Smartphones have become an even essential part of our lives. With the addition of payment systems, smartphones will soon take over the role of your wallet. While Samsung and Apple have already introduced their payment systems, other manufacturers are joining in. Microsoft, the makers of Windows Phone devices, have also announced that they will be unveiling their payment system soon.
Microsoft had showcased a tap to pay feature on its devices at a conference for Windows hardware makers in China. It was said then that this feature would not require support from the network operators. Just like Samsung and Apple Pay, this feature will also be based on NFC.
Microsoft’s plans were brought to light by Faisal Khan, a banking consultant. He found that Microsoft has already got permission from the American state of Idaho and has applied for licenses in all the states of the country.
Mobile payment was available on Windows phone through the Softcard app but the service closed down when Google bought Softcard. Bill Gates had predicted, after the launch of Apple Pay, the technology will soon be available on all smartphones. Considering the speed at which things are moving, it might be easy to visualize such a future.
A few months back, Airtel was on the receiving end of much public backlash following its decision to introduce differential charges for various online services. This was the first direct assault on Net Neutrality principle in India and the telecom major was forced to roll back the new policy. The company has introduced a new service called Airtel Zero which attempts to split services but with a friendlier face.
Airtel Zero is a new platform that will let companies buy data to offer their apps to consumers for free. It will allow users to access these apps without incurring data charges. This can be seen as a direct violation of net neutrality as it will give priority access to some apps over others.
Net neutrality principle states that all data on the internet should reach their destination with equal speeds and service providers cannot charge extra for priority access. Airtel will rope in extra revenues through Airtel Zero and companies with enough capital would be able to pay for this access while the budding apps will be left back to fend for themselves.
E-commerce giant Flipkart is also receiving criticism for signing up for the service that violates net neutrality. Airtel has reportedly called the new service a “B2B platform that is open non-discriminatory and will be a win-win for customers and businesses.” They added that they intended to include as many vendors as possible. But they haven’t made public the agreement or the fees paid by the vendors to reach the consumers. This raises the question whether the platform will be inclusive of new apps or will give priority access to just a few apps.
In the light of recent worldwide demand for tougher net neutrality laws, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India(TRAI) has brought forward a consultancy paper in the public domain. It has asked stakeholders that include the general public to share their views on net neutrality.
It is Airtel’s second attempt at undermining net neutrality, and it can be potentially dangerous for the growth of the information based economy that demands a free and fair internet. So if you want to get your voices heard at TRAI and want the Indian government to keep the internet open for all, you should send in your comments at [email protected]. You can find more information on the net neutrality consultation paper on TRAI’s website.
Android users of WhatsApp are elated to find the voice calling feature of the messaging app has finally come to their devices. At its recent developers conference, it was announced that the voice calling feature might be available for the iOS ecosystem soon. This lead many Windows Phone users to ask whether they’ll be getting the feature soon. Well looks like the Facebook owned messaging giant now has good news for its Windows users.
WhatsApp has confirmed that the voice calling feature is in its developmental stage. This was revealed when one Windows user inquired about the arrival of the feature on their devices.
There is no timeframe mentioned as of yet for the arrival of the voice calling feature on Windows phones. WhatsApp’s founder had stated during the developers conference that voice calling would be available on its iOS app in a few weeks. So as of now it isn’t sure which of the two will get the feature first, but considering the massive user base of Apple, our bet is on iOS devices.
Mobile phones have given a boost to communication like no other technology before it. Instead of looking for a telephone in every country you go to, the pocket-sized device is always handy to connect you with your loved ones. But the aspect of international calling that dissuades people from using their mobiles more often while traveling abroad is the high roaming charges, Google is set to challenge these exorbitant charges by introducing free international roaming.
The Silicon Valley giant is working on creating its own mobile phone service and is in talks with operators like Hutchison Whampoa to allow free roaming to its customers. Google will collaborate with other network operators to use their existing infrastructures to offer its services. The company has said that it will be a small scale network but considering Google’s massive resources, the company might aim for bigger scales in the future.
A tie-up with Hutchison will give Google access to countries like UK, Ireland, Italy, and several other countries. It is said that with this move, the company will force the American telecom companies to offer similar services to their US customers. The telecom firms of US like Verizon and AT&T make a lot of profits but are also known for their dismal services.
The recent advancements in the field of communication which includes voice and video calling through apps, free roaming and other features might be troublesome for the telecom companies. Sooner or later the telecom companies will have to shut down their prime service of voice call and text messaging as internet based apps take over their markets. It will be interesting to see how they manage to stay relevant in the coming future.
