Technology news

Netflix plans to begin testing a top 10 list for streaming customers in the UK. It will allow them to see which shows and movies are currently the most popular across the service. The top 10 will be updated weekly, and each genre / category will get its own list.“For those who want to watch what others are watching, this may make choosing titles even easier,” CEO Reed Hastings wrote in this quarter’s letter to investors. “After a few months we’ll decide whether to

No, you’re not misremembering the details from that young adult dystopian fiction you’re reading — Facebookreally does sell a video chat camera adept at tracking the faces of you and your loved ones. Now, you too can own Facebook’s poorly timed foray into social hardware for the low, low price of $99. That’s a pretty big price drop considering that the Portal, introduced less than six months ago, debuted at $199.
Unfortunately for whoever toiled away on Facebook&rsq

Sedan sales may be collapsing in the United States, but some of China’s highest-profile automakers have announced all-electric cars — not SUVs — at this week’s Shanghai Auto Show. At least three were unveiled on Tuesday alone, including two by EV startups NIO and XPeng, and one by Geely, which owns Volvo.Add to that Aston Martin’s first all-electric car, the Rapide E, and the return of Lotus as an all-electric hypercar maker (both of which were also announced on Tu

GameStop is launching a new promotion that will allow customers to return a game for full store credit within 48 hours of purchase. The program, as circulated today by Cheap Ass Gamer and verified by The Verge, is called “Guarantee to Love It,” and will launch next week with the debut of Days Gone.
The promotion window will apply only in the first week of a game’s arrival, and GameStop will specify during various times which titles are eligible. Days Gone officially lands on A

Discs! What are they good for? Well, they’re nice if you don’t want to be tied to an online-only ecosystem. But if you don’t mind that, Microsoft’slatest Xbox One S “All-Digital Edition” might be for you. With no slots to speak of, the console is limited to downloading games to its drive — which is how we’ve been doing it on PC for quite some time.
Announced during today’s “Inside Xbox” video presentation, the Xbox One S All-Digit

Microsoft is making its disc-less Xbox One S official today. After weeks of leaks, the software maker is unveiling the Xbox One S All-Digital Edition, which is priced at $249 and will be available on May 7th. This is a new model that will be sold alongside the original Xbox One S, and the more powerful Xbox One X. The big selling point here is that this All-Digital Edition will not ship with the Blu-ray drive, cutting the price slightly by $50 (recommended retail price).
Microsoft is including

The colossal, industry-changing merger between US mobile providers T-Mobile and Sprint is running into significant resistance from regulators. According to The Wall Street Journal, the Department of Justice has warned both companies that their merger is unlikely to be approved as currently proposed. Antitrust concerns are said to be at the top of the DOJ’s qualms with the deal: regulators are worried that the deal could harm wireless competition despite insistence from the two carriers th

The colossal, industry-changing merger between US mobile providers T-Mobile and Sprint is running into significant resistance from regulators. According to The Wall Street Journal, the Department of Justice has warned both companies that their merger is unlikely to be approved as currently proposed. Antitrust concerns are said to be at the top of the DOJ’s qualms with the deal: regulators are worried that the deal could harm wireless competition despite insistence from the two carriers th

After boasting about one of its biggest quarters to date, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings doesn’t seem too concerned about Apple and Disney’s upcoming streaming services.Hastings and Netflix chief financial officer Spencer Neumann issued Netflix’s first quarterly earnings for 2019, directly addressing recent presentations from Disney and Apple about their forays into streaming. The letter to investors recognized that Disney and Apple are both “world class consumer brands,&rdqu

Microsoft is unveiling a new Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription today that combines Xbox Live Gold and Xbox Game Pass into a single monthly charge. This new service was rumored earlier this month, and it’s now official. Xbox Game Pass Ultimate will combine both the Xbox Game Pass and Xbox Live Gold subscriptions into a single monthly cost of $14.99.
Xbox owners will save around $5 per month compared to the $19.98 monthly subscription price for an existing combination of the two services

Victor Basta Contributor Victor Basta is the founder of the boutique investment firm Magister Advisors.More posts by this contributorThere’s an implosion of early-stage VC funding, and no one’s talking about it Venture investing in the US and Europe are totally different industries
If you’re hoping to create a unicorn on a budget, look to the European technology sector for inspiration. Despite the well-documented increase in available funding for tech companies across the cont

