Huawei P20 series may be available in Canada on May 17

Currently no word on pricing.

The P20 lineup is one of the most impressive we’ve seen from Huawei in some time, and we’ve heard that it’s bringing all three of the phones to Canada.

Beginning May 17, the Huawei P20, P20 Lite, and P20 Pro will likely be available on Rogers, Bell, Telus, Fido, Virgin Mobile, Koodo, and Videotron. (Huawei won’t confirm these details right now, but we’ve reached for clarification.)

There’s currently no word as to how much the phones will cost in the country, but for comparison’s sake, the P20 sells for around €680 while the P20 Pro goes for a steep €900.

We’ll update this post with more information as it becomes available, but in the meantime, do you plan on picking up any of these phones when they’re released?

Huawei P20 + P20 Pro review: Camera kings

AT&T is working on a $15/month live TV streaming service

There’s one caveat — you won’t find any sports channels here.

In the quest to give cable and satellite companies the boot, we’ve seen the market for Internet-based live TV services pop up like crazy over the past few years. Following the release of DirecTV Now in 2016, AT&T’s now gearing up to launch another service called “AT&T Watch.”

AT&T’s other streaming service, DirecTV Now.

According to The Wall Street Journal, AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson announced the new service while speaking during the company’s antitrust court hearing regarding its want to purchase Time Warner Inc.

Although we don’t know which channels will be available with AT&T Watch or which platforms it’ll support, there are a few key details to take note of. Perhaps most damning for some customers, AT&T Watch won’t have any sports channels. We saw Philo introduce a similar package last November, and also similar to Philo, AT&T Watch will be incredibly cheap — just $15/month.

That pricing would make AT&T Watch considering cheaper than YouTube TV ($45/month), PlayStation Vue ($39/month+), and even AT&T’s own DirecTV Now ($35/month+). The lack of sports will be a deal-breaker for some, but for people like myself who could care less about that, the service sounds rather compelling.

Stephenson said that AT&T wireless subscribers will get Watch for free, and the service is expected to launch in the coming weeks.

Does this sound like something you’d be interested in?

Verizon’s TV streaming service will consist of multiple standalone apps

Today’s best deals you won’t want to miss

Whether you’re looking for new tech gear or household items, we’ve got you covered.

Today you can get big discounts on Dyson air purifiers, portable chargers, smart plugs, electric shavers, and more! Don’t pass these up.

View the rest of the deals

If you want to know about the deals as soon as they are happening, you’ll want to follow Thrifter on Twitter, and sign up for the newsletter, because missing out on a great deal stinks!

Step up your sound with the $159 Elac B5 bookshelf speakers

The Elac series is a classic, and this price is killer.

The Elac B5 Debut Series 5.25-inch Bookshelf Speakers are down to $159 on Amazon. The big brother Elac B6 speakers dropped to $200 on Amazon yesterday, so it makes sense the B5 have now become even cheaper. They normally sell for around $230 and have never dropped this low before.

The Elac B5 speakers have 4 stars from What Hi-Fi?. They have custom drivers designed by Andrew Jones, woven aramid-fiber woofers, and a custom deep-spheroid waveguide designed to improve control and shield the tweeter from cabinet diffraction. These speakers have 4.6 stars based on 115 user reviews.

See on Amazon

Here’s what we’re reading, watching, playing, and listening to this week

How we’re spending our leisure time.

Everyone has a bit of quiet downtime once in a while. Whether you’re sitting quietly at home or trying to relax on a plane or just giving your busy mind and hands a break, it’s important to relax.

A good way to do that is to read a book, listen to some music or watch a movie or show. See what’s caught our attention for the week of April 20th.

Ara Wagoner

Awwwww, look at the little pink deathbringer!

Sword Art Online is back, and we’ve got new characters and a new dynamic inside a world that felt criminally underexplored the last time we saw it! Sword Art Online Alternate: Gun Gale Online (boy, that’s a mouthful) is the latest entry into the popular franchise about VRMMO gaming and the multi-world hijinks its players come across. This year’s model doesn’t seem to have any “you die in the video game, you die for real” drama this year, bringing the stakes down and giving the show a bit more of a slice of life feel, which is a refreshing twist: instead of people dying for real in these beautiful fantasy games, we have a protagonist who finds an ultra-cute online avatar inside Gun Gale Online, one of the most hardcore VRMMOs on the market.

