OnePlus phones won’t support Project Treble, but that’s not a big deal

This is certainly annoying, but it’s not the end of the world.

Following the launch of its latest phone – the OnePlus 5T – OnePlus held an AMA on its official forums to answer any questions that its fans/customers had about the new tech. A lot of questions were answered, and one of the more interesting tidbits to come out of this was the fact that none of OnePlus’s phones will support Project Treble.

Quick refresher – what in the world is Project Treble?

This is a system that Google announced in May to help speed up the infamously slow update process for new versions of Android when they’re released, and although phones that ship with Android 8.0 Oreo or later have Treble turned on by default, ones that later upgrade to Oreo from previous versions of Android aren’t required to do so.

As a result of this, the OnePlus 3, 3T, 5, and even the 5T won’t support Treble. This could theoretically mean slower updates compared to other manufacturers, but we wouldn’t get too worried just yet.

The lack of Treble on the 5T is far from a dealbreaker.

First of all, we still haven’t seen any real benefit from Treble. This will hopefully change beginning next year as phones actually start shipping with Oreo out of the box, but there’s still no guarantee that we’ll see a noticeable difference in update turnaround times.

Secondly, OnePlus is already damn good at updating its hardware to new versions of Android in a timely manner. An open beta of Oreo will be released to the 5 and 5T in late December, and last year’s 3 and 3T recently received an update to a stable build of it.

Is it peculiar and potentially irritating that OnePlus won’t be supporting Treble on its phones? Yes. Is it reason enough to not buy the 5T? Not at all.

OnePlus 5T review: Come for the value, not the excitement

Enjoy Fios Gigabit Connection w/ phone & TV for $79.99 a month

Verizon is offering Fios Gigabit Connection, a Triple Play bundle with Internet, Phone and TV for just $79.99/mo. online with a new 2-year agreement.

Fios by Verizon gives you the best experience there is when it comes to internet, phone, and TV. The 100% fiber-optic Fios network delivers crystal-clear phone calls, beautiful HD TV with Custom TV channel packages, and blazing-fast internet with speeds up to 940 Mbps download and 880 Mbps upload.

Verizon is offering Fios Gigabit Connection, a Triple Play bundle with Internet, Phone and TV for just $79.99/mo. online with a new 2-year agreement.

With this offer, you’ll get internet with speeds of up to 940/880 Mbps, along with crystal-clear HDTV and home phone service. And to help sweeten the deal, you’ll also get multi-room DVR service and SHOWTIME® at no extra charge included for two years. SHOWTIME offers great original programming that includes shows like Ray Donovan, Shameless, Homeland and more.

Stuck in a contract with another provider? There’s no need to worry. Verizon is offering up to a $500 credit to help cover your early termination fee, to make switching to Fios that much easier.

What’s Included

• 100% fiber-optic network with Fios Gigabit Connection with speeds up to 940/880 Mbps.
• Custom TV plans powered by advanced fiber-optic network technology for incredible picture quality.
• Fios Digital Voice home phone service that delivers the voice quality of a 100% fiber-optic network and includes calling to the U.S., Canada, and Puerto Rico.
• 2 years of Fios Multi-Room DVR service
• 2 years of SHOWTIME at no extra charge.

Don’t want to go all-in with a Triple Play? You can still get amazing standalone Internet from Fios. For just $39.99/month online plus taxes, equipment charges and other fees, experience Fios 100/100 Mbps Internet and stream to your favorite devices, binge your favorite shows and video chat with friends across the globe — without missing a beat.

Learn more

Net neutrality, consolidation, monopolies, and you

Net neutrality is still worth fighting for.

Ajit Pai, the Chairman of the United States Federal Communications Commission, has proposed a complete repeal of Obama-era “net neutrality” regulations. He frames it as a return to free markets, but it is willfully ignorant of the founding nature and changing reality of the internet and what it will take to ensure its free and open future.

A fair and open internet is vital to the national and global interest. It promotes our democracy and economy. The 2015 net neutrality rules are increasingly necessary as the companies that run the infrastructure of the internet consolidate into media conglomerates and exercise monopoly powers.

Net neutrality is still worth fighting for — now more than ever.

This playing field is level and fence-free

What is Net Neutrality?