On Tuesday, the White House rejected requests from the House Judiciary Committee to submit documents regarding any discussions the administration had with the Justice Department over the AT&T-Time Warner merger, according to Bloomberg.
In a letter, White House counsel Pat Cipollone told Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler (D-NY) and antitrust subcommittee chair Rep. David Cicilline (D-R) that the White House would not be supplying the documents that the lawmakers requested in a letter to the ad

A roughly five-minute apparent leak from Avengers: Endgame has made social media a minefield for spoiler-averse Marvel movie fans, and the directors have posted a plea for people to avoid revealing details about the movie. The leak (which we won’t describe in detail here) was apparently recorded surreptitiously during a screening, then cut together and posted online. It includes a handful of pivotal-seeming scenes from Endgame, although it certainly won’t give you a full picture of

Google has blocked TikTok users in India, which is one of the app’s biggest user bases, from accessing the app following a court order, according to a new Reuters report.
The move follows a request from the state court on April 3rd to ban access to TikTok on Google’s Play Store and Apple’s App Store after concerns were raised that people were using it for pornographic purposes and exploiting children, Reuters reported. Letters were sent to both Google and Apple; the app was re

Netflixjust released its earnings letter for the first quarter of 2019. The company says it saw growth of 9.6 million paying subscribers, up 16 percent year-over-year.
That’s significantly ahead of the 8.9 million new subscribers that analysts had predicted. On the financial side, the quarter came in right at expectations, with revenue of $4.5 billion and earnings per share of 76 cents.
Netflix says it now has 148.9 million paid streaming memberships. Most of this growth (7.9 million of th

Developers building voice-enabled applications for Amazon Echo and other Alexa-powered devices will now have a new way to validate their abilities, with Amazon’s launch of a new AWS Certified Alexa Skill Builder – Specialty certification. This is the first time Amazon has offered a certification program for Alexa developers, the company says.
Certification programs are standard in the technology industry — and AWS already offers a training program and certifications of its own

Qualcommstock surged after the announcement that the company has settled its multi-billion-dollar lawsuits with Apple. At market close Qualcomm’s stock price settled at $70.45 after opening at $57.46.
The stock surge showcases just how surprising the resolution is, especially given how wholeheartedly Appleappeared to be moving forward with Intel to keep Qualcomm tech out of their mobile devices. Qualcomm and Apple had spent the better part of more than two years engaged in a legal skirmish

The years-long legal battle between Appleand Qualcommappears to be coming to an end.
In a standoff that has been brewing since 2017, Apple argued that Qualcomm was charging too much for patent licensing. After Apple shifted to using Intel chips, Qualcomm moved to get iPhone imports banned in countries around the world for patent infringement.
The two companies have just announced a settlement, with both agreeing to drop all litigation with the other worldwide.
Exact details of the agreement are

Boston Dynamics has shown its SpotMini robot doing a new trick: joining a robot army to pull a large vehicle that’s in neutral gear. Ten of them can work together to get the job done. This is building off of the small, four-legged robot’s repertoire of skills that includes picking up objects, opening doors, climbing stairs, and having eerily lifelike movement.Today’s big news is that SpotMini is off of the production line, and Boston Dynamics says that it will be available &ld

Apple and Qualcomm have agreed to settle all ongoing lawsuits, putting an end to the blockbuster legal battle that’s seen the two tech giants sue one another across the globe.
As part of the settlement, Apple will make a payment to Qualcomm for an undisclosed amount. The companies have reached a six year global patent licensing agreement, which may be extended for another two years. They’ve also agreed for Qualcomm to supply parts to Apple for multiple years, which likely means its

Parisian firefighters used DJI drones to track the progression of the Notre Dame fire and to find the best positions to aim fire hoses. By flying DJI Mavic Pro and Matrice M210 drones over the Notre Dame cathedral, firefighters were able to get essential data for taming the flames.Notre Dame de Paris was severely damaged by the fire that ravaged its roof, spire, stained glass window, and pipe organ. Police say the fire was likely an accident, potentially caused by ongoing renovation work.Fire b

Google is abandoning plans to open a two-story retail store in the Fulton Market district of Chicago, according to a report yesterday from the Chicago Tribune. Google was eyeing the location, a 14,000-square-foot retail space on W. Randolph Street, as of August last year, the Tribune reported at the time. Now, the space is being shown to other potential companies after Google walked away from signing a lease, the report states.There’s no indication that Google is giving up entirely on bri