We’re only two episodes in, but it’s been a fun ride bordering on hilarious. LLENN is a newbie who only stuck around in Gun Gale Online because she’d finally found a cute, short avatar, and as a result, she’s often panicked and seems to get by on amazing luck. GGO is available on Crunchyroll and Hulu, and whether you’re a gamer or not, this is a show that will make you laugh and make you whoop.

Marc Lagace

One of my all-time favorite videos on YouTube is this gem from back when the first iPhone was released, where a woman with $16K in hand buy her way to the front of the line — only to learn that store policy only allowed them to sell one phone per customer. Meanwhile, the dude at the front of the line made off an extra $800 to put towards his new phone, plus accessories — instantly became an Internet legend that day.

Flash forward to 2018 and that same dude, Marc Rebillet, is carving out a new legendary status for himself as a YouTube musician/comedian/weirdo. He’s got some real talent and has been steadily growing his channel in part by posting live-made music creations he calls “Idealogues” that are equal parts funny, bizarre, and catchy as all heck. To celebrate his channel reaching 20,000 subscribers, he live-streamed a 3-hour performance at the Deep Ellum Arts Fest which is pretty incredible to just watch unsuspecting people react to his art.

Check it out if you’re into recording music at home or simply enjoy exploring some of the weirder corners of YouTube.

Joe Maring

During MoviePass’s recent promotion that knocked down the monthly rate to just $6.95, I finally succumbed to its lustrous appeal and signed up for the service. As such, I’ve been seeing a lot more movies.

This past week, I saw Rampage and Isle of Dogs. The former is a great popcorn flick that has giant monsters wrecking Chicago and the latter is stunning work of art chronicling the story of a young boy that won’t stop at anything to find his lost best friend. This is the first and only Wes Anderson movie I’ve ever seen, but it’s already got me itching to check out the rest of his work.

Lastly, I also caught Back to the Future on the big screen last Sunday. I never got a chance to see the movie in theaters since it came out 12 years before I was born, so being able to finally do so was a pretty great experience. I tried hitting 88 Mph on the ride home, but I, unfortunately, didn’t make it to the 1950s. Sigh.

Jerry Hildenbrand

Work, eat, Far Cry 5. Not necessarily in that order …

It’s my favorite Far Cry yet because I get to run around and wreck cars, shoot guns, and go fishing — things I’d just love to do all day in real life. I like to think of it as Grand Theft Auto: West Virginia.

Because I’m glued to a chair for the rest of my life I play a lot of video games and usually end up preordering whatever comes next. I also usually end up disappointed, but not this time. If you’re a fan of the Far Cry series or just like to run around wrecking cars and shooting guns, it’s worth the $55.

Hayato Huseman

I started up on Netflix’s Santa Clarita Diet last weekend … I also finished it last weekend. The main plot is that Drew Barrymore’s character randomly up and dies, then reawakens as a zombie who can only eat human flesh. Sounds like a cheesy ’80s horror movie, I know, but it’s one of the funniest damn shows I’ve seen in years, and season two just dropped last month. It’s definitely worth your time.

As far as music goes, one of my new favorite albums of 2018 has to be Yeah Whatever by Owane. I love all of Owane’s music, but I think his new album is his best work yet. On top of his usual chill jazz rock vibe, there’s all kinds of crazy cool synth and saxophone arrangements.

Russell Holly

She’s been called “the next J.K. Rowling” and to be honest I find that comparison underselling the experience you get with this book. Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi is an amazing story with a fascinating magical twist. It’s honestly unlike anything I’ve ever read, complete with emotional characters and a healthy dose of action.

If you’re looking for something different, and you’re a fan of fantasy, pick this up. You can get the Audiobook on sale in the Play Store if you’re not really up for a huge book like this right now.

See at Amazon

Tom Westrick

One of the few musicians I’ve seen in person is Rosanne Cash. She is the daughter of country legend Johnny Cash, and she’s a superbly talented songwriter and musician in her own right. I saw her and her full band perform in December 2014, and saw her again this past weekend — this time it was just her and her husband, John Levanthal. Both concerts were fantastic mixes of history, storytelling and music. Photography wasn’t allowed at the most recent concert, so I substituted in a video of one of Rosanne’s most recent hits.

