Google

Apps on millions of Android phones execute a multimillion-dollar ad fraud scheme

Written by

Craig Silverman, BuzzFeed News:

Last April, Steven Schoen received an email from someone named Natalie Andrea who said she worked for a company called We Purchase Apps. She wanted to buy his Android app, Emoji Switcher. But right away, something seemed off.

“I did a little bit of digging because I was a little sketched out because I couldn’t really find even that the company existed,” Schoen told BuzzFeed News.

The We Purchase Apps website listed a location in New York, but the address appeared to be a residence. “And their phone number was British. It was just all over the place,” Schoen said.

It was all a bit weird, but nothing indicated he was about to see his app end up in the hands of an organization responsible for potentially hundreds of millions of dollars in ad fraud, and which has funneled money to a cabal of shell companies and people scattered across Israel, Serbia, Germany, Bulgaria, Malta, and elsewhere.

Oh, what a scheme. Incredibly sophisticated scam. Amazing story.

Why does Google need hardware?

Written by

Shira Ovide, Bloomberg:

In 2017 and the first half of this year, Google shipped about 5 million Pixel smartphones worldwide, according to the research firm IDC. Apple Inc. sells as many iPhones in about eight days as Google did in 18 months — and even Apple has a relatively small minority market share in smartphones.

And:

Small numbers aren’t confined to Google, either. Journalists like me can’t stop talking about the “runaway success” of the Echo devices, Amazon.com Inc.’s rapidly expanding lineup of voice-activated home doodads. Amazon sold about 3.6 million of the two most popular Echo models from April to June, Strategy Analytics estimated. Fitbit, a company that journalists like me stopped talking about long ago, sold 2.7 million motion-tracking gadgets in the same period.

And:

For most software or internet tech empires, hardware is a niche hobby, and it will remain so for the foreseeable future.

It take a lot of R&D dollars, fragmentation of company focus, to design, test, build, and ship a hardware product. Why does Google do it? Interesting question.

Google announces Call Screen, a feature Apple should copy

Written by

Buzzfeed:

To help you avoid calls from scammers, Google is adding Call Screen to the Pixel, a new option that appears when you receive a phone call. Whenever someone calls you, you can tap a “Screen call” button, and a robot voice will pick up.

And:

“The person you’re calling is using a screening service and will get a copy of this conversation. Go ahead and say your name and why you’re calling,” the Google bot will say. As the caller responds, the digital assistant will transcribe the caller’s message for you. If you need more information, you can use one of the feature’s canned responses, which include “Tell me more” and “Who is this?” There are also buttons to either pick up or hang up the call, so you can accept or reject it at any time.

I wonder if it’d be possible for Apple to implement a feature like this that let you actually screen the call screening audio as it happens. In other words, the phone rings, ScreenBot answers, and you hear the back and forth with ScreenBot, then you jump into the call if it’s someone you know.

As is, sounds like Google’s Call Screen is all done via text transcription, rather than via listen-in audio. Could be wrong about this. We’ll know for sure once it ships.

How to delete your Google+ account

Written by

Washington Post:

Hundreds of thousands of accounts on Google’s long-suffering social media service, Google+, may have been affected by a security flaw, the company said Monday, exposing personal information such as names and email addresses.

In the wake of the accidental exposure, Google said it is planning to shut down Google+ for consumers. But that will not happen for about 10 months. If you are wondering whether you still have a Google+ account — and if so, how to delete it — you can follow these instructions.

If nothing else, good to know how to tell if you have a Google Plus profile tied to your Google account.

Google streaming a blockbuster video game

Written by

Google blog:

We’ve been working on Project Stream, a technical test to solve some of the biggest challenges of streaming. For this test, we’re going to push the limits with one of the most demanding applications for streaming—a blockbuster video game.

We’ve partnered with one of the most innovative and successful video game publishers, Ubisoft, to stream their soon-to-be released Assassin’s Creed Odyssey® to your Chrome browser on a laptop or desktop. Starting on October 5, a limited number of participants will get to play the latest in this best-selling franchise at no charge for the duration of the Project Stream test.