OnePlus users were finally delighted to see the launch of the new Oxygen OS by the company. It had been in works for quite a while and it has now finally reached OnePlus One devices. In the meanwhile, the company was also supposed to launch the new version of CyanogenMod for its customers but it seems like they have to wait a while to get their update.
OnePlus has said that the new update has been delayed due to certification issues at Google. Cyanogen is proactively working to release the new update, and its boss, Kirt McMaster was visibly frustrated with the mounting queries for the date of arrival. It was the OnePlus bosses who had promised an estimated time of arrival (ETA) for the latest CyanogenMod OTA update.
An interaction with the co-founder of CyanogenMod, Steve Kondik was posted on the forums of OnePlus. Steve said that they are in a scramble mode and really want to bring their hard work to the public. In one of the latest posts, Steve has said that it might take about four more days to get the certifications done. He added that he might write about what all transpired behind the scenes to bring the new update once it came to the market that we bet would be exciting to read.
The comment was posted on Friday, hence we should expect the update within the next two days. OnePlus updates have faced delays in the past and though it is appreciable that it wants to give top-notch service to its customers but it’s rather necessary to give them a quality bug-free update.
Switzerland is known to be the land of exquisite watch makers. For decades, the Swiss watch has been one of the most prominent exports of the tiny European nation. The year now is 2015, and it’s the age of smartwatches. Silicon Valley giant, Apple is ready to launch its new product, the Apple Watch around the world, but it has hit a legal wall in the watchmakers’ nation.
Apple cannot sell the Watch with the name Apple or image of an Apple, which are both central to the branding of the product. The patent to the brand name in the country is held by William Longe, who received it in 1985. This patent is set to expire on December 5 of this year after which the tech giant can bring its new smartwatch to the country.
The patent issue was reported by Swiss broadcaster RTS. Till now there has been no comment from either Apple or the patent authority of Switzerland on the matter. Apple will be bringing its new product to nine countries on April 24th.
Seeing the challenge to their markets, the Swiss watchmakers are raising their game too. Founder of one of the largest watchmaker from the country, Swatch had recently said that the nation’s watch business will head for trouble if they don’t compete with the tech companies. Swatch has already unveiled their own smartwatches, but they look like toys at present. They will have to do a lot better to take on the offerings from Samsung, LG and of course, Apple.
Microsoft had recently announced its plans for taking on one of its biggest business rivals, Google. The Redmond-based technology giant had announced that they would be bringing low-cost laptops to target the market of Chromebooks. Google decided to reply back in kind and has now unveiled a series of low-cost Chromebooks to capture the space before Microsoft arrives with its offerings.
The first in the series of new launches is the Asus Chromebook Flip, which comes with a touch screen. It has a 10.1 inch display with a resolution of 1280×800 pixels which can be folded backwards so that you can use it as a tablet. This 2-in-1 notebook will be powered by a Rockchip 3288 processor with four ARM Cortex A17 cores. It offers 16 GB of internal storage and promises 10 hours of battery life.
Asus Chromebook-Flip
Along with the Asus Chromebook Flip, Haier and Hisense have also introduced their Chromebook options which have a dirt cheap price tag. Both the offerings feature 11.6-inch displays with a resolution of 1366×768-pixel. They are powered by ARM Cortex-A17 based processors along with 2 GB RAM. They offer 16 GB of storage space and feature two USB 2.0 ports, HDMI output, and a microSD card slot. They differ only in terms of battery life; the Haier model offer 10 hours while the Hisense model offers 8.5 hours of runtime on a single charge.
Asus Chromebook Flip is priced at $249 (approx Rs. 15,525) while the Haier and Hisense versions will be available for $149 (approx Rs. 9,300). They will be available in the US and may find their way to the Indian shores in the future. With such tempting prices, we can only hope they arrive here sooner than later.
Just a few days back we got news from OnePlus that it would be bringing a drone to its line-up of products. Today the company did bring out the drone, and many claim that it is an April Fool’s prank. However, we just placed an order for two.
OnePlus created a fantastic product website for DR-1. It talks about the features of the new drone which includes the ability to fly higher than any other drone in the market and a simple controller.
The website also has a 30 second teaser video for the product with some sexy graphics. At the end of the video, you get a clear indication that the DR-1 is nothing but a toy with OnePlus branding on it.
A few lucky fans of OnePlus will get to own this remote controlled toy. All you need to do is go on Facebook, fill up a simple form and tag two friends. Even though it isn’t a full-fledged drone that some of you must have been hoping for; you still get to own a tiny OnePlus souvenier. This is definitely better than the usual pranks by Google which just end up making you feel embarrassed and sad inside. So go ahead and prank your friend with a link to DR-1’s website.