I’ve been getting back into Brooklyn Nine-Nine, and I’m just starting season five. It’s a hilarious show, and I’m glad to see the writers tackling complex issues surrounding racism is police forces. It’s definitely worth a watch.

Your turn

What are YOU reading, watching, or listening to this week? Let us know in the comments!

Update, April 20th, 2018: This is a weekly series where we tell you what we’re into, so check back every Friday or Saturday!

Learn all about who you are and where you come from with the $69 23andMe DNA test kit

The 23andMe at-home Ancestry DNA test is down to $69 on Amazon. It normally sells for $99, but 23andMe is currently taking 30% off for a limited time.

You can also get the equivalent AncestryDNA testing kit for $59 if you buy from them directly. That’s a better price but it’s not on Amazon this low (yet).

Another option is to upgrade to the 23andMe Health + Ancestry personal genetic service for $139. That’s down from a price around $199 and just $10 above its lowest price ever.

The first kit is strictly DNA testing. It’ll tell you all about your family’s history, your ethnic background, and maybe reveal some interesting facts about yourself you never knew. You’ll also be able to connect with relatives based on your DNA from all around the world. If you want to, you’ll be able to upgrade to the health screening later but it will cost extra. The second, more expensive option is the one that adds health screening. It will tell you everything your DNA tells them about your health, your traits, and what you might be at risk for.

See on Amazon

CBS All Access lands Muhammad Ali biography ‘8 Fights’

CBS continues to ramp up its All Access content to compete with the likes of Netflix, with six to seven new shows set to hit the streaming service, like the Will Ferrell-produced No Activity. Now Deadline reports that CBS’ service has just landed 8 Fights – The Life of Muhammad Ali for development. It will be produced by Morgan Freeman, Revelations Entertainment and CBS TV Studios.

The limited event series is based on Jonathan Eig’s recent biography Ali: a Life, according to Deadline, and will show eight distinct moments in Ali’s life, each organized on a single fight from his boxing career. The show will apparently focus on the internal struggle in Ali’s heart and mind as an influential figure of the 20th century.

CBS TV Studios sold the series to All Access in a competitive bid, landing a script-to-series commitment, which means there will be no pilot process if the script is good enough to warrant the series itself. The studio currently has 13 premium shows on cable and streaming, notes Deadline, including American Vandal, Insatiable, Cartoon President, The Twilight Zone and Star Trek: Discovery.

Source: Deadline

Is Trump serious about legalizing weed?

No matter how many handy gadgets we recommend, the 4/20 holiday is legally tenuous for tokers in the 21 (mostly-red) states that don’t allow for recreational or medical marijuana use. But that could change with a word from the president. A week after promising Colorado’s Republican Senator that the feds would keep their hands off state-sanctioned marijuana operations, Trump has the opportunity to make good on his word. Will he?

While on the campaign trail, Donald Trump repeatedly promised to leave the matter of cannabis legalization to the states. However, shortly after entering office, both he and his Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who himself had promised the same during his confirmation hearing, pivoted on the issue and threatened a federal crackdown on both recreational and medical marijuana in states where it was legal. This led the freshman GOP Senator from Colorado, Cory Gardner, to blockade any and all of the President’s DOJ nominees until he received assurances that the feds would not interfere with state-regulated cannabis businesses.

Attorney General Sessions speaks at a press conference regarding new opioid drug policy

Last Friday, Trump broke the standoff and promised to uphold his campaign pledge and leave cannabis legalization to individual states. But given how often the President pivots on well, just about every issue put before him, not to mentions Session’s zealousness in enforcing drug statutes that incarcerate and harm minorities, can we really trust that this administration will do right by medical marijuana patients and respect states’ rights? Jonathan Havens, Co-Chair of the Cannabis Law Practice at Saul Ewing Arnstein & Lehr, is not convinced.

“I’m generally a bit skeptical,” Havens told Engadget. “Interested, encouraged, but skeptical … until there’s actually a proposal that’s out there, it’s debated, it’s voted out of Congress, and the President signed it into law.”

