A Pokemon Go smartwatch app needs to happen
Pokemon Go has basically taken the rulebook and thrown it out of the Window. It’s seen huge interest around the globe and really shaken up mobile gaming, by insisting that you leave your house.
The biggest downside – apart from the demand overwhelming the Pokemon Go servers – has been the incredible battery drain experienced by smartphones.
There’s no real escape from the battery drain problem because Pokemon Go needs your phone on, the screen awake, the GPS position monitored and data synced with the servers. Ok, sure, increasing the battery capacity of your phone is one aspect, but if there’s ever an argument for a smartwatch app, this is it.
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Smartwatches are much derided in technology and haven’t seen huge adoption. Apple seems to have slowed in talking up the Apple Watch and Android Wear seems to have had few releases in 2016. That’s because, ultimately, they struggle to do anything that’s not bettered by the phone they are connected to.
But in the case of Pokemon Go, a smartwatch could offer a lot, by letting you share the workload with your phone and allowing you to put your phone away – reducing the chances of you getting mugged as you stroll down the street trying to catch Tangela.
Instead, a smartwatch app for Apple Watch or Android Wear could easily alert you when a new Pokemon appears, it could let you look at the map and check local PokeStops and Gyms to decide whether you need to vary your route to get to them, and it could easily let you check your stats and carry out other in-game tasks – all while your phone remains in your pocket.
In many ways, a smartwatch could offer the sort of functions being promised by the Pokemon Go Plus, but move it from a connected accessory to part of the game.
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- Pokemon Go top tips: Master the Pokemon mayhem
Of course, we’d never envision using a smartwatch app to catch Pokemon or to battle in Gyms as the mechanics would be too small and far too problematic, but it could at least save you from having the screen on for 2 hours as you walk around playing the game.
So perhaps Pokemon Go could be the saviour of smartwatches. It’s one area where the connected devices would be genuinely useful, rather than just a worse version of what you already get on your phone.
Chinese scientists will soon begin the first CRISPR human trial
American regulators already approved a University of Pennsylvania team’s plans to conduct a CRISPR trial on humans, but a group of Chinese scientists will beat them to the punch. The Chinese team from the Sichuan University’s West China Hospital in Chengdu will begin testing the efficacy of modified cells for lung cancer treatment in August. They chose patients who still haven’t gotten well even after undergoing chemotherapy, radiation therapy and other treatments.
The scientists plan to take T cells (a type of white blood cell) from patients and use the CRISPR-Cas9 technique to edit out the PD-1 gene. PD-1 regulates T cells’ immune response and prevents them from attacking healthy cells. The team will then multiply the modified samples in the lab before reintroducing them to the patients’ bloodstream, in hopes that they’ll target parts of the patient’s body affected with cancer.
A biotechnology company will validate the cells before they’re reintroduced into the patient to make sure only PD-1 was edited out. But Timothy Chan, an immunotherapy researcher from the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City, still has reservations about the team’s plan. He told Nature that he’s worried the cells would activate an excessive immune response that could target perfectly healthy tissues.
Chan suggested taking T cells directly from a tumor, but the Chinese scientists said the patients’ lung cancer tumors aren’t easily accessible. As a precaution, the team will start things slow. They’ll begin with 10 people and will initially administer increasing dosages on just one patient in order to monitor the results closely and to look out for side effects. It’s worth noting that Chinese scientists were also the first to use CRISPR editing on human embryos to repair a gene that causes fatal blood disorder. Their approach only worked on half the embryos, though, so they ultimately had to scrap the study.
Source: Nature
Samsung fires back at Huawei with its own patent lawsuit
Huawei filed a lawsuit against Samsung back in May, accusing the Korean corporation of infringing on some of its 4G-related patents. Now, it’s Samsung that’s on the offensive: according to Reuters, it has filed a lawsuit of its own against Huawei for a very similar reason. The Korean chaebol sued Huawei in its home country (China) a couple of weeks ago for allegedly infringing on six of its patents. A spokesperson said the company tried to “resolve this matter amicably” but didn’t elaborate on the nature of the affected intellectual properties.
Huawei didn’t demand money when it filed its lawsuit and asked for a cross-licensing deal instead. Analyst Lee Do-hoon told Reuters that Samsung probably isn’t looking to be paid either. He said both sides might have ulterior motives: Huawei’s is to boost its reputation. “If you look at the patent battle with Apple and Samsung… it ultimately created a lot of benefits for Samsung in a kind of an advertisement,” he explained. Samsung’s motive, on the other hand, might be to compel Huawei to settle as soon as possible.
Source: Reuters
Pokémon Go Launches in Japan, Apple on Course for $3 Billion Revenue
Pokémon Go finally launched in Japan this morning after the game’s release was delayed following an email leak about the developer’s sponsored retail partnerships.
