Now you don’t have to clean up before making Skype calls. Microsoft has added a background-blurring feature to its video calling service in its latest update. “With a simple toggle, right-click, or even through your Skype settings, your background will be instantly and subtly blurred, leaving just you as the only focal point,” the Skype …
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Bixby is about to take over Samsung’s digital world. Samsung’s at CES 2019, talking up how it’s supercharging Bixby through various partnerships and moving into new areas like robotics. The digital assistant now will help people manage their health routines using new Samsung robots or check whether their car’s gas tank is full. Apps like Google Maps and Gmail will soon …
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Chinese censors must reportedly learn a history previously unknown to them so they know which information the government wants them to stop from spreading. Employees of censorship companies like the Beijing-based Beyondsoft are taught about the government’s violent suppression of the 1989 student-led Tiananmen Square protests and late activist Liu Xiaobo, who was repeatedly imprisoned for his anti-government views, The …
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We know what the year’s best gadgets were. But innovative tech is another measuring stick. 2018 moved fast and was full of chaos. And in the world of tech, sometimes products didn’t seem to evolve as fast as you’d expect. But these were the best concepts and tech directions we saw and there’s a good chance they’ll indicate where the …
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The Google Lens AI smart search app (download on iOS or Android) is rolling out for iOS users, Google announced Monday. The feature was released for Android in March but was only accessible to iOS users through the Google Photos app (iOS, Android). Now, instead of having to take a picture and use Lens through the camera roll, iPhone and iPad users can …
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There are two porgs from Star Wars running around a living room. One waddles near my feet while the other is out of my sightline behind a small bookshelf. Things are getting chaotic, but also really fun. To get them to behave, a hologram of C-3PO advises I gain their trust by offering the porg near my feet a treat. …
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The White House held a roundtable “listening session” on innovation with top tech executives on Thursday, part of the Trump Administration efforts to ensure US leadership in emerging fields, such as artificial intelligence, 5G wireless and quantum computing. Executives who participated include Microsoft’s Satya Nadella, Google’s Sundar Pichai, Oracle’s Safra Catz, Qualcomm’s Steve Mollenkopf, IBM’s Ginni Rometty and others, according …
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Learning to read is a time-consuming and complex process for any kiddo, but the 32 million deaf children in the world face an extra challenge. They must learn how to interpret the words they see on the page without using the sound-based phonics system that most school children rely upon or being able to hear a teacher or parent repeat …
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A background-blurring portrait mode arrived last year in Google’s Pixel 2 smartphone, but researchers used a hacked-together clump of five phones to improve how the feature worked in this year’s Pixel 3. The portrait mode simulates the shallow depth of field of higher-end cameras and lenses that concentrate your attention on the subject while turning the background into an undistracting …
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When it comes to AI, Qualcomm’s betting big. The company said on Wednesday that it plans to start a venture fund that will invest at least $100 million in early stage startups working on artificial intelligence. In particular, the fund will look at companies finding ways to do intensive data processing on devices like smartphones and security cameras instead of …
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