Everything Else
News: Google Is Deadly Serious About Taking on Apple's iPhone
Looking past the obvious visual similarities between the iPhone 7 and Google's new Pixel phones, there are several indications that the search giant had Apple in its sights as they released their latest flagships. For once, this isn't an Android phone we're talking about, it's a Google phone—and it showcases Google's latest strategy.
News: WhatsApp Is Now Sharing Your Data with Facebook, but Opting Out Doesn't Solve the Problem
When Facebook purchased WhatsApp for $19.3 billion back in 2014, we all knew this was coming—it just took longer than we thought. But starting today, the data mining became official, and now, information from your favorite messaging app is no longer out of reach for the world's biggest social media site.
News: Google Finally Launches Duo—Here's Why You Should Give the New Video Chat App a Try
Google's new cross-platform video chat app, Duo, is finally making its debut today, following a long waiting period that began in late May. The app was heavily teased during the keynote speech at Google I/O, but was not made available for download until now, so any early hype Google managed to whip up has died down quite a bit.
News: MIT's Temporary Tattoos Turn Your Skin into a Touchpad
We're inching closer towards the singularity—that point where technology advances to the steepest slope of the logistic function S-curve and simply skyrockets at a rate we've never seen before. Somewhere along the way, the line between humans and the tech we rely on will become blurred, and MIT's latest project might very well be a step in that direction.
News: At Last, Someone Came Up with a Way to Run Android on an iPhone
A developer from a firm named Tendigi came up with a way to run Android Marshmallow 6.0.1 on an iPhone 6 Plus, and it's pretty awesome. The hack is the brainchild of Nick Lee, who had previously installed Windows 95 on an Apple Watch, and you can see it in action below.
News: T-Mobile Is Giving Away Free Stuff Every Tuesday
T-Mobile is going for broke. The carrier recently announced it will be giving away free stuff to its customers every Tuesday through a new app called T-Mobile Tuesdays for Android and iOS, and that's in addition to one share of stock and free in-flight Wi-Fi. The app will give out "food, movie tickets, gift cards, subscriptions, ridesharing, and more," the announcement said. You just have to be the primary account holder and you're good to go. One person will win a huge prize every Tuesday, l...
News: 72 New Emojis Are Coming—These 5 Didn't Make the Cut
The Unicode Consortium just unveiled 72 new emojis that will be included in the upcoming Unicode 9.0 release, but we're not here to talk about the winners. Instead, let's take a look at the five poor emojis that will have to wait until at least next year to join the Unicode roster.
News: Facebook Messenger Brings 1,500 Diverse Emoji to Its App
In an effort to be more inclusive, Facebook will release over 1,500 ethnic and gender diverse emojis for its Messenger app across all platforms on June 2nd, 2016. The update includes the usual emoji diversity inclusions, such as skin tone choice for faces and hand gestures, and widened gender roles such as female police officers, surfers, and runners, to name just a few, along with fancier "gender-agnostic" options. Beyond the diversity choices themselves, the update will allow you to set a c...
News: I Ditched My iPhone for Windows & Went Right Back After 100 Days
I've been an iPhone user in the iOS ecosystem for years now after a brief stint in the Android realm. But, I'm also enthusiastic about varying forms of technology in general; I realize that iOS is far from perfect and that healthy market competition is beneficial for all. So, naturally being curious about other platforms, I decided to take Windows Phone for an extended trial run.
News: Angry Birds Movie Wants You to Break Out Your Smartphone in the Theater
Having your phone on during a movie is a major annoyance to the majority of moviegoers, a fact that some theaters learned the hard way. One major film release is taking a different approach, however, and actively encouraging you to turn on your smartphone—during the end credits, at least. That film would be The Angry Birds Movie, and it's hitting theaters on Friday, May 20th, 2016. Rovio and Sony have been heavily promoting this upcoming 3D animated comedy, and the two worked closely together...
News: Google's New Duo App Will Change the Way You Video Chat with Friends
Google I/O is like Christmas for smartphone fans. At their annual developer's conference, the Mountain View search giant gave us a glimpse of what they've been working on over the past year—and they've been quite busy, to say the least.
