TikTok Deal in Trump Jeopardy; Facebook Will Let People Claim Image Ownership; Amazon ‘Sidewalk’ Neighborhood Network; Apple’s U1Chip Plans

After it came out that Oracle and Walmart would take a minority share of TikTok in the US and host the service here, the latest from Reuters is that Donald Trump has said his administration will turn thumbs-down on the deal. Trump is insisting that a US company or companies have total control or else. He is not only doing this in his continuing squabble with China, but apparently is also still angry that young people on the platform put in for some one million tickets to his Oklahoma rally earlier this year (and of course, didn’t show up…so the crowd was much smaller than he expected.) It appears that he doesn’t understand that many of the younger users already bailed from TikTok to other platforms when he first said he would ban it, so shutting it down in the US will do nothing to stop any further shenanigans by young folks involving his campaign, should they choose to troll him further.

Facebook has updated policy to give people more control over the images they own, and ‘where they end up.’ According to theverge.com, the company is starting to work with some partners today to give them power to claim ownership of images, then moderate where those images show up on Facebook’s platforms…including Instagram. Eventually, the plan isn to open this feature to everyone, as i the car with music and video rights. No timeline for that has been forthcoming from Facebook at this point. To claim their copyright, the image rights holder uploads a CSV file to Facebook’s Rights Manager that contains all the image’s metadata. They’ll also specify where the copyright applies and can leave certain territories out. Once the manager verifies that the metadata and image match, it’ll then process that image and monitor where it shows up.

Amazon has disclosed more detail about its Sidewalk network, the low-bandwidth, long-distance wireless protocol it developed to help connect smart devices inside and outside of your home. Techcrunch.com reports that in the near future, Echo units will become Bluetooth bridges for the sidewalk network later this year, and some Ring Floodlight and Spotlight cams will also be part of the network. Tile will become the first 3rd party device to use the Sidewalk network when it launches a comparable tracker…supposedly coming soon.

It was noted last week that Apple has included its U1 ultra-sideband chip in the new Watch 6. There has been much speculation over what the chip will be used for. Now, in a new leak, it appears that the upcoming AirPods Studio headphones will also have the chip. Macrumors.com says it can not only be used to sense the position of the headphones…so they will send left audio to your left ear and right to right no matter how you put them on, and locate the ‘cans’ with the Find My app, but the chip allows other applications…like directional detection of other in-range U1 devices. Apple had already disclosed that the chip will enable the next generation of digital car keys, and improved AirDrop. Besides the Watch, and the upcoming AirPods Studio, the chip is already in the iPhone 11 series, and is expected to be in the new iPhone 12 models.