Airbnb said in an announcement today that it is reviewing its anti-discrimination policy in an effort to get its "house in order," and has recruited an unexpected person to help: former US Attorney General Eric Holder.
Starting in August, Mozilla’s Firefox will block Flash content that “is not essential to the user experience,” the organization announced today.
With this move, Mozilla is following Google’s lead, which made a similar decision last year and now plans to almost completely block Flash content in its Chrome browser.
Not too long ago, Flash was one of the fundamental… Read More
by David Nield on Field Guide, shared by Andy Orin to Lifehacker
Spotify, the original titan of the music streaming world, is packed with plenty of great—but there are still plenty of third party add-ons that can enhance the original app even further. Here are some of our favorite utilities for doing more with Spotify and taking your streaming to the next level.
1) Equalify Pro
Equalify Pro is a full equalizer plug-in for Spotify, though you’ll have to pay a few bucks to get your hands on it. The plug-in only works on the Spotify client for Windows at the moment. If you think you can mix your tunes better than the professionals originally did, then it’s well worth the investment. Just click the Equalify Pro button inside Spotify to launch it.
We’d only recommend the plug-in for those who are serious about tweaking their music output rather than having a quick play around with it. The tool uses a parametric rather than a graphic interface, and blends it seamlessly into the main Spotify interface. The presets that come with the software are a useful way to test out different mixes, too.
2) Spotify Web Player Hotkeys
Spotify’s web player is all well and good if you want to listen through a browser, but it doesn’t have much in the way of keyboard controls, which is where Spotify Web Player Hotkeys comes in. This Chrome extension lets you control playback from your keyboard even when the Spotify tab isn’t actually active, and the shortcuts can be customized too.
By default, Alt+Shift+P will start and stop playback, Alt+Shift+Period will skip to the next track, and Alt+Shift+Comma goes back to the previous one. If you’d like to change these to ones that are a little more suited to you (and add others), open the Extensions page from Chrome’s menu and scroll right down to the Keyboard shortcuts link at the bottom.
3) The Set Listener
The Set Listener combines features from the Spotify API and the API from gig database Setlist.fm to create playlists from your favorite band’s most recent show. Type in the name of a particular artist to get the setlist from their last gig, which can then be saved to your Spotify account as a new playlist with a couple of mouse clicks in your web browser.
Of course, you’re getting the album versions of these songs rather than live recordings, but it’s still a great way of reliving a gig you’ve just been to or listening to the specific tracks a particular band is running through these days. You’re relying on the Setlist.fm data being accurate and up to date, but from the tests that we ran it seems to be up to scratch.
4) The Playlist Miner
Another automatic playlist generator in the vein of The Set Listener, but The Playlist Miner works by plugging itself into all the most popular public playlists on Spotify to bring you tunes based around the keyword of your choice. Type in “workout”, for instance, and you get back a bunch of tracks other Spotify users have associated with their time at the gym.
Log in with your Spotify credentials first of all then type in any word or phrase to get started. Anything goes really—try “Sunday” or “ballad” or whatever you like—and from the results screen you can either browse individual playlists or click the Find Top Tracks button to collect together the songs that occur most frequently across all these playlists.
5) Last.fm
If you’ve ever wandered through the Spotify settings page and wondered exactly what that option to connect to Last.fm is all about, then wonder no longer. Last.fm is a platform for discovering and sharing music, but perhaps its most useful feature is the ability to log (or “scrobble”) all of your listening over multiple devices and apps (including Spotify).
Spotify lets you look back through your most recent history but it’s nowhere near as comprehensive as Last.fm, which can tell you which album you’ve heard most often during your lifetime or remind you which track you couldn’t get enough of three summers ago. It can serve up intelligent recommendations for new artists you might like as well.
The UK is sometimes called a nation of shopkeepers, and soon mobile payments company Square may be putting that to the test in the search for new business. Square Register — the company’s point of sale app used by merchants to manage their inventory, make invoices and take payments from customers — has quietly started to allow users to make payments in the UK, in UK pounds.… Read More
Skype has been slowly transitioning from a P2P service to the cloud over the past few years, and Microsoft is unveiling some changes today to the Skype apps it supports as a result. While Microsoft will continue to support Skype on iOS 8, Android 4.03, and Windows 10 Mobile, any users stuck on Windows Phone 8 or older versions of Android will no longer receive access to the latest versions of Skype. That will render some of the apps useless over time as the Skype service evolves.