News: Google's New Group Messaging App Is Like Pinterest & Hangouts in One
Google is launching a new app called Spaces that lets you share things from the web with small groups of people. The aim of Spaces appears to be granting you a forum with like-minded people to help cut down on off-topic comments that can steer a conversation off the rails. Spaces comes with Google Search, Chrome, and YouTube built in, so you won't need to switch apps to go hunting for interesting content to share. You can invite people to your groups—or "spaces" as they're called in the app—b...
News: Do the Absolute Bare Minimum This Mother's Day with These Hangouts Easter Eggs
Google adds Easter eggs to Hangouts from time to time, and they're marking Mother's Day this weekend with the addition of three pop-up animations.
News: Big Changes in Apple Music Will Fix Some Annoyances (But Not All)
Apple is planning to completely overhaul its Apple Music streaming service this summer, and is expected to unveil the changes at its Worldwide Developers Conference in June, according to reports from Bloomberg and 9to5Mac.
News: Facebook Is Taking Snapchat Head-On with Disappearing Messages & Pictures
Facebook Messenger is getting ready to roll out a Snapchat-esque feature that will let users send messages that self-destruct after a certain amount of time, so you'll have an extra level of security when you need to send sensitive financial information or, more likely, risqué texts or images.
UnaPhone Zenith: The No-Google, Super-Secure Android Phone
With the FBI getting access to iPhones, and apps like Waze being used to track people's locations, you've got to wonder just how safe and secure your smartphone is... or isn't. When you consider everything you do on your phone, from taking and sharing pictures to mobile banking, keeping your information safe is a crucial step that may seem out of your hands.
News: Google Trips Is Like Yelp, TripAdvisor, & Your Itinerary All Rolled into One (Download Inside)
According to sources, Google has been working on a travel app for some time, and now it has a name: Google Trips. Google Trips aims to be the all-in-one place to go for travel information about your trip. It hasn't been officially announced, but from the leaks that have come out so far, think of it like Yelp, TripAdvisor, and your itinerary in one.
News: How to Use BlackBerry's Video Calling on Android & iOS
BlackBerry announced in April that they included a beta of their video messaging service in BBM for Android and BBM for iOS for users in the United States and Canada. Well, it's finally spread to other parts of the world. Latin America, the Middle East, Europe, Africa, and the Asia-Pacific region all have access to BBM video calls.
News: 10 Ways iOS Beats Android
I've been an Android user almost as long as the operating system has existed, so when I received my first iPhone in April, I felt like I was in a foreign land. Sure, it runs most of the apps I'm used to, and the phone itself feels about the same in my hand as any similarly-sized device, but everything else is just different.
News: 10 Things Android Users Hate About iPhones
I'm an Android user. Over the course of the past seven years, I've owned ten different smartphones—all of them powered by Android. This isn't due to some blind trust in Google or some unfounded hate for Apple, either, because I've always made sure to get my hands on each iPhone iteration along the way to see what it had to offer.
News: You Can Now Host a 50-Person Group Call on Facebook Messenger
Facebook just added another feature to Messenger as part of its quest to have their service become an all-encompassing communications app. This feature lets you make free group calls using Messenger's VoIP service, and you can chat with up to 50 people at once.
It's Finally Here: Reddit Releases Official Apps
Reddit announced this morning, April 7th, that it has finally released an official mobile app. You can get it on Android and iOS.
News: Facebook Is Going All in on Live Video Streaming on Your Phone
It looks like Facebook is adding a "Live" tab to the navigation bar for its Android app, and the feature has already been turned on for at least one user. A screenshot uploaded by Niko Steele shows the new feature, which lets you search for and watch live video directly on the Facebook app. Right now, you need to already be friends with a person who is streaming or be following a page or personality to receive a notification that live video has started. Some pages will post about an upcoming ...
News: Verizon Takes Greed to New Levels with an Additional $20 Upgrade Fee
Wireless contracts and phone-buying programs continue to become more and more confusing. As if you didn't have enough to worry about with regards to the rising costs of services and the elimination of contracts with mobile providers, Verizon Wireless will soon institute a new charge that puts the grub in "money-grubbing." Sadly, this isn't one of those April's Fools pranks that are running rampant on the web today. Starting next week, the largest mobile phone provider in the United States wil...