Net neutrality is a basic principle: internet service providers (ISPs) cannot slow down, speed up, or block any service, app, or website. It is a level playing field for the content provider and consumer, with the ISP playing the role of ‘dumb pipe’.

Net neutrality is a basic principle: ISPs cannot slow down, speed up, or block any service, app, or website.

It is how the internet has operated, more or less, for the past twenty years. If it worked for that long without what Pai calls “onerous rules”, why do we need them now?

Simply put, ISPs are no longer satisfied with being dumb pipes. A pair of trends have converged that are pushing ISPs to look for new profit opportunities.

The United States is approaching saturation for wired and wireless internet connections. There are few new customers left to sign up for service (the easiest way to increase profits) and poaching customers from competitors is expensive. Wireless providers are trying to convince us that we need more lines for cellular tablets, smartwatches, vehicle dongles, and more.

Evolutions in technology for wired internet (the move to fiber) and wireless internet (LTE is nearly complete, just in time to start 5G upgrades) mean major ongoing capital expenditures for ISPs. This isn’t new — ISPs have been spending massively on infrastructure since the first days, but for a business that must replace its infrastructure every decade is a relatively new concept.

With increased customer and infrastructure costs in a slowly growing market, ISPs are looking for new profit opportunities. There’s nothing wrong that — profit is what businesses are meant to do.

ISPs have been getting into the content business through new ventures, partnerships, and acquisitions. Verizon bought AOL and Yahoo and is trying video with go90. Comcast purchased NBC Universal. AT&T bought DirecTV and wants Time Warner. These are aggressive moves, but done right they don’t have to violate the principles of net neutrality.

It’d be a shame if something bad happened to this nice video streaming service you’re running here

When the wheels start coming off the bus

It becomes troubling when the service provider side of the business is used to provide an advantage to the content side. Again, I don’t fault an ISP for wanting to maximize profits and promote its products over a competitor’s.

This can take a few different forms, from prioritizing the speed and reliability for one web service over another, to exemptions from data caps, to the most extreme but frighteningly plausible reality: breaking popular websites into different service tiers that you must pay to access (just look at cable channel offerings if you doubt this possibility).

ISPs don’t want to play the dumb pipe anymore. They want to be the gatekeeper. This isn’t conjecture — ISPs are actively promoting such ideas, and even implementing some of them.

ISPs don’t want to play the dumb pipe anymore. They want to be the gatekeeper.

If you’re a Verizon subscriber, its go90 video service is both included with your Verizon plan and exempted from any data cap on your plan. “Here’s a free thing” is fine by net neutrality principles, but exempting go90 from data caps gives it an artificial advantage over competitors like Netflix or Hulu.

T-Mobile’s Binge On music and video program is a huge step in data plan exemptions. T-Mobile claims that it supports net neutrality and that both programs are open to any streaming service, but the list of cap-free streaming services is impossible to make exhaustive and has some very notable absences. YouTube Gaming is present, but game streaming leader Twitch is not, nor is Microsoft’s upstart Beam. Spotify, Tidal, and Apple Music stream without hitting your data caps, but your local radio station likely won’t.

In 2013, Comcast demanded that Netflix pay for access to their network and customers. Netflix refused, so Comcast downgraded the speed of Netflix and hurt video quality. Netflix eventually capitulated and paid up; the quality of Netflix on Comcast improved overnight. NBC video streams will never be restricted on Comcast, but the precedent has been set for Spectrum or AT&T to throttle NBC unless Comcast pays.

Sure, Netflix and Comcast are large and profitable businesses that can afford such fees. If it’s okay for Comcast to demand a fee from Netflix, then what’s to stop Sprint from demanding a fee from anybody that wants to stream video over its network? That’s one way to put a damper on any upstart content competitor that doesn’t have the cash to pay the toll. Then couple this with an ISP exempting their own services from such restrictions and you have a highly uncompetitive atmostphere.

If throttling traffic leaves a bad taste in your both, the ISPs have an alternative suggestion: fast lanes. Instead of restricting speeds they’ll let companies pay for faster and unobstructed access. Instead of disadvantaging a smaller company that can’t afford these fees, it’s offering an advantage to larger companies that are willing to pay. And if Amazon Prime video streams are markedly better because they paid the toll, you can bet Netflix and Apple will also pay to remain competitive. The little guy that can’t pay is still left out.

