Niantic Refunds Guests as Pokémon Go Fest Plagued by Network Problems and Game Bugs

This past weekend, Niantic held a real-life event for the popular iOS and Android game Pokémon Go, called Pokémon Go Fest, where fans from all over the world descended upon Chicago to hunt for Pokémon in Grant Park. Ahead of the event, Niantic promised increased Pokémon encounters, challenges and rewards for the game’s three teams, an exclusive in-game medal, special PokéStops, and more.

Unfortunately, the anniversary event was met with disgruntled attendees once network issues and game bugs were discovered by some of the 20,000 visitors to Chicago (via NBC Chicago). Niantic chief marketing officer Mike Quigley described the problems to fans during the event:

“One is a network issue. One of the providers is trying to pump in some more bandwidth so that’s something that we’re working with them closely on,” CMO Mike Quigley said onstage. “The other two issues are on the Niantic side. There’s a crash bug issue that we’ve identified. I know some of you have had that issue, as well as an authentication issue, so we’ve got it completely pinpointed to those three things.”

Some fans, speaking to CNBC, said that the problems became less frequent as the day went on, because Niantic began implementing quick fixes in the game — like reducing animations — to get it to run smoother.

“I spent more time trying to get the game to load than I have playing it,” said Laura, who was using a phone with AT&T service. But early on, network issues were affecting all four of the major US carriers. “It was rough in the morning,” said Abbie Harrison, a Verizon customer. “They’re turning off animations for the lures and stuff to make it run better. It’s running better now. I’m actually able to log in. It was really spotty and nothing would show up on my screen. I can now actually see and do things.”

In response, Niantic is offering those who went to Pokémon Go Fest in Chicago a full $20 refund on their tickets, as well as $100 in-game credit in the form of Pokécoins. The developer also expanded the range of special Pokémon and PokéStops that appeared during the event to a two mile radius, giving attendees a chance to move farther out from Grant Park and get better cellular reception.

Image via Pokémon Go on YouTube
The event marked the start of Legendary Pokémon appearing within the game, so in response to the sign-in problems Niantic is gifting all registered attendees Lugia into their Pokémon Go accounts.

Game bugs, crashes, and server problems have been associated with Pokémon Go since the app launched last summer, which Niantic has largely addressed with various updates to the game. With Pokémon Go Fest in Chicago over, a similar festival has already been announced in Yokohama, Japan for sometime in August.

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Foxconn Reportedly Nearing Decision to Invest in Display Factory in Wisconsin

Taiwanese electronics manufacturer Foxconn is nearing a decision to invest in Wisconsin, and could hold an event in Washington, D.C. as soon as this week to discuss its U.S. investment plans, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Foxconn is one of Apple’s primary iPhone assemblers in China, but in Wisconsin, the company is initially looking at producing display panels that can be used in large-screen electronics like televisions, according to the report.

The report, citing two people allegedly familiar with the plans, said Foxconn is also looking in the Detroit area for a possible factory.

Last month, Foxconn chairman Terry Gou confirmed that Foxconn is interested in investing at least $10 billion towards U.S. manufacturing in seven states: Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin, Indiana, and Texas.

Foxconn’s display factory in Wisconsin will reportedly cost at least $7 billion. Gou said it could create tens of thousands of American jobs.

Earlier, Gou confirmed Apple is willing to invest in the facility, suggesting the Wisconsin plant could eventually also be used to manufacture smaller displays for products like iPhones, iPads, and MacBooks.

Foxconn has reportedly been in talks with U.S. government officials for several months over the facility, including House Speaker Paul Ryan, a Republican who represents a district in southeastern Wisconsin.

Gou said Foxconn will work closely with Japanese display maker Sharp, which it acquired last year, on its U.S. investment plans.

Rumors suggesting Foxconn might open its first U.S. factory began circulating last November, after Apple reportedly asked its suppliers Foxconn and Pegatron to look into the feasibility of producing iPhones in the United States.

