Apple iPhone XR First impressions

Apple is making a habit of launching “one more” iPhone every year. It did that with the iPhone X in 2017 and this year it’s the iPhone XR which fell into that category. What’s remarkable is that it’s very rare when the cheapest iPhone of the year catches the maximum attention. But that’s exactly what the iPhone XR has managed to do at the 2018 iPhone launch event. Even in the demo area of the Steve Jobs theatre, it attracted the maximum curiosity. Why? Read our first impressions to know:


Design

The first thing you’ll notice about the iPhone XR are the plethora of colour options it comes in. Apple has taken a bold step of moving away from its usual palette of colours with the iPhone XR. This phone comes in funky colours like Coral, White, Yellow, Black, Blue and even the Product Red. The Blue and Coral ones certainly stands out the most.

The iPhone XR has an all-screen glass and aluminum design which gives it a sturdy look and feel. The 6.1-inch screen is bigger than the iPhone X. The smartphone is easy to hold and offers a firm grip as well. The iPhone XR is splash and water resistant and comes with a rating of IP67. It retains the design appeal of the iPhone X but gets a nice dash of colour. The last time Apple went bold with colours was with the iPhone 5C. However, this is a more elegant design and the iPhone XR is one good looking smartphone.

Display

The one major difference between the iPhone XS and iPhone XR lies in the display. While the former has an OLED display, Apple has opted for an LCD display for the latter. If you’re thinking that there is a remarkable difference between the two, then yes there is. At least on paper. In reality, the LCD display on iPhone XR is really good. The images look sharp and colour reproduction is top notch. Apple seems to have done a fine job with the LCD display.


Camera and processor

The other difference in the iPhone XR and XS is the camera set up. The iPhone XR comes with a single camera at the back which we couldn’t test in detail. However, the Portraid mode and bokeh effect can be found in the iPhone XR as well. The images clicked on the iPhone XR we saw looked remarkably sharp and clear. Even the depth effect – a strong suit of dual rear cameras – was quite good. The front camera is a 7MP module. You’ll have to wait for our full review to know how the camera of iPhone XR measures against the rest.

As far as the processor is concerned, the iPhone XR is powered by the same A12 Bionic chipset. We fully expect this phone to deliver solid performance on all counts.

What we think

This might just be the best-selling iPhone of the year. Not because of its price alone but because this has all the good parts – well almost all – that the iPhone XS series has. And it costs considerably less, when compared to the iPhone XS. With a price tag of Rs 76,900, this could be the most compelling iPhone buy of the year. The LCD display is nothing to scoff at as it’s really good and it has the same processor as the expensive iPhones. However, it’s early to give a verdict on it but our hunch is that Apple might just have a winner on its hands with the iPhone XR.

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Google follows Apple & Samsung in switching to water pistol for the gun emoji

With iOS 10 in 2016, Apple switched to a water pistol for its gun emoji. The new design was not widely adopted — if not critiqued — until this year where there’s been a rash of changes on other platforms. Google is now the latest to match Apple’s design direction on the gun emoji with the upcoming version of Android.

Nintendo Switch

According to Emojipedia, Google today updated its NotoColorEmoji library with a new emoji design. The current realistic revolver with a dark gray barrel and brown handle has been replaced with an equally realistic water pistol that is brightly colored in yellow and orange with hints of green and blue.

In line with Google’s other modern emoji, there is a fine attention to detail. Interestingly, the preceding version of the emoji was just revamped in 2017, with the prior version in use for three years. Before that Google used a musket, while in 2012 Google used the generic outline of a modern handgun.

As Emojipedia notes, Google — following Apple’s decision in 2016 — was cautious about changing, citing a desire to maintain “cross-platform communication.” However the landscape in 2018 has changed with Twitter and later Samsung on the Galaxy S9 switching to a water pistol.
Given the momentum, it makes sense Google to follow along to ensure that communication across platforms is consistent. The new design should be adopted system-wide with the launch of Android P later this fall.

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Xiaomi Mi 5s and Mi 5s Plus debut in China; boast of Snapdragon 821 and dual-camera setup

After months of rumours and speculation, Xiaomi has, at long last, unveiled the Xiaomi Mi 5s and Mi 5s Plus smartphones.

Both phones are powered by a Snapdragon 821 SoC and Adreno 530 GPU. The phones run MIUI, which is built on Android 6.0 and feature a brand new, ultrasonic fingerprint sensor. The connector is of the USB Type-C variety.


Interestingly, the fingerprint sensor is buried under the front glass so the upper surface is seamless.
Both phones boast of support for 4G+ 3x CA (which can give transfer speeds in excess of 300Mbps on supported networks), NFC and UFS 2.0 storage.

We won’t waste words on the design. The images below will be far more expressive than we are.
Here are the detailed specs of the phones:

Xiaomi Mi 5s


This is the smaller of the two phones launched. It features a 5.15-inch display with a Full HD resolution. Xiaomi says that brightness is an eye-watering 600 nits, thanks to 16 special LEDs that provide enhanced backlight.



