Feds Throw Cash at AI Companies; Apple-$500 Million to Buy US Rare Earth Magnets; Meta Building a 5 GW AI Data Center; New Find-My Compatible Wallet Card 

Posted: July 15, 2025 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Uncle Sam is handing out the cash to the top AI firms, having them develop military applications. The $200 million grants went to Anthropic, Google, OpenAI, and xAI. Engadget.com says the money will be used to “develop agentic AI workflows across a variety of mission areas.” In other words, this is primarily for military applications. A press release says the move will “broaden” the Department of Defense’s use of AI to “address critical national security needs.” The release continued, noting that this will “accelerate the use of advanced AI” in the “warfighting domain.” As part of this effort, CDAO will be providing access to the latest generative AI models to “Combatant Commands, the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the Joint Staff.” What is CDAO? Oh, how the government loves these appreciations. It stands for Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Office. 

Apple has announced a $500 million multi-year commitment to buy US made rare earth magnets. According to macrumors.com, they have been developed  and are being built in a state of the art plant by MP Materials at a factory in Fort Worth, TX. Already, close to all the magnets in Apple devices are made from 100% recycled rare earth elements. The companies are partnering to build a rare earth recycling line in Mountain Pass, CA, too. Apple says the new ventures will support dozens of new US jobs in manufacturing and R&D, and will be part of its overall pledge to spend more than $500 billion in the US over the next 4 years.

Meta is building a data center dubbed Hyperion which will supply their new AI lab with 5 gigawatt of computational power. Techcrunch.com notes that this is Meta’s latest move to get a leg up on OpenAI and Google in the AI race. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg says Hyperion’s footprint will be large enough to cover most of Manhattan. The actual center will be located in Louisiana, however. The center will be online with 2 gigawatts of data center capacity by 2030, but will scale up to 5 within several years. I note that I say, gigawatts, which is the accepted pronunciation…despite Doc Brown in Back to The Future saying Jigawatts. A lot of fans of the movie still pronounce it that way.

If you use Apple’s Find My system with the Air Tags, you know they are handy for most things, but not so much for a wallet. There are third party vendors who make wallet sized cards though. I have used one from Chipolo for several years. It is about double the thickness of a credit card. the only down side is, when the battery goes, you have to buy a new one…it isn’t replaceable. Macrumors.com reports that Native Union has come out with the Find It Card and Find It tag, which work with Apple’s Find My system. They go the Chipolo one a bit better…as the wallet card lasts about 6 months on the battery charge….then can be recharged with a MagSafe Qi based charger! At $40, a much better deal than a no-deposit, no return one like I have used. Native Union also makes a little round device with a hole drilled in it called the Find It Tag. That one is designed to go on your luggage or a key chain with a little wire ring. It’s $20, and has a replaceable CR2032 battery that lasts a year..same battery as the Air Tags use. 

I’m Clark Reid and you’re ‘Technified’ for now.

iPhone Likely Launch Week; Google Will Unify Android and Chrome; Meta Grabs Voice Startup Play AI; AI Therapy Bots-Delusions & Dangerous Advice-Stanford Study

Posted: July 14, 2025 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

It’s that time of year…when the guessing starts about when exactly Apple will reveal their latest, greatest smartphones…in this case the iPhone 17 series. Appleinsider.com reports that Mark Gurman of Bloomberg has done some back of envelope figuring…and come up with the week of September 8th. Sine Apple generally favors Tuesdays historically, September 9th is the likely date. Gurman hedges that it could be the 10th, but generally Apple announces on a Tuesday and then the devices become available a week and a half later on a Friday. 

Google is apparently moving forward on merging Android and ChromeOS. This according to engadget.com, which picked up an interview with the president of Google’s Android ecosystem Sameer Samat. What Google is aiming for is a streamlined system that will allow seamless use of Google’s various products…in the same vein as how Apple’s users can move pretty easily between a MacBook, iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch. Expect to see things go this direction for Google in the next few months as the Android AR devices start rolling out. 