And:

The idea of streaming such graphically-rich content that requires near-instant interaction between the game controller and the graphics on the screen poses a number of challenges. When streaming TV or movies, consumers are comfortable with a few seconds of buffering at the start, but streaming high-quality games requires latency measured in milliseconds, with no graphic degradation.

This is a big deal. This is less about streaming a video game and more about making a major improvement to streaming latency. This has implications in the gaming console market, for sure, reducing the need for a high end console that is separate from a desktop computer.

But this also might impact the delivery of video itself, impacting services like Netflix and YouTube. Very interesting.

Apple Park construction time-lapse, and a bit of map wandering

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[VIDEO] Came across this Apple Park construction time-lapse video yesterday (embedded in the main Loop post). The video is from last year, is relatively high resolution, but jumpy. Obviously, this is as many frame grabs as the source data allowed. It did make me wish for both an even higher resolution, and enough images to create a single smooth animation.

Pulled me down a bit of a rabbit hole. First, I went to Google Maps and searched for Apple Park, checked out that satellite imagery. I then searched for Googleplex, to check out the satellite imagery of Google’s headquarters.

Of course, I then had to do the same thing on Apple Maps. As you’d expect, the satellite captures were from different dates, but the image resolution was relatively high. As I explored, I also realized how much of the satellite and Google street view imagery continues to be updated.

To get a better sense of this, I took a look at a giant construction project that is still underway, a building in Philadelphia that will be the tallest building in the US outside of New York and Chicago. To find it, search for:

1800 Arch Street, Philadelphia, PA

In Google Maps, you can see the building underway, already pretty tall. In Apple Maps, the site is still a parking map, the building not yet begun.

Not a slam at Apple Maps. I’m sure if I kept looking, I’d find major construction projects where the reverse was true. I just found this interesting.

iOS 11 adoption rate hits 85 percent, Android Oreo approaching 15 percent

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As we move close to the official release of iOS 12, Apple has updated their official iOS adoption tracker. 85% of active devices, as measured by the iOS App Store, are using iOS 11, as shown in the pie chart below.

As we always do when Apple updates their numbers, let’s take a look at Android’s official adoption rate numbers. Here ya go:

The two most recent versions of Android are Android 9 Pie (officially released on August 6th) and Android Oreo (August 21, 2017). As you can see, Pie has not yet made a dent in the universe and Oreo is approaching 15% (when you combine Oreo 8.0 and 8.1).

What a difference between the two platforms. The largest issue caused by this fragmentation is the inability to get critical updates out to the masses. Apple is about to release a brand new OS, and it will work on the vast majority of iPhones in the wild. And there are no carriers or third party manufacturers that stand in between users and their updates.

Lyft driver finds Pixel 3 XL in car; No one cares

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Snarky headline, but Gruber has a point:

The almost complete lack of attention paid to this story exemplifies the niche status of Google’s Pixel phones — which is sad, considering that they’re indisputably among the best Android phones.

Short of posts like this, chances are you were not aware that this happened.

Chances are excellent that if one of the new iPhones was left in a Lyft, the internet would have exploded, and someone at Forbes would have written a headline connecting the event to a confirmation of Apple’s demise.

Here’s a link to the original Verge post. If you care.

An Android fanboy spends an enlightening week with an iPhone

Written by

C. Scott Brown, Android Authority:

When the opportunity came up here for a writer to switch to an iPhone for a week to see what it’s like, I jumped on it. I figured this would be a way to put my convictions to the test. Is Android really better for me than iOS, or have I just become complacent and comfortable with Android?

I like the premise. But the execution was flawed.

Take a few minutes to make your way through the article. Scott clearly likes a lot about the iPhone, highlighting lack of clutter, the rewrite of the iOS App Store, iPhone’s superior Bluetooth implementation, and the ease of use of the Camera app.

But one dealbreaker for Scott:

The horrible layout of the keyboard makes you need to do not one, not two, but three taps to insert a comma in a sentence. First, you tap the keyboard-swap button, then you type a comma, then you hit the button to go back to the main keyboard.

Three strokes to use probably the second-most-used punctuation mark in the English language.

But as I pointed out in this tweet this morning, there’s a quicker way to type a comma. Press and slide the number (123) key, release on the comma, and you remain in the alphabetic keyboard. Fast and, once you know about it, easy.