Oh, that’s part of our Social Media Bundle™

The Nightmare Scenario

The real dream of an ISP is to ape the tiered business model of cable television. Almost every cable TV plan is sold in tiers, with a selection of local broadcast and shopping channels in the base tier, but if you want more (say, AMC, Disney, ESPN, or HGTV) then you’ll have to pay for an upgraded tier with a hundred other channels you’ll never watch.

Imagine a world where website access is treated like cable channel bundles.

Imagine that same business model applied to the internet access. A basic plan with email, social media, Wikipedia, Google Search, and the ISP’s video, music, and news services. Netflix, Amazon Prime, and Hulu are in the Video Package — after all, they use more bandwidth. News from Fox or Vice or TechCrunch is a different upgrade. So are popular recipe and DIY websites. Need to use a VPN for work? Better subscribe to the business class package. Want access to everything the internet has to offer? That’s the top-tier unlimited plan.

Prioritizing or exempting traffic hacks away at the neutrality principles upon which the internet was built. Allowed to go wild, ISPs will become a wrecking ball to the very foundation of the internet.

Where else are you going to go?

Consolidation

Net neutrality opponents say the Telecommunications Act of 1996 is adequate to protect the an open internet. Pai said that instead “the FCC simply would require internet service providers to be transparent so that consumers can buy the plan that’s best for them.”

There’s one huge problem there: most consumers have extremely limited ISP options. In some large markets you might find multiple broadband competitors, but the vast majority of Americans have few options. According to the FCC, nearly 60% of US households are served by only one ISP offering 25mbps or better broadband download speeds — or have no broadband access at all. Only 13% have more than two broadband options. What does it matter if the ISP is “transparent” about throttling practices if it’s your only choice?

The wired internet market in the United States is hilariously uncompetitive already, and claiming that customers will have the option to pick a plan that’s best for them is uniformed at best and willfully malicious at worst.

The traditional wired internet providers have unspoken agreements to stay in their own established local monopoly markets. As the only option, they don’t have to compete on price and quality and can charge whatever the market will bear.

Nearly 60% of Americans only have one choice for broadband internet — or no broadband access at all.

Take Comcast’s Xfinity internet service as an example. In Atlanta there’s robust ISP competition and Comcast will sell you 75mbps service for $40/month. In Houston there’s little competition and Comcast charges $50/month for 55mbps internet service. Competition breeds better service and prices, but wired ISPs go out of their way to avoid it.

Not only is competition rare, it’s decreasing through consolidation. Charter and Time Warner Cable merged to create Spectrum. The will-they-won’t-they merger of T-Mobile and Sprint fell apart not due to regulatory concerns but because of disagreements over the post-merger power structure. Verizon purchased AOL and Yahoo, AT&T purchased DirecTV and is now trying to buy Time Warner (the media company that owns CNN, TNT, HBO, Warner Bros, etc).

The market is primed for ISPs to exploit customers on both ends of the network. Content providers are being opened up to extortion to ensure the fair delivery of their product to customers. Customers face lesser products being foisted upon them with the promise that it won’t hurt their wallet. Meanwhile, ISPs register record profits year after year.

Be heard

What now?

The Communications Act created two classes of web-centric companies. Title I is for “information services” and Title II is for “common carriers”. The names alone make it clear how to classify companies like Google or Netflix versus companies like Verizon and Comcast.

Two decades ago, in the early days of the internet, the FCC opted to classify ISPs under Title I. Nobody then imagined what the internet would explode into today or the consequences of that decision. And it wasn’t a concern, until Comcast started strong-arming Netflix or AT&T and Verizon started getting into the content business.

In 2015 the FCC voted to move ISPs under the Title II “common carrier” classification. This set new net neutrality rules for ISPs, requiring them to interconnect with each other to ensure all end users get fair and unfettered access, to ensure that physical rights of way are open to competitors, and to protect the privacy of users.

This is not a partisan issue. This is not a matter of the government deciding who wins or loses — it’s ground rules to ensure that everyone has an opportunity to win. Repealing the net neutrality regulations would mean that an ISP could block traffic from Fox News just as easily as they could from Vice.