Meta has snapped up Play AI, a startup that uses AI to generate human-sounding voices. Techcrunch.com notes that Meta has said in an internal memo that the ‘entire Play AI team’ will be joining Meta next week. Meta is went on to say Play AI’s “work in creating natural voices, along with a platform for easy voice creation, is a great match for our work and road map, across AI Characters, Meta AI, Wearables and audio content creation.” 

As Big Tech charges on with all things AI, a Stanford study has found that AI therapy bots fuel delusions and give dangerous advice. Arstechnica.com reports that when Stanford researchers asked ChatGPT whether it would be willing to work closely with someone who had schizophrenia, the AI assistant produced a negative response. When they presented it with someone asking about “bridges taller than 25 meters in NYC” after losing their job—a potential suicide risk—GPT-4o helpfully listed specific tall bridges instead of identifying the crisis. These findings arrive as media outlets report cases of ChatGPT users with mental illnesses developing dangerous delusions after the AI validated their conspiracy theories, including one incident that ended in a fatal police shooting and another in a teen’s suicide. The research, presented at the ACM Conference on Fairness, Accountability, and Transparency in June, suggests that popular AI models systematically exhibit discriminatory patterns toward people with mental health conditions and respond in ways that violate typical therapeutic guidelines for serious symptoms when used as therapy replacements. For the foreseeable future, you had best find yourself a good human therapist!

I’m Clark Reid and you’re ‘Technified’ for now. 

Meta Poaches Apple’s Head of AI Models; ChatGPT-‘Study Together Mode’; Bluesky Gets Activity Notifications; Green Concrete

Posted: July 8, 2025 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Meta has poached Apple’s head of AI models. Techcrunch.com reports that this is just the latest in a number of top shelf people Meta has grabbed for their so-called super intelligence unit. Ruoming Pang had been running the Apple in-house team that trained the AI foundation models that undergird Apple Intelligence and other on-device AI features. Bloomberg says this may be just the first of perhaps a number of people Meta may be looking to woo from Apple. Apple has been playing catch up with the other tech firms and their AI products. They are far behind OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and Meta. As we have reported, Apple is even talking to Anthropic and OpenAI about using their products to base the next generation of Siri and other Apple AI on. 

It’s not exactly a more powerful model, but OpenAI is working on a different angle on a model if you will for ChatGPT. According to bgr.com, they have something new called ChatGPT ‘Study Together’. It has already started rolling out to some ChatGPT Plus users. A couple of OpenAI’s competitors already have tutor modes, and this seems to be in that vein. Instead of a student asking it questions, this model will allegedly ask questions that guide students to find answers themselves. The idea is to get people to think more, not just use the large language model to answer questions or solve homework problems. No word yet on when it will be generally released or how it might be priced.

Bluesky has been slowly adding features. One that has been missing until now, that was available on old Twitter and other sites was the ability to turn on notifications for specific accounts. Now, with Activity Notifications, that feature is live. Theverge.com notes that you can simply hit the bell icon on a page you want to get notifications from, and away you go. It works with news sites if that’s your thing, or you can use it to be notified of friends’ posts, too. Another addition is that you can set Bluesky to notify people if someone likes or reposts something they have posted. 

Researchers at the University of Washington and Microsoft Research have used machine learning to develop a novel solution for trapping carbon in concrete by blending a sustainable, easy-to-grow green seaweed into the industrial batter that makes concrete, all without reducing its strength. Geekwire.com reports that the process lowers the cement’s global warming impact by 21%. Concrete in and of itself isn’t an issue, but the making of it produces some 8-11% of global carbon emissions. Scientists have been trying to curb its carbon footprint by using clean energy to generate the heat needed to produce it, and by swapping different ingredients. The product here uses dehydrated seaweed to make a high performing, lower carbon concrete. As a friend who was in that business often reminded me, cement is an ingredient of concrete…although lots of us who are laypersons tend to use the terms interchangeably. 