The phone itself is powered by a Snapdragon 821 SoC with an Adreno 530 GPU. Two variants of the device will be available, one with 3GB RAM and 64GB storage and one with 4GB RAM and 128GB storage.

A shot from the Xiaomi Mi 5s’ new 13MP rear camera

The rear camera unit is a 13MP f/2.0 unit with a Sony IMX 378 sensor. The pixel size is 1.55 µm. The camera is capable of recording video at 4K 30fps and 1080p 120fps. The front camera is a 4MP, f/2.0 unit with 2 µm pixels. It can record at 1080p.



Xiaomi waxed lyrical on the camera performance of both phones. When compared to the iPhone 6s Plus and the Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge, 55 percent of those polled preferred the images from the Mi 5s and 49 percent of professionals preferred the images from the Mi 5s. In blind tests of course.

The Mi 5s will be available in 4 colours.

The variants are priced at 1999 CNY (around Rs 20,000) for the 3GB RAM + 64GB storage option and 2299 CNY (around Rs 23,000) for the 4GB RAM + 128GB storage option.
Both options offer a 3,200mAh battery.

Thankfully, the phone has a 3.5mm jack.

Xiaomi Mi 5s Plus



The Mi 5s Plus boasts of a 5.7-inch display, 0.2mm larger the iPhone 6s Plus’ display, but it’s claimed to be 3.6mm less wide than the iPhone. It’s also claimed to be 20g lighter than the iPhone 7 Plus.



The rest of the specs remain the same as on the smaller 5s, but you get a 4GB RAM + 64GB storage and 6GB RAM + 128GB storage option now.



The camera sensors are the real stars of the show. Yes, you read that right, sensors. The rear of the device features a dual-camera system with two 13MP Sony IMX 378 sensors with the same aperture and speed rating as the camera on the Mi 5s.

The camera sensors on the Mi 5s Plus

Of the two cameras, one captures a colour image and the other captures black and white data, which is more sensitive to light. The phone then combines the data from the two sensors to create a sharper, brighter image.



The best part about the design of the new camera system is that it sits flush with the body of the phone. No more ugly protrusions to worry about.

Some monochrome shots from Xiaomi’s new camera unit

Oh, and benchmark figures? Xiaomi claims 164119 in AnTuTu.

Xiaomi Mi 5s Plus AnTuTu score

The Xiaomi Mi 5s Plus will be available in the same four colours as the Mi 5s. It will retail for 2299 CNY (around Rs 23,000) for the 4GB RAM + 64GB storage option and 2599 CNY (around Rs 26,000) for the 6GB RAM + 128GB storage option.

Xiaomi Mi 5s Plus price

Both phones will go on sale for on 29 September in China. At this moment, India launch date and prices are unknown at this time.

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WhatsApp for iOS, Android: How to add bold, italics and strikethrough formatting options

Soon after WhatsApp announced that it introduced text formatting tools for Android beta, the features are now available for users running version 2.12.17 on iOS and version 2.12.535 for Android.

A report by Telegraph explains that once WhatsApp is updated, you add asterisks to either side of your text, e.g. *hello* to format your text into bold. To italicise, add underscores either side, e.g. _hello_ and to strike through text, add tildes either side, e.g. ~tilde~. One can also combine the new formats, such as _*bolditalics*_. For now this is not a feature per se but more like a temporary workaround. Moreover, it works cross platform, only if your friend has the above mentioned versions of WhatsApp installed on their smartphones.

Recently, WhatsApp also released an update which would display a progress percentage whenever an automatic local backup is in motion. However, the pop-up still blocks everything but it at least displays the percentage, so that one has a fair idea of how much time one will have to wait before the app is usable again. Another small change is the the phone number no longer shows up front and centre in the new Settings screen. The new profile section will only show the photo, name, and status, but not the phone number.

Along with this change, some new improvements have been made to the WhatsApp document file sharing feature too. One can now share a document through Google Drive. A report by points out that users can select a PDF, Word file or PowerPoint presentation file from Google Drive. Although, all of the files will be automatically converted to PDF format before sending it to other users.

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Uber: Hack us and we’ll give you up to $10,000

Today, Uber — the site with a bit of an image problem when it comes to security — opened the doors on its bug bounty program and promised payouts of up to $10,000.

The program has very specific examples of what qualifies for a reward, such as cross-site scripting (XSS), SQL injection, server-side remote code execution (RCE) and others. You can find what it it is, and isn’t, looking for here. Or, you can peruse the company’s blog post for information about specific technologies in use across several Uber Web properties, including:

• https://*.uber.com/
• https://*.dev.uber.com/
• http://petition.uber.org
• http://ubermovement.com
• iPhone Rider Application
• iPhone Partner Application
• Android Rider Application
• Android Partner Application

If you find a bug, you'll be paid $3,000 to $10,000 for issues for one of the items on its hit list, or you'll get a nice firm pat on the back if you find an issue related to fraud, as Uber isn't currently rewarding those who find fraud issues.

