Technology

San Francisco, Sep 11 (IANS) With an aim to enhance the video-conferencing experience on Chromebooks, tech giant Google is reportedly developing new built-in features that include background blur and other effects to improve lighting.

According to a potential feature flag, the Chrome OS team is developing a background blur effect, available on Apple's macOS machines powered by Apple Silicon, for Chromebooks, reports Android Central.

As per the report, background blur is a popular feature of many of the best video conference software, such as Google Meet. It is a useful tool for hiding your messy bedroom when video-calling your colleagues.

The report said that adding these effects to Chromebooks as a built-in feature will significantly improve user experience on the platform, which has traditionally lagged behind Windows PCs and MacBooks in terms of features.

The tech giant is also likely working on another feature called "Portrait Relighting," which is similar to a feature found in the Google Camera app for Pixel phones.

According to Google, Portrait Light "adds a simulated directional light source to portraits" to complement the lighting in the original photo.

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San Francisco, Sep 11 (IANS) Tech giant Google is bringing a new app review policy to make app ratings and reviews as genuine as possible in the Play Store.

The latest change will hold up user-submitted reviews and ratings by around 24 hours before they go public, assuming they're from real people, reports Android Central.

As per the report, the tech giant aims for the new policy to detect suspicious ratings and reviews on Android apps.

"To allow us to automatically detect suspicious Ratings or Reviews activity, we are introducing a delay of around 24 hours from when users submit Ratings or Reviews to when those submissions are published," Google was quoted as saying in an advisory.

"In this period, you will still be able to help your users by seeing Reviews and replying to them, but these won't be immediately public," it added.

The report mentioned that the new policy might help to reduce the spread of fake reviews on online products.

The tech giant warned against posting the same review multiple times, as well as reviews for the same content from multiple accounts, the report said.

The UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) launched an investigation into Google and Amazon last year to determine whether they "may not have done enough" to combat fake reviews on their respective platforms.

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New Delhi, Sep 11 (IANS) Google is likely planning a Pixel foldable smartphone and a new Pro tablet, and the new hardware has been spotted in the Android 13 code.

Within the first in-development build of Android 13 quarterly platform release by Google, developers have spotted a detachable Pixel tablet and the rumoured Pixel foldable.

Developers have spotted "Felix" foldable device, with a 64MP Sony IMX787 primary sensor and a 10.8MP Samsung S5K3J1 telephoto lens on the back of the phone.

The device could also house an 8MP Sony IMX355 sensor (the same one used by the Pixel 6A) on the inside, reports Android Police.

The smartphone could fold horizontally like the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold.
?According to developer Kuba Wojciechowski, Google released the first beta for Android 13 QPR1 beta and with it a lot of updated code.

It includes "new camera drivers, revealing some details about their upcoming products. I have found some details about a yet-unknown foldable, another tablet and more," he posted in a tweet.

"As of now, we know about two foldable devices from Google - passport and pipit," he said.

The first one has been canceled, but the status of the other one was unknown.

"Recently we've heard that the display production for their foldable would start in 4 months," said the developer.

Goggle was yet to make any comment. The company will hold a Pixel 7 launch event on October 6.

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New Delhi, Sep 10 (IANS) French consumer electronics brand Thomson has launched new QLED TV series with Google TV in India, ahead of the festive season, that starts from Rs 33,999.

Thomson 50-inch QLED TV starts from Rs 33,999, the 55-inch from Rs 40,999 and 65-inch from Rs 59,999.

The QLED TVs at the price of 4K will be available on Flipkart during its annual ‘The Big Billion Days' sale, said the company.

"These TVs are packed with top-notch features and hardware yet again giving the Indian consumer the opportunity to put their hands on the best of technology and design at an extremely pocket-friendly price," said Avneet Singh Marwah, CEO SPPL, exclusive brand licensee of Thomson in India.

The TVs offers support for multiple adult and child user profiles, a selection of smart TV apps, manual and voice controls for smart home devices, personalised home screen for each user, Google TV app to control the TV and smart home controls for lights and cameras.

