it on a secondary handset where glitches are tolerable.

Google may not have revealed everything there is to know about Android 14. It typically waits until its I/O conference in the spring to share the major feature sets for upcoming Android launches, and you won't see the first release candidates until June. The completed OS is likely to arrive late in the summer. Think of this as Google slowly drawing a curtain open — it's not quite ready for the full reveal.

Artifact, the news aggregation app from the creators of Instagram, now has some social features following its latest update. Users can now create profiles and comment on any article in the app.

Taking a cue from Reddit, Artifact will let you upvote and downvote other users' comments, which will factor into commenters' reputation scores and help to moderate discussions. The app is also using artificial intelligence for moderation.

Artifact says the reputation score "represents the earned trust from the community and will help you weigh people’s opinions and help us filter out bad behavior." The goal, according to a blog post, is to foster a positive community in which everyone feels encouraged to take part. The app will let you know when your comments get upvotes or downvotes. You'll also be notified when your contacts comment on things they read.

Artifact

You'll need a profile, which is optional, to comment on articles. Profiles can include your photo and bio (adding both will apparently boost your reputation). You'll need to provide a verified phone number to create one. A phone number is also needed if you want to move to a different device and retain your Artifact history and preferences.

Instagram founders Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger unveiled Artifact back in January. It uses AI to curate news and present you with things it reckons you'll want to read. "We have a strong and growing community and sometimes the most important voices are never interviewed or quoted," Systrom wrote in an Artifact comment. "These discussions give everyone a chance to participate and have a voice."

In a bit of a coincidence, Artifact is gaining true social components on the same day that Substack is rolling out its Twitter-esque Notes feature. In a sense, the two relative upstarts are trying to take on established social media platforms at their own game.

After a teaser last year, Google is ready to help you save space on your phone by shelving unused apps. The company is rolling out an auto-archive feature that removes key parts of apps without erasing personal data. So long as an app is still available on the Play Store, you just have to tap its icon to re-download the missing pieces. This can free as much as 60 percent of an app's space, Google says.

You'll get the auto-archive option if you try to install an app when your device doesn't have enough remaining storage. If you want to look for unused apps, you can visit the Apps section of settings. The software will typically say that it hasn't been opened for more than a few months. Developers have to publish their apps using the App Bundle format for the feature to work, but that shouldn't be an issue as it's been required since 2021.

The concept isn't new. Apple has offered custom recommendations to pull unused apps since iOS 11's release in 2017. However, the addition may be particularly helpful on Android, which powers a wider range of phones, including low-end models. You may not feel as much pressure to upgrade a budget handset if you know you can simply archive apps until you're ready to use them.

Google adds that this could help developers. If users can auto-archive apps, they're less likely to completely uninstall those apps. Creators may be more likely to hold on to users, even if those customers seldomly return.

Microsoft and Snap have teamed up to bring Snapchat Lenses to Teams. The next time you hop onto a call with colleagues or friends, you'll be able to pick from one of 26 popular Lenses to add some visual flair to your video chats. You'll be able to turn yourself into a cartoon character, add virtual snow and slap a variety of backgrounds onto your webcam feed. That said, it's probably best to make sure you don't accidentally leave a Lens on during more serious conversations. 

Snap and Microsoft say the library of Lenses will rotate to keep things fresh. You can switch on a Lens in Teams by selecting the Video Effects option, then Snapchat. The companies tapped into Snap's Camera Kit (a software development kit) to bring the latter's augmented reality tech to Teams.

Microsoft previously used Camera Kit to add Snap's AR features to its video learning platform, Flip, where educators try to kickstart video discussions among students by providing them with prompts. According to Snap, since Microsoft added the integration to Flip, teachers and students have been 60 percent more likely to post videos to the platform.

Snap used to have its own desktop app that enabled folks to use Lenses on third-party video calling services. However, the company shut down the app, Snap Camera, earlier this year.

Google announced end-of-life dates today for products relying on the Nest app that won’t carry over to the new Google Home. If you own any Nest Secure or Dropcam home-security products, you have a year to use them before they become paperweights. Phasing out old and incompatible hardware could signal that the arrival of Google’s more customizable new Home app is drawing near.

Nest Secure will continue to work until April 8th, 2024. To ease the blow, Google is offering some freebies to customers — as the company often does when its products head to the Google Graveyard. Nest Secure users will receive an offer for a free ADT Self Setup System (up to a $485 value); alternatively, they can opt for $200 in Google Store credit. Google says it will send an email with redemption instructions to eligible users.

