Rolandt

Just like Stackoverflow does it.

We’re doing work on using data better as part of FeverBee’s coaching program.

A big part of this is building out decision trees which shows what you will do with data before you collect it.

This removes the bias from you and your team. It guides you to the right answer instead of what you want to work on.

For example, if the level of participation drops, you can create a series of binary decisions to guide you to the answer.

(click for larger image)

Building a decision tree requires creating a series of decisions which relate to an internal or external cause.

If a metric has significantly changed, it’s typically because of an internal or external cause.
Either something internal to community has changed (new design, onboarding journey, community manager etc… ) or something external has changed (new competition, changing needs, decline in customers etc..).

The decision tree means creating a series of decisions to identify the precise problems to ensure you’re working on the right solution.

There’s no point working on a new gamification program to increase participation if the problem is external to the audience. For example, if most members have solved most of their problems, a gamification problem is a waste of time.

Without decision trees in place, you’re almost certainly:

1. Working on the wrong things.
2. Not benefitting at all from the data you collect.
3. Failing to create a system your team/next community manager can use.

If you need help, join our FeverBee Coaching program.

Even though the Python 3.8 release is getting all the news coverage in the Python universe today, PyPy 7.2 is a lot more interesting to me since it has full 3.6 support and some of the fixes I’ve been waiting for.

I’ll be updating my runtime images when I can find the time.

In this article we look at the tiny 0.49″ 64×32 graphic OLED from PMD Way. It is a compact and useful display, that only requires a small amount of time to get working with your Arduino or compatible board.

The purpose of this guide is to get your display successfully operating with your Arduino, so you can move forward and experiment and explore further types of operation with the display.

This includes installing the Arduino library, making a succesful board connection and running a demonstration sketch. So let’s get started!

Connecting the display to your Arduino

The display uses the I2C data bus for communication, and is a 5V and 3.3V-tolerant board.

Arduino Uno to Display

GND ---- GND (GND)
5V/3.3V- Vcc (power supply, can be 3.3V or 5V)
A5 ----- SCL (I2C bus clock)
A4 ----- SDA (I2C bus data)


I2C pinouts vary for other boards. Arduino Leonard uses D2/D3 for SDA and SCL or the separate pins to the left of D13. Arduino Mega uses D20/D21 for SDA and SCL. If you can’t find your I2C pins on other boards, email admin at tronixstuff dot com for assistance.

Installing the Arduino library

To install the library – simply open the Arduino IDE and select Manage Libraries… from the Tools menu. Enter “u8g2” in the search box, and after a moment it should appear in the results as shown in the image below. Click on the library then click “Install”:

After a moment the library will be installed and you can close that box.

Now it’s time to check everything necessary is working. Open a new sketch in the IDE, then copy and paste the following sketch into the IDE (you may find the “view raw” link at the end useful):

Your display should go through the demonstration of various font sizes and so on as shown in the video below:

You can see how we’ve used a different font in the sketch – at lines 19, 30 and 38. The list of fonts included with the library are provided at https://github.com/olikraus/u8g2/wiki/fntlistall.

Note that the initial location for each line of text (for example in line 20):

  u8g2.drawStr(0, 5, "Hello,");	 // write something to the internal memory 

The x and y coordinates (0,5) are for the bottom-left of the first character.

If you want to display values, not text – such as integers, use:

    u8g2.print();

… an example of which is show around line 49 in the example sketch.

Where to from here?

Now it’s time for you to explore the library reference guide which explains all the various functions available to create text and graphics on the display, as well as the fonts and so on. These can all be found on the right-hand side of the driver wiki page.

And that’s all for now. This post brought to you by pmdway.com – everything for makers and electronics enthusiasts, with free delivery worldwide.

To keep up to date with new posts at tronixstuff.com, please subscribe to the mailing list in the box on the right, or follow us on twitter @tronixstuff.

 

The ten years we have just experienced were expected to be some of the most fruitful and productive in the history of advertising.  We had amazing new tools and stunning new media that we never had before. The whole thing was head-spinning and certain to engender all kinds of remarkable opportunities for advertisers.

Our ability to reach consumers one-to-one with web-based platforms was sure to make advertising more personalized, more relevant, and more timely.

Brands' abilities to listen to consumer conversations through social media and react quickly couldn’t help but connect us more closely with our customers.

Consumers themselves would be one of our biggest assets by engendering conversations about our brands and helping us understand and define what our brands should represent.

Further, the web would have a democratizing effect on society and particularly in the business sphere where new brands could flourish without spending lavishly on marketing.

And yet, the past decade has been the most disappointing and disheartening period that I’ve experienced in my long advertising career.

It is widely believed inside and outside the ad industry that on the whole the state of advertising has gotten worse, not better.

