The Tech Landscape #149 🤿
This is issue 149 of The Tech Landscape, a weekly collection of news about consumer digital technology. Stories are selected by me, Peter Gasston, with a little insight and opinion where appropriate.
EN 149 is the European standard for respiratory protection masks. It covers three levels of personal protection, including FFP2 which protects against liquid droplets such as those which transmit the COVID-19 coronavirus. The UK government paid BA to fly to China and bring back 2.5 million items including FFP2 masks, as poor provision meant the NHS was running out.
In case you need a reminder, if you’re reading this on the day I sent it then it’s Monday.
I’ve been doing some live-streamed presentations at work to remind people that I’m there. Here’s the last one, about the response to the COVID-19 lockdown from tech companies, people using tech, and brands (that bit is by my colleague, Adi Greenberg).
COVID-19: The Brand, Tech, and Human Responses
Until next week… persevere.
Assistants & Voice
Amazon updated Alexa’s voice options with a new long-form speaking style, and the ‘conversational’ and ‘news’ styles of speaking extended to more of the optional Polly voices. Amazon continues to push Alexa’s capabilities while it feels that Google has kind of lost heart in Assistant as a third-party platform.
developer.amazon.com/en-US/blogs/alexa/alexa-skills-kit/2020/04/new-alexa-long-form-speaking-style-and-polly-voices
Apple acquired Voysis, a startup specialising in natural language recognition for retail. This is presumably to improve Siri.
bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-03/apple-acquires-ai-startup-to-better-understand-natural-language
Social
Instagram redesigned its IGTV app to better promote and discover creator content. This move obviously comes in the shadow of TikTok.
theverge.com/2020/4/13/21216886/instagram-igtv-redesign-update-video-creators-discover-page
Instagram added features to help small businesses and creators: a sticker that links through to a food delivery website, and a link to buy gift cards from businesses forced to close.
theverge.com/2020/4/15/21222038/instagram-small-business-sticker-stories-gift-cards-delivery
TikTok introduced Family Pairing, which lets parents link their accounts to those of their teens and set certain safety features. They’re also disabling DMs for users aged under 16. TikTok use has blown up during the lockdown, so this is useful timing.
newsroom.tiktok.com/en-us/tiktok-introduces-family-pairing
The video chat app, Houseparty, has seen 50m new signups in the past month. It’s been one of the breakout communication apps of the global lockdown.
bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-15/houseparty-vies-with-zoom-to-be-homebound-chatters-app-of-choice
Everything Else
Facebook will release a standalone Gaming app this week, to let players live-stream their gaming sessions or watch other live streams. YouTube tried this a couple of years ago, then closed it down; it remains to be seen how Facebook’s attempt will go.
nytimes.com/2020/04/19/technology/facebook-app-gaming.html
Google will launch its own mobile chip in next year’s Pixel 6, according to Axios. IMO this was always the long-term plan for Google, which is why it acquihired most of HTC’s engineering talent in 2017. Pixel might not be the profit-maker that Google would like, but it’s strategically important as a channel for its own hardware designs.
axios.com/scoop-google-readies-its-own-chip-for-future-pixels-chromebooks-e5f8479e-4a38-485c-a264-9ef9cf68908c.html
Google announced Video Builder, a tool which makes it easy to generate short video ads for YouTube. It’s a closed Beta.
blog.google/products/ads/youtube-video-builder/
Facebook’s experimental NPE Team released Kit, a one-to-one communication tool for Apple Watch based on Messenger. It lets users send emoji, voice recordings, or short text messages to a single chosen friend, an easy way to keep in touch without needing to open the phone.
techcrunch.com/2020/04/14/facebook-launches-an-experimental-app-for-messaging-close-friends-over-apple-watch/
The Libra currency project lead by Facebook has scaled back its ambitions to be a global currency alternative and instead will be more of a ‘standard’ digital payment system tied to the value of local currencies.
nytimes.com/2020/04/16/technology/facebook-libra-cryptocurrency.html
Verizon will buy video-conferencing platform BlueJeans for an estimated $500 million. It says the technology will play a key role in its 5G strategy for distance services like telemedicine.
verizon.com/about/news/verizon-business-enters-agreement-acquire-bluejeans