Apple's AirPods Pro are our favorite option for iPhone users in our guide to wireless earbuds — but at $250, they're not cheap. If you keep tabs on them at Amazon, however, you can sometimes snag them for $200, making them a much better buy. They've dropped down to this price a couple of times this year, once in February and again in March. The 20 percent discount is within a dollar of the lowest price we've ever seen on Apple's latest generation premium buds. Only problem is, they tend to go out of stock quickly, and sometimes pop back up to their list price, so you might want to add them to your cart while the deal's still live.
The second-gen AirPods Pro deliver one of the best transparency modes of any earbuds on the market and the active noise cancellation is solid. The sound is clear and consistent, even at low volume, and the call performance is better than a lot of the competition. Of course, where the buds really shine is with their seamless pairing with iOS and integration with Apple's ecosystem. We got six hours and 15 minutes of battery life in our tests and gave the earbuds an overall score of 88 in our review.
It's worth noting that a few other wireless options from Apple are on sale right now too, including the third (and current) generation of the standard AirPods for $150, which matches their lowest price this year. You can save even more on the previous generation AirPods which are 38 percent off, or $99.
If you don't carry around an iPhone, you may want to check out a few of the other best buds from our guide. Three of them are currently seeing discounts — though none are all time lows. You can snag our best overall pick, Sony's WF-1000XM4, for a 29 percent discount that brings the price down to $198. Our runner up recommendation, Sennheiser's Momentum True Wireless 3 are also $198, or 21 percent off. And finally, our favorite budget option, the Jabra Elite 3 are even more budget-friendly after a fifteen percent savings. Again, those aren't the lowest prices we've seen, but if today's the day for some fresh new in-ear speakers, you may as well save some coin.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/apples-second-gen-airpods-pro-have-dropped-back-down-to-200-154955969.html?src=rss
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.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/the-dos-and-donts-of-location-sharing-140002009.html?src=rss
It’s difficult to pinpoint the best music streaming service for everyone. Most of the popular options available today hit on the essentials: a giant and diverse library of music that you can access à la carte, sort into playlists, download for offline listening and play across multiple devices. Most are available for around the same price, too. That said, there are subtle yet significant differences in features and philosophy among them that can determine which will fit into your life best. To assist those thinking about trying a new music app, we’ve spent the past few months using most popular music streaming services simultaneously, testing their limits and seeing how they adapt to our input.
Most well-rounded: Apple Music
No music streaming service is perfect, but for many, Apple Music should get the closest to covering all of the necessary bases. It has a library of more than 100 million songs, all of which are available in lossless streaming quality for no extra cost. Its user interface doesn’t make it too hard to get to your music library and strikes a balance between useful algorithmic recommendations and smartly curated content from actual people. It’s one of the few music streaming services that lets you upload your own music files and naturally it’s tightly integrated with Apple devices.
Apple Music’s ALAC files have a minimum resolution of 16-bit/44.1kHz, which is the same quality you’d hear from a CD. A smaller but still significant selection can stream at higher resolutions up to 24-bit/192kHz. A significant number of albums are also available in Dolby Atmos surround sound mixes, or “spatial audio.”
Lossless streaming isn’t a game-changer for most casual listeners. You need a decent set of wired headphones and an external DAC (or a good speaker system) to take full advantage, and the upgrade isn’t so stark that non-enthusiasts will care. That said, even if the difference is subtle, a lossless file does sound better than a more compressed one, particularly in the way it draws out higher-frequency sounds from cymbals, strings and the like.
Photo by Jeff Dunn / Engadget
Spatial audio, on the other hand, is more of a fun gimmick: technologically impressive, yes, and sometimes genuinely immersive, but just as likely to make a record sound less natural.
Relative to other music streaming services, Apple Music’s UI is perfectly serviceable. In general, it emphasizes human curation more than peers like Spotify or YouTube Music. It’s not as great an emphasis as it used to be, and the home “Listen Now” tab can be a smorgasbord of hit-and-miss suggestions based on your recent listening history. Still, the service is littered with clever, editor-picked playlists. The default search page holds several different genre tabs, each of which holds relevant playlists, music videos and a typically spot-on list of “essential albums.” Artist pages often spotlight a group’s most essential works alongside playlists of “deep cuts,” artists that likely inspired them, artists that were influenced by them and so on.