Social media excitement reached a peak on Niantic’s announcement that it was “finally broadcasting” in the game’s birthplace, over two weeks after it was released in the U.S., Australia and New Zealand. Pokémon Go is now available in over 30 countries.
The McDonalds sponsorship deal leaked earlier this week is expected to usher in a flurry of business at fast food restaurants around the country as players queue up to capture monsters and train characters at official “gyms”.
Wary of the game’s popularity, McDonalds has warned players “not to become a bother to customers who are eating”, while Japanese authorities have issued safety guidelines in cartoon form for young Pokémon Go players.
The country’s National Centre of Incident Readiness and Strategy for Cybersecurity called on users to bring spare batteries with their smartphones to prepare for emergency communications and to refrain from using their phones while walking.
In the U.S., Pokémon Go had 21 million active users less than two weeks after the game was launched. According to brokerage Needham & Co, Apple is set to make $3 billion in revenue from the game’s in-app purchases in the next one or two years.
Pokémon Go’s ratio of paid users to total users is said to be 10 times that of Candy Crush, which generated over $1 billion of revenue in both 2013 and 2014. Apple’s shares have gained 5 percent market value – about $25 billion – since the launch of Pokémon Go on July 6.
Tag: Pokémon GO
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Police Ask 3D Print Lab to Replicate Dead Man’s Finger to Unlock Phone
Police in Michigan are reportedly attempting to use a 3D model of a fingerprint to unlock a murder victim’s phone and reveal clues that could help solve an open case.
Fusion reports that the investigation is still ongoing, therefore details remain murky, but essentially instead of requesting that the phone manufacturer unlocks the murder victim’s handset, officers have asked computer scientists at Michigan State University to create a 3D printed replica of the victim’s fingers so they can do it themselves.
The victim’s body was apparently too decayed for a fingerprint to be directly applied to the phone, but the police already had a scan of the victim’s prints from when the man was arrested in a previous case.
Most fingerprint readers like Apple’s Touch ID are capacitive, meaning they use electric circuits that close when human skin comes into contact with them, which generates the image of the print.
However, a 3D printed finger doesn’t possess the conductivity that human skin does. So, to circumvent the problem, engineers coated the printed fingers in a thin layer of metallic particles so that the fingerprint scanner can read them.
Currently it’s unclear whether the method works, as the designers haven’t yet delivered the printed fingers to the police to attempt to unlock the victim’s phone.
Another potential stumbling block is that if the phone in question is an iPhone, then police may come up against a passcode screen, since newer Apple handsets request a passcode if the fingerprint unlock hasn’t been used within eight hours and the code hasn’t been entered in six days.
But if the technology is a success, then theoretically the authorities could use it on cases involving living suspects by applying for a court order.
Fusion notes that the courts draw a distinction between a fingerprint password and a memorized one. “Courts generally draw a line between the ‘contents of the mind’ (which is protected) and ‘tangible’ bodily evidence like blood, DNA, and fingerprints (which is not),” said Bryan Choi, a security, law and technology researcher.
So while a memorized password might be protected by the Fifth Amendment which protects against self-incrimination, a fingerprint isn’t. Indeed, in 2014, a court in Virginia ruled that a suspect can be required to unlock their phone using their fingerprint.
Therefore if a suspect is at large but the police have their phone in hand and their fingerprints on record, there’s nothing to say that the method could be used to unlock the device in the owner’s absence.
Choi argues that in this day and age, phones should be considered extensions of the mind and therefore protected under the Fifth Amendment and not just the Fourth Amendment (protection against illegal search and seizure).
“We offload so many of our personal thoughts, moments, tics, and habits to our cellphones,” Choi told Fusion. “Having those contents aired in court feels like having your innermost thoughts extracted and spilled unwillingly in public.”
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BlackBerry’s next flagship, Argon: What’s the story so far?
Blackberry is expected to launch three phones over the next year. One of them is the Argon, and by the sounds of it, this will be the company’s 2016 flagship phone. It’s a big, all touchscreen device with a powerful processor, support for the latest Quick Charge and Type-C connectivity.
BlackBerry Argon: Design
Very little is known about the design, but it’s likely to be an all-touch device, rather than a portrait slider hiding a physical keyboard underneath. That could mean that the Priv form factor is short-lived and that the only keyboard-equipped device in BlackBerry’s lineup for 2016/17 is the mid-range Mecury.
Looking at the hardware specifications, and seeing as thought the “Hamburg” or Neon is basically a rebranded Alcatel Idol 4, it could be assumed that the Argon is akin to the Alcatel Idol 4S. But that would be completely speculative to say so. The short answer is: we don’t really know.
BlackBerry Argon: Display
Just like the BlackBerry Priv, the Argon is expected to feature a large 5.5-inch AMOLED display boasting Quad HD resolution. It’s likely that it will be coated in Corning Gorilla Glass, and be curved on both edges.