The issue here is low discoverability. And, to me, the flaw in Scott’s experiment was tweeting out his concerns, to see if there are shortcuts (like the comma shortcut) or other solutions with the issues he raised, before he published.

All that said, this was an interesting read for me. There are clearly things iOS does better and things Android does better. Another example Scott raised was the way Android groups Notifications. If only he’d asked. This is a feature Apple has in place in the iOS 12 beta, coming soon to iOS devices everywhere. And iOS’s lack of fragmentation means anyone with an iOS device can get it, either by trying the public beta or waiting a few weeks for the release. No need to wait for a carrier update that might never come.

And those keyboard shortcuts? They’ve been around a long, long time. But if that comma thing was new to you, check out this terrific post (from 2016!) chock full of gems like this.

Google and Mastercard cut a secret ad deal to track retail sales

Written by

Bloomberg:

For the past year, select Google advertisers have had access to a potent new tool to track whether the ads they ran online led to a sale at a physical store in the U.S. That insight came thanks in part to a stockpile of Mastercard transactions that Google paid for.

But most of the two billion Mastercard holders aren’t aware of this behind-the-scenes tracking. That’s because the companies never told the public about the arrangement.

And:

The company said people can opt out of ad tracking using Google’s “Web and App Activity” online console. Inside Google, multiple people raised objections that the service did not have a more obvious way for cardholders to opt out of the tracking, one of the people said.

Off the top of your head, any idea how to find Google’s “Web and App Activity” online console?

Start off on this page: https://myaccount.google.com.

If you’re not already logged in, you’ll need to do so. Next, make your way to the “Person info & privacy” section and just start looking around, getting a sense of the options Google offers for managing your data. At the very least, be sure to check out the “Ad settings” page. Do this for each of your Google accounts.

Google’s Wear OS no longer feels like Android on a smartwatch

Written by

Engadget:

Google is ready to unveil a shiny new version of Wear OS at last. This is the third major release of the platform (the first since rebranding to Wear OS), and Google finally shows an understanding that what people want from a smartwatch is not a phone replacement. They want a reliable daily assistant and coach that is fast and unobtrusive. The new system doesn’t have obvious battery life enhancements, though, which is still a major pain that the industry has yet to solve. It may be up to Google’s partners to figure that out for themselves.

Watch the video embedded in the article to see the new Wear OS at work.

My immediate reaction? It’s still round. Dealbreaker for me.

The fight against Google’s smart city

Written by

Brian Barth, Washington Post:

In October 2017, Sidewalk Labs, a Google-affiliated company looking to make urban life more streamlined, economical and green by infusing cities with sensors and data analytics, announced plans to build the world’s first neighborhood “from the Internet up” on 12 acres of the Toronto waterfront, an area known as Quayside. Sidewalk aims to, for example, build an “advanced microgrid” to power electric cars, design “mixed-use” spaces to bring down housing costs, employ “sensor-enabled waste separation” to aid recycling and use data to improve public services.

So far, so good. But one group, Tech Reset Canada (TRC), has a problem with this:

TRC’s founders are not opposed to the concept of smart cities in principle. Their concerns revolve around the collection and commodification of urban data and whether that occurs through a democratic process or via corporate fiat.

As it is, technological innovation has far outpaced lawmakers’ ability to establish the rules of the road, whether in the context of Google and Facebook’s immensely profitable endeavor to commodify Internet browsing activity or Internet-connected assistants like Amazon’s Alexa, which eavesdrops on your every conversation while awaiting your commands. But critics of the smart city industry say that it brings the disconnect between policy and digital intrusions on privacy to another level.

Very interesting. Who owns the data collected in the running of a smart city? How will that data be used?

So far, the virtual world has been something we opt into — giving up various rights in the terms of service agreements we hastily click closed — and can opt out of if we so choose. It’s one thing to willingly install Alexa in your home. It’s another when publicly owned infrastructure — streets, bridges, parks and plazas — is Alexa, so to speak. There’s no opting out of public space, or government services, for which Sidewalk Labs appears eager to provide an IT platform.

I am a fan of smart cities. But there is an Orwellian side. This is a great read.

Google, Apple drop college degree requirements?

