Technology news

Today is Bill Gates’ 61st birthday, and in true sharing fashion Mark Zuckerberg took to Facebook to wish Gates a happy birthday and thank him for his friendship.
This comes a few days after Gates, cofounder and former chief executive of Microsoft, said that he and the Facebook cofounder and chief executive are “good friends.” Gates gushed about Zuck in a conversation on October 20 with Robert Perkins, a content and media strategist from the office of strategic communications at

SpaceX still doesn’t know exactly what caused its Falcon 9 rocket to explode in September, but the company says it has narrowed down the problem to one of three helium pressure vessels in the upper portion of the rocket. It further confirms what SpaceX suspected late last month — that the accident was caused by a breach in the cryogenic helium system in the vehicle’s upper oxygen tank. This helium system is used to pressurize the rocket during flight. Continue reading…

Lilt, a startup that has developed a web application and application programming interface (API) for helping translators work more quickly, is announcing that it’s raised a $2.35 million seed round.
Lilt uses statistical machine translation to offer potential translations of sentences in different languages, then changes the rest of sentences on the fly as human translators type their translations into text boxes. With every human input, the machine translation system grows smarter, such t

GUEST: In 1908, Henry Ford’s Model T assembly line changed factory operations forever. By 1921, the term “workflow” was being used in a railway engineering journal. Workflow describes the progression of steps (tasks, events, and interactions) that comprises a work process from initiation to completion, involves two or more persons, and creates or adds value to the organization’s activities.
Workflow is about industrializing any kind of work. They are all around us, a

Dogs are good. Did you know that dogs are good? That they are, in fact, a perfect way to cheer up everyone in your life?
Let me introduce you to a very special dog named Jolene. Jolene really loves Gumby, as seen by her lovingly gnawing on a pint-sized version at the start of the video. When a human in a Gumby suit approaches Jolene, she’s at first taken aback. Is this real? Could it be?
It is. And nothing has ever made us or Jolene happier.We need something to smile about now that Vine is

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“When it comes to the content that we produce, content is the bridge

Apple has given up on making its own external display panels. If you want that long rumored Cinema 5K monitor, you’ll have to look at LG instead. It already seemed suspicious that the company chose to highlight an LG display instead of one of its own during its MacBook Pro announcement, but Apple confirmed to The Verge’s Nilay Patel that it is “out of the standalone display biz.” Good notes by @jsnell. I can add that Apple told me it's out of standalone display

GUEST: Brands of all sizes today are on a content kick, constantly churning out media vying for our attention and hoping to convert us to a prospect or a customer. One of the most common content marketing formats is the ever-present blog, ubiquitous to any brand website. But do blogs work? New reports are calling the reliability of this content marketing staple, on its own, into question — as well as questioning some of our overarching content marketing strategies.
Build it well, but they

Barnes & Noble gave up its Nook brand a couple years ago and opted to instead co-brand other manufacturers’ tablets with the Nook name. Now it seems the bookstore chain will once again release its own new Nook, called the Nook Tablet 7. The device just passed through the FCC. As is typical with FCC documents, we can’t gather too much information, but but what we do know is that the new tablet will run Android, and the Google Play Store will be available. This is great news consid

GUEST: If pop culture is to be believed, society is quickly heading toward a highly automated future ruled by artificial intelligence. Take Iron Man’s trusty sidekick, J.A.R.V.I.S. Within the Marvel franchise, the artificial intelligence system is able to think, act, and feel like a human. The supporting character is even sarcastic and witty — both trademark human characteristics. In some ways, J.A.R.V.I.S. seems like a better human than most humans.
With the release of AI techn

In an incredibly well-planned and executed move demonstrating a deep understanding of my personal interests, Zagat has set up a Tiny Cafe pop-up shop in New York City. The pop-up is to celebrate the new 2017 New York City Restaurants Guidebook and the relaunch of the restaurant review iOS app from the Google-owned company. The app offers restaurant guidance from editors who curate snippets from user reviews, with the data coming from Google's Local Guides program. Using that same concept —

Some of us think the Touch Bar on the new MacBook Pro is a bit underwhelming, but at least there’s limitless potential to what developers can do with a mini touchscreen, right? Apparently, not if Apple has its way. See – as noted by TechCrunch – Apple wants you to take the Touch Bar really seriously, lest you be scolded by Jony Ive’s sultry voice. Here are some of the things Apple explicit tells developers to not do in its Touch Bar design guidelines: Don’t us

Much has been said about the cost, trade-offs, and compromises involved with purchasing Apple’s new MacBook Pro. Apple unveiled the device, which comes in three new iterations, yesterday at a press event, and people pouring over its spec sheets and purchase options have complained that its limiting 16GB memory option is severe given the price tag. Apple has now come out and explained that any more RAM in a notebook of its size would have a detrimental effect on battery life.
The

Red Bull Global Rallycross is adding an all-electric class of racing starting in 2018, the series announced today. The EV class will run alongside the two main classes during each of the series’ race weekends.
“The electric car is one of the hottest topics in the automotive industry, and manufacturers across the globe have recognized its immense potential,” series CEO Colin Dyne said in a statement. “We want to embrace this technology by welcoming it into our series as we