In a blog post outlining the changes, Microsoft's Skype chief Gurdeep Pall admits that Skype has experienced some issues over the past couple of years. "At times, unforeseen issues have cropped up, like messages not syncing across devices, or delayed...
The BBC has launched a new app for iOS and Android that acts as a hub to bring together online iPlayer content, weather forecasts, recipes and more all in one place. While a myBBC account is required so the BBC can more conveniently track your use of the new app, it serves as your new centralized hub for all things BBC. Whether you're wanting to catch-up on your favorite original series or wish to check out tomorrow's forecast, you can do all this with BBC+.
As noted by the BBC in its own coverage, the corporation hopes the launch of BBC+ will help avoid a situation where consumers become confused with multiple apps for different types of content. This isn't the only move the BBC has made to consolidate content into a single offering. The corporation recently shut down BBC Newsbeat and moved all content to the BBC News umbrella. When firing up the BBC+ app for the first time, you'll be asked to choose at least three topics from a rather lengthy list.
This enables the app to curate an "at a glance" geed that will help keep you in the loop without requiring multiple menu entries to find content covering numerous topics. The myBBC connection brings with it a few neat features, one being the ability to save tracks heard on shows that can be listened to at a later date. Head to the Play Store to download BBC+ and let us know your thoughts in the comments!
Twitter has permanently suspended Milo Yiannopoulos, an editor at the conservative news outlet Breitbart and one of its most notorious trolls. The expulsion of Yiannopoulos, who counted more than 300,000 followers on the service, comes just one day after he urged on a hateful mob that harassed ‘Ghostbusters’ actress Leslie Jones to the point that she quit Twitter. Jones received… Read More
In Botswana, conservation scientists from the University of New South Wales are painting eyes on the rear ends of cattle in an effort to deter lions from eating them. As the lions' protected habitats shrink, they move closer to human settlements. In Botswana, the lions attack the livestock that the subsistence farmers count on. That leads the farmers to kill the African lions, further endangering the species.
(UNSW conservation biologist Neil Jordan’s idea of painting eyes onto cattle rumps came about after two lionesses were killed near the village in Botswana where he was based. While watching a lion hunt an impala, he noticed something interesting: “Lions are ambush hunters, so they creep up on their prey, get close and jump on them unseen. But in this case, the impala noticed the lion. And when the lion realised it had been spotted, it gave up on the hunt,” he says.
In nature, being ‘seen’ can deter predation. For example, patterns resembling eyes on butterfly wings are known to deter birds. In India, woodcutters in the forest have long worn masks on the back of their heads to ward-off man-eating tigers.
Jordan’s idea was to “hijack this mechanism” of psychological trickery. Last year, he collaborated with the BPCT and a local farmer to trial the innovative strategy, which he’s dubbed “iCow”.
Uber’s drive to get closer to core components of its business continues as the company has secured a partnership with DigitalGlobe, a satellite imaging company that also provides images to Apple, Google and the U.S. government. DigitalGlobe’s high res satellite pics can provide extremely high levels of detail, revealing the changing topography of the modern city with a clarity… Read More
A Brazilian judge has ordered an indefinite blackout of the WhatsApp messaging service, following months of legal efforts by the country’s law enforcement agencies. First reported by O Globo, the order comes after temporary blackouts issued in December and May, both of which were overturned by higher courts in a matter of days. The order is valid for the entire nation of Brazil.
Unlike previous orders, today’s blackout has no set expiration period, and is intended to continue until the company complies with a previously issued request for WhatsApp messages related to an ongoing investigation. But WhatsApp’s lawyers have argued in court that the company does not have access to the requested data and is unable to comply with the request....
Twitter is opening the blue checkmark to everyone. Starting today, the company will let users request a verified account on its website by filling out a form with a verified phone number and email address, a profile photo, and additional information regarding why verification is required or helpful. In defining who will get approved, Twitter says "an account may be verified if it is determined to be of public interest." Prior to today, Twitter tended only to verify public figures, brands, and people in media, politics, sports, business, and other high-profile sectors.
