Mobile recap: Apple Watch in April; Outlook here now; Google Now gets apps, and more for Saturday, January 31, 2015

Mobile recap: Apple Watch in April; Outlook here now; Google Now gets apps Kevin C. Tofel Jan 31 2015, 5:58am PDT Ever since we first saw the Apple Watch in September, we’ve been waiting for an actual availability date. Now we at least have a month: Tim Cook said the Apple Watch will be shipping “right on schedule” in April. Cook made his comment right after Apple […] Read More » British securocrats try to sneak in Snooper’s Charter yet again David Meyer Jan 31 2015, 2:16am PDT Earlier this month, four U.K. lords tried to sneak the text of a rejected piece of legislation popularly known as the Snooper’s Charter into a new anti-terror bill. After debate in the House of Lords produced heavy pushback, the peers withdrew the amendments that would have […] Read More » Newsweek designer defends his controversial tech sexism cover Carmel DeAmicis Jan 30 2015, 5:46pm PDT The relaunched version of Newsweek is no stranger to controversy. Almost a year ago, it brought the ire of the internet upon it with its launch story on Bitcoin creator Satashi Nakamoto, to the point where the company had to hire private security for the reporter […] Read More » With new apps, Google Now may be your future home screen Kevin C. Tofel Jan 30 2015, 12:03pm PDT In a perfect world, you wouldn’t have to search your phone for the app that you need. Instead, your smartphone might surface the right app at just the right time. Sounds good, right? It’s coming to Google Now for Android, at least on a small scale. […] Read More » BuzzFeed gets serious with editorial standards and ethics guide Mathew Ingram Jan 30 2015, 12:01pm PDT In an attempt to hold what was once an experimental viral-content lab to higher standards of conduct, BuzzFeed has published a new comprehensive standards and ethical guidelines document that tells staff what they should and shouldn't do Read More » A model that can predict the unpredictable New England Patriots Derrick Harris Jan 30 2015, 10:39am PDT It’s said that familiarity breeds contempt in personal relationships. In the NFL, it might also breed predictability. Although the New England Patriots and their coach Bill Belichick are often called unpredictable, it turns out that machine learning models are actually pretty good at guessing what they’ll do. Alex Tellez, […] Read More » Why Outlook for mobile is a hit on iOS and a miss on Android Kevin C. Tofel Jan 30 2015, 8:48am PDT Talk about an app store dichotomy: Microsoft’s new version of Outlook is a chart-topper on iPhones but a big miss on Android handsets based on their respective app stores. Of course, this is just one day after the company released what used to be Accompli for iOS and […] Read More » Inventor Dean Kamen wants you at his robot competitions Katie Fehrenbacher Jan 30 2015, 7:00am PDT Dean Kamen — the inventor of countless tech products, holder of 440 patents, and probably most famous for his creation of the Segway — is “scared shitless” about the lack of emphasis on science and technology in American society today. U.S. culture celebrates entertainment and sports […] Read More » New to deep learning? Here are 4 easy lessons from Google Derrick Harris Jan 29 2015, 5:26pm PDT Google employs some of the world’s smartest researchers in deep learning and artificial intelligence, so it’s not a bad idea to listen to what they have to say about the space. One of those researchers, senior research scientist Greg Corrado, spoke at RE:WORK’s Deep Learning Summit on Thursday […] Read More » Google’s Chromecast has been used for more than one billion casts Janko Roettgers Jan 29 2015, 2:09pm PDT Google still hasn’t released any sales numbers for its Chromecast streaming stick, but Google’s Chief Business officer Omid Kordestani updated investors on one metric during the company’s Q4 call Thursday: Chromecast reached one billion cast sessions last week, Kordestani said. This means that Chromecast usage seems […] Read More » Hooray! Amazon will start breaking out AWS numbers Barb Darrow Jan 29 2015, 1:42pm PDT For cloud watchers,  the real news out of Amazon’s fourth-quarter earnings call is that the company will finally break out Amazon Web Services numbers from the rest of its gigantic retail business starting in the first quarter. To date, the AWS numbers have been buried in the […] Read More » Microsoft wants to back Android-forking startup Cyanogen Kif Leswing Jan 29 2015, 11:55am PDT What does Microsoft see in Android developer Cyanogen? It’s a question raised on Thursday by a new report in the Wall Street Journal that says that Microsoft is planning to be a minority investor — to the tune of “roughly $70 million” — in Cyanogen’s latest […] Read More » 4G spectrum auction ends, raising a record $45B Kevin Fitchard Jan 29 2015, 11:42am PDT It took a grueling two and half months, but the Federal Communications Commission auction of new 4G airwaves is finally over. The provisional winning bids totaled $44.9 billion for 65 MHz of airwaves, the most the FCC has ever raised at an auction, but we won’t […] Read More » How AI can help build a universal real-time translator Stacey Higginbotham Jan 29 2015, 9:47am PDT The breakthroughs in natural language processing and machine translation brought by deep learning might enable us to build a trope of science-fiction books — a universal real-time translator that fits within the human ear. Geoff Hinton, one of the godfathers of deep learning and neural networks, […] Read More » BAM! The FCC just defined broadband as 25 Mbps down and 3 Mbps up Stacey Higginbotham Jan 29 2015, 9:30am PDT The Federal Communications Commission just took a bold step and redefined broadband as 25 Mbps for downstream speeds and 3 Mbps for upstream speeds, a move that FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler had hinted at earlier this month in a speech at International CES. The definition is […] Read More » FTC shuts down “revenge porn” operation, but imposes no fine Jeff John Roberts Jan 29 2015, 9:28am PDT In one of the most despicable scams on the internet, Colorado resident Craig Brittain ran a website that posted nude photographs of hundreds of women alongside their Facebook profiles and other personal information, then blackmailed the victims to pay bogus lawyer sites, controlled by Brittain, in […] Read More » This is Tesla’s first battery swap station (photos) Katie Fehrenbacher Jan 29 2015, 6:00am PDT Last month Tesla announced that it would soon start trialing its first battery swap station in private beta to invited customers, next to its super charger station at Harris Ranch in Coalinga, Calif. Soon after the announcement, customers on Tesla forums started asking each other if […] Read More » Does the FCC want to oversee peering deals like Netflix vs. Comcast? Jeff John Roberts Jan 28 2015, 4:28pm PDT The FCC will soon pass new rules for how ISP’s must handle broadband traffic and, while it’s expected to impose a policy of net neutrality when it comes to consumers, it’s been less clear how the agency will resolve another thorny internet issue: whether network providers can charge content companies to accept their traffic […] Read More » SK Telecom and Nokia make big cells and small cells play nice Kevin Fitchard Jan 28 2015, 3:22pm PDT SK Telecom has just incorporated a tongue-twister of a technology into its Nokia-built LTE network in Gwangju, South Korea. It’s called Enchanced Inter-Cell Interference Coordination, or eICIC for short, and its aim to make networks packed with all different sizes and shapes of cells work in […] Read More » A sneak peek at Sony’s PlayStation Vue internet TV service Janko Roettgers Jan 28 2015, 2:10pm PDT Sony may have just shuttered its music service, but it’s getting ready to launch another media venture: PlayStation Vue, the company’s upcoming live TV service, is supposed to launch before the end of the quarter. Sony has been testing the service with a limited number of users […] Read More »