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Want to brick your iPhone? Set the date to January 1st, 1970

If anyone asks you to set the date on your iOS device to January 1st, 1970, DON’T! A recently discovered bug in devices running the 64-bit version of iOS will render your device useless for a while.

Since the bug only seems to affect iOS devices, the most popular, and most probable, theory by far is one that suggests a bug in the UNIX core of iOS. While trying to avoid sounding too technical, the theory is that since UNIX measures time from January 1st, 1970, setting the date to that value when in a different time zone might cause the date value to go below zero. Since UNIX, and by extension, iOS, can’t read a negative date, the device will get stuck.

So far, the only reliable way to recover the device is to either go to an Apple Certified service centre and have the battery removed and reinstalled. You can try to reinstall the battery yourself, but woe be you if you damage the TouchID sensor. Another less reliable option is to turn off the device and wait for a few hours.

Every device running 64-bit iOS is affected but luckily, a simple software update should fix it. The entire list of 64-bit iOS devices comprise of the 6th gen iPod touch, every iPhone from the iPhone 5S onwards, every iPad from the iPad Air and iPad Mini 2 onwards.

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Say Goodbye To GPS! India's All Set To Switch To The Desi Navigation System, IRNSS

It's time we move away from the American Global Positioning System (GPS) and make way for our own desi navigation system — the Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System or IRNSS on our mobile phones.




Beginning Thursday, Isro will hold a major meeting in Bangalore involving location and navigation device manufacturers, mobile phone manufacturers and global information system (GIS) technology developers presenting to them the advantages of using the IRNSS technology over the current GPS technology.

During the two-day meet, Isro will demonstrate how the seven IRNSS constellation satellites once operational by July next year, will be significantly more accurate than the American GPS system. The meeting will also be attended by senior scientists from Space Application Centre (SAC) Ahmedabad.



Unlike American GPS, Isro is recommending a small additional hardware in handheld devices that can receive S-Band signals from IRNSS satellites and inclusion of a code in the phone software to receive L-Band signals.

"Both these L and S band signals received from seven satellite constellation of the IRNSS are being calculated by a special embedded software which reduces the errors caused by atmospheric disturbances significantly. This in turn gives a superior quality location accuracy than the American GPS system," says a senior Isro official.

All the seven satellites of Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System (IRNSS) are expected to be in orbit by March 2016, Indian Space Research Organisation said today.

ISRO also aims to make signals available not only to India and surrounding countries but also to the entire globe, ISRO Chairman Kiran Kumar said.

GSAT-15 satellite with GAGAN payload is slated for launch by November 10

IRNSS is ISRO's initiative to build an independent satellite navigation system to provide precise position, velocity and time to the users of Indian region. The system is designed with a constellation of seven spacecraft and a vast network of ground systems.

With the addition of fourth spacecraft IRNSS-1D in March 2015, the minimum satellite requirement is met and independent positioning is now possible for the first time using an Indian satellite-based navigation system.

He said, "as we make it global, global users will be able to take advantage. Otherwise, now only regional users can take advantage of IRNSS." 

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iPhone users can now finally use WhatsApp on the web

Almost eight months after WhatsApp launched its web client for Android users, WhatApp Web finally arrives for iPhone users. WhatsApp for Web will now work with Safari on the Mac.

To use this service, one will have to simply head to the WhatsApp Web website and scan the QR code seen on the desktop via the mobile app. However, this feature has not been rolled out to all the users and will be available in phases. Recently, the service introduced many new features for iPhone users such as the option to mute an individual chat, mark a conversation as read or unread, backup videos and location sharing. In addition, features such as auto loading of older messages was added along with better support for VoiceOver.

WhatsApp for Web is now available for Android, BlackBerry, Windows Phone, iPhone, Nokia S40 and Nokia S60. Recently, WhatsApp for Web was updated too. The update included some mobile-like features including more control over chats and group conversations.

Users will now see more options in the browser version too. Firstly, you can edit your profile photo and status message. Some UI tweaks have also been included in this update. The Settings option will now show overflow for chats, allowing users to delete and archive chats. In addition, users can also archive, mute and exit group chats.

iPhone users seem quite excited to try out the new client too!

Looks like WhatsApp Web is turned on for iOS. pic.twitter.com/qGYwlqahIi

— Krishna (@ofkrishna) August 19, 2015

Finally! #WhatsAppWeb for #iOS is here! pic.twitter.com/qFyDAZ2JCi

— bottecla (@bottecla) August 19, 2015

WhatsApp Web is now available for iOS users pic.twitter.com/4GWqqLAUx6

— Arian (@arianismmm) August 19, 2015

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WhatsApp rolling out voice calling feature for iOS users

As promised by Brian Acton at F8 conference, WhatsApp’s voice calling feature that was rolled out to Android users a while back is now being made available for iOS.