Streaming radio stations are one of Apple Music’s biggest differentiators. There’s a regular rotation of shows that feature artist interviews and have a sort of pre-internet feel. The main tabs often make room to highlight new buzzy releases, and you can find top charts for different countries and cities. All of this gives Apple Music an air of taste, something that can help you find music but prioritizes a personal touch.
Photo by Jeff Dunn / Engadget
Beyond that, getting a simple view of your saved artists, albums, songs and playlists is uncomplicated. You can reliably search for tracks by lyrics, and there’s a great lyrics view for impromptu karaoke sessions. Creating playlists and downloading albums for offline listening is straightforward, and you can start a radio station from any song. While your imported music won’t be available in lossless quality, being able to upload music at all is a great boon for those with big iTunes libraries. Just note that you’re capped at 100,000 tracks that aren’t already available in the app.
If you enjoy classical music, Apple recently launched an Apple Music Classical app that’s dedicated to the genre and comes included with most Apple Music plans. Booting those works into a separate app is somewhat cumbersome, though.
There are still some drawbacks. While Apple Music has apps for Android, Windows and web browsers, the Windows app is only available in a buggy “preview” form as of this writing and there’s no lossless streaming in a browser. It’s best used with Apple devices. There’s (bafflingly) no way to see a list of your “loved” songs in the mobile app. There’s no free tier or annual family plan, either, and the individual plan is $1 more a month than some competitors.
Free tier: No Individual plan: $11/month or $109/year Family plan: $17/month (up to 6 members) Voice plan: $5/month (only usable with Siri) Student plan: $6/month
Best for music discovery: Spotify
Spotify leans much harder on algorithmic suggestions than Apple Music, but having a giant treasure trove of user listening data for so many years has allowed the service to fine-tune its music recommendation engine. This is the main reason to consider it: No service is more accurate at reading the music you like and serving up worthwhile suggestions for other songs you might enjoy (even if its UI is arguably getting worse with every update). As the most popular music streaming app, it’s also available on a wide array of devices.
Spotify is particularly impressive at creating playlists. “Discover Weekly” is famously adept at digging up unheard tracks and artists that align with your tastes. “Release Radar” is similarly impressive at spotlighting new tracks from artists you follow and those with complementary sounds. A selection of “Daily Mix” playlists blend past likes with deeper cuts from artists in your library and similar songs from ones who aren’t, then sorts them by mood as much as genre. Based on what you’ve been playing, you may wake up to one mix that’s mostly upbeat electro, another marked by soaring indie rock, and another with spacey hip-hop. While its selections can be more hit-or-miss, a new “Niche Mixes” feature lets you search for a mood or genre and have the app generate a relevant playlist. Simply following the algorithm down its rabbit holes makes it easy to find somethingyou can enjoy in just a few taps.
Photo by Jeff Dunn / Engadget
That said, there are still a ton of human-curated playlists to peruse as well. Regularly updated lists like “Rap Caviar,” “New Music Friday” and “Viva Latino” may not be tailored specifically for you, but they’re clearly programmed by knowledgeable people in-tune with current trends. A huge range of less frequently updated playlists based on genres, eras and vibes give the same impression. There’s a human touch here; it’s just not emphasized as much as it is in Apple Music, so which you’ll prefer depends on how willing you are to let an algorithm lead the way.
Spotify’s interface isn’t bad, but some recent changes have made it harder to use. The home tab has rows of suggestions based on your recent listening history. I went through a big yacht rock phase while researching this guide, for example, so my homepage became peppered with playlists like “Soft Rock Classics,” “All Out 70s,” and “Totally Stress Free.” It wasn’t all stuff like that, but the point is that the service will sensibly morph and adapt as your listening habits change.
Sorting and searching through your own library is relatively clean, and a playlist with all your liked songs is featured prominently in the “Playlists” section. There’s a useful lyrics view for sing-alongs. Search usually works as it should, letting you look up music by title, lyric, artist or even context like “workout” or “studying.”