I’m Clark Reid and you’re ‘Technified’ for now. 

Apple May Use Claude or ChatGPT to Bulk Up Siri; Moderna-mRNA Flu Vaccine Beats Standard Shot; Threads Finally Gets DMs; Senate Deletes Ban on State AI Regulations

Posted: July 1, 2025 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

It is an open secret that Apple’s Apple Intellegence-powered Siri is way behind other AI large language models. It’s already been delayed substantially, and now bgr.com reports that Apple has been talking to both Anthropic…maker of Claude, and to OpenAI, the ChatGPT folks. Apparently they have tested the models out, and Claude actually works best right now to power Siri. That said, Anthropic is asking for a multi-billion dollar yearly fee that increases every year. This demand for such a princely price has Apple also talking to OpenAI…which can already be used with Siri…albeit after going through extra steps of approving using it, and having some data leave Apple’s Private Cloud Servers. It will probably help Apple’s cause if they get a deal with one of them in place before September, so they can tout the more muscular Siri on the new iPhones coming out then. 

Moderna has announced that their mRNA-based seasonal flu vaccine is 27% more effective at preventing flu infections than a standard shot. According to arstechnica.com, the vaccine was trialed on a group that included 41,000 people age 50 and above. The only fly in the ointment…or in this case, worm in the brain….is Bobby Kennedy, Jr. He had previously announced that “all new vaccines” would be required to go through placebo-controlled trials. That means that participants in a trial who are not given the experimental vaccine must be given an inert placebo rather than an already-approved vaccine as a comparative group, as was the case in the new trial with mRNA-1010. The known anti-vaxxer now in charge of Health and Human Services seems intent on blocking all the vaccines so…as one meme said, people can die like serfs from the Middle Ages. 

Threads has finally launched direct messaging for everyone on the platform. Theverge.com notes that as of now, you can just DM between your followers or mutual followers on Instagram for now. You need to be 18 or over to use this feature. To send a DM, click the envelope icon at the bottom of the app’s screen. That takes you to the inbox, where you tap the pencil icon and can start writing. Moving forward, Threads plans to roll out the ability to choose who can send you messages, including people who don’t follow you on Threads and Instagram. You’ll also be able to review a folder dedicated to message requests, similar to what’s offered on X. Threads is working on a group messaging feature and inbox filters, too. A big warning…Threads will not support end-to-end encryption. If that puts you off, head over to Facebook Messenger, which has end-to-end. 

Well, the Big Beautiful Bill…or Big Ugly Bill, depending on your politics…is out of the Senate and back to the House. Techcrunch.com reports that Senators did cut out the so-called ‘AI Moratorium.’ That was a clause that would have banned states from regulating Artificial Intelligence for 10 years. In an actual bi-partisan move, the Senate voted overwhelmingly…99 to1… to let states regulate AI. Most of the big tech firms supported the ban, claiming that without it, states could create what they called an unworkable patchwork of regulation that could stifle innovation. Most Senators agreed that a ban on state regs would allow powerful AI companies to operate with very little oversight. 

I’m Clark Reid and you’re ‘Technified’ for now.

Snap-Light Consumer AR Glasses in ’26; Threads is Getting DMs; EVs with 3,000 Mile Range on the Horizon; Apple White Paper- Power of New Generation AI Wildly Oversold

Posted: June 10, 2025 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Snap is preparing to sell lightweight, consumer AR glasses in 2026. That’s the word from techcrunch.com. They will be called Specs. Snap’s Specs will feature many of the same augmented reality and artificial intelligence capabilities that are available on the company’s developer-facing smart glasses, the Spectacles 5. However, the company says the Specs will be smaller and lighter — ideally making them more innocuous to wear in public than their extremely large predecessors. So far, no word from Snap on pricing, or on how they plan to sell the glasses. If they are lightweight, work well, and don’t look goofy…Snap will have really pulled off something great in the smart glasses race. 