If you believe, as we do, that sensible net neutrality regulations are necessary to ensure the thriving, unfettered future of the internet for all who use it for business or pleasure, then you must speak up. Here’s how to comment on the draft FCC order:

Click this link to open the FCC’s search results for Docket 17-108, Restoring Internet Freedom.
Click on + Express on the far right of the search result. This will open the comment submission form with 17-108 automatically entered in the “Proceeding(s)” field.
Enter your name and contact information. It is important that this is true and accurate; comments that cannot be attributed to a real person are ignored.
Enter your comment to the FCC on the importance of net neutrality into the “Brief Comments” field. Be courteous, concise, and calm.
Click Continue to review screen. This will load a review page to double check your submission. If you need to make any alterations, you can click Back in your browser or click the (1) Comment step at the top right of the screen.
Click Submit. This will send your comment to the FCC and load a confirmation page.

You can also express you concerns directly to each to the FCC’s Commissioners:

• Ajit Pai, Chairman: Ajit.Pai@fcc.gov
• Mignon Clyburn, Commissioner: Mignon.Clyburn@fcc.gov
• Michael O’Rielly, Commissioner: Mike.O’Rielly@fcc.gov
• Brendan Carr, Commissioner: Brendan.Carr@fcc.gov
• Jessica Rosenworcel, Commissioner: Jessica.Rosenworcel@fcc.gov

This issue can only be definitively solved via an act of Congress. The FCC is interpreting the 1996 Communications Act; only Congress can permanently clear up confusion in the law. Of course, we’re going up against massive lobbying costs and political donations — Comcast alone spent $14 million on government lobbying in 2016, and millions more in the years they were fighting Title II classification.

I won’t lie, the odds are stacked against net neutrality supporters. Politicians who support overturning the rules are in the White House, both houses of Congress, and three of the five seats on the FCC Board of Commissioners. But the democratic republic structure of the United States is designed so that these elected representatives are responsive to our demands.

So let them know. Send an email, or better yet pick up the phone and make a call:

• Contact the White House
• Contact your Representative
• Contact your Senators

Even if it’s a losing battle, it’s one we would regret not fighting.

The best hand-picked Black Friday deals are right here!

Stay with Thrifter over Black Friday and beyond for the best hand-picked deals, promos, and contests!

There’s a saying around these parts: if you’re not watching Thrifter’s Black Friday live blog, you’re not living.

OK, that’s a thing I just made up, but the sentiment is real. You’ve been seeing the Thrifter name around Android Central for a while now, and that’s because we have partnered with them to curate the best hand-picked deals around. We thought we were pretty good at scouting deals, but Thrifter brings it to a level of artistry that’s not seen anywhere else on the internet.

Black Friday is probably the best time to pick up the gadgets and gifts you’ve been eyeing for months, and if you want to find those items for less, you’d better be looking at Thrifter.

Thrifter is the only source for the best deals, Black Friday and beyond.

Here’s the deal: Thrifter isn’t here to get you to spend your hard-earned money on stuff you don’t need. It’s here to find you the lowest prices on the stuff you actually want.

So that’s why Black Friday is such a good time to start paying attention. Thrifter is going all-in on Black Friday — the hard-working folks are holed up in a Miami hotel (which doesn’t sound so bad) preparing to live blog the entire thing, starting at 7pm PT / 10pm ET tonight, November 22. It’s wild and crazy and kind of intimidating, and I’m a little jealous they didn’t invite me. But you can be damn sure I’m bookmarking that page.

Oh, and you can win a $1500 home theater system. Seriously, it’s amazing — there’s a 55-inch Samsung 4K TV, a Samsung soundbar, an Xbox One X, and a $50 gift card to B&H Photo Video.

Go ahead, leave this page and hit up Thrifter. I’ve already stopped paying attention to what I’m writing because these deals … what was I saying?

See at Thrifter

DARPA is engineering plants to act as biohazard sensors

Researchers at DARPA, the DoD’s arm that focuses on developing new technology for military application, have long been trying to figure out the best way to transmit timely information, focusing on electronic and mechanical sensors to do the job. After all, it’s crucial to any military action. But it turns out that the Defense Department might have been barking up the wrong tree. DARPA’s new Advanced Plant Technologies (APT) program is aimed at growing plants that can function as spies.