Photo by Jeff Dunn / Engadget
Making and sharing a playlist is a breeze. Artist pages aren’t as comprehensive as Apple Music’s, but they do include a list of upcoming tour dates, with links to tickets from sites like Songkick, AXS and Ticketmaster. The search tab has dedicated pages for various genres and vibes, from “Jazz” and “R&B” to “In the car” and “League of Legends.” You can start a radio station from any track, too, though this might repeat songs over time.
Spotify has made a huge push into podcasts and audiobooks in recent years, snapping up exclusive deals with several popular shows along the way (for better or worse). Some may find this convenient, but it makes the UI feel cluttered. A row with “Your shows” is displayed right at the top of the home tab, which includes not only the shows you’ve subscribed to, but annoyingly, ones you’ve recently put on just once. Apple Music and many others completely omit podcasts, so they’ll be less aggravating if you’d prefer your music app to focus solely on music.
On the mobile app, you can filter the home screen by music, podcasts and audiobooks, but Spotify recently revamped these to look more like TikTok-style feeds with huge, autoplaying suggestion cards. This may look fresh, but scrolling through an endless feed, one or two suggestions at a time, is not an efficient way to find content. Similarly, the prominently featured AI-powered DJ tool is technically impressive but also has a tendency to make jarring jumps from genre to genre. It speaks to an app that may be putting a little too much emphasis on its algorithmic prowess.
Photo by Jeff Dunn / Engadget
Spotify doesn’t offer lossless streaming, instead topping out at a relatively low 320Kbps bitrate using the Ogg Vorbis format. Web browser playback uses AAC and maxes out at 256Kbps. The company announced a CD-quality “HiFi” tier more than two years ago and says that’s still on the way, but how it’ll work and what it’ll cost remains unclear.
Spotify offers a more robust free tier than most of its peers. You’ll have to deal with ads, an even lower 160 Kbps bitrate, and limits on track skips and on-demand playback, but you can still listen to several personalized playlists and enjoy much of the library. For casual background listening, it may be enough.
While it doesn’t have a practical effect on your listening experience, Spotify is particularly terrible when it comes to artist payouts. Some music workers have even launched advocacy campaigns seeking fairer compensation and greater transparency. Music streaming isn’t an ideal setup for artists, particularly independent acts, but Spotify is the poster child for everything wrong with the current system.
Free tier: Yes Individual plan: $10/month (12-month subscription gift cards for $99) Duo plan: $12/month (2 members) Family plan: $16/month (up to 6 members) Student plan: $5/month
Best for more obscure music: YouTube Music
From a UI or streaming quality perspective, there’s little reason to choose YouTube Music instead of Apple Music or Spotify. Still, Google’s music service has a few unique selling points that could make it worthwhile. Arguably the most compelling is that it comes included with a YouTube Premium subscription. For $12 a month or $120 a year, this also removes ads from YouTube, lets you download videos for offline viewing and enables background playback. Those features alone are massive benefits if you’re a frequent YouTube user, and you get a full music service on top.
Even without the perk of ad-free YouTube, YouTube Music benefits from a close integration with the video platform. YouTube is home to a mountain of content not available on other top music streaming services and integrates it with your music library. If you’re into rare live performances, deep underground hip-hop, obscure soundtracks, nightmarish Neil Cicierega mashups or Aphex Twin remixes made entirely from the sounds of Super Mario 64, this is the service for you.
Photo by Jeff Dunn / Engadget
If you sign up for YouTube Music with the same account you use for YouTube, music you’ve liked on the latter will already be there and help inform the service’s recommendations. Naturally, this integration also makes YouTube Music the best choice for music videos, which you can swap to with a single tap.
Because it’s wrangling so much material, however, YouTube Music’s UI can feel scattershot and overwhelming. Scrolling down the home page reveals a hodgepodge of recent listens, liked music, curated and community-generated playlists, “similar to” suggestions, radio stations, music videos, algorithmically personalized mixes, new releases and top charts. Searching for an artist may display community playlists and covers underneath more traditional results; it also tends to blend singles with full albums, and it doesn’t display albums in chronological order. Content originally hosted on YouTube won’t integrate with your library as neatly as standard material, either.