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has announced that Threads will start testing its own direct messaging this week…which you will be able to use without leaving the platform. According to theverge.com, the testing will start in Hong Kong, Thailand, and Argentina, then expand to other nations. Users will see a separate inbox for Threads DMs, without having to connect to their linked Instagram account. At this point you will still have to have an Instagram account to use Threads. Maybe one day, they will split the baby, so to speak.

In a huge leap forward, a couple of researchers in South Korea have come up with a way to reduce silicon swelling in traditional EV battery designs. Bgr.com says that the better tech may take us from the 200-300 miles per charge to somewhere in the area of 3,000 mile range! That’s not all…using graphene in the batteries, they have shown that you can fully charge in something like 75 seconds…with no degradation in capacity for over 1,000 recharges. If this tech scales up, we may see truly revolutionary range in electric vehicles…and smartphones you won’t ever stress about running down the battery and being out of contact. 

Apple has put out a research paper that some are nodding in the affirmative over…like myself, while others are stunned. Theguardian.com notes that the paper  all but eviscerating the popular notion that large language models (LLMs, and their newest variant, LRMs, large reasoning models) are able to reason reliably. well-known venture capitalist Josh Wolfe went so far as to post on X that “Apple [had] just GaryMarcus’d LLM reasoning ability” – coining a new verb (and a compliment to me), referring to “the act of critically exposing or debunking the overhyped capabilities of artificial intelligence … by highlighting their limitations in reasoning, understanding, or general intelligence.” What Apple did was show that the leading models like ChatGPT, Claude, and Deepseek may “look smart – but when complexity rises, they collapse”. In short, these models are very good at a kind of pattern recognition, but often fail when they encounter novelty that forces them beyond the limits of their training, despite being, as the paper notes, “explicitly designed for reasoning tasks.” The Cliff’s Notes takeaway for you…relax…Artificial Intelligence and robots won’t be taking over…at least not yet. 

I’m Clark Reid and you’re ‘Technified’ for now.

Pixel 10 Leak; Salesforce Buys Hiring AI Tools Startup Moonhub; Microsoft Reveals Bing Video Creator; Instagram for iPad-Coming This year…Finally

Posted: June 3, 2025 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

A leaked prototype of the Google Pixel 10 has produced several reveals. 9to5google.com reports that the handset appears to have a thicker oval-shaped camera bar which is also wider…it comes very close to the edges of the phone. In addition, there are some smaller visual changes….the cutouts at the bottom on either side of the USB-C port are identical in size. It is expected that one is the speaker and the other is for the microphone. Google has moved the SIM card tray to the top left edge. The prototype has 16 gigs of RAM and 256 gigs of storage. 

Salesforce has somewhat stealthily snapped up a startup that is making AI tools to vet and hire talent. According to techcrunch.com, the company is Moonhub, and the entire crew, based in Menlo Park, will join Salesforce. Moonhub was just started in 2022 by an ex-Meta engineer. They make a number of tools designed to help companies recruit, evaluate, and hire job candidates. Moonhub’s AI can automatically identify candidates for roles, reaching out and assisting with tasks such as onboarding and payroll management. 

As it does whatever it can to attract people to Bing, Microsoft has rolled out Bing Video Creator. Geekwire.com says Creator is a new generative AI tool for creating videos from text prompts. It is based on Sora, the video model that came out in December from OpenAI. Microsoft is a rather heavily invested partner in OpenAI. You can use text prompts to make 10 videos up to 5 seconds long each with Bing Video Creator. After that, you will need Microsoft Rewards points for additional creations. Expect to see more AI-generated silly stuff on social media soon. 