Consumer research shows that regard for our industry is at a new low. It's gotten so bad that we have half the trustworthiness of lawyers.

Marketers are disillusioned. They don’t trust us. Their trade organization, the ANA, has officially stated that they believe corruption in our industry is “pervasive.”

Brands are facing strong headwinds. A recent study by Nielsen reported that consumers say they are 46% more likely to change brands than they were just 5 years ago, and only 8% say they are strongly brand loyal.

Regulators and governments are after us with a passion. They want to know what we are doing with data and whether we are acting illegally in collecting, trading and selling personal private information about consumers.

By steadfastly defending the abusive and creepy surveillance practices of our adtech ecosystem, the "leaders" of our industry are clearly on the wrong side of history.

As for consumers, one study showed that of all forms of advertising, the eight types rated the lowest by consumers were all forms of online advertising. Ad blocking apps are reportedly present on somewhere between one and two billion devices.

Meanwhile tens of billions of dollars are being stolen annually from our clients by online ad fraud.

Marketers are taking their advertising duties in-house and hiring consulting firms to do what we used to do.

As for the democratizing effect, it has been just the opposite. The web has produced advertising and marketing monopolies (Google, Facebook, Amazon, YouTube, etc) that would never be tolerated on dry land. Our industry has been right in the middle of scandals that have undermined our confidence in free and fair elections.

To say that the last decade has not lived up to expectations is like saying the Titanic was a boating mishap.

Our industry is in trouble. I believe we've had a lost decade. We have allowed ourselves to be bamboozled by the suspect assertions of articulate people -- and more than a few clowns -- masquerading as experts. We have lost any healthy degree of skepticism. It has cost us dearly.

Our industry needs to take a good hard look at our assumptions and where those assumptions have led us. It's time for the pretending to end.

Roku announced in a press release that the Apple TV app would be available on its streaming devices starting today:

For the first time ever, Roku users can add the Apple TV app via the Roku Channel Store to discover and watch movies, TV shows and more, including accessing their iTunes video library and subscribing to Apple TV channels directly on Roku devices. Starting November 1, Apple TV+, Apple’s home for all-original shows and movies from the world’s greatest storytellers, will be available on the Apple TV app on the Roku platform.

Like the TV app on Samsung smart TV sets, the Roku version of the app offers access to all iTunes movie and TV show content, as well as all Apple TV channels options, such as HBO, CBS All-Access, and soon Apple TV+. However, content from non-channels like Hulu or Amazon Prime Video, which are accessible on iOS and tvOS devices, will not be present on the Roku version of the TV app because it lacks third-party app integrations. Moving forward though, I expect that all of Apple’s new content partners with the TV app will be full-on channels rather than legacy app integrations.

Earlier this year Apple announced that the TV app would also be arriving on Amazon Fire TV devices and TV sets from more manufacturers, so as we get closer to the November 1 launch of Apple TV+, I expect we’ll see those other vendors all follow Roku’s lead.

→ Source: newsroom.roku.com

Apple subsidiary Beats has announced a new version of the Beats Solo Pro noise cancelling headphones, which can be pre-ordered now and will begin shipping at the end of the month.

The new headphones, which retail for $299, feature Apple’s H1 chip that also powers the second-generation AirPods and Powerbeats Pro. The H1 chip enables hands-free ‘Hey Siri’ commands and the ability to share audio with someone using the Audio Sharing feature that Apple debuted with iOS and iPadOS 13. The headphones also have volume, track, and call controls on the right ear cup and a button for turning noise cancellation and their Transparency feature on and off on the left ear cup.

The Beats Solo Pros feature active noise cancellation to filter out external sound and what Beats calls Transparency that uses external microphones to allow some sounds through, so users remain aware of their surroundings when using the headphones. According to Beats, the headphones, which are turned on and off by unfolding and folding them, get 22 hours of battery life with noise cancellation and Transparency turned on. If those features are turned off, the company says the battery life lasts 40 hours. The company also says that a ten-minute charge provides up to 3 hours of battery life. The Solo Pros charge with a USB-A to Lightning cable for the first time too.

The Solo Pros come in six colors: light blue, red, dark blue, ivory, black, and gray. Although The Verge and other sites report that the new headphones will begin shipping on October 30th in the US, apple.com currently lists the ship date as October 29th during the pre-order checkout process.

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A mask to block AI based Facial Recognition from all angles by Jip van Leeuwenstein                          

 

It’s hard to believe in this time of technology that we still require police officers to be vulnerable road users outside of their vehicles to flag over motorists for speed  transgressions on Canadian highways. Not only are they subject to being crashed into by the vehicle they are flagging down, they also may be hit by other  inattentive motorists.