BlackBerry Argon: Camera
Blackberry is upping the ante on its camera this year, at least when it comes to the number of pixels packed in to the sensor. The Argon is rumoured to have a 21-megapixel sensor in its rear camera, and an 8-megapixel sensor on the front camera.
BlackBerry Argon: Hardware specs
The hardware spec-list, at the moment, reads like the spec sheet of almost every other flagship out there. That means we’re looking forward to seeing 4GB of RAM, 32GB storage and a 3,000mAh battery all built in to a device featuring a fingerprint scanner, Quick Charge 3.0 support and a Type-C connector.
The processor is rumoured to be a slightly under-clocked version of the Snapdragon 820 chip. That means it should be fast and fluid.
BlackBerry Argon: Release date and price
According to a member of Howard Forums, the BlackBerry Argon will have a price to match its flagship specifications, although it may still be slightly cheaper than the Priv was when it launched.
In the US, it’s rumoured to cost between $600-$700 USD, which means it will more than likely cost between £500-£600 in the UK. We’re expecting it to land in October, just before the holiday season kicks off in earnest.
Want to know more?
We’ll be keeping an eye on all the rumours surrounding the BlackBerryMercury/Vienna/Rome (whatever you want to call it) and updating as we learn more. You can follow all the news and reviews on the BlackBerry hub!
Edward Snowden Designed an iPhone Case to Guard Against Radio Snitching
NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden has helped to design an iPhone 6 case that detects if a handset is transmitting data when it’s in airplane mode.
The project was announced yesterday by design collaborator and American hacker Andrew “Bunnie” Huang, the founder of Bunnie Studios and best known for being the first person to hack the Xbox and for legally challenging the DCMA act.
Mockup of Edward Snowden and Andrew Huang’s iPhone case (Image: Huang & Snowden)
The concept for the case is described in a paper titled Against the Law: Countering Lawful Abuses of Digital Surveillance, which explains that the design is to protect journalists, activists, and rights workers from being tracked by governments.
The case features probe wires that access the phone’s antennae through the SIM slot to monitor signal transmission, while audible alarms and a display on the outside of the case inform users of their phone’s status.
Snowden and Huang write that using Airplane mode is “no defense” against radio transmission, which makes such a case necessary:
For example, on iPhones since iOS 8.2, GPS is active in airplane mode. Furthermore, airplane mode is a “soft switch” – the graphics on the screen have no essential correlation with the hardware state. Malware packages, peddled by hackers at a price accessible by private individuals, can activate radios without any indication from the user interface; trusting a phone that has been hacked to go into airplane mode is like trusting a drunk person to judge if they are sober enough to drive.
Concept design for the iPhone case (Image: Huang & Snowden)
The paper cites the case of American reporter Marie Colvin, who is reputed to have been tracked by the Assad regime in Syria and killed for covering stories about civilian casualties.
According to a lawsuit filed by Colvin’s family this year, the Sunday Times journalist’s location was discovered in part through the use of intercept devices that monitored satellite-dish and cellphone communications.
You can find out more about the project by reading the white paper at Pubpub.
Note: Due to the political nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Politics, Religion, Social Issues forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.
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Here’s our best look yet at the Galaxy Note 7
We’re less than two weeks away from the launch of the Galaxy Note 7, with Samsung all set to unveil its next flagship in New York on August 2. Following several leaks of the phone over the course of the month, we’re now treated to official renders of the phone in gold, blue, and silver.
The renders come by way of South Korea’s Seeko (via SamMobile), revealing dual curved edge displays.
What color are you guys most interested in?
Pokémon Go launches in Japan with sponsored gyms
Pokémon Go has made its debut in Japan, and the game is seeing its first commercial tie-in. Over 3,000 McDonald’s outlets spread across the country have been turned into gyms, allowing players to battle and take control of the real-world locations for their teams.
The game should make its way to other markets in Asia in due course of time. In the meantime, check out our extensive coverage of Pokémon Go.
Download Pokémon Go from the Play Store
Pokémon Go
- Join our Pokémon Go forums!
- How to deal with GPS errors in-game
- Which team should you choose?
- How to play without killing your battery
- The Ultimate Pokémon Go Game Guide!
- Listen to the Pokémon Go podcast!
The Galaxy Note 7 is already up for pre-order in Dubai
We’re still two weeks out from the official unveil of the Galaxy Note 7, but the phone is already up for pre-order in Dubai. Customers interested in getting their hands on Samsung’s upcoming flagship can deposit AED 500 ($130) to book the phone.
No information as of now regarding the launch date, but all customers pre-ordering the Note 7 will receive a 128GB microSD slot for free. According to SamMobile, T-Mobile will begin taking pre-orders from next week.
As a reminder, Samsung will officially unveil the Galaxy Note 7 on August 2. Check out our preview for more:
Galaxy Note 7 preview
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