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JCPenney Now Accepts Apple Pay Nationwide, Integrates With Own Credit Card and Loyalty Program

American department store chain JCPenney today announced it now accepts Apple Pay at all of its stores across the United States. The retailer said Apple Pay in the JCPenney app for iPhone and iPad is coming soon as well.

JCPenney also said it will make its credit card available on Apple Pay, which enables customers to earn shopping points through its JCPenney Rewards loyalty program, directly in the Wallet app on iPhone.

JCPenney point-of-sale registers now process all Apple Pay supported credit and debit bank cards, including the Company’s credit card and co-branded Mastercard, both issued by Synchrony Bank and available to use with Apple Pay. Customers simply add their JCPenney credit card as a payment option to Apple Pay using the Wallet or Apple Watch app on their iPhone. Plus, coming soon, customers with the JCPenney app on iPhone and iPad will have the option to complete their purchases using Apple Pay.

JCPenney started testing Apple Pay in the Dallas—Fort Worth area in late 2015. The retailer joins the likes of Kohl’s and Walgreens with Apple Pay support for store-branded credit cards and customer loyalty programs.

Related Roundup: Apple Pay
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Man caught driving 112 mph blames it on Snapchat’s new speed filter

Why it matters to you

Arrest proves Snapchat’s speed filter is there to show how fast you can run, not to prove you are speeding.

A man has been arrested after driving at almost twice the speed limit on a highway in Georgia. Nothing that unusual, except the driver didn’t give any of the usual, tired excuses cops may often hear in these situations. No, the driver admitted he was speeding because he wanted to capture it on Snapchat.

Clocked at 112 miles per hour, Malon Neal told astounded officers he was doing it for Snapchat after he was pulled over. Footage recorded at the time shows Neal’s honesty when the cops confront him over the speeding. Although he doesn’t go into much detail, there’s an excellent chance he was using the Snapchat filter which can measure current speed, and placed it over the top of a picture.

“I would love to see where you are headed in such a hurry,” the officer asked. Neal replied, “Um, I was trying to do it for Snapchat, not going to lie to you.” Obviously not expecting such an answer, the officer sounds taken aback, asking, “Trying to what?” The response from Neal is the same: “Do it for Snapchat,” he said.

Seriously?

“to look good on snapchat” is never a reason to endanger the public…especially at 112 MPH pic.twitter.com/n9LPTk6Rfe

— AlpharettaDPS (@AlpharettaDPS) July 19, 2017

Neal was caught in his 2015 Dodge Charger by a stationary radar trap as the officer watched the car accelerate far faster than the traffic around it. The radar measured a speed of 112 mph, nearly twice the 65 mph speed limit of the road, but Neal didn’t state whether his Snap said he was going faster than this, but apparently did admit he knew it was more than 100 mph in his police report. He was charged with reckless driving, and for using a mobile device while driving.

It’s not the first time Snapchat’s speed filter has encouraged someone to drive too fast, and at least one time has ended in a horrific accident. In one high profile incident, Wentworth — who suffered brain damage from the accident — and Karen Maynard were victims in a crash caused by a driver who was using Snapchat, and the Maynards sued both the driver and Snapchat. They alleged that Christal McGee was trying to reach 100 mph on the Snapchat speed filter; however, a judge ruled Snapchat had immunity under the Communications Decency Act, and Snapchat’s attorney was quoted as saying the win “diverted blame,” and encouraged “responsible use of these technologies by the driver.”

Tech is making life in Barcelona better, even if you don’t know it’s there

Your city is dumb. The potholed streets, coin-operated parking meters, and drafty brick buildings many of us interact with every day haven’t changed much in a century. But it’s finally happening. From Oslo to San Diego, cities across the globe are installing technology to gather data in the hopes of saving money, becoming cleaner, reducing traffic, and improving urban life. In Digital Trends’ Smart Cities series, we’ll examine how smart cities deal with everything from energy management, to disaster preparedness, to public safety, and what it all means for you.

Does a smart city require savvy citizens? The goal of many smart cities is to make residents’ lives easier, be it finding a parking space easier or paying for a ticket online instead of through the mail. But Barcelona doesn’t just want an easy-to-use app. The people using the solutions are providing data, and they should own it, Francesca Bria, Barcelona’s digital chief, told Alphr.