I have written about how Switzerland has become the safest country in Europe on the roads by  regulating speed limits. In five years from 2001 to 2006 Swiss speed camera enforcement resulted in a fatality decrease of 15 percent per year, bringing road deaths from 71 annually down to 31. No need to have police flagging you down on the autoroute, a $330  ticket for driving 16 kilometres an hour over the speed limit  is in the mail.

The maximum travel speed is 120 km/h and it is rigidly enforced, making Swiss motorways the safest according to the European Transport Safety Council. Managing speed makes the roads easier to drive on, with consistent motorist behaviour and plenty of reaction time due to highway speed conformity.

A poll conducted by Mario Canseco  last year shows that 70 percent of  people in British Columbia are now supportive of the use of a camera system similar to the Swiss to enforce road speed limits in this province. While the Province has located 140 red light camera at intersections with high collision statistics, speed on highways does not have similar technology.

On the Thanksgiving weekend police forces across British Columbia announced a drive safely campaign, notifying that they would be out on highways  looking for anything that took away from safe highway driving. Anyone driving on highways from Abbotsford to Vancouver quickly saw the difference, with motorists staying to posted speed limits on highways.

But last month one  Delta Police Force member was nearly struck by a vehicle driver that was weaving in and out of traffic along a busy section of highway as the officer was outside of his vehicle attending to another stopped car.  That officer was nearly clipped and this was caught on a dash camera.

As reported by CTV News 

“The footage shows the driver speeding excessively and weaving through traffic while an unmarked police car has another driver pulled over. The police car had its red and blue flashing lights activated at the time, which means the driver should have slowed down and moved over.”

Sadly, the vehicle owner was only fined $368 for an action that could have led to a fatality. It’s one more reason why speed enforcement by automated cameras is simply the right thing to do, making roads safer and saving lives, health care costs and trauma. This approach also values the health and safety of  police officers to do work that does not expose them as vulnerable road users. It’s the 21st century, and time for technology to assist in changing driver behaviour for safer, speed regulated highways.

 

You can view the event as recorded here:

Image: Wrexham history.com

On October 30th, Mandy Moore and I will be celebrating the launch of the fourth printing and tenth anniversary edition of our book Yarn Bombing: The Art of Crochet and Knit Graffiti. For this special anniversary, we’ve added a new chapter featuring new yarn bombing works that delight us. Yarn Bombing: The Art of Knit…

The post Find Your Co-Conspirators appeared first on Leanne Prain.

BAD METAPHORS is an ongoing series that takes a critical look at the figures of speech that shuttle between technology and everyday life. Read the others here.

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In the 1940s, when computers were the size of rooms, it took one’s entire body to program them. It demanded movement, reaching and hauling cables, adjusting complex series of switches that presented themselves as arrays in physical space. Programming, that is, was rooted in an embodied understanding: It was not merely thought but felt, through a constant confrontation with the limits of both the hardware and our own physical capabilities.

That physical effort was part of what it meant to be “close to the metal” — programmers’ jargon for computing that dealt directly with materials of machines. Instead of writing code for communication between operating systems and drivers, programmers “close to the metal” affect the hardware itself, dealing with the machine’s transistors, resistors, and other material components at the base level of the computer’s performance. Being close to the metal meant understanding the machine’s switches before they are covered by layers of abstraction. To the mostly male programmers of the era, that conveyed a sense of their exclusive dominance over machines.

In 1968, when computers were the size of desks, Douglas Engelbart invented the computer mouse as part of his “oN-Line System” (NLS). As John Markoff describes in What the Dormouse Said: How the ’60s Counterculture Shaped the Personal Computer, the audience who saw its initial demonstration at a San Francisco computer conference were surprised, in the era of mainframes, to see the system “being used interactively with all its resources appearing to be devoted to a single individual.” Mainframe computers then required separate operators for inputting data and analyzing the output. The oN-Line System reimagined computing, staging all the processes for a single user. In Engelbart’s system, the body was not reaching for the computer; the computer became an extension of the body.

As Paul Dourish notes in Where the Action Is, there “has been a long transition from interacting with computers using a soldering iron to interacting using a mouse.” As the mouse brought users into a more intimate symbiosis with the machine, offering direct command over it, it also distanced them from the metal — from the computer as a physical, material object. It brought us into a world where the computer can appear as an immersive world in itself. Users were not close to the metal but at one with it.

But this shift did not destroy the desire of some to be “close to the metal” in the sense of having exclusive or privileged access. It did, however, change its terms: Simpler interfaces meant that it no longer required soldering circuit boards to retain a sense of a superior mastery of machines. Just knowing how to code the software that sat on top of the computer’s increasingly small silicon chip meant you were among the elite. This meant that programmers retained status not by being physically closer to material but by dictating and controlling others’ interfaces.