The new QLED TVs are frameless and offer Dolby Vision with HDR 10+, Dolby Atmos, Dolby Digital Plus, DTS Trusurround, Bezel- less design, 40W Dolby Audio Stereo Box Speaker, 2GB RAM, 16GB ROM, Dual Band (2.4+5) GHz Wi-Fi, Google TV and much more.

The TVs come with completely bezel-less and Air Slim design.

"We are excited for the launch of Thomson's QLED series with Google TV on our platform which will offer a differentiated TV viewing experience this festive season to millions of our customers across the country," said Hari G. Kumar, Vice-President, Large Appliances at Flipkart.

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San Francisco, Sep 9 (IANS) Tech giant Google has announced that it is bringing several new features -- including Nearby Share -- to help users stay productive, communicate with loved ones and enjoy entertainment across devices.

The company said that Nearby Share lets users quickly and securely share files between nearby Android phones, tablets and Chromebooks, whether they are photos or videos or even entire folders.

"In the next few weeks, you will be able to use Nearby Share to effortlessly transfer files across your own devices," Scott Blanksteen, Senior Director, Product Management, Android, said in a statement.

"Just select Android devices logged into your Google account from the sharing menu to quickly share files between them. And once you have opted in, transfers between devices you own are automatically accepted -- even if your screen is off," Blanksteen added.

The company said that it recently introduced a new look and updated Google Workspace apps for bigger screens and now it is continuing to optimise users' favourite Google apps on tablets to make multi-tasking a breeze, starting with redesigned widgets for Google Drive and Keep.

"With an updated Google Drive widget, three home screen buttons now offer one-touch access to your Google Docs, Google Slides and Google Sheets files," the company said.

"And in Google Keep, a bigger widget and font size makes note-taking, to-do lists, and reminders easy to access," it added.

The company has added many new Emoji Kitchen mashups, available as stickers via Gboard.

To bring people closer, the company said it is also adding new shared experiences in Google Meet.

"With live sharing features, you can instantly co-watch YouTube videos and play classic games with up to 100 friends and family members at a time," the company said.

"So even if you are far apart, you can maintain traditions like a movie and game nights. This feature is rolling out to Android phones and tablets," it added.

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San Francisco, Sep 9 (IANS) Tech giant Microsoft has announced that it is rolling out new experiments to learn how to create a more personalised home screen experience for Xbox users.

The company said that it is focused on making it faster and easier for users to play the games they love and find their next favourite game.

"We know the Xbox homepage is where our gamers spend a lot of their time, and it is a space that is very personal. We also know we can always be listening and learning how we can do better here while keeping your experience fast and familiar," Ivy Krislov, Senior Product Manager Lead, Xbox, said in a blogpost.

The company said that starting this week, a random subset of Xbox Insiders in the Alpha Skip-Ahead ring will see layout, design, and ease of access changes as we experiment with different approaches.

"In addition, we are exploring options for new game channels and collections when you scroll down that include content that's curated for you based on things like the games you have played or how to make the most out of your Game Pass subscription," Krislov said.

The key update in this first round of preview updates is that the new "Jump back in" row gives users quick access to their most recently played games and apps.

Users can easily access essential system apps like Settings, Store, Search and My Games and Apps with their own dedicated tiles on Xbox Home.

"We want to ensure this experience is the best it can be, and we know getting it right will take some time which is why we will be rolling it out slowly and iterating throughout the process," Krislov said.

"With your input, we are looking forward to launching this new, better Home experience in 2023. Please share your feedback and be patient as we add, remove, and change features to optimize the experience," Krislov added.

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San Francisco, Sep 8 (IANS) After unveiling its next-gen products, tech giant Apple has discontinued older iPhones, including iPhone 11, 12 Mini, 13 Pro, and 13 Pro Max.

According to GizmoChina, the tech giant has replaced the outgoing Pro models with the launch of new Pro models in Apple's iPhone lineup, like it does every year.

The report mentioned that Apple has officially stopped selling the aforementioned older iPhone models, but they will still be available for purchase from retailers around the world while stocks last.

The iPhone 13 Pro series brought some major upgrades. It introduced features like a 120Hz LTPO display, an improved triple camera system, much better battery life, and more. Further, the firm discontinued the iPhone 11 from 2019. It was the first base iPhone with a dual-camera setup, 4GB RAM, 18W wired charging support, and more.