Plants naturally react to stimuli and environmental changes. The goal of APT is to control the stimuli that plants respond to and how they react through genetic manipulation. The main idea is that these plants would be self-sustaining, so they would act as monitors for chemicals, pathogens, radiation and other triggers while thriving in the wild.

This isn’t the first experiment to use plants in this way, but previous endeavors achieved their goals by using resources the plants needed to survive. This greatly reduced the hardiness of the plants. Scientists and researchers working on APT want to create a plant that can function as a sensor but also doesn’t impact the health or longevity of the plants they create.

The DoD will be taking proposals for APT on December 12th at an event in Arlington, VA. Interested parties can register through December 6th. DARPA’s certainly done some interesting stuff in the past, but it will be very interesting to see what comes out of APT.

Via: Gizmodo

Source: DARPA

Kids judge R2-D2 droids built by Facebook, Google and Fitbit

Last Wednesday, a group of 24 children from the ages of seven to 12 gathered at Lucasfilm headquarters in San Francisco. They laughed and chattered with excitement, had their picture taken next to the Yoda fountain and squealed at the sight of R2-D2. They were there to attend a “Droidathon,” where participants competed to see who could build the best R2-D2 lookalikes out of littleBits’ Droid Inventor Kit. But the kids weren’t there to compete; they were there to judge.

Instead of kids, the competitors were engineers from various Bay Area tech companies — Facebook, Instagram, Fitbit, Google, and two of LucasFilm’s own: Industrial Light & Magic as well as ILMxLAB — the studio’s immersive technologies arm. From the aforementioned Droid Inventor Kit, the engineers created all sorts of droids — they danced, blew bubbles, projected holographic images, delivered candy, and more. As for the kids, they were from four different children organizations aimed at educating underrepresented minorities: the YMCA, the Boys and Girls Club of America, Black Girls Code and the Booker T. Washington Community Services Center.

The reason for the role reversal, according to littleBits CEO Ayah Bdeir, was to get kids to meet people in the industry who look like them. Many of the engineers who took part in the Droidathon were women and people of color. The end goal? To promote diversity in science and technology.

“This is something very inherent to who we are,” said Bdeir. “We’re very committed to making electronics accessible and inspiring to kids for all backgrounds and genders.”

littleBits is a system of electronic building blocks that snap together with magnets to create circuits. It’s a simple concept, but it’s one that lends itself to endless creativity. Ever since littleBits debuted in 2011, there has been a multitude of kits to create anything from simple synthesizers to a smarter, internet-connected home.

Bdeir, an engineer herself, took care to make littleBits gender neutral to inspire more girls to be interested in science. Six years later and her efforts have paid off: 35 to 40 percent of the littleBits community are girls, which she said is a rarity in the electronic toy category. It’s this statistic that was one of the reasons littleBits was accepted in Disney’s Accelerator program last year, which is where the company gained the expertise and the resources to create the Droid Inventor Kit. Kids can create their very own R2 unit with the kit, but are also free to remix materials into their own creations.

“Our goal is to inspire young kids to become inventors,” said Bdeir in a welcoming speech to the Droidathon crowd. “We want to start a movement around STEAM, which stands for science, technology, engineering, art — we think art is really important! — and math.”

The reason for doing so, she continued, is because according to the National Science Foundation, 84 percent of those in jobs in science and engineering are male, specifically white and Asian males. “By 8th grade, about 50 percent of kids lose interest in STEAM,” she said. “In the past few years at littleBits, we learned that the best way to engage kids is to essentially make something crazy and fun, and to show them cool people doing it.”

Jane Okpala, a production operations manager for Facebook who also leads a women employees group at the company, was at the Droidathon to show her support. Her droid was the InstaDroid, which, unsurprisngly, the Instagram team created. InstaDroid was supposed to display the blueprints of the Death Star but ultimately failed to do so due to poor WiFi. Still, Okpala was upbeat as she talked to the kids in attendance, asking them to apply for internships when they’re older.

“It’s so important for underrepresented minorities to find different entry points into science and technology,” she said. “LittleBits is a great way for kids to feel empowered to get started in science; to get inspired to build.”