Now, human-computer interaction is shifting away from the mouse and toward even more intimate interfaces: Touch devices are another step toward the forgetting of the body as it merges with machine. Like the mouse but more so, touch provides the illusion of even more direct agency and therefore of being in more control. But if you are closer to the physical metal when using a laptop’s trackpad or touchscreen, you are no closer to understanding how it works or, more important, how you work on your laptop and how it works on you. “As computer interfaces increasingly shift toward touch pads and touch screens,” Ali Na warns in “The Fetish of the Click: A Small History of the Computer Mouse as Vulva,” “it is important to avoid understanding this transition as one toward more direct or unmediated contact with the digital.” The more direct the interface seems to ordinary users, the more likely they are to take it for granted and ignore how their experience is being mediated. This in turn allows the would-be programming elite to remain “close to the metal” by taking advantage of those users’ ignorance (even as coding itself becomes more automated and distant from the machine).

But closeness to the metal need not imply users becoming ever more fused with machines, and being ever more manipulated by a programming elite a few steps ahead of them. Instead, we can reconceive what “being close to the metal” could mean, return it to the sense of physicality and friction that it once implied, and update the ethos for programmers accordingly.

If we can’t get into the hardware or even the software, then closeness to the metal is about getting into the consequences. It’s about making connections between people’s lives, their bodies, and how computationally built systems have an effect on them. Closeness to the metal can signify a push back against elitism and dominance, toward a more inclusive and more inquisitive understanding of computers.

The removal of the body from our understanding of computers can seem to imply a removal of accountability from the programmer. Many digital platforms tend to urge this perspective by pushing responsibility into the hands of the user where users only have a very limited set of agencies. But remembering the mouse can be helpful here. With the touchscreen dominating our interactions, the mouse, which once seemed to grant agency (albeit through narrowly prescribing the form of our interactions), has been recontextualized. It now appears as full of friction, which gives it the potential to interrupt the perceptions of computing that it once facilitated.

Contrasting mouse use with touch screens illustrates the speed at which computing technology urges us to move, and what it has overlooked in the process. That is, mouse use can now bring us closer to the metal in the sense of encouraging us to pause. It can be a moment for the programmers to take their hands off the keyboard and consider how their code might have an effect on a real life.

This can be helpful in considering different bodies, different sorts of users — how the friction of an interface is always relative to the person using it regardless of the interface’s ultimate goal: efficiency. The mouse has potential to remind us of the body. It can, in turn, bring us closer to understanding the complex history of how computers came to be personal and very much about the bodies who brought them to where they are today.

Today, being “close to the metal” can be an acknowledgment by technologists that there is value in questioning and complicating what we think we know about the machine’s deepest workings. If you are close to the metal in this sense, then you are committed to re-evaluating and reframing complex systems to have a fuller understanding of them. It is recognizing that there is work to be done toward undoing computational systems which prioritize algorithmic prowess over people’s lives. Coding a new machine learning model, for example, takes us even one step further away from the metal, where mathematical representations of bodies have unprecedented and often negative effects on bodies. Being closer to the metal means insisting on accountability for the social implications of these systems.

This contemplation is about re-prioritizing the body over the computer, ensuring that the computer is something between bodies as opposed to in control of them. Like the reaching arms of the programmers in the 1940s, many of whom were women, the mouse can bring us back into our body as we learn to live with and through computers.

Many technologists today are “close to the metal” in this sense. Committed to unearthing these negative effects before they ever reach the human body, data scientist Rumman Chowdhury leads the group Responsible AI at Accenture Applied Intelligence. The group, which operates on the basis that technology is always directly shaped by its makers, develops tools to ensure the fairness of a data set or algorithmic process. While addressing potentially harmful technology through adjusting the technology itself is important, so is disseminating resources on existing technology’s effects. The Detroit Community Technology Project conducts research, creates educational material, and sustains initiatives which are committed to data justice and the equitable access and use of technology. They recently published “Our Data Bodies: Digital Defense Playbook,” which is meant to support groups involved “in intersectional fights for racial justice, LGBQ liberation, feminism, immigrant rights, economic justice, and other freedom struggles, to help us understand and address the impact of data-based technologies on our social justice work.” Also committed to unearthing technology’s effects on human lives, Ruha Benjamin, associate professor of African American studies at Princeton University, has presented research in a talk entitled “A New Jim Code?” which explores technology’s built-in discriminations through the “world of biased bots” and “altruistic algorithms.” Benjamin asks us to “question not only the technologies we are sold, but also the ones we manufacture ourselves” by providing information and tools which can help us to dissect the technologies that we are confronted with on a daily basis.  And there are many more examples: Joy Buolamwini, Cathy O’Neil, and Wendy Hui Kong Chun, to name only a few.

To be close to the metal, then, is considering the social implications of the code. Knowing what’s inside the tiniest of computer chips is no longer be a priority when beginning the work of deconstruction of large computational systems.