Barcelona is trying to get its citizens involved as it evolves into a smarter city, including through its waste management initiatives and Fab Labs, maker spaces focused on helping residents produce goods usually shipped in from the outside.

An Olympic legacy

In 1992, Barcelona hosted the Olympics. In preparation for the event, officials installed 310 miles of fiber-optic cable and worked to revitalize the run-down industrial neighborhood known as Poblenou . Thanks to their efforts, Poblenou is now the site of @22, a with green space, subsidized housing, and mixed-use buildings. is still underway, and is set to be the location of Cisco’s Innovation Center. The company has heavily invested in Barcelona, and the Center houses a lab for developing projects aimed at smarter parking and energy management, as well as a space to demonstrate how these solutions would look in the real world.

“Barcelona has probably come up there as one of the one or two smartest cities in the world.”

Barcelona just completed its first “superblock.” It’s a bit like having a block party, every day. Pedestrians are a priority, and while vehicles can use the streets, they’re restricted to 10 kilometers (about six miles per hour), according to The Guardian. Picnic tables, trees, benches, chairs, bike racks, a running track, and ping pong tables are all planned for one area, El Periódico reports. None of that sounds particularly tech-y, but it reflects Barcelona Mayor Ada Colau’s agenda and priorities. Colau has built upon the previous mayor’s interest and focus on technology but also made sure that citizens are involved in the process.

“What we’ve been seeing in the past year is really a renewed focus on including citizens, including the different neighborhoods of Barcelona in the definition of this smart city strategy and making sure this smart city strategy is designed by and for citizens,” Cyril Maury, manager at consulting firm Claro Partners, told Digital Trends.

Previous Mayor Xavier Trius and his smart city team had originally identified 12 areas for intervention and improvement, including transportation, energy, waste, and water. Today, the city’s roadmap to 2020 focuses on using open-source technology that is “more democratic and accessible” to find solutions for “long-term social and wage inequality, climate change, scarcity of natural resources, and employment.” According to the report, “The current government does not renounce the work done” thus far in making Barcelona a smart city but wants to go further in making it “open, equitable, circular, and democratic.”

Some of its goals include closing the “digital divide” that shuts out some residents, like elderly residents who don’t have internet access, from modern amenities. It will also implement more responsible water-use practices, and helping bring down rents by identifying vacant and illegally used buildings.

With plans to improve everything from transportation to waste management, it might be easy to forget how connected the city already is. “Barcelona, I would argue, over the past five years, has probably come up there as one of the one or two smartest cities in the world,” said Arvind Satyam, Cisco’s managing director of smart cities and digitization division. He said Trias was a driving force. “The thing that got Barcelona on the map was not the city, it was the leadership.”

During his administration, Barcelona became known as one of the smartest cities in the world.

Barcelona’s Eixample District is home to the cities’ first “superblock”. (Photo: Iakov Filimonov/123RF)

What waste?

Cisco has been involved since 2011 and has been operating its Smart+Connected Digital Platform in stealth-mode for three years, publicly launching it last November. “It connects and collects all the data from different sensors and devices — water sensors, parking sensors, street lights, waste bins, environmental sensors — and brings that data and provides an API to different existing applications in a city to improve productivity and efficiency,” said Munish Khetrapal, managing director of Cisco’s smarter cities and IoT department. “When you’re deploying a smart city, for us what is very important is you don’t have to replace your current waste management application and systems, but you improve and enhance their capability.”

“You don’t have to replace your current waste management application and systems, but you improve and enhance their capability.”

Barcelona has 19,500 smart energy meters, more than 1,100 LED streetlights (many of which can monitor noise, weather, and traffic), sensors embedded in the asphalt that relay parking information, sensors that detect rain for less wasteful irrigation systems, Wi-Fi on its buses, and one of the most innovative waste management systems around.

Barcelona was spending a fortune on waste and recycling – 1.5 billion euros over four years. In an effort to reduce cost, city officials approached Cisco for a solution. They wanted to know if it would make a difference if they only emptied trashcans more than 50 percent full.