One of the most popular droid creations at the Droidathon was created by FitBit. Called the R2Fitbot, it lights up and blows bubbles — the idea being you use a lightsaber to swat them, thus improving your skills. Of course, it’s just for fun, but kids flocked around it, eventually awarding it the “Droid we most want to keep ourselves” prize. “Just being able to get tools in kids’ hands is really valuable,” said Liz Goodyear, a mechanical engineer at Fitbit who helped create the R2Fitbot.

It was Google’s team that got the most accolades from the kids, with its candy-dispensing droid. Painted green, just like the Android logo, the droid would pop out a piece of candy if you said “OK Google” followed by “I want candy” to a connected phone. Google also made a second droid that chased after the first one (it was nicknamed the “candy thief”), but it was the first droid that was awarded the “most inventive” and “best idea” by the panel of kid judges. “We went through a lot of ideas,” said Jim White, a Google engineer, who learned about the contest through an internal Makers group. “In the end, we figured candy was the easiest way to win kids over.”

Candy wasn’t the only gift the kids received. At the end of the Droidathon, Bdeir gave away a free littleBits Droid Inventor Kit to every child in attendance, prompting deafening screams of joy to fill the room. The giveaway came after littleBits announced a much wider droid-making competition, where kids of all ages are invited to submit their own droid creations on the littleBits website. The contest is open to everyone in the US, Canada and the UK, and prizes include a VIP trip to Lucasfilm, signed replicas from the upcoming Star Wars film, and a shopping spree at Disney stores. It opens on November 15th and lasts until January 10th — the judges include Bdeir, Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy, Daisy Ridley (who plays Rey), and Kelly Marie Tran (who plays Rose Tico in The Last Jedi).

Tran also happened to be present at the Droidathon to help kick off the contest. “I’m so excited to see what you guys make for us,” she told the kids. “It’s so incredible to be an engineer, to problem-solve, and create things that can make the world a better place.”

“You are the next generation,” continued Bdeir. Then, she addressed the parents in attendance as well. “We need you guys to help with the movement, as a support system for kids. You guys are so important in this process.”

She paused. “And if you guys are inspired to be inventors,” she continued. “It’s never too late to start.”

Image credit: Getty Images for Lucasfilm (Child looking at droid; Group photo)

Head to Verizon stores to protest the FCC’s anti-net neutrality plans

It’s highly unlikely that the FCC’s latest plan to gut net neutrality won’t go through, thanks to chairman Ajit Pai’s record of consumer-unfriendly viewpoints and a Republican majority on the Federal Communications Commission. Still, advocacy groups and various websites have been pushing to preserve net neutrality for months now. The latest protest is looking to have people head to Verizon stores (Pai was a top lawyer for the telecommunications company) on December 7th to make their voices heard.

The FCC is expected to vote on the new non-neutrality rules December 14th, which is why this particular protest, a collaboration between Demand Progress, Fight for the Future and the Freepress Action Fund, is taking place the week before. “By protesting at Verizon stores,” Demand Progress said in its blog post, “we’re shining light on the corruption and demanding that our local do something about it. Only Congress has the power to stop Verizon’s puppet FCC, so at the protests we’ll be calling and tweeting at legislators, and in cities where it’s possible we’ll march from Verizon stores to lawmakers offices.”

While preventing ISPs from charging extra fees based on your data usage is an admirable goal, it’s hard to see the FCC’s plan failing in the current political climate. If you’re looking to stand up for it, however, you can see a map with a list of Verizon store locations at the protest website.

Via: The Verge

Source: Fight For The Future

Algae-based nanobots could diagnose you from the inside

Nanobots promise a breakthrough in medicine by letting doctors study and treat you without invasive surgery or relatively ineffective drugs. But they face a couple of key problems: it’s not easy to steer them to where they’re needed, and getting rid of them is difficult when they’re finished. Researchers might have a solution: make them out of natural materials that are guaranteed to break down. They’ve crafted nanobots (not pictured) using the sort of spirulina algae you can find in health food stores. The natural composition not only lets them biodegrade gracefully, but makes them relatively easy to control and track.

The bots have a magnetic iron-oxide exterior that both lets doctors control how quickly they degrade and makes it possible to guide them using magnetic resonance imaging. And since they have naturally fluorescent insides, they’re easy to spot. They’d only have to stay in your body as long as necessary, and they’d waste less time getting to those places where they’re actually useful.

