The Tech Landscape #103 🛰
Before its retirement in 2011, the space shuttle Discovery flew 39 missions—the most of any spacecraft to date—and launched the Hubble space telescope. It’s official designation was Orbiter Vehicle 103.
This email was supposed to go out yesterday (Monday 27th) but was delayed by the bank holiday in the UK. But I figure that as most of my readers are in the UK, you’ll forgive me for this.
I’ve been thinking that I should perhaps have some more strict criteria for what I include in this newsletter; my current criteria is largely: do I find this interesting? If you have a few spare minutes, and the inclination, perhaps you could hit Reply and let me know if you think there are things I should or shouldn’t be covering.
Assistants & Voice
Google Assistant is now available on Bose smart speakers.
blog.google/products/assistant/bose-speakers-get-smarter-google-assistant/
China overtook the US in smart speaker sales in the first quarter of this year, according to Canalys. Alibaba and Xiaomi both grew sales substantially, but Baidu came from nowhere to take 16% of sales.
canalys.com/newsroom/china-overtakes-us-in-fast-growing-smart-speaker-market
Announcements, the Alexa feature that lets users send intercom-style voice messages to all Echo devices, is now available to all Alexa built-in devices—including the Fire TV family.
developer.amazon.com/blogs/alexa/post/c291e779-366b-4e7f-93e2-782b220d4142/introducing-announcements-on-alexa-built-in-devices
XR
A redesigned Google Lens is rolling out to phones, with modes for the new shopping and dining features announced at IO. I’m a bit mixed on this, I think the camera should have a single mode and not make the user decide what context it should be in.
androidpolice.com/2019/05/22/google-lens-revamp-rolling-out-comes-with-new-dining-and-shopping-modes/
Pepsi will run a large-scale promotion this year using their bottles to launch AR filters from Instagram.
digiday.com/marketing/pepsi-ar-filters-instagram-snapchat/
Hardware
Google released a new version of Glass, its smart glasses. Enterprise Edition 2 has an improved camera and updated processor for computer vision and machine learning, and a new design. It’s aimed at businesses, and costs $1000. And it’s still not ‘augmented reality’.
blog.google/products/hardware/glass-enterprise-edition-2/
Amazon is testing a device that can detect a user’s emotional state from their voice, according to a report by Bloomberg. The device is being positioned as a health product.
bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-05-23/amazon-is-working-on-a-wearable-device-that-reads-human-emotions
Realme, a new smartphone brand from the Chinese group that owns Oppo, Vivo, and OnePlus, has launched its first smartphone in the EU. The Realme 3 Pro has decent specs for a £175 phone.
digitaltrends.com/mobile/realme-3-pro-uk-news/
Payments
Facebook is reportedly planning to launch its own currency, known as GlobalCoin, in 2020.
bbc.co.uk/news/business-48383460
Google Pay is trialling contactless PAYG payments on the MTA public transit system. TfL have been doing this for five years now; welcome to the modern world, New York!
blog.google/products/google-pay/easier-commute-google-pay-assistant/
Video
Google’s video-calling app, Duo, now supports eight-person group calls, video messages, and data-saving mode in certain countries. Duo is the default video caller on the new Nest Hub Max.
blog.google/products/duo/few-new-features-try-your-next-video-call-google-duo/
Instagram’s IGTV video app will now support landscape video. The app was launched ‘proudly portrait’ but feedback from creators says they don’t want to create unique content just for IGTV and prefer to use content across multiple channels.
theverge.com/2019/5/23/18637105/instagram-igtv-vertical-landscape-video-upload-support
Privacy
Apple’s WebKit browser announced a new way to track ad click attribution while preserving privacy. This will impact Google somewhat, so it’s likely Safari and Firefox will implement this but don’t expect to see it in Chrome any time soon.
webkit.org/blog/8943/privacy-preserving-ad-click-attribution-for-the-web/
Ireland’s Data Protection Commissioner is opening an investigation into claimed GDPR breaches by Google. This could be somewhat of a test case for the EU regulation.
finance.yahoo.com/news/irish-regulator-opens-first-privacy-171118175.html
Everything Else
Google Search is undergoing a design refresh, with a page’s URL and brand icon appearing above the page title. Rolling out gradually to mobile search first.
blog.google/products/search/new-design-google-search/
You can now order food delivery directly through Google Maps and Assistant (if you live in certain cities in the US). Google Maps is the super-app for every ‘near me’ search.
blog.google/products/assistant/order-your-favorite-food-with-google/
Eventbrite and Facebook teamed up for Ticketing on Facebook, a new service that makes it easier for event creators in the US to sell tickets directly through the platform.
eventbrite.com/l/facebook-ticketing/
ByteDance, the Chinese company that owns phenomenally popular TikTok, launched its new community-focused chat app, Flipchat.
techcrunch.com/2019/05/19/bytedance-flipchat/
GitHub, the Microsoft-owned software repository used by the majority of the world’s developers, has launched Sponsors, a way to reward software creators. Many of the web’s most important services depend on free software, so tipping creators is a way to ensure it continues to be created and maintained.
github.blog/2019-05-23-announcing-github-sponsors-a-new-way-to-contribute-to-open-source/
Top live-streaming game influencers are being paid up to £39,500 per hour to play new games, according to a report by the Wall Street Journal.
forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2019/05/19/twitch-streamers-are-getting-paid-50000-an-hour-to-play-new-games-they-deserve-it/