The Daily Crunch is TechCrunch’s roundup of our biggest and most important stories. If you’d like to get this delivered to your inbox every day at around 9am Pacific, you can subscribe here.
1. Unfolding the Samsung Galaxy Fold
After eight years of teasing a folding device, Samsung finally pulled the trigger with an announcement at its developer’s conference late last year. But the device itself remained mysterious.
Earlier this week, Brian Heater finally held the Galaxy Fold i

A new FCC filing suggests that Disney and Lenovo are making a Marvel-themed follow-up to their lightsaber-equipped augmented reality headset. The filing, publicized by Variety yesterday, refers to a “Lenovo Mirage 1.5 Marvel Controller.” The original Lenovo Mirage launched in 2017 with the game Star Wars: Jedi Challenges, which let players duel Darth Vader and several other Star Wars antagonists. Based on the name and other details, it now looks like a second major Mirage game is on

TwitterCEO Jack Dorseytook the stage today at the TEDconference. But instead of giving the standard talk, he answered questions from TED’s Chris Anderson and Whitney Pennington Rodgers.
For most of the interview, Dorsey outlined steps that Twitter has taken to combat abuse and misinformation, but Anderson explained why the company’s critics sometimes find those steps so insufficient and unsatisfying. He compared Twitter to the Titanic, and Dorsey to the captain, listening to passenge

KZen is about to release ZenGo, a mobile app to manage your cryptocurrencies securely and more easily. There are already countless crypto wallets out there, but the startup thinks they’re all either too complicated or too insecure.
If you own cryptocurrencies, chances are they’re sitting on an exchange, such as Coinbase or Binance. If somebody manages to log in to your account, nothing is stopping them from sending those assets to other wallets and stealing everything.
Worse, if some

Logitechhas a long history of serving AV nerds with its advanced line of universal remotes. In an age of eight million set-top boxes, dongles and video-on-demand services, the Harmony line has done a good job streamlining users’ needs into a single device.
As the name suggests, the Harmony Express isn’t designed for as serious a crowd as its predecessors. In fact, the new remote skips the more advanced stuff like touchscreens in order to let Alexa do the heavy lifting.
Amazon’s

“Allegory does not reinforce reality. It obscures it,” Hugo Award-winning science fiction novelist N.K. Jemisin wrote in a recent Twitter thread. Her point in the thread is that science fiction writers have often invested in allegories about racism and oppression. Mutants are persecuted in fiction just like black people or gay people are persecuted in real life; aliens colonize Earth like the UK colonized other countries. Yet, Jemisin says, there are still few characters of color an

Apple’s latest macOS software update may have made your 2018 MacBook Air’s display brighter. Those who eventually install the update might be pleasantly surprised to find that their laptop’s Retina display is suddenly 100 nits brighter than it was before, for a new total of 400 nits brightness.The brightness change has been confirmed by users on Reddit and MacRumors; Apple’s recent macOS 10.14.4 update released on March 25th “corrects the default screen brightness&

On Tuesday, former Maryland representative and 2020 presidential candidate John Delaney announced a plan to create an independent agency to address national cybersecurity threats.The proposed Department of Cybersecurity would be led by a cabinet-level secretary who would be in charge of implementing the United States’ cybersecurity strategy. The proposal is the first major cybersecurity push from any presidential candidate so far this cycle.In a press release, Delaney argued that the US&r

Apple’s temporary store on Fifth Avenue has been dealing with bed bugs for several weeks, according to a report by the New York Post. Despite the infestation, employees and shoppers have been allowed into the store without any warnings.
The first bed bug was spotted overnight at the 24-hour store about three to four weeks ago, on a table on the second floor. The table was cordoned off while business carried on as usual, leaving the bed bug to potentially make its way to an unwitting custo

With its KubernetesEngine (GKE), GoogleCloud has long offered a managed service for running containers on its platform. Kubernetes users tend to have a variety of needs, but so far, Google only offered a single tier of GKE that wasn’t necessarily geared toward the high-end enterprise users the company is trying to woo. Today, however, the company announced a new advanced edition of GKE that introduces a number of new features and an enhanced financially backed SLA, additional security tool

Waymo’s ride-hail app is now available in the Google Play Store for Android users, but don’t download it expecting to summon a self-driving car right away.Waymo, the self-driving unit of Google parent Alphabet, officially launched its first commercial autonomous taxi service in the cities surrounding Phoenix late last year. But the app that riders use to summon one of Waymo’s self-driving minivans was only available via a private link in an emailed invitation. Now anyone can d

