Facebook Freshens Pages; Google Plans New Line of Nest Cams; EV Maker Rivian Snags More Cash; Amazon Buys Jets

Facebook has freshened Pages, which is used by celebrities, businesses, politicians and other public figures to interact with their fans and customers. The cleaner design will lose the total number of likes, and make the profile picture more prominent. It also will be easier for the owners to switch from their public page and personal page. A new feature will allow people to host a Q&A on their page. 

Nest Cam models are showing up out of stock, and we previously reported that the FCC has a filing for a new device, thought to be a new Nest Hub. Now, Google has revealed it is planning a “new lineup of security cameras for 2021.” With the partnership they made last Summer with ADT, expect them to offer a new security solution where professional techs will “sell and install devices like Nest Cameras and Nest Hub Max.” We could see the new Google Smart Display and the new cams in the next couple months. 

Electric pickup startup Rivian is about to nail down new financing that will bring its valuation up to $25 billion. Bloomberg notes that Ford (which is an earlier investor in Rivian) is only valued at $33 billion! It seems like a crazy valuation for a company that has yet to release a product, but bear in mind that Amazon has an order of 100,000 electric vans from the company. 

Amazon has been bulking up on logistics for years, even leasing a fleet of jets in 2016 and a hub for them. Now, according to theverge.com, they have bought 11 used Boeing 767-300 jets from Delta and WestJet. This will bring their air fleet up to 85 planes by 2022. Amazon already delivers over half the packages in the US, and is seeking to free themselves of the need to use FedEx and UPS…doing it all themselves. Amazon does say it will continue to rely on third-party carriers to operate the new aircraft. 

Microsoft Looks to Unify Mail Apps with ‘One Outlook’; Dell Laptops Auto Webcam Shutter; Apple to ‘Phase 2’ of AR Glasses Prototype; FCC-New Google Device…Nest Hub?

Microsoft appears poised to replace its numerous versions of mail with ‘One Outlook.’ Zdnet.com reports that the new single version of Outlook will replace Windows 10 Mail and Calendar apps, as well as its legacy Win 32 Outlook client with a single Outlook client for both Windows and Mac. Right now, it’s a project code named ‘Project Monarch.’ It is apparently designed to be better for larger screen experiences. According to Windows Central, we could see a preview of ‘One Outlook’ by late 2021, but it won’t replace the built-in Mail and calendar apps in Windows 10 until some time in 2022.

In a better answer for laptop cams with all the web meetings going on during the pandemic, Dell’s latest Latitude business laptops are featuring a webcam shutter to physically block your cam when it’s not in use. According to theverge.com, this will be fully automated…a nice upgrade from the shutters you have to slide manually, or the infamous post it notes that everyone from you and I to Zuckerberg have been using to cover the damned things when not in use! There are also ‘mute’ keys to manually mute the mic or cam as needed. The 14 inch 9420 will be $1949. No pricing for the 15.6 inch 95s0 yet. Release is ‘this Spring.

 Dell is also rolling out new monitors this month, including 3 that will be the first ones certified for Microsoft Teams. They feature a Teams button that will quickly launch the app to make and receive video calls. Hands free commands are also supported via Cortana and the built-in microphone. Prices range from $519.99 for a 24 inch model up to $1149 for a curved 34 inch model. Those drop on February 16th. 

Apple is readying to hit the ‘2nd phase of development’ for their augmented reality glasses prototype. Macrumors.com says this comes from a paywalled preview in a DigiTimes story. It is thought that Apple may release an AR headset this year…in fact, analyst Ming-Chi Kuo mentioned this in a piece a few days ago, saying Apple suppliers are gearing up for an unspecified Apple AR device this year. The latest thinking is that we could see an AR headset this year, and possibly the finished version of Apple AR glasses in 2022.

A new Filing with the FCC points to a new device, called an ‘Interactive Device’, as meaning a new Nest Hub Smart Display is on the way. According to 9to5google.com, Google has used ‘Interactive’ in describing smart displays and speakers up to now. The device has Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and Zigbee. Zigbee is a big tell, as that is used by a number of smart home devices. The Nest Hub Max is over a year old, and the Home/Nest Hub is more than 2 years old, so it’s a good bet that this is a replacement with display to one of those. 

Alphabet-Google Workers Look to Unionizing; Samsung Unpacked Date Announced; Backdoor in Zyxel Firewalls & VPNs; Freshened Tesla Model X Spotted

Over 200 Google and Alphabet employees have announced plans to form a union. Techcrunch.com reports that the union is the CWA, Communication Workers of America, and it’s part of the union’s campaign to organize digital employees. The Alphabet Workers Union seeks to be open to both employees and contractors. The bulk of the employees are based in the San Francisco Bay Area. Kickstarter and Glitch unionized last year. We are also hearing of moves to unionize at Apple. 

The next Samsung event will be January 14th at 7am Pacific, and the company will be showing off the latest and greatest Galaxy flagship phones….likely to be the S21. S21 Plus, and S21 Ultra. Theverge.com notes there have already been massive leaks about the phones, but there are always a few things that haven’t been leaked out. Samsung teased with ‘Welcome to the Everyday Epic.’ We’ll have details here after the presentation on the 14th.

In a troubling discovery, a backdoor account has been found in more than 100,000 Zyxel firewalls and VPN gateways. Zdnet.com says there’s a hard-coded, admin-level backdoor account that grants attackers root access using either the SSH interface or the web admin panel. The backdoor was found by a team of Dutch security researchers from Eye Control. It doesn’t get much worse than this! If you use anything from Zyxel, update your system asap! Patches are already available for a number of their devices. 

A Tesla Model S with some styling changes was spotted in Palo Alto over the weekend. Mashable.com reports that EV YouTube channel  https://www.youtube.com/c/TheKilowatts/featured posted video and have a running description of the vehicle. It has more aggressive headlights and rear styling, among other things. This comes on the heels of Tesla announcing that they delivered 499,550 vehicles in 2020, just barely under the 500,000 they had been shooting for. Final numbers may be as much as .5% more, which would put them over the top. 2020 was an exceptional year for the EV maker….shares were up 743%!