Photo by Jeff Dunn / Engadget
That said, the sheer mass of suggestions make YouTube Music good at surfacing new music you might like, and its “Discover Mix” works nearly as well as Spotify’s Discover Weekly. A few buttons at the top of the app can filter the home page’s suggestions to suit different moods: Relax, Workout, Energize, Commute or Focus. You can start a radio station from any song, though we also found this to regurgitate previously liked tracks more than we’d prefer. You can upload up to 100,000 of your own music files, too, which’ll be available even if you aren’t a paid subscriber (these won’t affect the service’s recommendations, however).
YouTube Music lacks lossless streaming and tops out at a relatively low 256 Kbps bitrate, so it’s not for audio enthusiasts. There’s no dedicated desktop app, and while there is an ad-supported tier, it stops playback whenever you exit the app on a phone and maxes at a rough 128 Kbps bitrate. All of your playlists are limited to a maximum of 5,000 songs. Podcast support is on the way, though as of this writing it’s unclear how that’ll look. Google also has a long history of killing its own products, including this service’s predecessor; we’d understand if that makes you skittish long-term, though the company seems committed to improving YouTube Music today.
Free tier: Yes Individual plan: $10/month or $100/year; also available as part of YouTube Premium subscription for $12/month or $120/year Family plan: $15/month (up to 6 members) Student plan: $5/month
Another good option: Amazon Music Unlimited
Amazon Music Unlimited is a strong alternative to Apple Music and Spotify if you want podcasts and lossless streaming within the same app. Like Apple Music, it offers 100+ million songs in CD quality at no extra cost, with a smaller but ever-growing selection of FLAC files available in “Ultra HD” (24-bit/192kHz). Various tracks are mixed in Dolby Atmos or Sony’s 360 Reality Audio as well. Like Spotify, its catalog encompasses a wide selection of non-music content. Most of the major podcast networks are represented, and several shows are presented ad-free.
If you already subscribe to Amazon Prime, you can get Music Unlimited for less than its rivals, with an individual plan available for $9 a month or $89 a year. It’s not a massive discount, but $10 or $20 less each year isn’t nothing when the broad differences between music streaming services are so marginal. Naturally, Music Unlimited works the smoothest on Amazon’s fleet of Alexa devices as well.
Photo by Jeff Dunn / Engadget
Music Unlimited’s UI is similar to its peers but has some annoyances. Amazon is more aggressive than Spotify when it comes to pushing podcasts that don’t align with your listening history. Radio stations and algorithmic playlists don’t display what songs are in the queue. Search isn’t as precise as the options above, and you can’t directly search through the saved albums on your library page. Amazon is also less proactive about surfacing new music you might like than Apple or Spotify. Even still, Music Unlimited delivers an impressive catalog for a potentially cut-rate price.
Free tier: Yes Individual plan: $11/month; $9/month or $89/year with Amazon Prime Family plan: $16/month or $159/year (up to 6 members) Single device plan: $5/month (for one Echo or Fire TV only) Student plan: $6/month
Honorable mentions
Photo by Jeff Dunn / Engadget
Tidal
Tidal offers the highest royalty rates for artists, CD-quality streaming at no extra cost, a free tier, a library of more than 100 million songs and an experience rich with human curation and feature-style content. If you’re a music nerd and determined to not give another monthly fee to a tech industry behemoth, it’s a good choice. Its apps aren’t quite as smooth as those from Apple Music, though, and its highest-resolution tier costs $20 a month. Those high-res tracks are also encoded in MQA, a partly lossy format that still sounds sharp but isn’t open-source like FLAC.
Qobuz
Qobuz is a favorite in audiophile circles, particularly when it’s paired with the Roon music player. Like Tidal, it downplays algorithmic discovery for a more considered, editorial-heavy approach. It offers up to 24-bit/192kHz FLAC streams and includes a digital music store for purchasing high-res downloads of various albums. It’s particularly attentive to classical music. But unless you want to avoid Apple or Amazon, you can get similarly high-quality streaming for a lower price. Some may also find the UI leans too hard on personal curation and requires too much effort to discover new music.
