Jan 13th 2017
Tech News Today 1683
Tales from the Encrypt
Microsot buys Maluuba; Project Ara history
We start with the story that is captivating Nintendo fans: The Switch. That's the name of the much-anticipated 6.2 inch multi-touch screen portable gaming system from Nintendo. The Verge says with true portability, combined with the ability to stream high-res to your television, the Switch already gets right what that Wii U got wrong. It'll cost $300 and be available on March 3.
Consumer Reports says they will now give Apple's new MacBooks their coveted Recommended rating. Back in December the magazine said they could not recommend the laptops due to inconsistent battery life. Apple fixed the bug on January 9th.
Facebook-owned Messaging tool WhatsApp is under the privacy microscope again, this time for what The Guardian is calling a backdoor that allows snooping, even on encrypted messages. Sources call the flaw a threat to privacy and a potential tool for government agency spying. However, security experts say the Guardian report is hyperbolic and this backdoor is really a design decision by Facebook.
Microsoft just acquired a Toronto-based AI startup called Maluuba. In a blog post on their site, the creators of Maluuba say their focus is artificial general intelligence, or creating literate machines that could think. Microsoft's Artificial Intelligence head executive Harry Shum says Microsoft will share their plans for Maluuba in the coming months, but it will most likely include some kind of AI for the enterprise.
- Harrison Weber from VentureBeat on the rise and fall of ATAP's Project Ara module phone.
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Links
- Nintendo’s Switch already gets right what the Wii U got wrong
- Here’s every game we know you can play on the Nintendo Switch
- Consumer Reports Now Recommends MacBook Pros
- WhatsApp vulnerability allows snooping on encrypted messages
- Microsoft Buys Canadian Artificial Intelligence Startup for More Brainpower
- The dream of Ara: Inside the rise and fall of the world’s most revolutionary phone
- Google confirms suspension of Ara modular smartphone project
- Exclusive - Google shelves plan for phone with interchangeable parts: sources
- An engineer rigged a rotary phone to play a text adventure