On Exponent, the weekly podcast I host with James Allworth, we discuss The China Cultural Clash.

Listen to it here.

A study found that a hospital program significantly reduced the number of hospitalizations and emergency department visits. Great. But then the researchers realized that the data was recoded incorrectly, and the program actually increased hospitalizations and emergency department visits. Not so great.

They retracted their paper:

The identified programming error was in a file used for preparation of the analytic data sets for statistical analysis and occurred while the variable referring to the study “arm” (ie, group) assignment was recoded. The purpose of the recoding was to change the randomization assignment variable format of “1, 2” to a binary format of “0, 1.” However, the assignment was made incorrectly and resulted in a reversed coding of the study groups. Even though the data analyst created and conducted some test analysis programs, they were of the type that did not show any labeling of the arm categories, only the “arm” variable in a regression, for example.

Here’s the original, now-retracted study. And here’s the revised one.

Data can be tricky and could lead to unintended consequences if you don’t handle it correctly. Be careful out there.

Tags: recode, retraction

Inspired by For-profit, faux-pen, and critical conversations about the future of learning materials – a blog post by Rajiv Jhangiani.

The post Openwashing appeared first on Visual Thinkery.

When experiencing the glory of a double row of street trees in fall, it’s a good time to give thanks to those who had the vision to realize the city we have today.

Give thanks to the landscape designers of the 1970s, beginning with Cornelia Oberlander and her allee of trees along Hornby next to Robson Square.  Or, as above, the double rows along Georgia Street from the park to Cardero – a consequence of the Greening Downtown study of 1982 (by the Toronto firm of Baird/Simpson in collaboration with Hotson/Bakker).

Approved by council in the 1980s; planted, development by development, in the 1990s; only maturing now, with the final blocks still to come.

1900-block West Georgia

Schon seit Wochen hat Google die Bloggerszene mit zahlreichen "Leaks" zum neuen Pixel 4 versorgt. Wir wussten also bereits bestens Bescheid, was da heute kommt. Ich habe mir den Launchevent trotzdem angeschaut und fand ihn erwartungsgemäß etwas langweilig. Aber eine Stelle hat mich richtig beeindruckt: Die Geschwindigkeit und Präsision der Transkription des Sprachrekorders. Ein fehlerloses Diktat, und das im Flugmodus, das ist unglaublich nützlich. Das wünsche ich mir auch von Apple. Die Gestensteurung erscheint mir als Gimmick, die Kamera und die schlanke Software mit blitzschnellen Updates werden mir weiterhin gefallen. Aber ich frage mich ernsthaft, ob es nicht auch ein Pixel 3a tut. Wie geht es Euch?

Last week, a firestorm erupted over Apple’s decision to remove HKmap.live from the App Store in Hong Kong. Apple claimed the app, which mapped crowd-sourced information regarding police activity, broke App Store guidelines and local laws. Hours earlier, Apple had been threatened by China’s People’s Daily newspaper about continuing to make the app available.

In the past, such a decision would have been accompanied by a debate regarding Apple’s decision to continue to do business in China. However, things are different this time. Instead of a debate, virtue signaling is rampant. U.S. ideologies are being weaponized in a broader U.S. versus China debate, and Apple is finding itself caught in the middle.

Based on narratives in the U.S. press, Apple should become some type of political entity tasked with undermining political institutions. iPhones and iPads are to be used as indoctrination weapons for Apple’s beliefs. If such objectives represent Apple’s future, the company will first need new management, employees, customers, and a different board of directors, as Apple is not in the business of waging political wars.

How did we get to this point? Are we seeing a byproduct of U.S. and China trade tensions boil over? Did the NBA versus China clash a few days prior to Apple removing the app in Hong Kong touch a nerve in the U.S.?

Instead of publishing an article on Apple and China last week, I used the Above Avalon daily updates to share my initial thoughts on the developments. After sending out updates last Wednesday and Thursday, I received comments from Above Avalon members who live outside the U.S. They saw the situation from a different perspective. Simply put, they saw the complexity associated with the latest developments in Hong Kong and China. That same complexity is missing from U.S. press coverage of the situation.

There are pros and cons associated with Apple doing business in China just as there are pros and cons found with doing business in a long list of other countries. Even Apple’s decision to engage with the U.S. administration on certain issues can be debated. In some countries, like the U.S., Apple can discuss where it stands on social and political issues. In other countries, like China, such openness is not possible. This has led some to call Apple a hypocrite for “pontificating” on certain ideals only to be willing to do business in a country that doesn’t follow the same ideals.

Apple is no stranger to criticism regarding its decision to do business in China. Back in 2016, Cook said the following in response to critics who said he shouldn’t engage with the government:

“From my American mindset, I believe strongly in freedoms. They are at the core of what being an American is, and I have no confusion on that. But I also know that every country in the world decides their laws and regulations.”