Deezer
Deezer has an attractive interface, a competitive library, CD-quality streaming and the ability to upload your own MP3 files to the service from a desktop. It’s at least worth a look if you want an independent service and don’t fancy yourself an audiophile. Though, its suggestions and playlists generally aren’t as robust as its competitors. It also lacks a high-res tier to match Apple, Amazon, Tidal or Qobuz.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/best-music-streaming-service-130046189.html?src=rss
The Halo Rise is also a small but significant piece of Amazon’s ongoing foray into health and wellness. For $140 (on sale now for $100), the Rise uses motion sensing to predict and track your breathing rate and calculate how long you’ve slept.
Like Google’s Nest Hub, which also uses motion detection to track your sleep, the Halo Rise must be beside your bed, within arm’s reach. When you wake up, Amazon will show you a summary of the last night, including a score and the time you slept. It’ll also congratulate you on doing well or caution you to go easy that day if you didn’t get enough rest.
With products like the Halo Band and app features like body composition scanning, mobility and posture assessment, as well as the controversial tone monitoring that monitors how you speak, the company is investing in health management tools. As Engadget’s Cherlynn Low puts it in her review: “The question is whether we’re willing to trade our personal data for the convenience of an all-Amazon healthcare solution.”
– Mat Smith
The Morning After isn’t just a newsletter – it’s also a daily podcast. Get our daily audio briefings, Monday through Friday, by subscribing right here.
Top-down editing makes sense, but you might miss the fine controls.
Adobe Podcast, formerly Project Shasta, is a cloud-based audio production tool. As the name suggests, it’s primarily for podcast production, though it might interest anyone that works with narrative audio. The main thing to know is there’s no audio timeline here and no mixer view with channels. The first thing you’ll notice is how it doesn’t look like an audio editor at all. Podcast has a singular focus on audio, so there are no video editing, presentation or live streaming tools you might not need. Second would be some proprietary tools – notably Enhance Speech. With one click, this button transforms garbage audio recorded in the worst of rooms into something that sounds more professional. It’s almost magic.
'It is unacceptable for Twitter to label us this way,' the public broadcaster's CEO said.
Twitter has added a label to NPR’s main account to designate the public broadcaster as "US state-affiliated media." Such labels have typically been reserved for state-run organizations, such as RT and Sputnik in Russia and China's Xinhua News Agency. The labels appear on every tweet from the accounts they're applied to. NPR, an independent non-profit, says that on average, less than one percent of its annual operating budget comes from government grants. Meanwhile, the UK’s BBC, largely funded by the government, still lacks the label.
Privacy experts say the rules would violate everyone's privacy, not just teens'.
Utah recently passed two laws that would drastically change how teens in the state can use social media. The new laws will impose strict rules on how companies handle teenagers’ accounts. But among the most controversial aspects of the law is age verification. It requires companies like Snap, Meta and TikTok to confirm the ages of their youngest users to enforce age-based restrictions. Under the rules, which take effect next March, large platforms will no longer be able to simply allow teens to enter their own birthday at sign-up. But experts warn that focusing on age-based restrictions won’t address the core safety issues lawmakers say they want to solve, like privacy. And age verification measures, like those in Utah, pose a significant threat to the privacy of all social media users, not just teens.
God of War Ragnarök just got a pretty significant upgrade with a New Game+ that is much more than a simple rehash with tougher enemies. This NG+ is packed with features to squeeze more life out of last year’s PlayStation hit. It includes new armor sets that bring unique gameplay mechanics to the table. The Zeus armor increases your magic and spell damage but places you at greater risk of incoming damage. The Spartan Armor, as the name suggests, eliminates all perks and stat boosts, increasing the challenge and leaving no room for error. If that wasn’t tough enough, the level cap is increased for enemies and players. There’s even a new black-and-white mode.
Best Buy announced today it’s extending its gadget recycling program to include a new mail-in option. The retailer will provide a box for your used electronics, so you can ship them back for recycling, saving a trip to the store. However, you pay for the privilege: either a $23 small (9 x 5 x 3 inches) box for e-waste weighing up to 6 lbs and a $30 medium (18 x 14 x 4 inches) one supporting up to 15 lbs. After receiving it, you can pack in as many (approved) devices as you can fit, as long as they stay under the weight limit.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/the-morning-after-amazons-halo-rise-sleep-tracker-is-surprisingly-helpful-111505142.html?src=rss
After getting beat to the punch by its primary rival, Google plans to add conversational AI to its flagship Search product, CEO Sundar Pichai told The Wall Street Journal in an interview. "Will people be able to ask questions to Google and engage with LLMs [large language models] in the context of search? Absolutely," he said. Google has already said it would integrate LLMs into search, but this is the first time the company has announced plans for conversational features.