“The answer is absolutely,” Satyam said.

Now, sensors detect how full the bins are, and trucks empty them accordingly. “Sustainability is probably the area where they are most advanced,” Maury said of Barcelona. It’s also an area that requires heavy citizen participation. Homes often have five different types of waste bins: one for glass, one for paper, one for plastic, and so on.

“This is a good example of a way to have people do the right thing, the sustainable thing, precisely because it is very convenient,” Maury said. “It doesn’t add any more complexity to their life.”

Midnight Black OnePlus 5 with 8GB RAM is now ready for immediate dispatch

The Midnight Black OnePlus 5 will be shipped out immediately after you’ve ordered it.

OnePlus announced at the start of the year that one of its resolutions for 2017 was to tackle shipping delays by making its products available for immediate dispatch, which sees the company shipping a phone mere hours after you’ve placed the order.

The standard 6GB variant of the OnePlus 5 has been eligible for immediate dispatch in the U.S. for some time now, and now the variant with 8GB of RAM and 128GB internal memory will also be shipped out immediately after you’ve ordered it.

As a refresher, the Midnight Black OnePlus 5 comes with a 5.5-inch Super AMOLED display, Snapdragon 835, 8GB of LPDDR4X RAM, 128GB UFS 2.1 storage, dual cameras at the back (16MP primary lens backed by a 20MP telephoto lens), front 16MP shooter, Wi-Fi ac 2×2 MIMO, global LTE bands, NFC, aptX HD, and a 3300mAh battery with Dash Charge.

The phone retails for $539, undercutting the likes of the Galaxy S8 by a few hundred dollars. If you’re interested, head to the link below to pick up the OnePlus 5.

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Best tricks to fix YouTube’s most annoying features

YouTube is a simple service with a lot of not-so-simple problems to it.

It’s easy for YouTube to frustrate users because beneath the cat videos and endless comment sections are a lot of features that can really make or break your experience. You thought you turned off Autoplay, but it still seems to be turned on when you’re showing your family videos on the TV. You get notifications when people across the house are casting. Why? And more importantly, how do you end these annyoances? Here’s how.

• How to control and stop someone casting from YouTube
• How to keep YouTube from Autoplaying when casting
• How to quickly skip forward or backward in a YouTube video
• How to change how far your double-tap to seek goes

How to control and stop someone casting from YouTube

By default, when someone casts content from YouTube (or most other apps) to a Chromecast, everyone else connected to the same router as at that Chromecast will receive a notification that allows them to control that content as its being cast. This can be useful if you need to pause or stop someone casting YouTube to a TV, as when a family member leaves the room without stopping their cast or when a family member gets a call and needs to pause the video while their phone is already in use.

In the notification shade, pull down on the A device on your Wi-Fi is casting to show all your options.
To pause the video, tap Pause.
To turn off the volume tap Mute.

To stop the video, tap Stop.

If you want to stop getting those cast notifications every time someone uses a Chromecast in your house, here’s how you do it:

Open Settings.
Tap Google.
Tap Cast media controls.

Tap Media control for Cast devices to toggle it off.

How to keep YouTube from Autoplaying when casting

You’d think that if you don’t want Autoplay while you’re watching on your phone, you wouldn’t want it while you’re casting, either, right? Well, apparently YouTube doesn’t see it that way. Unfortunately, the only way to change this setting is while you’re casting something, so let’s go ahead and cast something and turn it off now so it doesn’t bite us while we’re watching something later on!

Open YouTube.
Tap the Google Cast icon in the top bar.
Tap a Chromecast to cast to.
Tap a video.
Tap the Queue at the bottom of the screen.

Tap Autoplay is on to turn that toggle off.

You can now stop casting your video and go about your business, content that YouTube won’t run rampant on you while cast.

How to quickly skip forward or backward in a YouTube video

Ever watch a video, then someone walks in and makes you miss the best part? Well, we can’t stop the intrusions, but we can quickly rewind and skip ahead in a YouTube video.

• To rewind a few seconds, double-tap the left side of the video screen away from the visible controls.
• To skip ahead a few seconds, double-tap the right side of the video screen away from the visible controls.