"We want to make it even easier for people to find creators and influencers on Twitter so it makes sense for us to let people apply for verification," said Tina Bhatnagar,...
Necklaces tangle easily, especially during travel, and untangling them is frustrating. Pack them in plastic wrap to keep each necklace separate and ready-to-wear once you arrive at your destination.
Put down a layer of plastic wrap, lay your necklaces out, then cover with another layer of plastic wrap. Press the two layers together around your necklaces to keep them separated. Gently fold or roll your wrapped necklaces so that they create a small bundle that’s easy to pack in your suitcase.
Less bulky necklaces, like pendants on chains, work best with this method. You can also pack bracelets this way, but buttons will work best for earrings. While the plastic wrap will provide some protection, if your bundle has any particularly delicate jewelry in it, wrap clothing around the bundle for added padding.
Some people have theorized that self-driving cars and ride-hailing apps will lead to the end of public transport, but really, you still can't beat the efficiency of cramming a load of people into a single bus. Combine that with autonomous driving tech and you might have a whole new sort of public transport. At least, that's what Mercedes-Benz thinks, and its semi-autonomous Future Bus program has just passed a major milestone: navigating a route of more than 20 kilometers.
Now, this is nothing compared to the million-plus kilometers traveled by Google's self-driving cars, but every journey starts with single step (or rotation of the wheel). The Future Bus followed a route from Amsterdam's Schiphol airport to the town of Haarlem, a...
Something as indispensable as hearing aids — which cost upwards of $5,000 (and that’s just for the basics) — should be as accessible and, frankly, affordable as a smartphone. Considering how many people have hearing loss, or are at risk, it’s astonishing to see that innovation in this space has been painfully stagnant. But it doesn’t have to stay that way. Read More
Just as the world’s precious artworks and monuments need a touch-up to look their best, the home we’ve built to host the world’s cultural treasures online needs a lick of paint every now and then. We’re ready to pull off the dust sheets and introduce the new Google Arts & Culture website and app, by the Google Cultural Institute. The app lets you explore anything from cats in art since 200 BCE to the color red in Abstract Expressionism, and everything in between.
We’re sure you’ll want to see some of the artworks in real life too—and the Google Arts & Culture app is there to help. Click “Visit” on a museum’s page to get opening times, find out what’s on that day and navigate there in one click. We’ve also been experimenting with a new feature. The Art Recognizer is now available in London’s Dulwich Picture Gallery, Sydney’s Art Gallery of New South Wales and the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC. Just pull up the app, point your phone’s camera to a painting on display and find all the information you want to know about the artwork. We’re planning to roll this out to museums around the world—so stay tuned.
There’s much to learn about our shared cultural heritage. Download the app for iOS and Android to unlock a world of experiences, every day.
Posted by Duncan Osborn, Product Manager, Google Cultural Institute https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-i-NlpIDu4cU/V41iDtvxXwI/AAAAAAAASss/nUeudu0ftYAvYiQCqCfseyUUyLG9sEH5ACLcB/s200/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-07-18%2Bat%2B4.10.35%2BPM.png Duncan Osborn Product Manager Google Cultural Institute
The creators of a drone that can autonomously map, detect, and detonate land mines say their technology could potentially clear the world of these deadly devices in the less than 10 years' time. It's an ambitious goal, but one well worth pursuing. Worldwide, there are thought to be some 100 million land mines, many of which are leftover from conflicts long since finished. Every year these mines kill thousands of people, the vast majority of which are innocent civilians. The Mine Kafon Drone (MKD) wants to help change this.
The MKD is designed to make clearing land mines easier, cheaper, and safer. The drone has six rotors and a trio of different attachments. The first is used to map the desired area, while the second, a metal detector,...
You don't get much more British than the BBC. It's like a cup of tea or chocolate digestive biscuits. Presumably because the BBC has realised it is losing market share to other news websites and TV services like Netflix or Amazon Prime, it has released a new app, BBC+, in an attempt to combat this. Provided the user has a BBC iD, they can pick what they're interested in and then see in a magazine-like format.