Written by

CNBC:

Recently, job-search site Glassdoor compiled a list of 15 top employers that have said they no longer require applicants to have a college degree. Companies like Google, Apple, IBM and EY are all in this group.

This just does not ring true to me. I know a number of people who work at Apple and Google without college degrees. And many more with degrees unrelated to the field in which they work.

I’d like to see the quote from Apple or Google citing a specific policy change. Ping me if you know more about this.

Google confirms it tracks users even when ‘Location History’ setting is disabled

Written by

Andrew O’Hara, Apple Insider:

Google updated help center documentation Thursday to clarify its location data collection policies, changes made in light of recent revelations that the firm’s apps and website continue to harvest user information even when a global “Location History” setting is disabled.

Here’s a link to the updated Google help page. Read it for yourself.

Millions of Android devices are vulnerable right out of the box

Written by

Wired:

Security meltdowns on your smartphone are often self-inflicted: You clicked the wrong link, or installed the wrong app. But for millions of Android devices, the vulnerabilities have been baked in ahead of time, deep in the firmware, just waiting to be exploited. Who put them there? Some combination of the manufacturer that made it, and the carrier that sold it to you.

And:

“The problem is not going to go away, because a lot of the people in the supply chain want to be able to add their own applications, customize, add their own code. That increases the attack surface, and increases the probability of software error,” Stavrou says. “They’re exposing the end user to exploits that the end user is not able to respond to.”

This problem is an end result of Android allowing third party companies the ability to modify the source code. An example:

Take the Asus ZenFone V Live, which Kryptowire found to leave its owners exposed to an entire system takeover, including taking screenshots and video recordings of a user’s screen, making phone calls, reading and modifying text messages, and more.

This is a fascinating read. This loss of centralized security control is yet another thing that keeps me in the Apple ecosystem. I do recognize that macOS, iOS, et al have flaws, but the centralized security model (All the system software comes from Apple, not a third party) and the commitment to privacy do make me feel safer.

As Google Maps renames neighborhoods, residents fume

Written by

Jack Nicas, New York Times:

For decades, the district south of downtown and alongside San Francisco Bay here was known as either Rincon Hill, South Beach or South of Market. This spring, it was suddenly rebranded on Google Maps to a name few had heard: the East Cut.

The peculiar moniker immediately spread digitally, from hotel sites to dating apps to Uber, which all use Google’s map data. The name soon spilled over into the physical world, too. Real-estate listings beckoned prospective tenants to the East Cut. And news organizations referred to the vicinity by that term.

And:

The swift rebranding of the roughly 170-year-old district is just one example of how Google Maps has now become the primary arbiter of place names. With decisions made by a few Google cartographers, the identity of a city, town or neighborhood can be reshaped, illustrating the outsize influence that Silicon Valley increasingly has in the real world.

And:

Yet how Google arrives at its names in maps is often mysterious. The company declined to detail how some place names came about, though some appear to have resulted from mistakes by researchers, rebrandings by real estate agents — or just outright fiction.

I find this amazing. The way I read this, the Google Maps team has the power to come up with new neighborhood names and make them official, all without consult.

Why is Google doing this? Is this an experiment in localized branding? Simple mistakes? As always, follow the money.

Apple Q3 earnings call transcript

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Here’s a link to the transcript.

One little snippet:

Based on third party research estimates, the App Store generated nearly twice the revenue of Google Play so far in 2018.

Amazing to me how much money can be made, all while prioritizing privacy.

Google is quietly working on a successor to Android

Written by

Bloomberg:

For more than two years, a small and stealthy group of engineers within Google has been working on software that they hope will eventually replace Android, the world’s dominant mobile operating system. As the team grows, it will have to overcome some fierce internal debate about how the software will work.

The project, known as Fuchsia, was created from scratch to overcome the limitations of Android as more personal devices and other gadgets come online. It’s being designed to better accommodate voice interactions and frequent security updates and to look the same across a range of devices, from laptops to tiny internet-connected sensors.

Fantastic read. I hope Fuchsia solves the security problems and offers privacy options absent from Android.