Twitter is gearing up for Avengers: Endgame with 40 new emoji that celebrate almost every single Marvel Cinematic Universe hero — even those who were snapped away by Thanos.Marvel Studios partnered with pop artist Truck Torrence to create the Twitter emoji seen in the photo below. The obvious superheroes are there — Iron Man, Captain America, Hulk, Black Widow, Thor, and Hawkeye — along with newcomers like the cast of Black Panther, Captain Marvel, and Thanos himself. Most imp

Facebook acquired Instagram for $1 billion in 2012, and in the seven years since, the photo sharing app has gone from just that — a place to share photos with friends — to an entire video, photo, and shopping ecosystem unto itself. That transition hasn’t been seamless.
Today, we learned a little more about why. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Instagram co-founders Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger didn’t agree on the app’s future, and that’s why the duo left th

Russian lawmakers are moving ahead with a proposal to take further control over internet traffic in the country, The Associated Press reports.
Under the proposal, Russian internet traffic would be required to be sent through servers in the country, according to the AP, giving the country more leverage to surveil and censor information. The bill was approved by the State Duma, and it will now head to the upper legislative chamber before going to President Putin’s desk for a signature.Russi

Spoilers ahead for Game of Thrones, season 8, episode 1, “Winterfell.”As we near the end of Game of Thrones, there are still a few huge mysteries left unsolved. The audience still knows relatively little about the White Walkers. Their origins were revealed in season 6, but the extent of their powers hasn’t been explained, nor have the mysterious symbols they leave behind in their bloodshed. The season 8 premiere, “Winterfell,” prominently features one of these symb

A rigorous new study of workplace wellness programs suggests that they may not be as effective as employers hope, at least in the short term. Employees assigned to receive wellness training did become more conscious of diet and exercise, but didn’t score better on various health measures or spend less on health care.The 80 percent of large US employers that offer workplace wellness programs hope that the benefit will be a win-win situation. The programs (which usually include health asses

Savage has released a major update for the iPad illustration app Procreate today, adding long-awaited features like the ability to add text and create animations. The update will come with standard iOS fonts, plus three additional typefaces. Artists will also be able to add their own custom fonts. New Layer Export options come with an Export to GIF feature, which let artists create looping animations with frame rates from 0.1 to 60 frames per second.
A text tool feature is a major game-changing

There has never been a device with the number of accessories that the Game Boy had. As the first mainstream portable game console, the Game Boy had the kind of user base to support a vast hardware ecosystem, and it came into being at just the right time to need those kinds of accessories to offer a complete experience. It was a perfect storm of hardware that resulted in some of the most varied add-ons ever made for a console. Looking back, there have been roughly two categories that Game Boy ac

Zoom,the developer of video conferencing software, plans to list its shares on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol “ZM” at between $33 and $35 apiece, per an updated S-1 filing. The company has also announced plans to sell $100 million in Class A shares to Salesforce Ventures at the initial public offering price.
The latest price range is a step up from Zoom’s earlier plans to charge between $28 and $32 per share.
Zoom plans to sell 9,911,434 shares of Class A common stock in th

Nintendo has turned the mini-console into a trend, with the likes of Sony and Sega following suit. Now, game publisher Capcom is getting in on the action as well. Today, the company announced the Capcom Home Arcade, a plug-and-play system designed to play classic arcade games on your TV. It includes 16 built-in games and a fairly authentic-looking arcade control setup. Curiously, the whole device is in the shape of the Capcom logo.
The device connects to your TV via HDMI and is powered by a sim

Apple might be about to “Sherlock” another app in macOS 10.15. The company is reportedly working on enabling native support to use a connected iPad as an external display for a Mac, in what might render popular third-party options like Luna or Duet Display obsolete, according to 9to5Mac.The feature — referred to internally as “Sidecar” — is part of a new window management system coming in macOS 10.15. Users will be able to hover over the green maximize button

When the creators of Mousr, an autonomous cat toy, launched their crowdfunding campaign in 2013, they hoped it would either be a clear viral hit or an obvious failure.
“The goal was $100,000. We raised $117,000,” says Dave Cohen, one of the co-founders. “We got pretty much as middle of the road as we could.”
Still, the team took the cash and began work on their product. They anticipated shipping within a year of launch, but backers ultimately didn’t receive their c