Dropcam products will also cease to work after April 8th of next year. Google advises users to download and save their video history before this date to avoid losing it. As consolation for Dropcam customers, the company is offering a free Nest Cam (indoor, wired) for those with a Nest Aware subscription; those without a subscription can take 50 percent off the same camera.

Dropcam

Finally, Works With Nest, the API system allowing third-party integrations with otherwise incompatible smart home accessories, will stop working after September 29th. Google points customers to Assistant-based routines in the Google Home app as a replacement, and it plans to launch a script editor “in the coming months” to make up for other lost features. The company says it’s also “working closely” with partners to provide replacement integrations.

Google announced an updated Home app last October that could be the primary source for today’s hardware cutoff announcements. The updated Home app integrates Matter, including its Fast Pair feature. It’s available now in a public preview.

Nest Secure launched in 2017 as a fresh take on smart home security. Designed to compete with legacy brands like ADT (which Google later invested in), the system included a Guard base, motion-detecting sensors for windows and doors and tag keychains, which let you quickly enable or disable the system. Google announced in 2020 it had discontinued the platform but promised it would continue working for the foreseeable future. Meanwhile, Dropcam began as a pioneering smart home security brand, launching some of the first cloud-connected cameras. Google / Nest bought the startup in 2014 for $555 million, a move that founder Greg Duffy later described as a “mistake.”

Twitter has finally shut off its free API and, predictably, it’s breaking a lot of apps and websites. The company had previously said it would cut off access in early February, but later delayed the move without providing an updated timeline.

But, after announcing its new paid API tiers last week, the company seems to have started cutting off the thousands of developers relying on its free developer tools. Over the last couple days, a number of app makers and other services have reported that the Twitter API is no longer functioning. Mashable reported the shutoff seems to have started Tuesday morning, though many developers are still trying to understand what’s happening as Twitter doesn’t seem to have communicated with most developers about the changes.

The ending of Twitter’s free API comes after the company abruptly changed its rules to ban third-party Twitter clients as part of a larger shakeup of its developer strategy. But, as we’ve previously reported, third-party clients were only a small fraction of the developers, researchers, bot makers and others who relied on Twitter’s APIs.

For example, apps and websites that used Twitter’s API to enable sharing of content to and from Twitter are now seeing that functionality break. WordPress reported Tuesday that it was no longer able to access the API, rendering its websites unable to automatically share posts to Twitter. (The issue has since been fixed, according to the company.)

Likewise, Echobox, a service that allows publishers to share content on Twitter, said on Wednesday it was also disconnected from the Twitter API “without warning.” The company said it found a workaround, but hadn’t heard from Twitter. News reading app Flipboard, which recently began shifting its focus to Mastodon, also warned that anyone who used Flipboard to view Twitter feeds would soon see the feature disabled.

Many of Twitter’s bot developers are also impacted. The maker of “Cheap Bots Done Quick,” which allows people to create bots for Twitter, reported receiving a notice that they were cut off from the API. Twitter has said that its new “basic” tier is meant to provide a pathway to allow bots to continue, but many developers have said the monthly limit of 1,500 tweets is too constrained.

Newsletter platform Substack is also having issues using embedded tweets, though it’s unclear if this is related to the API shutdown or the company recently announcing a potential Twitter competitor. (Embeds seem to be functioning normally on other websites, including this one.)

All of these issues are further complicated by the fact that Twitter seems to have communicated very little with any of its developers about these changes or what they mean. Most of the employees who worked in developer relations were cut during the company’s mass layoffs. And the company’s developer forums are filled with posts from confused developers looking for answers. The company no longer has a communications team, and its press email auto-responds with a poop emoji.

As Mashablepoints out, the shutoff has even affected developers who are willing to pay for Twitter’s API, even though pricing for higher-level enterprise tiers is still unclear. “When Twitter announced these new tiers last week, we immediately sought to sign up for the Enterprise tier,” Echobox wrote in a blog post on Wednesday. “ We still have had no response from Twitter’s enterprise sales team and our access to the API was cut off without notice yesterday.”

News app Tweet Shelf said its API access had also been suspended despite applying for Enterprise API access. So did TweetDeleter, a service for automatically deleting tweets, and Tweet Archivist an analytics tool. 

But it’s still unclear how many developers will be able to continue using Twitter’s API in some form. The free and $100/month “basic” tier are extremely limited compared to what was previously offered for free. And, while Twitter hasn’t revealed exactly how much the “enterprise” level will cost, many are expecting it to be prohibitively expensive – rumors have suggested it could cost $40,000 a month or more.