Cook then alluded to “The Man in the Arena” passage from U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt’s “Citizenship in a Republic” speech:

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”

In most politically dicey situations, Cook has followed Roosevelt’s advice and picked engagement. While Cook has become more comfortable talking about the ideals that guide Apple’s culture such as environmental responsibility, privacy, and equality, he doesn’t weaponize them to issue ultimatums to foreign governments. Instead, Cook uses his position as CEO to explain to the world which ideals guide Apple employees and the company’s mission to create tools for people.

This brings up a few questions: What drives Cook to follow Roosevelt’s advice and engage? Why does Apple put itself in what appears to be compromising positions in terms of doing business with certain countries if it doesn’t intend to leverage its position to push for immediate change?

My suspicion is that Cook doesn’t want Apple to become an idealistic mirage of itself with closed-mindedness reigning supreme. If Apple only did business in countries that have laws matching its beliefs, Apple would operate in just a handful of countries. Such a strategy would represent a big step back in Apple’s toolmaking mission as the biggest loser would be the Apple customer. In my view, that is a good enough reason for Apple to remain engaged with China and other countries rather than retreat into some kind of self-imposed bubble. The fact that the preceding opinion is now viewed as extremist in the U.S. shows just how far the narrative involving China has shifted. Ongoing issues between China and the U.S. regarding intellectual property theft and economic prowess have taken over the discussion, making Apple’s “engaged” strategy seem naive and out of date.

Another factor that likely plays a role in Cook’s engaged strategy is how Apple views its customers. I don’t think of Apple as a U.S. company. Instead, Apple is a global company headquartered in the U.S. That may seem like a subtle difference in terminology, but it speaks volumes. Apple doesn't look at its customers as Americans, Chinese, Russian, or German. Everyone is an Apple customer. This becomes apparent when attending an Apple product event at Apple Park. The cultural diversity found in the audience isn’t visible when watching the keynotes online. English ends up being just one of many different languages spoken at Apple events.

While governments around the world play a role in how Apple is able to reach its customers, as seen with Apple’s most recent app removal controversy in Hong Kong, that doesn’t take anything away from the ideals that guide Apple’s toolmaking mission. Those who think Apple should abandon China at whatever cost fail to recognize that China is now home to approximately 15% of Apple’s customers. Advocating that Apple should succumb to various pressures and shun anyone who may disagree with its ideals is the very definition of closed-mindedness.

As for the increasingly popular claim that Apple isn’t just doing business in China but is instead going so far as to kowtow to the government, the supporting evidence is underwhelming. Following local laws is not kowtowing. For example, removing an app that delivers news from a publication banned in a country is not kowtowing to China. Apple would do the same in any other country with similar laws. Instead, kowtowing would involve breaking other country’s laws merely because China told Apple to do so. Another example of kowtowing would be Apple telling its employees to change their ideals because China told them that is the only way to do business in the country. We simply don’t see Apple exhibiting such behavior, contrary to what is being reported in the U.S. press.

One example of kowtowing to China would be international companies agreeing to refer to Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan as part of China. However, the uniqueness found with that example is duly noted. Given how following economic sanctions imposed by the U.S on other countries end up being another example of companies kowtowing to a government, it’s clear that the topic deserves a much more nuanced debate.

While Apple executives struggle at times with how best to do business in China, the company has shown little to no hesitation in its broader engagement strategy. For example, Apple’s apparent final decision to pull HKmap.live from the App Store in Hong Kong took nearly a week to play itself out. Apple initially pulled the app only to reinstate the app and then pull the app again. However, at the end of the day, it was Cook who wrote a message to Apple employees explaining his decision - a decision that was met with intense skepticism by those in Hong Kong and the U.S.

There is no playbook for Apple management to follow when it comes to leading a trillion dollar company with a billion customers around the world. Cook’s decision to engage Apple will mean that there will be more controversies such as HKmap.live. Apple may not be completely ready for such controversies, but the company will likely be willing to confront them. Such a stance shouldn’t take anything away from Apple’s steadfast pursuit to leave the world a better place.

I don’t know what will unfold politically in China in a month, a year, or a decade from now. No one does, not even Apple. However, I am confident that Apple will continue to develop tools for improving people’s lives. It was this tool-making mission that initially led Cook to begin building Apple’s supply chain and manufacturing apparatus in China in the late 1990s. Cook saw how China, not the U.S., could support such a global apparatus capable of making a lot of high-quality products in a short amount of time.

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Uber has laid off 350 employees across different departments within the company, which it says is the third and final phase of layouts that began earlier this year.

The company’s CEO Dara Khosrowshahi told employees in an email that affected persons are from Eats, performance marketing, Advanced Technologies Group, and recruiting. Some from various teams in the global rides and platform department are also getting laid off. The email also noted that some employees might be relocated.