The new version of the Messenger available for download on the Apple App store reveals support for voice calling. It reads, “WhatsApp Calling: Call your friends and family using WhatsApp for free, even if they’re in another country. WhatsApp calls use your phone’s Internet connection rather than your cellular plan’s voice minutes. Data charges may apply. Note: WhatsApp Calling is rolling out slowly over the next several weeks.”

Whatapp is also updated to work with iOS 8’s new sharing system. This meansusers can share photos, videos, links and more using the share button in other apps. Then there’s the quick access button to the camera.

Though the new update is available for download right away, users may have to wait for the highly-anticipated voice calling feature. The feature isn’t rolled out to everyone yet, and will be released in phases.

It should work in a manner similar to WhatsApp for Android. In India, there are a lot of messenger apps which allow free peer-to-peer calling like Viber, Hike, Skype, Line and so on. But what gives WhatsApp an edge is the user base here, which comes to around 70 million active monthly users.

Meanwhile, WhatsApp voice-calling for Windows Phone is ‘still in works’.

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Flipkart will shut down website within a year; Myntra to be app-only from May 1

Indian e-commerce firm Flipkart will shut down its website within a year whereas its fashion retail website Myntra will become app-only entity from May 1. According a senior executive quoted in The Times of India, Flipkart will move to an app-only format within a year.

Michael Adnani, vice president (retail and head of brand alliances) at Flipkart said that although last year despite getting more app users, Flipkart continued to be on the web platform, next year it would be mobile only. “A year ago, 6% of our traffic was coming from mobile. In less than 18 months, that traffic is 10-fold. That shows the significance of what a mobile phone is doing for the consumers and consequently doing for us,” he told the newspaper.

Flipkart becoming an app-only platform has been speculated before as well. Earlier in a report in Mint, sources in Flipkart had hinted that the website would be shutting down. According to the Flipkart spokesperson, the app has gained relevance because it allows the users to stay logged in all the time and also the shopping is quicker with faster checkouts as compared to the website.

This move isn’t surprising considering the response the apps are getting from consumers. Just to give an example, Myntra, the online fashion retailer which was acquired by Flipkart, has around 90% traffic and 70% of orders coming from its mobile app.

According to Prasad Kompalli, head of Myntra’s ecommerce platform, while seamless shopping experience is one aspect of a mobile e-commerce app, the other advantage include saving on costs. Maintaining a website, advertising and reaching out to consumers on the web platform is a tedious process whereas on an app-platform, things are relatively more focussed. Collecting relevant user data and targetted marketing is easier on the app than on the website according to people familiar with the matter.

Flipkart has around 40 million registered users and around 30,000 merchants selling over 20 million products online. According to the TOI report, Boston Consulting Group expects more than 580 million people in India to be online by 2018 out of which 70-80% will be accessing the web through their phones only. That’s a huge market to tap for mobile apps, since a majority of this population will not be able to afford a desktop to log on to the Flipkart website to shop.

According to Adnani, Myntra’s growth on the app has been higher than Flipkart which has lead the company to decide to shut down the web operations by May 1 and all transactions going forward will happen only on the Myntra app.

Recently, Flipkart was caught in the middle of a storm after news reports emerged that it was going to be part of the Airtel Zero marketing platform – which lets app developers pay for consumers’ data usage charges, provided they are using the said developer’s app. Flipkart which was initially supposed to be a partner in the Airtel Zero program, later withdrew support following backlash from netizens, who went to the Play Store and downvoted the Flipkart app to 1 star rating. Many thousands of users even uninstalled the Flipkart app. While the net neutrality debate is still on, Airtel has refused to back down from its Airtel Zero platform.

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Finally, Facebook Messenger for iPad arrives

It only took three years.
Facebook’s dedicated chat app, has finally arrived for the iPad. It has already been available for Android, iOS and even Windows Phone smartphones. There is no word on support for Android tablets yet though. Facebook Messenger for iPad can be downloaded now from the Apple App store.

The all-new Messenger for iPad comes with a multi-window interface that displays a list of threads alongside your current conversation. It features most of the Messenger features including stickers and group chat. However, Facebook hasn’t added some of the latest features like split-screen selfie camera and tap-and-hold quick video recordings.

Though Facebook doesn’t make money directly from Messenger, it has several opportunities to start monetising it, especially considering it recently hired PayPal’s David Marcus as the VP of messaging Products.

In 2011, Facebook had acquired Beluga to launch its dedicated chat app. Over the years, Facebook Messenger has been getting timely updates to stay at par with rival messaging apps. It’s most recent features include Snapchat-like messaging features, and one-tap photo sharing for Windows Phone.