The company must also settle some internal feuds. Some of the principles that Fuchsia creators are pursuing have already run up against Google’s business model. Google’s ads business relies on an ability to target users based on their location and activity, and Fuchsia’s nascent privacy features would, if implemented, hamstring this important business. There’s already been at least one clash between advertising and engineering over security and privacy features of the fledgling operating system, according to a person familiar with the matter. The ad team prevailed, this person said.

Feh. Not holding my breath.

Gruber’s rollup of Google’s human-mimicking, restaurant calling Duplex demo

Written by

John Gruber:

Google has finally done what they should’ve done initially: let a group of journalists (two groups actually, one on each coast) actually listen to and participate in live Duplex calls.

Journalists from CNN, Ars Technica, The Verge, Wired, and others all got to participate. John does a nice job working through all the different takes, made for a fascinating read.

From the very end:

Right now it feels like a feature in search of a product, but they pitched it as an imminent product at I/O because it made for a stunning demo. (It remains the only thing announced at I/O that anyone is talking about.) If what Google really wanted was just for Google Assistant to be able to make restaurant reservations, they’d be better off building an OpenTable competitor and giving it away to all these small businesses that don’t yet offer online reservations. I’m not holding my breath for Duplex ever to allow anyone to make a reservation at any establishment.

True, but I don’t think that was the point of the demo. My two cents, this was showing off Google’s ability to mimic a human, well enough to pass a primitive Turing test. Being able to make restaurant reservations is more a proof of concept than an end goal.

To me, we’re far more likely to see a product called Google Help Center, the ability to triage 10,000 simultaneous tech support calls, for free, but with the benefit for Google of being able to harvest all the data gleaned from each interactive session.

iPhones and USB-C

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I came across this Android Central article over the weekend, a discussion about USB-C charging:

Unless you have a Moto Z series phone, none of the cheap adapters you see for sale offer a headphone jack and charging port. None of them. They all may not work with every Moto Z model, either. My advice is to just stay away from them.

This is because of parts of the USB-C specification that are optional. Motorola offers these options, but phones like the Pixel 2 and almost all others do not. It may be possible to define some fancy logic that allows this to happen, but you won’t get it for $12 on eBay or Amazon.

A few weeks ago, a rumor surfaced that Apple would replace the iPhone Lightning port with USB-C. Color me extremely skeptical.

The Lightning spec is consistent and the hardware is reliable (for the most part).

On the USB-C side, things are a bit of a mess. From this take by Android Authority:

Even the seemingly most basic function of USB Type-C — powering devices — has become a mess of compatibility issues, conflicting proprietary standards, and a general lack of consumer information to guide purchasing decisions. The problem is that the features supported by different devices aren’t clear, yet the defining principle of the USB Type-C standard makes consumers think everything should just work.

We’ve seen this issue on the MacBook, though staying with Apple specified adapters works fine. But iPhone adapters are much more of a commodity. Who doesn’t own a 3rd party Lightning cable or adapter for their iPhone? With Lightning, you know it’s iPhone compatible and the bad cables/frauds are sussed out pretty easily.

If Apple replaced Lightning with USB-C on the iPhone, they’d have to ensure that the USB-C standard issues would not become Apple customer support issues.

Google Home enables “continued conversation”

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Google blog:

We’ve heard from a lot of people that adding “Hey Google” before each follow-up question for the Assistant doesn’t feel as natural as they’d like. We announced Continued Conversation at I/O as an optional setting which lets you have a natural back-and-forth conversation with the Assistant without repeating “Hey Google” for each follow-up request. The new feature is starting to roll out today, and you can turn it on in the Google Assistant app by going to Settings → Preferences → Continued Conversation and hitting the toggle.

Basically, Google assistant will keep listening (for about 8 seconds) after the end of a “Hey Google” back and forth. No need for a follow-up “Hey Google”.

Wondering if Siri will follow this approach, or perhaps develop a more complex protocol for handling continued conversation.

Net neutrality repeal + AT&T Time-Warner merger = Trouble for Netflix, YouTube, Hulu, etc.

Written by

Danny Crichton, TechCrunch:

[The repeal of net neutrality] will allow telecom companies like AT&T to prioritize their own content over that of competitors. In the past, AT&T didn’t have all that much content, but the addition of Time Warner now gives them a library encompassing Warner Bros. to TBS, TNT, HBO and CNN. Suddenly, that control over prioritization just got a lot more powerful and profitable.