The tech giant has also discontinued the iPhone 12 Mini from 2020, which was the first Mini iPhone, and the most affordable iPhone with an OLED display at the launch.

Meanwhile, at its 'Far Out Event' this week on Wednesday, Apple has unveiled the iPhone 14 series, which were accompanied by AirPods Pro 2nd Gen, Apple Watch Series 8, and Apple Watch Ultra. Unsurprisingly, the American tech giant also announced the discontinuation of select older iPhones.

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San Francisco, Sep 8 (IANS) After launching its community-driven content moderation programme Birdwatch, microblogging site Twitter is now rolling out an updated Birdwatch onboarding process that better incentivises contributors to write and rate notes in a thoughtful way.

Birdwatch is a collaborative way to add helpful context to potentially misleading Tweets and keep people better informed.

"New Birdwatch contributors who have met the eligibility criteria will begin with an initial Rating Impact score of zero, which they can increase by consistently rating other contributors' notes and reliably identifying those that are Helpful and Not Helpful," the company said in a blogpost.

"Once a contributor's score has risen to five, they can start writing notes," it added.

The platform said that contributors can further increase their Writing and Rating Impact scores by both writing Helpful notes and continuing to rate notes written by others.

Repeatedly writing notes that reach a status of Not Helpful, however, will result in a decreasing score and could temporarily lock a contributor's note writing ability.

Birdwatch programme is made up of a group of people, or contributors, who help identify information in Tweets they believe is misleading and write notes that provide informative context.

Only notes that are rated Helpful by a diverse group of contributors, or that "bridge" across groups of people who have tended to disagree in their past ratings, are made visible on Twitter.

The programme began testing in 2021 and is regularly being updated and improved thanks to analysis from our research team and feedback from our academic advisory board and Birdwatch contributors.

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Cupertino (California), Sep 8 (IANS) Apple on Wednesday launched the new iPhone 14 series with four models -- iPhone 14, 14 Plus, 14 Pro and 14 Pro Max -- that starts from Rs 79,900.

Customers in India can get the 6.1-inch iPhone 14 for Rs 79,900 and the 6.7-inch iPhone 14 Plus for Rs 89,900.

They will be able to pre-order iPhone 14 and iPhone 14 Plus beginning September 9, with iPhone 14 availability beginning September 16 and iPhone 14 Plus beginning October 7.

Customers can get iPhone 14 Pro for Rs 129,900 and iPhone 14 Pro Max for Rs 139,900 (starting prices).

iPhone 14 Pro and iPhone 14 Pro Max will be available in deep purple, silver, gold, and space black in 128GB, 256GB, 512GB, and 1TB storage capacities.

The Pro models feature the Always-On display, Crash Detection, Emergency SOS via satellite, and an innovative new way to receive notifications and activities with the Dynamic Island.

Powered by A16 Bionic, the fastest chip ever in a smartphone, iPhone 14 Pro introduces a new class of pro camera system, with the first-ever 48MP Main camera on iPhone featuring a quad-pixel sensor, and Photonic Engine, an enhanced image pipeline that dramatically improves low-light photos.

iPhone 14 Pro and iPhone 14 Pro Max will be available in four gorgeous new finishes: deep purple, silver, gold, and space black. Pre-orders begin September 9 with availability beginning September 16.

Available in 6.1-inch and 6.7-inch sizes,1 both models include a new Super Retina XDR display with ProMotion that features the Always-On display for the first time ever on iPhone, enabled by a new 1Hz refresh rate and multiple power-efficient technologies.

The Dynamic Island enables new ways to interact with iPhone, featuring a design that blends the line between hardware and software, adapting in real time to show important alerts, notifications, and activities.

With the introduction of the Dynamic Island, the TrueDepth camera has been redesigned to take up less of the display area.

The A16 Bionic chip in iPhone 14 Pro and iPhone 14 Pro Max is generations ahead of the competition, and unlocks unparalleled experiences like the Dynamic Island, powers all-day battery life, and delivers impressive computational photography capabilities.