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Why You Shouldn’t Install The iOS 8 and OS X 10.10 Betas

From the second the news broke, Apple developers had access to beta versions of the upcoming iOS 8 and OS X 10.10 Yosemite. As ever, many scrambled to download and install the new software as soon as possible, but that might have been a mistake.

You probably shouldn’t install iOS 8 or OS X 10.10 unless you have a good reason for doing so, and if you have a good reason for doing so you probably won’t be reading this.

iOS Beta Beware

Last year I installed and used the iOS 7 developer preview from pretty much the day it was released, until the day I could replace it with Apple’s final revision just before the iPhone 5S went on sale. My experience with the reskinned version of iOS were interesting – things changed considerably from that first beta to the finished product we’re carrying around in our pockets right now, which was an interesting process to watch.

However I only had one iOS device – an iPhone 5 – and the bugs hardly made it worth it. Not only was the whole thing remarkably slow, likely due behind-the-scenes debugging measures, but things just didn’t behave as they were meant to. The UI glitched out on a daily basis. Random crashes became something I would expect when performing certain tasks or visiting specific websites. Perhaps most annoyingly of all, many apps refused to work – Instagram wouldn’t see my Camera Roll, Voxer couldn’t access the microphone and many apps that relied on permissions in general were broken due to shifts in the way iOS handles those things.

In short, it was a bit of a nightmare. Despite the fact that I was doing it for work purposes, I’m not keen on repeating the experience any time soon. There’s a reason they’re called developer previews, and there’s a reason many developers rush out and buy an iPod Touch at this time of year. If that’s not a good enough reason to hold off installing, there’s always the issue of registering your device with Apple.

Apple charges $99 for access to its developer program, which grants access to iOS 8 by allowing you to register your device’s unique device identification (UDID) number and use the beta unhindered. While many will find it’s possible to install the beta without registering your UDID, there’s a chance things won’t go to plan – especially considering that betas expire (there are usually five or six firmware revisions during this beta period). You’ll need to install the new beta before the old one expires, else you might be left with an expensive paperweight until the official release.

Last year’s iOS 7 beta made it difficult to downgrade once installed, though it was possible. Tracking down iOS 8 firmware files isn’t going to be difficult, but it might have serious repercussions for those of you who are not registered. If you absolutely have to download developer previews, at least use a slightly-fishy service like iModZone Downloads to register your UDID against the beta program. There’s no guarantee your phone will ever actually be approved unless you have your own developer account and do it yourself, though.

But I Absolutely Have To!

If you really want to install the iOS beta, and you’re confident your UDID has been accepted, you can do so using the following method:

1. Download the iOS 8 .IPSW file for your device either from Apple’s developer website, or elsewhere.
2. Backup your device.
3. Connect via USB and find your device in iTunes, then option (alt) + click the Restore button, a window should open.
4. Select the beta .IPSW file you downloaded and install. You can restore from your backup once the process is complete.

Argh! Can I Get Rid Of It?

We warned you, but you didn’t listen. Downgrade instructions are as follows:

1. Download the iOS 7.1.1 .IPSW.
2. Power down your device, hold the home button and connect to your computer. Continue to hold the home button until your iOS device says something about connecting to iTunes.
3. Find your device in iTunes, then option (alt) + click the Restore button, select the iOS 7 .IPSW you just downloaded and cross your fingers.
4. Restore your device from that precious backup you made.

Yosemite Can Wait, For Now

If you wanted to install Yosemite before it’s ready, you should have probably registered for the public beta program the day it was announced. The OS X 10.10 public beta signup page still exists, but it’s likely most of the invites (Apple limited it to the first one million applicants) are gone by now. Much like iOS betas, the OS X developer previews are designed for developers who pay the $99 annual fee, not the public.

Add to this the fact that many of the features – like iOS Continuity – are absent at present. The good news remains: for the first time ever Apple will be rolling out a public beta. So if you really do want to try out Yosemite before everyone else, this is probably the best way to do it.

But that’s not to say you should rely on public beta software any more than you should closed beta software. Unlike our mobile devices, desktops and laptops often take on workhorse roles. I can work around the problems on my iPhone by using my MacBook, but the opposite isn’t true. It’s not a great idea to put your main workhorse out of action, so if you’re going to install any beta, you should probably do it on another partition.

Installing Via A Partition

Whether you’re installing the public or developer preview, Apple doesn’t recommend using it as your main operating system just yet. If you’re not using a MacBook with precious little space left on your SSD, creating a partition might be a good option. The process is fairly easy too:

1. Backup your Mac, just in case something goes wrong.
2. Go to Applications > Utilities > Disk Utility and click on your main internal drive (at the top of the list).
3. Under the Partition tab click the plus “+” button.
4. Select the new partition that appears in the box and give it a size – 30GB should be enough for OS X and some software, but you can go hog wild if you want.
5. Give it a name and click Apply.