The entire debacle started in January when Sessions announced that he was rescinding the Cole memo, along with three other memos. The memo informed US attorneys that, due to limited resources, the Justice Department would not enforce its federal prohibitions on cannabis in states that had “legalized marijuana in some form and … implemented strong and effective regulatory and enforcement systems to control the cultivation, distribution, sale, and possession of marijuana.”

Fearing that federal enforcement would negatively impact the legal weed industry in his state, Sen Gardner declared a blockade on the administration’s DOJ nominees. “Personally I thought that was an interesting approach,” Havens said. “Seemingly, the response from the White House recently is that worked.”

US Senator Cory Gardner (R-CO) addressing the media in April

“I think that whether a bill can get through both the Senate and the House, whether there’s the votes for that, what’s in the bill, and then whether the President actually follows through on his support are things that remain to be seen,” Havens said.

The current administration has a consistent track record of reversing its position on issues, which invites skepticism. He points out that the administration fully reversed its position on the Trans Pacific Partnership deal in the course of just 24 hours earlier this year. Trump personally has reversed course on a number of issues from transexuals serving in the military to granting Dreamers amnesty. What’s more, Trump’s position on cannabis is currently running counter to his Attorney General’s.

What this bill would even look like — and how it would navigate the tensions between states’ rights and federal enforcement — remains a mystery. On one hand, it could simply be a standalone bill in the same vein as the Rohrabacher-Blumenauer Amendment. This amendment was first introduced in a 2001 piece of legislation and voted into law as part of the 2014 Omnibus package. It prohibits the Justice Department from spending federal funds to interfere with states implementing medical marijuana laws. That is, it says that the DOJ bill can’t prosecute people who are in compliance with state law.

Banking regulations are a major roadblock for the cannabis industry. Banks must already follow a litany of regulations to ensure that depositors aren’t, say, trying to launder illegal drug money. And for cannabis-related businesses, the regulations are even more unforgiving. This has resulted in a significant shortage of banks willing to do business with cannabis companies with usually only one or two state-level banks available.

Getty

National chains like Bank of America or PNC are off the table. Faced with increased scrutiny from the Treasury Department and higher overhead costs associated with properly documenting and reporting cannabis-related banking activity. “A lot of these banks have decided it’s just not worth their while,” Havens explained. “So they’re just not gonna do it.”

Financial insecurity isn’t the only thing that business owners need to worry about. Since his confirmation, Session’s has adopted a hardline stance against medical marijuana which runs counter to the White House’s current public position. “I’ve seen some reports in trade press particularly,which suggest that a marijuana business, even one authorized under state law who has 60,000 plus plants could be, if it’s interpreted strictly, subject to the death penalty under one of Sessions’ recent memos,” Havens expounded.

Havens is referring to a memo that Sessions sent to federal prosecutors in March, encouraging them to seek the death penalty in drug cases by exploiting the Continuing Criminal Enterprise, or Kingpin statute.

“Congress has passed several statutes that provide the Department with the ability to seek capital punishment for certain drug-related crimes,” Sessions said in a statement. “I strongly encourage federal prosecutors to use these statutes, when appropriate, to aid in our continuing fight against drug trafficking and the destruction it causes in our nation.”

Whether that tactic will actually work also remains to be seen. “The Supreme Court has consistently refused to sanction the use of the death penalty in crimes other than homicide. That makes another signature Trump policy headed for legal trouble,” Ames Grawert, senior counsel in the Justice Program at the Brennan Center, told CNN in March.

Despite the risk to individual business owners, national legalization legislation, the likes of which Trump is suggesting, likely won’t have much impact on ongoing border security and smuggling enforcement operations. Current drug laws only authorize people to cultivate, process, dispense or use cannabis within state borders. As Havens points out, “if DOJ saw, under the Cole memo, that people were diverting supply to youths, if they saw that people were transporting across state lines, if they thought people were under the influence while driving, they reserve the right to go after people.”

“I would be surprised if there’s not some sort of a carve out. I don’t see the White House supporting something like that, but again that remains to be seen,” Havens said. “But I don’t see there being an international perspective to this, because unless marijuana is descheduled, moved out of Schedule I, there’s not gonna be any change to the fact that it can’t be imported into the country.”