The move isn't unexpected, particularly after Microsoft released a version of its own Bing search engine that used OpenAI's ChatGPT AI engine. However, Google's implementation would potentially have more impact, considering its 93.4 percent worldwide share of the search market. Pichai added that he saw AI chat as a way to expand its search business, rather than a threat. "The opportunity space, if anything, is bigger than before," he told the WSJ.
Pichai didn't reveal a timeline for chat AI search, but it's clear that Google lags behind Microsoft. OpenAI's release of ChatGPT prompted Google to declare a "code red" as it saw the AI as an existential threat to its core business. That proved to be warranted, as Microsoft (which owns a large chunk of OpenAI), soon released a version of Bing Search powered by OpenAI's latest GPT 4 model that gave it some uncanny abilities.
Google released its own conversational AI called Bard strictly as a chat product on a standalone site and not in Search. However, it was clearly lagging behind ChatGPT, displaying incorrect answers in a Twitter ad. Pichai recently said Google would soon switch to a more "capable" language model in an effort to close the gap.
While Google is cutting jobs in an effort to achieve Pichai's goal of becoming 20 percent more productive, the company is accelerating work on new AI products. To be more efficient, it plans to allow more collaboration between divisions like Google Brain and DeepMind, its two primary AI units. "Expect a lot more, stronger collaboration, because some of these efforts will be more compute-intensive, so it makes sense to do it at a certain scale together," he said.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/pichai-google-will-add-gpt-style-conversational-ai-to-search-104200594.html?src=rss
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.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/google-will-soon-restrict-loan-apps-from-accessing-users-photos-and-contacts-100906959.html?src=rss
AI normally needs to be trained on existing material to detect objects, but Meta has a way for the technology to spot items without help. The social media giant has published a "Segment Anything" AI model that can detect objects in pictures and videos even if they weren't part of the training set. You can select items by clicking them or using free-form text prompts. As Reutersexplains, you can type the word "cat" and watch the AI highlight all the felines in a given photo.
The model can also work in tandem with other models. It can help reconstruct an object in 3D using a single image, or draw from views from a mixed reality headset. Effectively, Segment Anything can limit the need for additional AI training.
Both the AI model and a dataset will be downloadable with a non-commercial license. That is, creators can't use it for products. This is primarily for research and expanding access to the technology. Right now, Meta uses somewhat similar tech to moderate banned content, recommend posts and tag photos.
The developers acknowledge that the existing model is flawed. It might miss finer details, and isn't as accurate at detecting the boundaries as some models. And while Segment Anything can handle prompts in real-time, it bogs down when demanding image processing is involved. Some more specialized AI tools are likely to outperform this model in their respective fields, Meta says.
You aren't about to see this AI in robots or other devices where fast, accurate object detection is (usually) vital. However, models like this may still help in situations where it's impractical to rely exclusively on training data. A social network could use the tech to keep up with a rapidly growing volume of content. If nothing else, this shows that Meta wants to generalize computer vision.
Meta is no stranger to sharing AI breakthroughs, such a translator for unwritten languages. With that said, there's pressure on the company to show that it's as much of a powerhouse in the category as tech heavyweights like Google and Microsoft. It's already planning generative AI "personas" for its social apps, and inventions like Segment Anything show that it has a few advantages of its own.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/meta-shares-ai-model-that-can-detect-objects-it-hasnt-seen-before-210002471.html?src=rss
If you’ve been waiting for Apple’s 2022 iPad to go on sale, you can get one now for $50 off its usual price. Amazon currently offers the tablet starting at $399, its lowest price yet.
The $50 discount applies to all colors, storage and networking variants of the 10.9-inch tablet. Color options include silver, pink, blue and yellow; you can order it in 64GB and 256GB tiers. In addition to the deal on the base model, you’ll pay $549 for either the WiFi / 256GB variant or the WiFi + cellular / 64GB option. The 256GB / WiFi + cellular model costs $699.