The European Court of Justice has issued a preliminary ruling on a data retention case brought by UK MPs and privacy rights groups seeking to challenge the government’s data retention regime under DRIPA. Read More
It has been a couple of months since Play Books has been in the news, but there's a new update rolling out and it brings a couple of new features. Version 3.9 gives search a little more help with more thorough suggestions and adds a badge to series when new content hits the store. Those two things along with some other general bug fixes and improvements are certainly nice, but there are also a couple of things to talk about in a teardown.
With Samsung Pay expected to roll out in the UK later this year, it's worth brushing up on the basics.
Samsung Pay is coming to the UK! Well, technically it's been coming to the UK for the past several months, with the official announcement coming back at Mobile World Congress in February. We still don't know many of the specifics when it comes to the British launch of Samsung's payment service, but we can keep you informed on everything we know so far.
Read on.
When will Samsung Pay launch in the UK?
Right now Samsung Pay is currently only available in the United States, China and South Korea. The service is set to expand to more places, including the UK, soon. However Samsung hasn't provided any firm timetable.
When Samsung Pay becomes available in the UK, an over-the-air update on supported phones will enable the service.
Is Samsung Pay the same as Android Pay?
No. Android Pay is Google's own payment service which works on all Android phones running Android 4.4 KitKat with NFC (near field communication) capabilities.
Samsung Pay is a different service owned and operated by Samsung, and the technology behind it is slightly different. While Android Pay uses NFC — like a regular contactless credit or debit card — Samsung Pay can use both NFC and another technology called MST, which helps it work in more places.
Samsung Pay uses NFC like Android Pay and Apple Pay — but it'll also work with regular magnetic readers thanks to a technology called MST.
In addition to working with contactless payment terminals (just like Android Pay, Apple Pay or your contactless credit card), Samsung has a unique trick up its sleeve in the form of MST — Magnetic Secure Transmission.
MST — a feature of supported Samsung phones — allows Samsung Pay to work with just about any traditional magnetic card swiper by holding the back of the phone over the swiper. (After first authenticating with your fingerprint, of course.)
That means Samsung has a distinct advantage over its rivals, in that it's able to boast support "just about everywhere" due to the ubiquity of magnetic credit card readers.
Samsung Pay can also work with newer contactless payment terminals, which are becoming increasingly common throughout the UK. With these, you'll just hold your phone over the contactless area on the terminal, as you would a credit card.
Which Samsung devices are supported?
Supported phones and watches include:
Samsung Galaxy S7
Samsung Galaxy S7 edge
Samsung Galaxy S6 edge+
Samsung Galaxy Note 5 (not released in the UK)
Samsung Galaxy S6 Active (not released in the UK)
Samsung Galaxy S6 edge
Samsung Galaxy S6
Samsung Gear S2
It's almost certain the upcoming Galaxy Note 7 will support Samsung Pay, as well as the Gear S3 smartwatch, expected to break cover at the IFA 2016 show.
Which UK banks will support Samsung Pay
No banks have been announced just yet, but it's safe to assume Samsung will be courting the same major high street banks as Apple and Google. For what it's worth, Android Pay launched with eight major banks onboard — Bank of Scotland, First Direct, Halifax, HSBC, Lloyds, M&S, MBNA and Nationwide.
Whatever happens, expect Samsung to continue adding banks to Samsung Pay in the months following launch to plug any gaps.
Will there be a limit to Samsung Pay in the UK?
Samsung hasn't announced details of payment limits yet, however it's possible payment limits could line up with Android Pay — up to £30 without using your fingerprint, with higher amounts requiring fingerprint authentication.
How much you'll be able to pay may also depend on your bank and the merchant.
Is Samsung Pay secure to use?
Samsung Pay is arguably more secure than using a credit card, since your card details are never provided to the merchant. Instead, Samsung Pay uses a secure token generated by Samsung in order to authenticate your payment. This is true whether you're using Samsung Pay over NFC of MST.
It's debatable whether any kind of electronic payment can be completely safe and secure, but there's nothing inherently risky about paying with your phone — assuming you take sensible precautions and protect it in the same way you would a physical credit card.
Will you use Samsung Pay in the UK? Hit the comments and let us know!
Netflix released its earnings report for the second quarter today. The company was one of 2015's best performing stocks, but has seen its share price stumble in recent months on projections of slower growth. Today it reported $1.97 billion in revenue and net income of $41 million. Adding to worries about its growth, the company added just 1.54 million subscribers, well below its own projections of 2.5 million new customers. The stock is down around 14 percent in after-hours trading.