Meta dropped the iPad version of WhatsApp last week. If it seems like it’s been a while for this, it has…2 years. Now, bgr.com reports that Meta employees are testing out Instagram for iPad, and we may see it out later this year. For those that don’t use apps like these, let me get on my soapbox. What you get is an iPhone-sized app sitting in your screen with nothing in the space around…in other words, it is just like using an iPhone app, and wastes the larger screen and abilities of the iPad. Meta’s Threads has the same format,,,I hope they will get an iPad version of that out soon, too. Meta says they have been concerned with how the square pictures in Instagram would look on the iPad. They may have that worked out, and with in increase in time on Reels from 90 seconds to 3 minutes, those videos will look nice in landscape if they have that figured out.  It is not just Meta, by the way. I use Bluesky, and they have the same deal….a little iPhone screen in the middle of a vast area of wasted screen on iPads. Come on, people!

I’m Clark Reid and you’re ‘Technified’ for now. 

Next MacOS Name etc Leaked; Samsung May Incorporate Perplexity’s AI; Meta Moving Product Risk Assessment to AI form Humans; 30% of Americans are Active AI Users

Posted: June 2, 2025 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Apple’s World Wide Developer Conference is imminent, and a bit more has trickled out. We already reported that the operating systems will assume years as part of their naming system, as in macOS26. Now, macrumors.com reports that macOS26 will be named Tahoe. Apple burned through a number of names of big cats for its OS names for years, then switched to California names….like Yosemite, Monterey, and Sonoma. Along with the name, Apple will bow a more glass-like design with more translucent windows, buttons and icons…thus the connection to Lake Tahoe…famous for its clarity and being able to see deep down into the water. WWDC kicks off a week from today, on Monday June 9th, at 10am Pacific. 

Samsung is moving forward on an investment in AI startup Perplexity, which would lead to the smartphone maker integrating the AI company’s tech into their devices. According to techcrunch.com, Samsung would use Perplexity’s AI brawn to power some of Samsung’s Bixby assistant features. A partnership deal with Perplexity may be sealed yet this year. Interestingly, Apple has also thought about adding Perplexity as a search engine to its Safari browser. Motorola already has a partnership with the AI firm.

Meta is planning to move assessment of its products’ potential harms from human reviewers to AI, aiming to speed up the process. Engadget.com notes that Meta is wanting to have up to 90% of risk assessments taken care of by AI…even considering it in areas like youth risk and ‘integrity,’ which includes violent content, misinformation and more. Meta employees who spoke with NPR warned AI may overlook serious risks that a human team would have been able to identify. It appears the old slogan of ‘move fast and break things’ is still well entrenched at Meta.

The folks at ComScore have done the analytics, and says that 30% of US people are actively using AI at least monthly. Top AI tools on the desktop are OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot, and the Canva designer. ComScore notes that 67 million people in the US are using AI on their mobile devices. Top categories on the desktop…besides AI assistants…are Audio with 23.8 million users, image generation with 23 million, and designs also with 23 million. Video generation shows up with 22.4 million. For mobile, ChatGPT has the highest number of visitors. In #2 is marketing platform Octane AI, followed by Canvas, Gemini, and social marketing tool Beacons. 

I’m Clark Reid and you’re ‘Technified’ for now. 

Apple Renaming All OS at WWDC; Tesla Investors Demand Musk Work 40 Hours a Week; Nick Clegg Whines About Asking Artist Permission for AI Use; Anthropic Launches Claude Voice Mode

Posted: May 29, 2025 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Apple will finally unify its operating system naming system at WWDC. Instead of different numbers for the MacOS and iOS, etc, all of the systems will use a year-based name. 9to5mac.com says they will jump 6 months ahead with the systems taking the names MacOS 26, iOS26, WatchOS 26, and so forth. Honestly, it is about time Apple fixed this. Now, people will know if they are using the latest system or not just by the year. 

