Tag Archives: Googles

How Google’s hot air balloon surprised its creators

The gaggle of Google employees peered at their computer screens in bewilderment. They had spent many months honing an algorithm designed to steer an unmanned hot air balloon all the way from Puerto Rico to Peru. But something was wrong. The balloon, controlled by its machine mind, kept veering off course. Salvatore Candido of Google’s now-defunct Project Loon venture, which aimed to bring internet access to remote areas via the balloons, couldn’t explain the craft’s trajectory. His… Source link

Read More »

Google’s treatment of AI ethics researchers continues to stir up controversy – TechCrunch

You’ve landed on the web version of the weekly Human Capital newsletter. Sign up here to get this in your inbox every Friday at 1 p.m. Welcome back to Human Capital. A lot happened this week pertaining to on-demand companies like Uber, Postmates, DoorDash and Instacart, and their respective gig workforces. Meanwhile, New York’s attorney general hit Amazon with a lawsuit over its warehouse labor practices and Twitter made some new commitments to increase diversity at the leadership… Source link

Read More »

Google’s older Pixel cameras are failing at an accelerating rate

Enlarge / The Pixel 2 XL. Ron Amadeo Does the Pixel camera have a hardware problem? Android Police has tracked down numerous reports of broken cameras on the Pixel 2 and Pixel 3, and the Pixel-exclusive Google Camera app has been getting review-bombed with tons of 1-star reviews from users who say their cameras no longer work. Google told the site it doesn’t know of any software issues, suggesting that all these people are experiencing a… Source link

Read More »

Ex-Stadia developers dish on Google’s mismanagement and poor communication

Google recently killed its only in-house Stadia game development studio, Stadia Games and Entertainment (SG&E), after building up the studio for only two years. In an industry where even established game studios take several years to ship a product, this was a breathtakingly fast pace for building and tearing down a game development studio. Kotaku got in touch with some of the 150+ staffers who were dismissed from Google’s studio, and they… Source link

Read More »

North Dakota lawmakers vote down a bill that threatened Apple’s and Google’s revenues.

A North Dakota bill that an Apple executive had warned “threatens to destroy iPhone as you know it” died in a vote on Tuesday. Three-quarters of North Dakota’s 48 state senators voted against the bill, which sought to prohibit Apple and Google from forcing North Dakota companies to hand over a share of their app sales. The bill targeted Apple’s and Google’s practices of charging a commission of up to 30 percent on many app sales. The companies brought in a combined $33 billion from… Source link

Read More »

Google’s new two-factor authentication prompt now has dark mode on Android

Google is rolling out a new update for its two-factor authentication prompt on Android, which adds support for dark mode (along with a new Material Design-style look), via 9to5Google. Is this objectively a minor cosmetic update in the great scheme of things? Yes. Is it nice to not be blasted with retina-searing white light when your two-factor authentication prompt comes up while you’re trying to log into something in pitch-black darkness? Also yes. … Source link

Read More »

Bumble’s IPO, Google’s missing privacy labels, a developer crusades against scams – TechCrunch

Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the weekly TechCrunch series that recaps the latest in mobile OS news, mobile applications and the overall app economy. The app industry is as hot as ever, with a record 218 billion downloads and $143 billion in global consumer spend in 2020. Consumers last year also spent 3.5 trillion minutes using apps on Android devices alone. And in the U.S., app usage surged ahead of the time spent watching live TV. Currently, the average American watches… Source link

Read More »