And:

If Comcast bids and is successful in buying 21st Century Fox, then connectivity in the United States will be made up of a handful of gigantic content library ISPs, and a few software players that will have to pay a premium to deliver their content to their own subscribers. While companies like Netflix and Alphabet have negotiated with the ISPs for years, the combination of these two news stories puts them in a significantly weaker negotiating position going forward.

So if you get your internet from AT&T or DirectTV or Time Warner (or other AT&T owned/branded ISPs), keep an eye out for either Netflix packet slowdown or an offer to make your connection net neutral.

And what about YouTube? No reason AT&T wouldn’t slow YouTube packets to allow their own content to hog the fast lane. Will this threat rekindle the stuttering Google Fiber (now spun off into Alphabet) efforts?

In what world is this a win for consumers? Feh.

Google, the Pentagon, and weaponized AI

Written by

New York Times:

The company’s relationship with the Defense Department since it won a share of the contract for the Maven program, which uses artificial intelligence to interpret video images and could be used to improve the targeting of drone strikes, has touched off an existential crisis, according to emails and documents reviewed by The Times as well as interviews with about a dozen current and former Google employees.

And:

Executives at DeepMind, an A.I. pioneer based in London that Google acquired in 2014, have said they are completely opposed to military and surveillance work, and employees at the lab have protested the contract. The acquisition agreement between the two companies said DeepMind technology would never be used for military or surveillance purposes.

About a dozen Google employees have resigned over the issue, which was first reported by Gizmodo. One departing engineer petitioned to rename a conference room after Clara Immerwahr, a German chemist who killed herself in 1915 after protesting the use of science in warfare. And “Do the Right Thing” stickers have appeared in Google’s New York City offices, according to company emails viewed by The Times.

And:

Dr. Li said in the email that the final decision would be made by her boss, Diane Greene, the chief executive of Google Cloud. But Dr. Li thought the company should publicize its share of the Maven contract as “a big win for GCP,” Google Cloud Platform.

This is clearly a contentious, divisive topic. Google is a business, has obligations to shareholders, and is watching competitors like Microsoft and Amazon reap the rewards of lucrative Pentagon contracts. Not an easy thing for a business to say no to.

The internal debate over Maven, viewed by both supporters and opponents as opening the door to much bigger defense contracts, generated a petition signed by about 4,000 employees who demanded “a clear policy stating that neither Google nor its contractors will ever build warfare technology.”

Polarizing.

I tried to watch a video of a puppy and accidentally sent every photo I’ve ever taken to Google

Written by

Jason Koebler, Motherboard:

When Google Photos was announced in 2015, I downloaded it. I had no intention of giving every photo I’ve ever taken to Google—which categorizes them, runs them through image recognition and facial recognition algorithms, makes weird algorithmic slideshows out of them, and adds them to its massive photo database—but I wanted to try it out in any case. I quickly realized it was not for me, but I did not delete the app.

And:

I texted him asking to see a picture. He responded with a video that he uploaded to Google Photos. Because I had Google Photos installed on my phone, it tried to open in the app. You cannot use Google Photos on iOS—even to view photos that have been shared with you—without granting the app access to all the photos on your phone. Because I was drunk, and because I wanted to see the puppy, I changed my app permissions. I watched the video (very cute, embedded below), the band started, I put the phone in my pocket.

You know what happened next. All his photos went up to Google’s servers, and went through the AI analysis that all photos go through.

Two sides to this. First, obviously, Jason made a mistake giving Google Photos permission to access his photos. Google Photos asked, as it should.

That said, this is the text of the alert Google Photos put up:

Google Photos needs access to your photo library to show photos in the app

Reading Jason’s piece, I don’t get any sense that Google Photos notified him that they were going to start uploading his photos to the Google servers, to start AI-analyzing them.

Should Apple require a finer grain notification when something like this happens? Or, at the very least, should Google recognize that this is a major change in the equation, let the user know that permission to show you a photo from another user gives them permission to suck up and analyze all your photos.

Playing detective, hunting down the truth about that Google Duplex restaurant

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Start off by reading John Gruber’s take on the fact or fiction of Google Duplex AI calling a restaurant and making a reservation.