News: LG's New Wireless Charger Is Three Times Faster Than Other Wireless Chargers
Innotek, an LG subsidiary, announced today (link is in Korean) that it has developed a 15-watt wireless charging module that can recharge a battery three times faster than other wireless chargers available on the market.
News: Finally, a Tangle-Less USB Cord You Can Store in Your Wallet
Computer cables tangle and get in the way, but Mobile Accessory Project hopes to solve that with CONNEX, a flat cable shaped like a credit card which expands up to 1.5 feet.
News: Nintendo's First Mobile Game Is Really, Really Bad
Nintendo rolls out its first smartphone-specific game in the U.S. on March 21st, and the main protagonist is... you. Well, your Mii, and it's not a game, but a social app.
News: This Device Can Turn Your Smartphone into a 3D Printer
3D printers have been surging in popularity for both professional and personal applications, and now OLO is on the verge of making 3D printing practical wherever you go. Their eponymous 3D printer is battery-powered and uses the light from your smartphone's screen to create 3D objects out of special "daylight" resins.
News: How to Get Unlimited YouTube & Google Play Movies on T-Mobile
Google dropped its opposition to T-Mobile's Binge On service due to some favorable policy changes at the magenta carrier. From now on, YouTube and Google Play Movies will happily work with the feature. Binge On rolled out late last year, allowing many customers to receive unlimited video streaming at 480p. That's not a great offer if you care about video quality, but it's nice if you want to save money.
News: Instagram's About to Become as Annoying as Facebook
We're so used to seeing things in particular ways that anything different just doesn't make sense to our brains. Culturally, we like to read things from left to right, and from top to bottom. Change that and our brains struggle to adjust.
News: After Weeks of Controversy, President Obama Finally Speaks Out About Smartphone Privacy
With the DOJ attempting to rip Apple a new one and an Apple attorney firing back, the President offered his opinion on the recent encryption debacle between the FBI and Apple at SXSW, amidst some talk about the direction of today's tech industry.
News: Your Smartphone's Fingerprint Scanner Can Easily Be 'Hacked' with a Printer
Using a fingerprint scanner to keep intruders out of your phone might not be as secure as you think. Two researchers from Michigan State University, Kai Cao and Anil K. Jain, developed a relatively cheap and effective way to beat fingerprint readers, and successfully tested their method on a Samsung Galaxy S6 and Huawei Honor 7.
News: Google Will Soon Let You Pay for Things with Your Face
Google has begun the testing phase for its new Hands Free app that lets you pay at participating locations without having to even take your phone out of your pocket.
News: Save Money with These Awesome Freebies from Your Cellular Provider
Cellular carriers like to nickel-and-dime us out of every bit of money they can feasibly justify, so as consumers, we owe it to ourselves to make sure that we're getting our money's worth.
News: This Cable Can Charge Both Androids & iPhones
We've all been there—you're away from home, your phone's battery is quickly nearing zero, and you forgot to bring your charger. "Hey, does anybody have an iPhone charger?" you ask. Crickets. If you could understand cricket-speak, you'd know that they too were saying "Sorry, bud. We're all on Android."
From 0 to 100% in 15 Minutes: The Fastest Phone Charger Ever
Chinese tech company OPPO has been on the cutting edge of smartphone battery charging since it released its VOOC Flash Charge in 2014. Using VOOC, you can charge your battery from 0-75% in 30 minutes.
News: How to Create Your Own Geofilters on Snapchat
Snapchat's Geofilters add a little flair to Snapchat, giving you the option to dress up your Snaps based on where you took them. They're so popular, in fact, that we even showed you how to pull Geofilters from locations outside of where you are.
News: Bing Update for Android & iOS Shows Gas Prices & Deals in Your Area
Microsoft is working hard to make Bing a good alternative to Google for more than just looking up images of the "human anatomy" that Google and a lot of other search engines filter out of their results.
News: eBay Vulnerability Allows Scammers to Attack Android & iOS with Malicious Programs
Researchers have discovered a "severe vulnerability" that allows attackers to use eBay to distribute malware, and the online auction company has no plans to fix the problem.
News: Microsoft Announces Acquisition of SwiftKey
Microsoft announced Wednesday morning that it has entered into an agreement to acquire SwiftKey, makers of the SwiftKey predictive keyboard and its SDK that runs on over 300 million Android and iOS smartphones, for about $250 million.