Some developers aren’t even waiting to find out the pricing details. The developer of Social Bearing, an analytics service used by researchers, said there was no way the service could continue to run. “I wish those of you left at Twitter and fellow devs the best of luck,” they tweeted.

It’s easy to say “yes” when an app or website asks for your location data just to get past the pop-up and back to scrolling, but it pays to be thoughtful about who you share it with and why. More often than not, it's more information than apps and websites really need to know about you.

Like other kinds of personal information, location data is presented by companies as a trade-off: consumers willingly expose where they are, usually for a more convenient user experience; the companies in turn gather crucial intel about customers and, more often than not, resell that data to third-parties for additional profit. Those third parties, according to Cooper Quintin, a security researcher at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, can include data brokers and advertisers, as well as law enforcement, bounty hunters, journalists and just about anyone else with the money to purchase this information. It's one of the reasons we feel like our devices “listen” to us — they probably don't hear you telling a friend that you’ve been really craving fast food, but they do know that there’s a McDonald’s nearby, and will serve up an advertisement for its french fries.

Because there aren’t federal laws or regulations currently in place to fully protect consumer information, it falls on individual users to navigate how they want that information to be spread. As you install new apps, don’t blindly agree to share location data, even if you think you have nothing to hide. “It's better just not to generate it in the first place,” Quintin said.

Is there ever a good reason to share this sensitive data with a company? A good rule of thumb is to avoid giving out location information unless the app requires it to function, according to Megan Iorio, senior counsel and amicus director at the Electronic Privacy Information Center. A maps app might need it to give you real-time directions; food delivery apps probably can get by with a simple address. Websites may ask for location permissions to enable convenience features, like a weather service, but will generate the same results from a zip code at a much lower risk. Even with the caveat that sharing location data is unavoidable in some instances, Iorio cautioned that providing apps or sites blanket access is never a good idea. “If you wind up needing location services, then you'll figure that out after using the app, but maybe the best strategy is to just tell everybody no until you actually realize that you need it,” Iorio said.

It's also best practice to revoke location permissions for any apps or sites you no longer use, or may have enabled thoughtlessly in the past. You can see what apps use your location data by going into the settings of your smartphone and navigating to the location sharing tab, usually in the privacy and security settings of most devices. That will list all of the apps with access to your location information, and give options to toggle it on or off. Apple, Samsung, Google and others all provide specific instructions on their websites. Popular browsers like Firefox, Chrome, Edge and Safari, also provide specific instructions on how to disable location sharing. Generally it's best not to choose "always allow" or similarly phrased options in-browser — instead wait for the pop-up requesting access and, if it's necessary, share location data on a case-by-case basis.

Google will implement a new rule for apps providing personal loans starting on May 31st that could help protect users from abuse and harassment. The tech giant has updated its policy (via TechCrunch) to prohibit cash lending applications from being able to access users' contacts list. They will no longer be able to access people's photos and videos, as well, whether they're saved on the phone itself or an external storage. 

This is but one of the changes Google has implemented over the past year, following multiple reports of harassment from certain markets, such as India, Pakistan, Kenya and the Philippines. It's common for loan apps to require access to users' phonebooks and media before they lend money. The fact that people can easily install these apps on their phones makes them look like a pretty convenient solution for sudden monetary issues. But since they typically charge exorbitant interest rates, a lot of borrowers end up having difficulties keeping up with payments. That's when the abuse begins. 

Agents for these services would mass send profanity-laden texts to all the borrower's contacts, including random acquaintances and co-workers, in an attempt to humiliate them into paying. Some would even go as far as to threaten them and their family bodily harm. As TechCrunchpreviously reported, the abuse got so bad for some people that it had driven them to suicide. 

In an attempt to keep these loan sharks under control, Google implemented rules for India, Indonesia, the Philippines, Nigeria, Kenya, and Pakistan, requiring them to submit proof of approval and other documentation from the appropriate government agencies. In the US, Google banned payday loan apps with an annual percentage rate of 36 percent or higher way back in 2019. And in Pakistan, non-banking financial institutions will only be allowed to publish one lending app on the Play Store starting on May 31st.

The tech giant tightened its screening measures for lending apps a year ago in the Philippines, where I live. I still see an enormous number of loan apps when I look at the Play Store, though, and still regularly hear stories about users being hounded by their agents. Clearly, the stricter screening rules weren't enough, but Google blocking these application from accessing people's phonebooks sounds like a step in the right direction.