Now when you go to install Yosemite make sure you click Show All Disks in the installer when asked for a location, and select the partition you created. At startup, you’ll be given the option of choosing between Mavericks and Yosemite, and all your old data, applications and settings remain in tact. When it comes to replacing Mavericks with the final version of Yosemite, just delete the partition.

They’re Not Ready Yet

This is the biggest and best reason to avoid both the iOS 8 and OS X 10.10 betas – they’re not ready. Many of the features you’re looking forward to – Continuity between devices, sending voice iMessages, making use of HealthKit and even the ability to use your old software – just aren’t there. Cult of Mac recently discovered what a nightmare Yosemite’s half-baked software compatibility can really be, especially when installed on your only machine.

If you do decide to plough onwards and install the developer previews then good luck to you, just remember to backup everything you need first and to ensure you have registered your iOS device with Apple’s developer program. Just in case you didn’t get it the first time: it’s not a good idea to replace your existing stable operating systems with unreleased betas.

Let us know if you’re running the beta, excited for the first OS X public beta or simply happy to wait a few months until Cupertino’s new toys are ready.

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Twitter Is Experimenting With A New Way To Retweet

The best thing about Twitter is that it forces users to embrace brevity thanks to its 140-character updates. It’s also the worst thing about Twitter, turning loquacious tweeters into Twitter stream hogs - as with the disaster that is the multi-part running commentary known as the Tweetstorm. But now Twitter is experimenting with a new feature called “retweet with comment” that would better allow users to participate in a conversation, while also providing context and commentary that can otherwise get lost when using the standard Twitter “retweet” function or “quoted tweets.”

In fact, it appears that the “retweet with comment” feature would replace the latter “quote tweet” option, which today often requires users to truncate the original tweet in order to add their own two cents.

Oh, in case all this Twitter terminology has you lost:

A Twitter retweet allows a user to re-post another’s tweet to their own personal timeline. The “quote tweet” feature, meanwhile, grabs the other person’s tweet, places it in quotation marks, then allows the person re-posting it to insert their own comment in front of or after the quoted snippet.

Unfortunately, neither of these methods really allow for the sharing of a longer thought of your own because of Twitter’s hard-coded, 140-character limit in the case of quoted tweets – and because retweets don’t allow you to insert your own text.

But now, Twitter may be changing things up.

If the current experiment rolls out to the general public, users will be able to “retweet with comment” instead of quoting a tweet which will give them more room to write their own words.

With this option, the original tweet a user references becomes a “Twitter Card” that appears below the original tweet. (Twitter Cards are what allows the network to display rich media in tweets like photos or Vine videos, for example. This – see below – appears to be a Twitter Card for a tweet itself, though.)

For now, Twitter is testing the change with a select portion of its user base, as it does from time to time when experimenting with how users will react to or adopt a change to its platform.

The new “retweet with comment” feature was first spotted by Mashable, which noticed that Twitter’s head of product communications, Carolyn Penner, was testing this on her own timeline.

But a quick scan of Twitter indicates that this is not some internal-only experiment. Other regular Twitter users are now seeing that the ability to quote a tweet has disappeared in favor of this new functionality.

So far, however, Twitter’s peanut gallery is not amused, writing that they “fckn hate” the new feature, and telling Twitter to “stop being lame.”

(People really hate change, don’t they?)

Despite a handful of angry tweets, the switch is arguably an improvement over the old process, which was maddening since it almost always required you to edit the original tweet in order to have room for your own words.

The 140-Character Problem

Twitter has for a long time been challenged by the limitations of its 140-character nature.

For example, originally, the retweet function actually began tweets with “RT” to indicate the post was not your own, but rather something you were pointing to from another account. Still, even those couple of extra letters and the space after them were eating away at the character count, which pushed the company to move to the RT-less “retweet” feature we have today. “Quote tweet” was later thrown in as a way to humor those who actually liked to have their say, not just mindlessly re-share content.

Twitter declined to comment on its plans for the new “retweet with comment” feature.

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Apple App Store policy changes/renewed

As you may be aware, TechCrunch recently posted a blog about Apple rejecting apps that use incentivized video views and social sharing and “any other inappropriate methods” of app promotions. The specific clauses that Apple seems to be referring to in making these rejections are found here (copied from App Store Review Guidelines)

Section 2.25: Apps that display Apps other than your own for purchase or promotion in a manner similar to or confusing with the App Store will be rejected, unless designed for a specific approved need (e.g. health management, aviation, accessibility, etc.) or which provide significant added value for a specific group of customers
Section 3.10: Developers who attempt to manipulate or cheat the user reviews or chart ranking in the App Store with fake or paid reviews, or any other inappropriate methods will be removed from the iOS Developer Program

We are sharing this communication to assure you that we have reviewed InMobi’s advertising solutions against these criterion and determined that our advertising is in complete compliance with Apple’s policies. Driven by a vision to deliver high quality users for our advertisers and high monetization for our publishers, InMobi's advertising platform does not incentivize any artificial manipulation of user reviews or ranks on the App Store to drive installs.