“Days like today are tough for us all, and the ELT and I will do everything we can to make certain that we won’t need or have another day like this ahead of us,” Khosrowshahi said in the email, which was obtained by TechCrunch. “We will all have to play a part by establishing a new normal in how we work: identifying and eliminating duplicate work, upholding high standards for performance, giving direct feedback and taking action when expectations aren’t being met, and eliminating the bureaucracy that tends to creep as companies grow.”

TechCrunch reported that these layoffs represent about one percent of the company and they come about a month after Uber laid off 435 employees from product and engineering teams and less than three months after it laid off 400 people from marketing.

More than 70 percent of those affected in this round of layoffs are based in the U.S. and Canada, TechCrunch noted. Uber has let those employees know on October 14th.

“As you know, over the past few months, our leaders have looked carefully at their teams to ensure our organizations are structured for success for the next few years,” Khosrowshahi wrote. “This has resulted in difficult but necessary changes to ensure we have the right people in the right roles in the right locations, and that we’re always holding ourselves accountable to top performance.”

Source: TechCrunch

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In what seems like an effort to convince the world to forget about the ill-fated Pixel Slate, during its hardware keynote in New York, Google revealed the Pixelbook Go. The device has a lot in common with the original Pixelbook but features a slightly different design.

Instead of a 2-in-1 design like 2017’s Pixelbook, the Pixelbook Go features a more traditional laptop-like clamshell. This means the Chromebook’s 13.3-inch display can’t flip around 360-degrees to turn into a tablet.

Overall, the Pixelbook Go’s design is far more curved when compared to the original PixelBook. It also features ridges on its base that give the Chromebook additional grip, along with what Google calls quieter ‘hush keys.’ Battery life measures in at 12 hours, with the Pixelbook Go charging two hours of battery life in 20 minutes, according to Google.

Regarding technical specifications, the Pixelbook Go features two USB-C ports, a 3.5mm headphone jack, dual front-firing speakers, two mics and 8GB or 16GB of RAM along with either 64GB, 128GB or 256GB of storage.

Processor wise, the Pixelbook Go comes in Intel m3, i5 and i7 variants. While the standard Pixelbook Go features a 1920 x 1080 pixel resolution (1080p), there’s also a high-end 4K version with a resolution of 3820 x 2160 pixels. The device’s camera measures in at 2-megapixels with an f/2.0 aperture.

The new Pixelbook will be available in two colours, though only ‘Just Black’ will be available in Canada at launch. The laptop’s cooler-looking ‘Not Pink’ variant is “coming soon” to Canada, according to Google.

 

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Third-party partners will be required to “to pass a security review” before they can access Nest devices, Google said during its fall hardware event in New York.

During the event, Rishi Chandra, vice-president and general manager of Google Nest stated that the company wants to focus on privacy especially for its devices that have Google Assistant.

This new security update requirement is for any third-party partner that intends to work with Google Assistant.

“We are working with partners to migrate to Nest, but doing it built on privacy and security,” Chandra said.

“For example, we are requiring partners to now pass a security review before they can access your Nest device. You should have confidence in how Google and its partners are protecting your home data. And instead, you can focus on the benefits of the helpful home.”

During the keynote, Google announced its new Nest Mini, the successor to the Home Mini. It is slightly smaller than the Home Mini and features better sound quality.

The Nest Mini will be priced at $49 USD (about $64.75 CAD) and will be available in 23 countries starting October 22nd.

More to come…

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Interac has announced that support for Apple Pay and Google Pay debit in-app and in-browser purchases is now widely available in Canada.

Over the past year, in-app and in-browser debt purchases were supported by ATB, Canada’s Credit Unions, Coast Capital, Desjardins, Moneris and National Bank. Now, Scotiabank and Tangerine have joined the list of financial institutions enabling the feature.

It’s important to note that businesses still need to allow this functionality on their end. Some of the participating companies include SkipTheDishes, foodora, Second Cup, Shell Canada, Maison Simons and MTY Group.

A full list of supporting businesses can be found on Interac’s respective Apple Pay and Google Pay pages.

Source: Interac

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It looks like Bell’s Crave streaming video service is finally getting 5.1 surround sound, according to a page on the platform’s official website.

In fact, Bell says that 5.1 surround sound is already available with some titles as long as you’re running the streaming platform on a 4th-generation Apple TV. 5.1 surround sound compatibility with “other platforms” is coming soon, according to Crave.

“We’re rolling out 5.1 surround sound video now. It is currently available on certain titles on Apple TV Gen 4 devices. We’ll be rolling it out to other platforms soon!,” reads the page.

It’s unclear what content is specifically available in 5.1 surround sound. MobileSyrup has reached out to Bell for more information.

