December, 2016

• 7 December

  Upgrade your family

  

  Stop me if this sounds familiar: You’re home for the holidays, trying to get comfy in your childhood bedroom. You’re almost ready to send out a perfectly crafted festive greeting when — fwishhp. The Wi-Fi cuts out, and your message is gone. Now nobody’s going to see your artful arrangement of holly and candy-cane emojis. …

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• 7 December

  Trump may have tech on edge, but your phone company likes him

  

  The signs are pointing in the right direction for telecommunications companies during a Donald Trump presidency. Trump’s transition team is full of critics of the Federal Communications Commission’s net neutrality rules, which imposed old-style telephone regulation on the internet. There are indications a Trump administration may be much friendlier to big mergers and acquisitions than was President Barack Obama’s team. …

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• 7 December

  A red iPhone? Rumors say heck, yeah

  

  Red could be the new jet black if the latest rumor about a bright new color for Apple’s 2017 iPhone turns out to be true. Enlarge Image Could the next iPhone come in red? César Salza/CNET Apple’s lineup of flagship phones typically plays it safe, with white, blacks and mellow metallics. Adding red to the lineup would echo the phone …

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• 7 December

  Pokemon Go gets new Pokemon as Sprint stores become hubs

  

  Now playing: Watch this: Pokemon Go to partner with Sprint, introduce new monsters 1:13 You’ll soon be able to battle in Sprint-sponsored gyms. Sprint Sprint is giving Pokemon trainers a reason to come into its stores. The nation’s fourth-largest wireless carrier is partnering with Niantic, the developer behind the smash hit Pokemon Go, to turn more than 10,500 Sprint, Boost …

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• 7 December

  Apple blames iPhone battery fires on ‘external damage’

  

  Apple says it’s not to blame for a spate of iPhones apparently catching fire. The Shanghai Consumer Council, a watchdog group in China, reported last week that eight iPhone 6 devices had spontaneously combusted. Apple’s response is that “external damage” was to blame for these “thermal events” with the phone batteries. “We have been in touch with the customers and …

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• 7 December

  ​VR beyond your budget? Microsoft

  

  Ever eager to keep you buying PCs, Microsoft and Intel are cooperating to bring virtual reality to the masses. Today’s more advanced virtual reality setups, like Facebook’s Oculus Rift and HTC’s Vive, require a high-powered PC with enough graphics horsepower to generate a convincing artificial 3D game for you to play or world to explore. There’s progress to pare back …

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• 7 December

  ​Apple reportedly angling for early movie rentals on iTunes

  

  Now playing: Watch this: Apple could give you early movie access 1:24 In a move that could beef up its iTunes business, Apple is reportedly pushing Hollywood studios for early access to movies that it would rent to consumers for a premium price — upward of $25 or $50. Studios including 21st Century Fox, Warner Bros. and Universal Pictures have …

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• 7 December

  Time’s ‘Person of the Year’ sparks social media brawl

  

  The “Person of the Year” is boiling on social media. This morning, Facebook and Twitter feel like the family dinner that turns to chaos the moment someone brings up politics. Time Magazine has selected Donald Trump as 2016’s Person of the Year. US presidents have been a fixture of the feature since it began, but that hasn’t stopped Trump’s opponents …

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• 7 December

  Amazon: No, we’re not opening 2,000 stores

  

  Can’t wait to shop at an Amazon supermarket? Well, you may have to wait a very, very long time. Two days after The Wall Street Journal reported that Amazon plans to open “more than 2,000 brick-and-mortar grocery stores under its name,” the company knocked down the idea as false. “It’s absolutely not correct,” Amazon spokeswoman Pia Arthur said in an …

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• 7 December

  ​Virtual reality gets a little more grown

  

  Never mind that consumers are actually starting to buy into all the virtual reality hype. An industry isn’t an official industry until it has its own acronym-ready association. Enter the Global Virtual Reality Association, or GVRA, which arrived officially on Wednesday. It’s made up for now of six competing headset manufacturers — Acer Starbreeze, Google, HTC Vive, Facebook’s Oculus, Samsung …

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