We continue to believe that video advertising creates engaging ad experiences that result in new users with high Lifetime Value (LTV) for advertisers and higher eCPMs for publishers. Video ads are the best performing ad format on our network, delivering a lift of up to 250% in conversions as compared to static interstitials.

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Samsung reportedly in talks to buy Nuance, the company behind Siri

Nuance Communications, the company behind Apple’s mobile assistant Siri, could be bought over by rival Samsung, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal.

The paper cited sources familiar with the matter and says that, “Nuance has held talks not only with Apple’s rival Samsung, but a number of private equity firms.” Interestingly Nuance has Carl Icahn as its biggest shareholder and he owns about 19 percent according to filings, adds the report. Icahn recently boosted his stake in Apple by 2.8 million shares worth nearly $1.65 billion. He has a total of 7.5 million AAPL shares.

The WSJ report says that it is not known how far the talks have progressed, or if a deal is close to being reached.

Apple isn’t the only big consumer for Nuance. The US company’s voice recognition tech also power Samsung’s handsets, televisions and tablets and its technology is integrated within Samsung’s S-Voice software and the firm’s upcoming wearable technology.

Samsung isn’t the only one who has been trying to acquire Nuance. According to this ZDNet report, last year saw rumours of a potential purchase of Nuance by Apple thanks to “a chance comment by Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, who stated the iPad and iPhone maker had bought the firm. It is believed that Apple held talks with Nuance, but a deal was never reached.

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250 new emojis coming soon: Flip off your friends with a virtual middle finger

Messaging fiends will be happy to know that a fresh batch of emojis are now on their way.

 

The Unicode Consortium has announced that version 7.0 of the Unicode Standard will be available soon, most likely next month, and it will be bringing a slew of much-demanded emojis to the table.

 

The latest version is expected to add 2,834 new characters, approximately 250 emoji, new currency symbols for the Russian ruble and Azerbaijani manat, 23 new lesser-used and historic scripts and some more symbols. Among the list of 250 emojis, there are some interesting additions such as the middle finger, shopping bags, a clamshell phone (presumably to make fun of that one friend), a reminder ribbon and world map.

 

Yes, you heard it right, the emojis list will include the symbol of a ‘reversed hand with middle finger extended’. So the next time your friend is being annoying, you could just flip them off instead of typing out abuses.

 

The list also includes some other ‘now-vintage’ emojis like the good old floppy disk and a tape cartridge. The new list includes a slew of computer-related peripherals like the hard disk, a wired keyboard, an old personal computer, a CD, a printer, monitor, mouse and more.

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Facebook launches mobile app that does not require Facebook account

Facebook Inc launched a smartphone app on Tuesday that will allow consumers to exchange disappearing photos and videos without requiring Facebook accounts, the Internet Company's latest effort to develop mobile services beyond its core social network.

The new app, dubbed Slingshot, allows users to sign up for the service with their mobile phone number and connect with friends in their phone's contact list or, if they want, by finding their Facebook friends.

Photos on Slingshot disappear from users' phones shortly after they are viewed, reflecting a growing anxiety about privacy in the age of Internet social networking.

Facebook's release of Slingshot comes as a new crop of mobile messaging services gain popularity and threatens to draw younger users away from Facebook's 1.28 billion-user social network.

To help mitigate the threat from alternative social networks, Facebook is developing a variety of standalone apps and acquiring fast-growing rivals. In 2012 it acquired photo-sharing service Instagram and in February it announced plans to acquire messaging app WhatsApp for $19 billion.

Snapchat, an app that lets users send messages that automatically disappear after a few seconds, turned down a $3 billion acquisition offer from Facebook last year, according to media reports at the time.

Unlike other messaging apps, Slingshot will not allow users to view the messages they have received from their friends until they reciprocate and send back a photo or video of their own. The rule is designed to make Slingshot a service for which everyone contributes material, although it could require a learning curve that confuses or turns off some users.

"When everyone participates there's less pressure, more creativity and even the little things in life can turn into awesome shared experiences," Facebook said in a blog post announcing the service on Tuesday.

Slingshot will be available in the United States on Tuesday for Android and iOS devices.

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Samsung Galaxy Tab S 10.5 vs Apple iPad Air: Tablet specs battle

Samsung has brought out its big guns with the new Galaxy Tab S line-up. This is perhaps the first time that we are seeing Samsung pack in everything its known for into a tablet line-up—from the ultra high-resolution Super AMOLED displays, to powerful octa-core processors to top-end graphics chips.

But the reigning tablet champion is the Apple iPad Air and it’s quite a tablet to beat, as we saw in our review. We absolutely love Apple tablet, but Samsung does have an attractive offering too. Before we can compare them head on, let’s take a look at the raw specs to see which one comes out on top on paper.