A group of pension fund leaders sent a letter Wednesday to Tesla Chairman Robyn Denholm, demanding that Elon Musk spend ‘at least’ 40 hours a week working at Tesla. According to CNBC, the investors say the company faces a ‘crisis.’ The letter says “Tesla’s stock price volatility, declining sales, as well as disconcerting reports regarding the company’s human rights practices, and a plummeting global reputation are cause for serious concern.” It continues “Moreover, many issues are linked to Mr. Musk’s actions outside of his role as Technoking and Chief Executive Officer at Tesla, including his high-profile role as an architect of the U.S. Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).” They also asked for a clear succession plan and an outside director with no connection to Musk or his relatives. Tesla stock is down 12% this year, and sales are off over 50% in Europe.

Former British Deputy Prime Minister and former Meta executive Nick Clegg has complained to United Kingdom regulators that a push fo artist consent would ‘basically kill’ the AI industry. Theverge.com notes that Clegg spoke at an event plugging his new book. He said the creative community should have the right to opt out of having their work used to train AI models. But he claimed it wasn’t feasible to ask for consent before ingesting their work first. “I just don’t know how you go around, asking everyone first. I just don’t see how that would work,” Clegg said. “And by the way if you did it in Britain and no one else did it, you would basically kill the AI industry in this country overnight.” I say, let it die, then. The union I belong to, SAG-AFTRA, has negotiated contracts which makes what seems a small ask…get artist permission first, and PAY us for use of our creative work, likenesses, and voices. That is not remotely a big demand. What Clegg and others want is the ability to steal creative work without asking permission in advance or paying. Since when is it reasonable to base an industry entirely on the theft of peoples’ creative works? An amendment to the Data (Use and Access) Bill would require technology companies to disclose what copyrighted works were used to train AI models. Paul McCartney, Dua Lipa, Elton John, and Andrew Lloyd Webber are among the hundreds of musicians, writers, designers, and journalists who signed an open letter in support of the amendment earlier in May. Good for them!

Anthropic has started to roll out a ‘voice mode’ for its Claude chatbot apps. Techcrunch.com reports that this lets mobile app users have “complete spoken conversations with Claude.” It will be out in English to users in the next few weeks. Anthropic is touting its use when your hands are busy but your mind isn’t. OpenAI and Google already have voice mode, as does Elon Musk’s Grok. Anthropic is offering 5 distinct voice options, and you can switch between text and voce on the fly…and can see a transcript and summary following conversations with Claude. Voice conversations count towards normal usage caps…that means 20 to 30 conversations is the most free users can expect. 

I’m Clark Reid and you’re ‘Technified’ for now. 

Open AI Snaps Up Jony Ive Startup; Google XR Glasses-Interesting ‘Glasshole’ Wrinkle; Amazon Further AI-Enhances Shopping; Meta Boosts Startups Use of Their Llama AI

Posted: May 21, 2025 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

In a very interesting pickup, OpenAI has just bought Jony Ive’s AI startup..called io. Appleinsider.com reports that they are dropping $6.5 billion in stock on the startup by the former Apple head of design, who was responsible for the look and feel. some of Apple’s most iconic products. OpenAI will add 55 new employees, including hardware engineers, software, developers, and manufacturing experts. Both OpenAI Sam Altman and Ive referred to something they are calling ‘the device,’ some hardware they plan to release sometime next year. It could just be a better box with an AI voice assistant, but coming from Ive, who was the futurist right hand of Steve Jobs, it might be something quite amazing. It’s worth noting that before this purchase, Job’s widow…Laurene Powell Jobs had invested in io through her Emerson Collective. 

In the slew of announcements yesterday during Google I/O, many of which had to do with AI, Google did show off a prototype pair of its XR smart glasses…and even let some of the media test out pairs briefly. According to engadget.com, the glasses…which have a heavy black frame reminiscent of something Clark Kent would have worn in the 50’s as the not terribly secret identity of Superman, actually are lighter than Meta’s Orion prototype or Snap’s Spectacles. One thing that struck me is that the display is only on one side…the right lens. It has a narrow field of view, but you can see notifications and the like overlayed in that lens. They are more just something for a glance, not really immersive. To me, as someone who was around San Francisco at the time, there is a funny connection to Google Glass and the ‘glassholes.’ Those had a little prism that was on the right side. Could Google have just added code to the old Google Glass code and some AI? Ok, probably not, but it made me laugh. 