"With the new, larger 6.7-inch display on iPhone 14 Plus, users can enjoy more content onscreen when browsing the web and even more text," said Greg Joswiak, Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing.A

"Both phones have a powerful new Main camera with a huge leap in low-light performance, advanced connectivity capabilities with 5G and eSIM, and the incredible performance of A15 Bionic, which helps enable even better battery life. All of this, tightly integrated with iOS 16, makes iPhone more essential than ever," he added.

The phones have the A15 Bionic chip with a 5-core GPU, which offers incredible performance and efficiency for demanding workloads, and is designed with privacy and security built in.

iPhone 14 and iPhone 14 Plus will be available in midnight, blue, starlight, purple, and (PRODUCT)RED1 finishes.

Both models have an updated internal design for better thermal performance, Super Retina XDR displays with OLED technology that supports 1200 nits of peak HDR brightness and Dolby Vision.

iPhone 14 and iPhone 14 Plus also feature the durable Ceramic Shield front cover -- exclusive to iPhone and tougher than any other smartphone glass.

iPhone 14 and iPhone 14 Plus have a new 12MP Main camera featuring a larger sensor and larger pixels, a new front TrueDepth camera, the Ultra Wide camera to capture more of a scene, and Photonic Engine for a giant leap in low-light performance.

With a new dual-core accelerometer capable of detecting G-force measurements of up to 256Gs and a new high dynamic range gyroscope, aCrash Detection' on iPhone can now detect a severe car crash and automatically dial emergency services when a user is unconscious or unable to reach their iPhone.A

The iPhone 14 lineup also introduces Emergency SOS via satellite, which combines custom components deeply integrated with software to allow antennas to connect directly to a satellite, enabling messaging with emergency services when outside of cellular or Wi-Fi coverage.A

Emergency SOS via satellite will be available to users in the US and Canada in November, and the service will be free for two years, said the company.

iPhone 14 and iPhone 14 Plus feature iOS 16, offering a reimagined Lock Screen along with new communication, sharing, and intelligence features that together change the way users experience iPhone.A

iOS 16 will be available as a free software update on September 12.

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New Delhi, Sep 7 (IANS) Chip-maker Qualcomm has announced Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 and Snapdragon 4 Gen 1 mobile platforms to address the mid-tier and mass-volume smartphone segment.

The Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 extends users' reach with expansive connectivity and sustained, efficient power and performance for high-intensity gaming.

Snapdragon 4 Gen 1 offers impressive performance and AI to make interactions seamless and intuitive. This chip also provides advanced photography features as well as improved connectivity, the company said in a statement.

Commercial devices powered by Snapdragon 6 are expected to be available in Q1 2023, while devices based on Snapdragon 4 are likely to be available in the ongoing third quarter.

"Both Snapdragon 6 and Snapdragon 4 provide upgrades in their respective series to enable advancements in capture, connectivity, entertainment, and AI. These new mobile platforms help our customers to deliver advanced solutions for consumers," said Deepu John, senior director, product management, Qualcomm Technologies.

The Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 allows users to capture 108 MP photos and video with computational HDR via support for staggered HDR image sensors — a first in the Snapdragon 6-series.

Snapdragon 6 features the 7th Gen Qualcomm AI Engine enabling up to three times improved AI performance compared to its predecessor for intelligent assistance across the board, including AI-based activity tracking.

"With hard-hitting gaming features that deliver up to 35 per cent quicker graphics rendering and up to 40 per cent faster processing, Snapdragon 6 powers HDR gaming at an ultra-smooth 60+fps while delivering real-time responses and high-quality visuals for winning entertainment," said the company.

Snapdragon 4 Gen 1 boasts impressive performance and multi-day battery life.

The platform features up to 15 per cent improved CPU and up to 10 per cent enhanced GPU compared to the previous generation, allowing users to multitask smoothly and enjoy immersive entertainment.

"Based on our long-lasting collaboration with Qualcomm, we can't wait to introduce our upcoming new iQOO smartphone adopting the new Snapdragon mobile platform," said Nipun Marya, chief executive officer, iQOO India.

"As a company, we will continue to find the perfect balance between performance and affordability by utilising the Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 Mobile platform in the future," said Francois La Flamme, head of strategy and chief of marketing office, Motorola.

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