Apple iPad Air

The iPad Air is a barnstormer of a tablet. With its wafer-thin design, excellent ergonomics and a stunning display, there’s really no tablet better than it at the moment, in the 10-inch category. To be exact, the Air has a 9.7-inch display with a Retina-class resolution of 2048×1536 pixels and 264 pixels per inch.

Brilliant build

The iPad Air is powered by the A7 processor, one of the fastest in the market. The 64-bit A7 64-bit system can handle data in bigger chunks than 32-bit processors. It’s also reputed to be one of best for power management.

Apple’s tablet has a 5-megapixel iSight camera, which is capable of recording HD videos at 1080p. Don’t expect iPad cameras to be like their iPhone counterparts. The front has an HD FaceTime camera. And the battery is rated for 10 hours of usage, something we can confirm is more or less on the money.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S 10.5

Samsung announced two sizes in the new Galaxy Tab S series and both are aimed squarely at the iPads, although in typical Samsung fashion, they have larger displays. Samsung’s 10.5-inch tablet comes with a WQXGA (2560×1600, 16:10) Super AMOLED display, that’s just a little higher in resolution than the iPad Air. Samsung has it beaten in terms of pixel density too with 288 PPI. The Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.5 Wi-Fi weighs 465 g (467 g for the LTE version), while the iPad Air is about the same at 469g. At 6.6 mm, Samsung’s tablet is also thinner than the iPad Air (which is 7.5 mm thick).

Samsung’s new tablets

LTE variant of the tablet packs a Snapdragon 800 chipset with a 2.3GHz quad-core Krait 400 CPU, while the Wi-Fi version offers Samsung’s Exynos 5 Octa chipset with a quad 1.3GHz Cortex-A7 and quad 1.9GHz Cortex-A15. Both come with 3GB of RAM and with either 16GB or 32GB of internal storage, with a microSD card slot. The Tab S has a 8MP camera with LED flash, capable of recording 1080p video, while the front camera is a 2.1MP snapper. Despite the slim waistline, battery in the 10.5-inch tablet is a generous 7,900mAh Li-Ion unit. Samsung has not specified a rated battery life.

Here is the breakdown of the specs:

The specs battle

On the face of it, the Tab S wins with higher specs, but the iPad Air is a proven tablet with a superb hardware-software integration, while Samsung’s version of Android might not to be everyone’s liking. The iPad Air is also more compact, which could work in its favour, but Samsung has managed to keep the size of its larger tablet under control as well.

We’re itching to see how Samsung’s latest will compete with the iPad on an everyday basis, but in terms of pure specs, the Korean company has a slight advantage.

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Five Labs analyzes your Facebook posts to supposedly reveal your personality

A lot of people addicted to social media judge people on the basis of the posts and photos they upload, or the comments they like. There are certain posts and comments that are taken far too seriously, but what if these were indicators of how the person is in real life?

A company called Five Labs has created a tool that claims to reveal an individual’s personality via their social media uploads. This tool analyses the News Feed of your Facebook account and gives a thorough analysis of your personality. The tool is based on a study conducted in the University of Pennsylvania that looks at the five biggest personality traits that can be used to narrow down the actual personality of the person. These are include extroversion, openness, neuroticism, conscientiousness and agreeableness.

As the tool is free, anyone can give it a try. We think the results should not be taken at face value since many of our posts and shares may have nothing to do with us or our opinions. They could be favours for friends, for example, but there’s no way the tool would know that, if your interaction with that person is not limited to just that one post.

On conducting the analysis of the app I found it quite hard to believe that I scored the highest in neuroticism with 53 percent. I scored 49 percent for openness, 13 percent for extroversion, 34 percent for agreeableness and 24 percent for conscientiousness. While I don’t quite agree with the neuroticism score, every other score seems fair.

The tool also allowed me to compare my scores with famous public figures and my Facebook friends. On comparision with Bill Gates scores I found out that 51 percent of our personality traits are similar through our Facebook posts. Unfortunately, that’s the only things in common between us.

There’s just one hitch that we just haven’t been able to understand, the tool lets you compare your score to Mahatma Gandhi as well. We are pretty sure the great man is not a part of Facebook. We’ve reached out to Five Labs for a clarification.

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Apple smartwatch all set for October launch

Apple is preparing to sell its first wearable device this October, aiming to produce 3 million to 5 million smartwatches a month in its initial run, the Nikkei reported on Friday, citing an unidentified parts supplier and sources familiar with the matter.

Specifications are still being finalized, but the devices are likely to sport curved OLED (organic light-emitting diode) displays and sensors that collect health data from blood glucose and calorie consumption to sleep activity, the Japanese news service cited industry sources as saying.

The industry has long expected Apple to unveil some sort of smartwatch, following the release of Samsung Electronics’ Galaxy Gear watches.

Wall Street is hoping to see a new Apple product this year to galvanize the former stock market darling’s share price and end a years-long drought of ground-breaking devices. CEO Tim Cook has promised “new product categories” in 2014.

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