In its letter to investors, Netflix blamed the weak subscriber growth on churn, meaning older customers exiting. "Our global member forecast for Q2 was 2.5m and we came in at 1.7m. Gross additions were on target, but churn ticked up slightly and...
The US Navy is now using a particular type of sonar in more than half of the world’s ocean under an illegal permit. That sonar harms marine mammals like whales, dolphins, seals, and walruses. On Friday, the Ninth US Circuit Court of Appeals in California found that a 2012 regulation that allowed the Navy to use a low-frequency active sonar for training and testing violates the Marine Mammal Protection Act.
The copyright troll business-model: a sleazy lawyer gets copyright holders to one or more films (often, but not always, porn) to deputize them to police those rights; then the lawyer's company uses sloppy investigative techniques to accuse internet users of violating those copyrights; they use deceptive notices to get ISPs to give them contact details for those users (or to get the ISPs to pass notices on to the users); then they send "speculative invoices" to their victims, demanding money not to sue -- usually a sum that's calculated to be less than it would cost to ask a lawyer whether it's worth paying.
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CityPilot has taken a key early step towards fully autonomous public transportation: The Mercedes-Benz self-driving bus program saw one of its Future Bus vehicles drive 20 km (or around 12.4 miles) in the Netherlands, on a route that connected Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport with the nearby town of Haarlem. To make the trip, the bus had to stop at traffic lights, pass through tunnels,… Read More
A new report released today confirms allegations that Russia operated a state-sponsored doping program during the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi and beyond. The World Anti-Doping Agency commissioned the independent investigation after Grigory Rodchenkov, former head of Russia's anti-doping laboratory, told TheNew York Times earlier this year that he had covered-up the doping of dozens of Russian Olympic athletes during the 2014 winter games and did so at the direction of Russian officials. While it's too early to know for certain what will come of the report, it may lead to Russia being the first country banned from the Olympics for doping.
The two-month investigation, conducted by Richard McLaren, a Canadian law professor and sports...
Starting in August, Mozilla’s Firefox will block Flash content that “is not essential to the user experience,” the organization announced today.
With this move, Mozilla is following Google’s lead, which made a similar decision last year and now plans to almost completely block Flash content in its Chrome browser.
Not too long ago, Flash was one of the fundamental… Read More
The UK is sometimes called a nation of shopkeepers, and soon mobile payments company Square may be putting that to the test in the search for new business. Square Register — the company’s point of sale app used by merchants to manage their inventory, make invoices and take payments from customers — has quietly started to allow users to make payments in the UK, in UK pounds.… Read More
Twitter has permanently suspended Milo Yiannopoulos, an editor at the conservative news outlet Breitbart and one of its most notorious trolls. The expulsion of Yiannopoulos, who counted more than 300,000 followers on the service, comes just one day after he urged on a hateful mob that harassed ‘Ghostbusters’ actress Leslie Jones to the point that she quit Twitter. Jones received… Read More
Uber’s drive to get closer to core components of its business continues as the company has secured a partnership with DigitalGlobe, a satellite imaging company that also provides images to Apple, Google and the U.S. government. DigitalGlobe’s high res satellite pics can provide extremely high levels of detail, revealing the changing topography of the modern city with a clarity… Read More
Something as indispensable as hearing aids — which cost upwards of $5,000 (and that’s just for the basics) — should be as accessible and, frankly, affordable as a smartphone. Considering how many people have hearing loss, or are at risk, it’s astonishing to see that innovation in this space has been painfully stagnant. But it doesn’t have to stay that way. Read More
Welcome to the roundup of the best new Android games that went live in the Play Store or were spotted by us in the previous 2 weeks or so.
The European Court of Justice has issued a preliminary ruling on a data retention case brought by UK MPs and privacy rights groups seeking to challenge the government’s data retention regime under DRIPA. Read More
CityPilot has taken a key early step towards fully autonomous public transportation: The Mercedes-Benz self-driving bus program saw one of its Future Bus vehicles drive 20 km (or around 12.4 miles) in the Netherlands, on a route that connected Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport with the nearby town of Haarlem. To make the trip, the bus had to stop at traffic lights, pass through tunnels,… Read More