National legislation protecting existing state laws, if not expanding those protections to the federal level, would go far in preventing Sessions from targeting America’s burgeoning cannabis industry and the President could make it happen. But, given Trump’s volatile nature and the chaos that drives his administration, these promises of national weed legalization could very well go up in smoke.

Images: Getty (All)

YouTube still has an ad problem

YouTube’s problem with automated ads appearing on extremist channels isn’t getting any better. A recent CNN investigation revealed that companies including Adidas, Amazon, Hershey, Netflix and Under Armour — and even the US government — had their ads placed on unsavory channels.

The CNN report is rife with examples of the offenses. Ads from the Toy Association promoting the importance of play for childhood development appeared on a channel devoted to promote pedophilia; promo spots for The Friends of Zion Museum ran ahead of videos from a “real, genuine and sincere Nazi” about “Jewish domination” in Hollywood. Ads for the Center for Disease Control, Customs and Border Patrol and Department of Transportation — potentially paid for with tax dollars — ran on channels focused on North Korean propaganda.

As you’d expect, advertisers are incredibly upset and have vowed to leave the platform until changes are made. After an absence, Proctor & Gamble agreed to return to YouTube, but only on the condition that it can pick which channels and videos that its ads for Crest, Tide and other products appear. Bloomberg writes that the advertisements will run on “fewer than 10,000 channels.”

“We paused advertising, and for the past year, we’ve worked extensively with YouTube to improve brand safety,” a Procter & Gamble spokesperson told Bloomberg. “We now feel the right measures are in place for P&G brands to have the option to advertise on YouTube.”

According to CNN, it sounds like the sort of approval P&G is using was also employed by the New York Times. NYT and the Washington Post had ads appear on far-right and conspiracy channels. If that’s the case, we probably don’t have long to wait before an ad for P&G-owned Head and Shoulders dandruff shampoo runs on a channel devoted to dismemberment and necrophilia.

It’s easy to see why YouTube’s algorithms matched the ads with the videos, but that’s not an excuse for it happening in the first place. A bulk of Google’s coffers are filled by automated ads; the company should have better safeguards in place as a result. Same goes for Facebook. Google loves touting its prowess in the AI field, but situations like this prove that a human touch is still necessary.

Source: Bloomberg, CNN

Audi’s e-tron SUV drives a modest 248 miles per charge

When Audi first trotted out its e-tron SUV concept, it was promising: there was talk of the electric crossover managing 311 miles on a charge, which would put Tesla’s Model X to shame. You… might need to dial down your expectations a bit. Audi has revealed that the production version of the e-tron prototype has an estimated range of 248.5 miles on the WLTP driving cycle thanks to its 95kWh battery. That’s still very usable for around-the-city driving, but it’s only slightly more than the 238 miles of a Chevy Bolt (although that was tested on an EPA cycle). Audi may have an ace up its sleeve, however: fast charging.

The e-tron SUV will be one of the first vehicles on the market to support charging up to 150kW, or about three times the 50kW you typically see in non-Tesla chargers. If you’re fortunate enough to live within range of one of those stations, Audi claims it’ll take a relatively quick 30 minutes before you’re ready to resume your trip. It’s not clear if that’s a full charge, but Tesla’s vaunted half-hour recharge only covers a partial top-up (a full charge takes over an hour). At the least, this should give you a healthy amount of range while you’ve stopped for lunch.

Home charging is, unsurprisingly, more limited. The standard garage outlet musters up to 11kW, or enough for a full recharge in 8.5 hours. There will be an optional 22kW charging option, though Audi didn’t say how quickly it would work — we wouldn’t expect it to take half as long, although it might come close.

The biggest obstacle may be the availability of public stations. Audi plans a network of “nearly 200” fast chargers by the time the e-tron reaches European customers in late 2018, with 400 of them by 2020. It won’t be the only automaker deploying these chargers, but that could still mean having to hunt for a specific station instead of using whatever is available. The next wave of EV technology is coming — it’s just going to take a few years to live up to its promises.

Via: Autoblog

Source: Audi