Many digital wellness books, programs and apps encourage commonsense behavioral changes – say, leaving your phone outside your room when you go to sleep – aimed to help people regain control of their time in a digital economy designed to drip feed information and dopamine in return for our data and attention.
But as this burgeoning movement becomes an industry, some worry that the “wellness” approach and its emphasis on personal responsibility is whitewashing deeper structural issues within the tech industry.
An iPod that’s just for music—updated to work with the streaming Apple Music service, perhaps—might help us create space away from our phones, laptops, and tablets. In an era that’s seen new minimalist phones and wild demand for totally offline “classic” consoles from Nintendo, a revival doesn’t seem particularly unreasonable. Amazon still makes Kindle e-readers, after all: They’re less “functional” than the Kindle Fire tablet, perhaps, but there’s a reason many people prefer to read e-books on them.
So, bring back the clickwheel.
Microsoft has updated the Seeing AI app for iOS users today, further expanding its feature set for those who are blind or with low vision. The update now allows users to tap an object captured from the camera to hear a description of the item. Additionally, the app now works natively on the iPad, giving users a larger display canvas to use as well as enabling the app to be used at work or in schools where cellular devices might not be permitted.
Though Seeing AI has a small audience of users, its evolution points to how the rest of us might use AI-powered technology like vision recognition in the future. Already much of the tech that people use today, from the computer mouse to text-to-speech software to predictive text, even the typewriter, has its roots in disability research.
The company is racing to secure movies and TV shows to offer alongside its own original videos and is offering concessions to get deals done by a Friday deadline, according to people familiar with the matter. Pay-TV programmers such as HBO, Showtime and Starz have to decide whether Apple is an existential threat, as some now view Netflix, a potential partner or something in between.
Although the Google Home and Alexa smart home ecosystems might be larger, there's something to be said for an ecosystem of products that all work together perfectly. Apple's HomeKit is the ideal smart home ecosystem to base your smart home around if you prefer a more carefully curated selection of smart home products. All HomeKit compatible products are vetted by Apple and made to work seamlessly together with the same ease that the Mac, iPhone, and Apple Watch all work together.
Of course, the HomeKit ecosystem is already pretty big, and it's only getting bigger, so it can be tough to find the right devices for your smart home. That is why we've put together this guide — to help you find the perfect HomeKit devices for your needs.
If you're already using Apple's HomeKit platform to control your smart home devices and want to spice things up with some colorful mood lighting, the Eve Light Strip is a solid choice. It delivers relatively bright lighting with bold colors and a good range of warm and cool whites, and it reacts instantly to Siri voice commands. Installation is quick and easy as well.
You’re never too old to learn to play a musical instrument, but finding a tutor and the time for lessons is another matter. If working with a personal teacher isn’t an option for you — or your interest in noodling around on a guitar, a piano or another instrument is still at the casual level — turn to your laptop or mobile device to learn the basics in your own time and space. Here are a few ways to get started.
Delegation enables team members to assign emails to one another, with optional due dates attached, and follow the progress of those emails over time. It's a feature that addresses well the workflows a manager or executive may have with their assistant or other team members.
Have you ever wanted to just jump into a sketch? Morpholio has enabled that with AR SketchWalk, an augmented reality application that lets you walk around inside the images that you create, like cruising through real-world blueprints.
You can’t predict what Apple will do or what Apple will want. But if you keep grinding out a solid experience for your users, you’ll be in the position to take advantage of opportunities. It’s like catching a literal wave. If you’re out in the water getting good at swimming and surfing, you’ll be in the right place and have the skills needed to ride that wave when it comes. But you can’t just run out into the water after you see that wave coming in, it’ll be too late! And you probably wouldn’t know what to do with it anyways!
Apple says The Singapore University of Technology and Design and RMIT Online have both launched app development courses based on its App Development with Swift Curriculum. Further, Pathlight School, which is Singapore’s first autism-focused school, will also offer a Swift Accelorator program.
Spotify has filed an official complaint against Apple in Europe, contending that Apple unfairly limits choice and competition through the rules of its app store.
[...]
Ek insisted that Spotify was not “seeking special treatment” and that “this is not a Spotify-versus-Apple issue.” He said Spotifying was requesting that “the same fair set of rules and restrictions” be applied to everyone – including Apple’s own Apple Music – and that app store users be given a choice of payment systems.
I appreciate Senator Warren raising these issues; they are indeed critical not only for the world today, but also the world we wish to create in the future. That, though, only increases the importance of getting things right: the history, the fundamental problem, and the nature of tech. Only then can we start to grope for solutions that actually make the situation better rather than worse.
A major operational error by GoDaddy, Apple, and Google has resulted in the issuance of at least 1 million browser-trusted digital certificates that don’t comply with binding industry mandates. The number of non-compliant certificates may be double that number, and other browser-trusted authorities are also likely to be affected.
[...]
Both Apple and Google use their publicly trusted authorities to issue certificates for use internally and by affiliated organizations. Caudill said additional certificate authorities may also be affected.
I still find working with computers -- programming, scripting, configuring -- is still so much easier and more fun than working with people. That's me.
But I can forsee, with AI and machine-learning and all that stuff coming down the pipeline, working with computers may not be fun anymore.
Of course, when that day arrive, I'll probably be long dead.
~
Thanks for reading.