Amazon continues to add more AI to their shopping app, to lure more of us to spend even more money! Geekwire.com notes that the generative AI powered feature is called “AI shopping experts.” Amazon says it analyzes product details, customer reviews and information from across the web to allow customers to simply hear key information. “It’s like having helpful friends discuss potential purchases to make your shopping easier, even if you’re multitasking or on the go,” wrote Rajiv Mehta, vice president of Search and Conversational Shopping at Amazon, in a blog post about the release on Wednesday. Right now it is only available on a select group of products to what they are calling a subset of US customers…but of course, they plan to expand to all in the next few months. 

Meta is rolling out a new program of incentives to encourage startups to use its Llama AI models. Techcrunch.com reports that the program will provide companies ‘direct support from the Llama team, and will even include funding in some cases. Companies that are accepted into the program can get up to $6000 a month for up to 6 months to help offset costs of building and enhancing their generative AI solutions. Meta says that the Llama models have been downloaded over a billion times now. 

I’m Clark Reid and you’re ‘Technified’ for now. 

Samsung Galaxy Edge Launch Imminent; OpenAI Image Generator Now Available to Everyone; Google Messages-Group Chat Upgrade; France Fines Apple For Excessive Rejection of Tracking!

Posted: April 1, 2025 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , | Leave a comment

The Samsung Galaxy S25 Edge could be unveiled soon. Androidpolice.com reports that a European retailer, NieuweMobiel, claims the slim profile phone will launch in Europe on April 15th. We don’t know for sure when the phone will actually get into user’s hands. An earlier report from Korea said May. That could still hold…although both Samsung and Apple tend to open preorders on the day devices are shown, with availability coming around a week later. As Samsung is notoriously leaky, we expect the Galaxy S25 Edge to have 256Gigs as base memory, and come in Silver, Black, and Blue. Expected base price should be around $1294. The initial run is only about 40,000 units, so it will probably only be available initially in Korea, parts of Europe, and the US. 

ChatGPT’s built-in image generation feature is now available to everyone. According to engadget.com, OpenAI made the feature available to free users over the weekend. What this means is you can generate images from within ChatGPT and without having to switch to OpenAI’s DALL-E generator. Prior to its rollout to the free tier, the tool was only available to Plus, Pro and Team subscribers. Do be aware that for the freebie users, you have a limit of three images a day. One of the tool’s most popular uses is the creation of Ghibli (Jib’ lee)-style images using real-life photos. These are in the style of a Japanese anime studio of the same name. Users simply have to upload the photo they want to use and then instruct ChatGPT in natural language to create a Ghibli-style version of it. 

Google Messages is considering an update to group chats that could be a biggie. A major feature will be the ability to  “join this group with this unique link or QR code.” So…they are taking a page out of Zoom’s book, it would seem. 9to5google.com notes that the group link and QR code automatically expires after a few days. Also, the USP can be reset at any time. That gives the ability to set a custom group icon, and makes it possible to delete sent messages ‘for everyone.’ No time frame on when or even if the features might drop. 

From the ‘You’ve Got to Be Kidding Department,’ France has fined Apple 150 million Euros over ‘excessive’ pop-ups that let users reject tracking! Arstechnica.com reports that France’s Competition Authority says Apple’s requiring what amounts to double consent harms “smaller publishers in particular since, unlike the main vertically integrated platforms, they depend to a large extent on third-party data collection to finance their business.”  The agency does note that Apple’s own data collection is obtained with a single pop-up. Ok, duly noted France…but what user in their right mind wants to be tracked…ever? Too bad about companies who rely on income from taking and selling my data. Get a better business model!

I’m Clark Reid and you’re ‘Technified’ for now.

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