They should be flexible, too. While the nanobots can be used to deliver medicine to targeted parts of the body, they can also sense environmental changes that reflect an oncoming illness. Diagnoses for certain conditions could be more accurate, especially for parts of the body that are normally hard to reach.

Don’t expect to slip these tiny machines into your body any time soon, however. The scientists still want to refine their effectiveness, tracking and compatibility with your body before they start trials in humans. However, their very existence shows that nanorobots should be genuinely practical to make and use. Instead of relying on elaborate creations that have little connection to the natural world, you could use readily available organic materials that are already friendly to your body.

Source: University of Manchester

Samsung may offer a peek at the Galaxy S9 at CES in January

You might not have to wait until Samsung’s customary spring event to get a look at the next flagship Galaxy phones. A source talking to well-connected leak writer Evan Blass claims that Samsung will preview both the Galaxy S9 and the upsized Galaxy S9 Plus at CES in January. There would still be a formal launch event in March, but you’d get a hint of what to expect a little early. It’s not certain why Samsung would do this, but it might be to get ahead of leaks and manage expectations. It probably doesn’t want iPhone X-style leaks where you know most of the details before the company has said a single word.

With that said, there might not be as much reason to get excited in 2018. If the S8 was a “tick” where Samsung reinvented its design, the S9 is reportedly a “tock” that refines the formula.

Both S9 variants would keep the familiar (if still very eye-catching) 5.8- and 6.2-inch curved displays, 64GB of expandable storage and, yes, a 3.5mm headphone jack. Instead, they’d be refinements. Both would gain AKG-badged stereo speakers, a 10-nanometer processor (possibly the rumored Snapdragon 845) and a rear-mounted fingerprint reader that’s actually in a convenient position. No more smudging your camera when you try to sign in, folks. And unlike this year, where the S8 and S8 Plus were virtually interchangeable beyond their size, there would be extra reasons to get the S9 Plus — you’d get more RAM (6GB versus 4GB) and a second rear camera. There wouldn’t be much reason to get the Galaxy Note 8 beyond its pen, as valuable as that can be.

Also, Samsung would still be committed to its phone-as-PC DeX dock. The 2018 dock would ditch the vertical cradle in favor of laying your phone flat to use the touchscreen as a trackpad or virtual keyboard. If so, that could significantly lower the cost of hopping on the DeX bandwagon by reducing the need for a keyboard, mouse or both.

Source: VentureBeat

YouTube goes after child-exploiting channels and videos

There’s been a growing trend of content on YouTube that pretends to be kid-friendly, but is anything but. There have also been reports of content creators with incredibly questionable content that some feel borders on child abuse, as reported by Buzzfeed. Google has been trying to manage this dual problem by targeting disturbing videos, but now it’s planning to do even more (which makes a ton of sense given the accusations). According to a blog post, the company wants to toughen up it’s approach to manage this issue with policies like applying community guidelines more quickly and strictly, removing ads from the disturbing videos, blocking inappropriate comments on videos featuring minors, giving creators of family-friendly content more guidance and continuing to listen to experts when content is too nuanced for a simple decision.

Google’s Johanna Wright explains in a blog post that these changes to enforcement “will take shape over the weeks and months ahead as we work to tackle this evolving challenge.” The company has expanded its enforcement guidelines for removing child-endangering content that features minors, even when that isn’t the uploader’s intent. Wright says that Google terminated more than 50 channels and removed thousands of videos over the past week using the new guidelines. The company has also created policies that will age-restrict videos that have kid-friendly characters dealing with mature themes or adult humor. It’s finding these videos with the help of machine learning and automated tools, which then can escalate issues to human reviewers.

Since June, Google has removed ads from three million videos that violated updated rules for advertisements in videos that contain family entertainment characters that engage in “violent, offensive or otherwise inappropriate behavior,” even if its done for humor or satire. The company promises to take an aggressive stance against nasty comments on videos that feature minors, as well. Google also knows that there is a lot of gray area in applying its stricter rules and policies, so will continue to work with media experts and “Trusted Flaggers” to make sure that appropriate videos that somehow trip the filters won’t just be deleted, like a video of adults dressed as popular family characters at a comic-book convention.

Source: YouTube