The Touch Bar is the most unorthodox addition to Apple’s new MacBook Pro — or any laptop in recent memory. A thin OLED strip that runs the length of the keyboard, resting just above the number keys, displays different “buttons” depending on the situation. Watching a movie? Symbols appear to let you adjust the volume. Hosting a party? Those symbols morph into an impromptu DJ kit. Texting? Enjoy the emoji keyboard.
Because most of us aren’t DJs, and none of us need a

Facebook has launched a tool it calls Voting Plan, which will summarize the candidates and measures you can vote for on Election Day (November 8). The social networking company has enlisted the help of the nonpartisan Center for Technology and Civic Life to ensure that every voter in the country will have a ballot specific to them and that it’s available on any device.
With 11 days before the end of a very contested election cycle, not only do voters have to choose between who they wa

Voting day in the US, November 8, will soon be here, and Facebook wants to be really sure you’re going to go out there and exercise your civic duty. The company is introducing a new feature today to preview your voting ballot– from presidential candidates to local ones – as well as where those candidates stand on issues you care about. Facebook will essentially present you with a preview of your November 8 choices – it makes a prediction for states th

Samsung officially put its limited edition coral blue Galaxy S7 Edge on sale in Taiwan and Singapore this week. The color might look familiar because it was previously available for the doomed Galaxy Note 7. Sad. I love a good limited edition color. Color releases keep things fresh, even if I can’t usually buy them because they’re only available abroad.
Clearly Samsung is hinting at ocean vibes with the phrase "coral blue," but its advertising really takes the marketing message to an

Nintendo is not holding back on the Switch due to supply constraints. Instead, the company doesn’t want systems sitting unsold in warehouses and on shelves.
Tatsumi Kimishima, Nintendo president and chief executive, said during a conference with investors that the company could roll out more than the planned 2 million Switch systems before the fiscal year ends March 31 if market demand is strong. The CEO previously said that the 2 million systems would hit before March, but it didn’t

This week is a special episode of The Vergecast. After attending the Apple event, Nilay and Dieter sit down in San Francisco together and talk about the newest product announcements from Cupertino.Let us not forget, Microsoft also announced new computers this week! We invited an old friend of the show, senior editor Vlad Savov, to help cover it all.01:27 - Microsoft event/Surface Studio
24:00 - Apple Mac event
28:25 - Macbook Pro
32:27 - Touchbar
41:01 - Specs
52:39 - Apple TV app
If you enjoyed

A new Twitter campaign is impersonating American teens, and using their likenesses to spread right-wing propaganda. The pattern was identified by Nicole Flotteron, who analyzes Twitter activity at Mercury LLC, after a friend fell victim to the scheme. But while Flotteron is used to spotting spam, she says this is something different. “They’re pushing pro-Trump propaganda,” Flotteron told The Verge. “There are a lot of disturbing things that happen on Twitter, but I’

Here we go again. The FBI has re-opened its investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails, following a report that some of the around 33,000 missing emails may not be missing after all. FBI Director James Comey said in a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee: In connection with an unrelated case, the FBI has learned of the existence of emails that appear to be pertinent to the investigation … I agreed that the FBI should take appropriate investigative steps designed to allow inves

FBI Director James Comey wrote in a letter today that the agency has discovered new emails that may be relevant to its investigation into Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server. In an unexpected development, The New York Times has since reported that the emails were found on devices belonging to Clinton aide Huma Abedin and her scandal-plagued husband Anthony Weiner.
New emails discovered by FBI
The letter, which was distributed to members of Congress, has little information,

If the workweek made you tired and hard around the edges, this will definitely help you cool off. Thanks to YouTube user Ben Mesches we can finally see what true happiness looks like. This dog is just playing around with his favorite toy, when something incredible happens — that same toy came alive in the much larger form of a Halloween costume. The following seconds are some of the cutest I’ve seen on the internet — the dog jumps up in disbelief and runs to its dres

I rarely laugh out loud while scrolling through Twitter anymore. When I do, it’s almost always at a promoted tweet.Promoted tweets, which are written by social media managers or marketing people for brands, are sometimes very boring. Sometimes they are just coupon codes for Nike or suggestions as to where you might purchase new car insurance. Sometimes though, they’re incredible non-sequiturs, begrudgingly written, and yet hilarious.Question: If cheetahs can talk, why can’t ted

Welcome to another GamesBeat weekly roundup! This time, we got a better look at the Nintendo Switch thanks to an 3D model, Minecraft is coming to Apple TV, and the PlayStation 4 is getitng some new, fancy controllers from third parties.
Enjoy, and have a great weekend!
Pieces of flair and opinion
The DeanBeat: Why video game companies — and all of us — need to think more about A.I.
The Nintendo Switch secrets that may sit inside Nvidia’s Shield
Why Nintendo’s st

I love role playing games, but playing one is a huge commitment, and increasingly I’m finding myself without the time or energy to power through epics that span dozens of hours. Unless it’s a major release like a new Fallout or Final Fantasy, it’s hard to fit a big RPG into my life. Having a full-time job and kids make saving a virtual world a lot more challenging than it used to be.
World of Final Fantasy, on the other hand, fits my life perfectly. On the surface, it looks lik

Microsoft has announced a second season of the Forza Racing Championship, a series of tournaments for its racing game series on Xbox One. The event will give out $150,000 in cash and prizes starting on November 7.
Esports are a growing industry worth $493 million, but most of the popular competitive games are multiplayer online battle arenas (MOBAs), shooters, or fighting games. Racing titles haven’t made a big splash in the esports world yet, but continuing to promote event