You can compound the initial double-tap to skip further and further. If you want to, you can also shift the amount of time a single double-tap will skip.

How to change how far your double-tap to seek goes

Some people want a double-tap to skip longer periods so that they don’t have to double-tap quite so many times, while some people want to double-tap to skip shorter periods to allow for more precision seeking. Luckily, YouTube caters to both crowds, and here’s how to set your double-tap to seek value:

Open YouTube.
Tap your avatar in the top right corner.
Tap Settings.
Tap General.
Tap Double-tap to seek.

Select the increment you prefer to seek at.

Questions?

Let us know in the comments below!

India’s $25 JioPhone is powered by the Qualcomm 205 Mobile Platform

JioPhone lowers the barrier to entry for 4G connectivity.

When Qualcomm announced the 205 Mobile Platform earlier this year, it listed India’s Jio as one of its launch partners. Jio rolled out its first 4G-enabled feature phone — the ₹1,499 ($25) JioPhone — last week, and the device is one of the first to be powered by Qualcomm’s 205 platform.

Glad to partner with @reliancejio on the new #JioPhone, powered by our #205 mobile platform.

— Qualcomm India (@qualcomm_in) July 22, 2017

The chipset features an X5 Category 4 LTE modem with a download speed of 150Mbps, VoLTE and VoWIFI, Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth 4.1, and a dual-core CPU clocked at 1.1GHz along with an Adreno 304 GPU.

The brief for the 205 Mobile Platform is to lower the barrier to entry for 4G connectivity by delivering sub-$50 phones, and that’s exactly what Jio delivered with the JioPhone. The feature phone has a 2.4-inch QVGA (240 x 160) screen, and offers access to Jio’s burgeoning digital content library along with Facebook and a basic web browser. It also has NFC, and support for 22 local languages.

The JioPhone will go up for sale in the month of September, with a limited beta kicking off on August 15.

6 awesome Google Home commands you may not know

These commands will help you get the most out of Google Home.

Google Home has tons of great features that allow you to keep better track of things. If you aren’t sure what it’s really capable of, or how to use it, then it can be hard to get started. That’s why we collected the six great commands you may not know about. These includes listening to music, checking your schedule, controlling your home, and more. We’ve got all the details for you here!

• Look up travel times
• Get recommendations
• Listen to music
• Check your schedule
• Control your home
• Set alarms and timers

Look up travel times

Google Home is able to access local traffic patterns in order to give you an idea of what your daily commute looks like. It goes much further than that, though. You can specify the route you want to take, which means you can avoid taking the highway if you prefer the scenic route. While you can program in your work address and get info about your commute, you can also ask Google Home how long it will take to get to a specific location.

There are several commands connected to looking up travel times that you can use.

• “How long is my commute?”
• “How long will it take to walk/bike/take a bus to target location?”
• “How long will it take to get to target location?”
• “How long with it take to get from work to target location?”.

Get recommendations

If you’re planning a trip, or you have friends coming in from out of town, you may want to find somewhere new to grab drinks or go out to dinner. Thankfully this is another thing you can ask Google Home to help you with. You can get tips from Google on restaurants that have been rated by users on Google Maps,

• “What are the best restaurants in target location?”
• “What restaurants are nearby?”

Listen to music

Being able to fill your home with the music without having to do anything but tell Google Home is fantastic. Google Home syncs up with Pandora, Spotify, and Google Play Music. In order to take advantage of a specific music service, you’ll need to set up your defaults.

• “Play music from a specific genre, artist, playlist, or album.”
• “Play a specific song, play music.”
• “Turn up and down the volume.”
• “Pause or skip tracks.”

Check your schedule

Most of us have lives absolutely filled to the brim with different events. From weddings, birthday parties and dinner dates to conference calls and work trips, keeping track of everything can be a bit overwhelming at times. Thankfully, Google can help you to keep track of everything you have scheduled from within the Google Calendar linked to your account.

• “What does my day look like?”
• “What/when/where is my next event?”
• “What/when/where is my first event?”
• “List all events for specific date.”
• “What’s on my calendar for day of the week?”