The 10th-generation iPad, launched in October, has an updated design reminiscent of the more expensive iPad Air and iPad Pro — losing the Home button and shifting Touch ID to the edge-facing power / sleep button. Its 10.9-inch display is also significantly larger than its predecessor, and it includes a faster A14 Bionic chip that’s plenty powerful for most iPad-related tasks. Additionally, Apple repositioned its front-facing camera to be centered in landscape mode, making your gaze appear more natural on video calls. It also supports the first-generation Apple Pencil (including its awkward charging setup) for jotting notes or sketching.
In Engadget’s review, the iPad’s battery life exceeded Apple’s 10-hour estimate, lasting 11 hours and 45 minutes while playing a movie from the iTunes Store. In addition, although it doesn’t support the Magic Keyboard that works with Apple’s premium tablets, you can add the Magic Keyboard Folio accessory for $229, a $20 discount. Despite a few tradeoffs, the iPad’s sale price addresses many of our reservations about it, which centered around its overall value.
Google wants to make it as easy to scrub an app account as it is to create one. The company has announced that Android apps on the Play Store will soon have to let you delete an account and its data both inside the app and on the web. Developers will also have to wipe data for an account when users ask to delete the account entirely.
The move is meant to "better educate" users on the control they have over their data, and to foster trust in both apps and the Play Store at large. It also provides more flexibility. You can delete certain data (such as your uploaded content) without having to completely erase your account, Google says. The web requirement also ensures that you won't have to reinstall an app just to purge your info.
The policy is taking effect in stages. Creators have until December 7th to answer questions about data deletion in their app's safety form. Store listings will start showing the changes in early 2024. Developers can file for an extension until May 31st of next year.
The changes come several months after Apple instituted a similar rule for App Store software. In both cases, the companies are concerned about privacy violations and the ensuing fallout — they don't want users to fall prey to data breaches because they couldn't easily delete accounts or sensitive info when they stop using an app.
This also follows growing efforts by regulators to demand more control over services. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) recently proposed rule changes requiring easy ways to cancel subscriptions and memberships. While the FTC is focused more on unwanted charges than privacy, the message to app makers is clear: provide more control of accounts or face repercussions.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/google-will-require-that-android-apps-let-you-delete-your-account-and-data-170618841.html?src=rss
Amazon is running another sale on its own products and this time around it's on Fire Kids tablets. Those looking for a way to keep kids entertained in the back seat on a long car ride might want to take a look at the latest Fire 7 Kids tablet. The 16GB model has dropped from $110 to $60. That's just $5 more than the lowest price we've seen to date. Doubling the internal storage to 32GB will only cost an extra $5. A microSD slot allows you to add up to 1TB additional storage.
The tablet, which is designed for youngsters aged three to seven, comes with a rugged protective case with built-in stand and a two-year worry-free guarantee. Also included is a one-year subscription to Amazon Kids+, which includes thousands of books, games, videos, apps and Alexa skills, all of which are ad-free. You'll be able to filter age-based content, set time limits and open access to apps such as Disney+ and Netflix via the parent dashboard.
Amazon says the latest version of the tablet delivers 30 percent faster performance than the previous generation and double the RAM at 2GB. The company says Fire 7 Kids will run for up to 10 hours on a single charge and it has a USB-C port rather than the micro-USB port of older models.
In case you feel a little more screen real estate is in order, the sale also includes a good deal on our pick for the best tablet for children, the Fire HD 10 Kids. That model is 30 percent off at $140. The Fire HD 10 Kids is just over 10 ounces heavier than the smaller model at 25.2 ounces (716 grams), so it's maybe better suited for resting on a surface than the back of a car.
The 10.1-inch Full HD device also comes with a case and a year of Amazon Kids+. Amazon says it'll run for up to 12 hours on a single charge. As with the Fire 7 Kids, this tablet has 2MP front-facing and 5MP rear-facing cameras with 720p video capture capabilities.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/amazon-fire-kids-tablets-are-up-to-45-percent-off-right-now-153710444.html?src=rss