Lot’s of interesting details here. Almost like a crime drama. Was the Google Duplex demo genuine? Was it staged?

Was the restaurant called without prior notice? If so, was a phone call recorded without prior consent?

From the Digital Media Law Project:

California’s wiretapping law is a “two-party consent” law. California makes it a crime to record or eavesdrop on any confidential communication, including a private conversation or telephone call, without the consent of all parties to the conversation.

It’s possible the demo was genuine and the Duplex team didn’t think this through. Seems to me more likely that this was staged, showing off technology that certainly exists, at least in pieces. And if it was staged, that call seems likely to have been recorded with the restaurant’s permission.

Also worth reading is the Twitter thread that shows John Gruber reaching out to followers to help figure out which restaurant was the one in question. Here’s the start of the thread. I found the whole thing fascinating.

And for dessert, here’s Google Duplex calling your parents.

YouTube Music, a new music streaming service, is coming soon

Written by

YouTube blog:

YouTube Music is a new music streaming service made for music: official songs, albums, thousands of playlists and artist radio plus YouTube’s tremendous catalog of remixes, live performances, covers and music videos that you can’t find anywhere else – all simply organized and personalized.

And better search:

YouTube Music search works even if fans don’t know exactly what they’re looking for … we’ll find it if they describe it (try “that hipster song with the whistling”) or give us some lyrics (try “I make money moves”).

And:

While fans can enjoy the new ad-supported version of YouTube Music for free, we’re also launching YouTube Music Premium, a paid membership that gives you background listening, downloads and an ad-free experience for $9.99 a month. If you are a subscriber to Google Play Music, good news, you get a YouTube Music Premium membership as part of your subscription each month.

To me, the branding is confusing, but the access to the tremendous catalog of things you can only find on YouTube is compelling. Will user posted content be included?

For example, will this video of Dave Grohl and his daughter Violet performing Adele’s “When We Were Young” be included in the mix? If so, will uploaders be compensated in the same way as when their videos are watched?

The new AI-powered Google News app is now available on iOS

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I’ve been playing with this news app. An interesting approach, very customizable. If you download it, be sure to tap the “…” icon next to each story for more options.

This is especially valuable in the For You tab, where it lets you select “More stories like this” and “Fewer stories like this”. Helps the app learn your prefs.

Note that the app requests access to your location. Presumably, this is to help customize the local stories feed. But I felt uncomfortable enabling that access. A comment on the times we live in, I think.

California DMV: Apple self-driving fleet now up to 55 vehicles

Written by

Serhat Kurt, macReports:

Apple Apple now has 55 vehicles and 83 drivers under its permit to test autonomous vehicles, the California Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) said in an emailed response to questions.

And:

Apple has the second highest number of self driving cars after GM Cruise,which as 104 vehicles, as of now.

I find it surprising that Apple has more self-driving vehicles than Waymo. From the Waymo Wikipedia page:

In 2018, the company placed separate orders for “thousands” of hybrid-drive Pacifica minivans and 20,000 Jaguar I-Pace electric sedans. The vehicles are intended to help launch ride-hailing services in various cities, enough to accommodate hundreds of thousands of riders each day.

That aside, it is interesting to watch Waymo (owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet) roll out their vision, while Apple, per tradition, keeps its cards closely held.

Google now says controversial AI voice calling system will identify itself to humans

Written by

Nick Statt, The Verge:

Following widespread outcry over the ethical dilemmas raised by Google’s new Duplex system, which lets artificial intelligence mimic a human voice to make appointments, Google has clarified in a statement that the experimental system will have “disclosure built-in.”

And:

“We understand and value the discussion around Google Duplex — as we’ve said from the beginning, transparency in the technology is important,” a Google spokesperson told The Verge in a statement this evening. “We are designing this feature with disclosure built-in, and we’ll make sure the system is appropriately identified. What we showed at I/O was an early technology demo, and we look forward to incorporating feedback as we develop this into a product.”

This is good. But as I’ve said before, much better if Google had weighed in with awareness of the ethical issues at the same time as they rolled out their demo.

A thought: Does Google have an ethics office? Or someone whose job it is to spot issues like this? If not, that might be worth exploring.