Back in August Bell revealed that Crave has 2.7 million subscribers across Canada. Unlike competing services such as Netflix, Bell has yet to add a 4K streaming tier to Crave.

Crave is available on desktop, iOS, Android, Apple TV, Samsung Smart TVs, Xbox One and Amazon Fire TV. There is not yet a Crave app available on the PlayStation 4.

Crave’s base subscription is priced at $9.99 per month, with the service’s additional HBO tier costing an addition $9.99. This brings the monthly cost for Crave to a total of $19.98 per month. Users can also add STARZ content can also be added for $5.99 CAD.

Source: Bell 

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Google’s new Pixel 4 phone won’t be shipped with earphones or a USB-C to 3.5mm adapter in the phone’s box.

This is interesting considering that the tech giant’s own truly wireless earphones, the wireless Pixel Buds, aren’t set to be released until next year.

This means that other companies that offer wireless headphones could potentially capitalize on Google’s decision to not include an adapter or earphones.

Prior to the Pixel 4, every Pixel phone box included an earphones option. The phones would either come with a USB-C to 3.5mm adapter, 3.5mm headphone jack, or a pair of USB-C earphones.

This is the first time that the tech giant has not included any of these options in its phone boxes.

Check out MobileSyrup‘s hands-on with the Pixel 4 and 4 XL.

Source: The Verge 

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The Apple TV app, home to Apple TV+ the tech giant’s upcoming streaming service, is beginning to roll out to Roku devices in Canada today.

At the company’s keynote presentation in March, it said the service would be available on RokuOS, Fire TVs and a ton of smart TVs along with the Apple TV set-top box, other Apple hardware devices and the web.

Until now, it hasn’t launched on any platforms beyond Apple’s products.

If your Roku device supports the new app you can download it from the Roku Channels Store. You can find a list of supported devices on Roku’s support page. To discover if your device is compatible, go to Settings > System > About.

The app will be similar to the version on the AppleTV set-top box, but it won’t source content from other apps on the Roku platform.

Users will still be able to rent and watch content from Apple’s video store plus subscribe to Apple TV Channels. These are like apps that provide content for users inside of the Apple TV interface.

Either way, now Roku owners can be ready for Apple TV+ to roll out on November 1st.

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Apple has announced new Solo Pro noise-cancelling headphones.

The headphones are essentially Beat’s popular Solo 3s, but with the addition of noise-cancelling, including greater frequency response and more balanced sound. This means that the headphones should, in theory, be less bass-heavy than the current Solo 3s.

The new headphones also feature redesigned ear cushions that are more comfortable, along with a revamped headband, according to Beats. Similar to Beat’s Studio 3 headphones, Beats says that an algorithm continuously monitors and adjusts the sound to your listening environment in order to adapt its noise-cancelling feature to the environment. There’s also a button hat that instantly turns this feature off.

Other features include Siri integration, 22 hours of battery life with noise-cancelling or 40 hours with the feature disabled. In the U.S. the Beats Solo Pro is set to start shipping on October 30th for $299 USD.

It’s unclear when the headphones will be released in Canada or how much they are set to cost. MobileSyrup has reached out to Apple for more information.

Via: CNET

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Amid the news of Google’s new products, the tech giant has removed a number of older products from its store.

The Google Clips camera, the Daydream View VR set and the first generation of Pixel Buds have all been removed from the Google Store.

The direct links to the product pages now redirect you to the Google Store homepage.

Android Police reported that the pages previously displayed a “no longer available” message that replaced the purchase button.

Although the Pixel Buds will be replaced with a significant update in 2020, there weren’t any announcements regarding the Google Clips or Daydream View at during the Made by Google 2019 keynote.

Source: Google Store, Android Police

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Google is skimping on Pixel 4 perks, by not adding in the usual free Pixel feature which includes unlimited full-resolution photo backups.

Beyond not offering full-quality photo backups for free, users are also not getting headphones or a headphone adapter in the box for the first time.

This means that users are only going to get to upload their photos in ‘High-Quality’ for free. This is a compressed version that still looks decent, but it’s not perfect. Users can still upload the full version of their photos, but the pictures will take up space in their Google Cloud storage plans.

This is the second Pixel phone that doesn’t include the feature beyond the Pixel 3a. It made more sense for Google not to offer it with the 3a since it was a mid-range phone at a low price. It feels cheap for the company not to bundle it in with the Pixel 4 since it’s an expensive flagship.

The Pixel 3 launched with unlimited photo backups until 2022.

Instead of the free photo backups, Google is offering people who buy the Pixel 4 three free months of Google One, which is the company’s cloud storage subscription. The free trial includes 100GB of online storage. Once the trial ends, this costs $2.79 per month or $27.99 per year.

Source: The Verge

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