Control your home

With connected accessories like Hue bulbs or a Nest thermostat, you can actually control them using Google Home. You can turn lights on and off or dim them, once you have connected them to your Google Home, and you can also adjust your thermostat or turn switches on and off. Since all connected accessories need to be named when connecting them to Google Home, it’s easy to specify which accessory you asking Google Home to adjust. With thermostats, in particular, you can also ask, and get the ambient temperature in a room, or find out what the thermostat is set to.

When using lights you can turn them on, turn them off, brighten them, dim them, set them to a specific color or brightness percentage, or turn off all lights in a room. Switches can be turned on or off. When using a connected thermostat you can adjust the temperature, change heating or cooling modes, and turn off the thermostat.

Set Alarms and timers

It’s easy for time to slip through your fingers during a busy day, and we’ve all forgotten that dinner is cooking in the oven once or twice. Thankfully, Google can easily set timers or alarms, which can help to remind you when to take the lasagna out of the oven or remember that it’s time to head to the airport to pick up your roommates. You can even ask Google how much time is left on a specific timer so that you can plan out your time accordingly.

• “Set an alarm for preferred time.”
• “Set a timer for specified amount of time.”
• “How much time is left on the timer?”
• “How long until my alarm goes off?”

Questions?

Do you have a favorite command for Google Home? Is there a great command that we should have included here? Let us know about it in the comments below.

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The Morning After: Monday, July 24th 2017

Hey, good morning! You look fabulous.

Have a good weekend? Then you probably weren’t at Pokémon Go Fest. Of course, even if you stayed home, there were still plenty of previews to check out from Comic-Con, and a surprise Siri ‘movie.’ Once you’ve caught up on all the news, keep an eye out this afternoon for the Google/Alphabet earnings report just after 4PM ET.

Oops?Wells Fargo accidentally leaks 50,000 clients’ records

Thousands of sensitive Wells-Fargo leaked, but not in the way you think. The bank wasn’t hacked, and its computers didn’t go on the fritz: It just inadvertently sent 1.4GB of files to a former financial adviser who’d subpoenaed the company as part of a lawsuit against one of its current employees. While 1.4GB of data doesn’t seem like much, the collection includes at least 50,000 customers’ names, social-security numbers and sensitive financial info.

Oops?Pokémon Go Fiasco

Niantic’s big celebration for the first year of its groundbreaking augmented-reality game didn’t work out as planned, with technical glitches and cell-network overloads ruining the event in Chicago. As a result, the company is refunding attendees and granting them all a legendary Pokémon for their trouble. For players around the world, there are other bonuses available, and new legendary monsters have begun spawning in raids.

Issa advertisement.The Rock and Apple release a Siri ‘movie’

Over the weekend, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson surprise-announced a new project with an unusual co-star: Apple’s Siri assistant. Now available on YouTube, it’s easier to interpret as an advertisement/educational video for Siri’s capabilities as a hands-free assistant. One of the toughest things about the rollout of voice-controlled AI helpers has been that few people know what they’re capable of or how to activate each feature but Dominate the Day explains a lot in just under four minutes.

Previews everywhere.‘Stranger Things,’ ‘Star Trek,’ ‘Westworld’ and ‘Ready Player One’ trailers debut at Comic-Con

Comic-Con is over, but in case you missed any of the previews, there were four we think you’ll be interested in: Stranger Things season two, Westworld season two, Star Trek: Discovery and Ready Player One.

Look who’s stealing from Snapchat nowTelegram adds disappearing messages

Telegram’s messaging app is better known for its security than catering to Snapchat fans, but it’s blurring those lines. The company has updated its mobile apps with support for disappearing photos and videos in any private chat.

But wait, there’s more…

• Nissan preps its semi-autonomous driving assist for the US
• The truth about what happened to that drowned security robot
• Recommended Reading: Instagram’s influence on restaurants
• Yes, Microsoft is still working on a ‘Halo’ TV series
• Hobbyist developers will make $30 million via ‘Roblox’ this year

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