Jay Z is one of the royalties of the music industry. He has had a long and eventful career, and his wife Beyonce enjoys a similar status in the music industry. Jay Z is also a successful entrepreneur with a personal net worth of $560 Million with investments in several brands. Now he is using his status in the industry to offer a new music streaming service called Tidal and for this he has invited the who’s who of the music industry.
Tidal is a subscription-based music streaming service that has been in operation since October 2014. The music service combines lossless audio and high definition music videos which are curated by the editors. The most attractive bit about this service is its ownership. The musicians will have the stake in this streaming service, thereby guaranteeing them a return on their creation. This means that the musicians will have direct control over their product on Tidal.
For the announcement of his involvement, Jay Z invited the most notable faces of the music industry. The list includes Madonna, Kanye West, Nicky Minaj, Coldplay lead singer, Chris Martin, Alicia Keys and the eccentric Daft Punk. These celebrities began promoting the service under the hashtag #TIDALforALL on Twitter.
Access to content on Tidal will be available in two subscription plans, $10 a month for a compressed format (the standard on most digital outlets) and $20 for CD-quality streams. Tidal’s parent company had reported last autumn that the service has about 512,000 paying users. That number will significantly rise, thanks to Jay Z’s involvement.
But Tidal has a long climb ahead in the streaming service business which is currently ruled by the likes of Spotify and Pandora. Also, while the artists may be on board, but the distribution rights of the songs are still held by the studios who produce them, so that bit needs to be ironed out. The biggest challenge for the service, of course, is to find consumers who are ready to pay for the music instead of going for the plethora of avenues on the Internet to get music for free. Jay Z may have had 99 Problems, and now this will be a major one.
The concept of Tidal sounds interesting as it would let users listen to the high-quality audio while the revenues generated will directly reach the artists. But the service should also be equally kind to budding musicians who face tremendous pressures to get their art recognized and eventually get paid for it.
Here is the video of all your favourite music superstar coming together for Tidal:
Xiaomi is celebrating its fifth year in business today. The Chinese electronics company has unveiled a bunch of new devices just for this occasion. One device that catches the eye immediately is the new Redmi 2A. Xiaomi has made its already low priced Redmi 2 even cheaper in this latest version.
Xiaomi Redmi 2A differs from its sibling, the Redmi 2 only in terms of its processor. The device is powered by a Leadcore L1860C quad-core Cortex A7 1.5GHz processor. Apart from that, it packs in the same specifications as the Redmi 2 including the 1 GB RAM and 8 GB of internal storage.
The handset is priced at RMB 599 (Rs.6000) which makes it slightly cheaper than the Redmi 2. It is not sure as of yet if the device will come to India, but buyers would have to consider if they want to pay Rs.1000 less for a new processor or get the Snapdragon powered Redmi 2. Well, it’s still good that they now have a choice, something that a consumer always appreciates.
The software markets around the world are dominated by US based products. With the revelation of the NSA snooping on the data of major companies like Google, Microsoft and other players, the governments around the world have become vary of using such products. The Indian government too is taking measures to reduce the dominance of US based products in its workflow and hence has introduced a new Open Source Software(OSS) Policy.
With the use of open source software, the government intends to bring greater transparency. It is also looking to invest in propriety software for official functions. The development costs of OSS’s are also lower than the big brand software.
An official statement said that the new policy will be applicable to the central government institutions, and state governments will have to induct the policy when they upgrade their e-governance systems. It also added that under the Digital India program, the government intends to bring low-cost, but high-quality services to the citizens and OSS are an optimal way of going about with the plans.
All government institutions, under this policy, would have to consider OSS for implementing the E-governance model. The source code of these softwares will be available to community/adopter/end-user to study and modify the software. These softwares will also be “royalty-free.”
India’s stand for open source software is appreciable and will lead to greater transparency. The governments of US, UK, Germany and many European nations have stressed on OSS platforms too. India’s crowdsourcing platform, MyGov.in has already been built on open source platforms.
Microsoft is going for a major revamp with its new operating system, Windows 10. The latest OS will also come with an all new browser, known at present as “Project Spartan”. Microsoft has unveiled Spartan during the consumer preview of Windows 10 in January, and it looked competent enough to take on the likes of Chrome, Safari and others. The latest technical preview of the Windows 10 has now been released, and Microsoft is now giving developers the chance to play with the new browser.
Project Spartan comes with a brand new rendering engine. This new engine will be faster and will facilitate the new sharing features. The preview also features the most talked about feature of inking, where users can add annotations to existing pages and share them through various channels.
Cortana, Microsoft’s voice assistant, presently found in Windows Mobile will also be available in Windows 10. Cortana will lead to faster searching capabilities and can be easily conjured up when required. Cortana in Spartan will be available in the US versions of this build, and available more broadly later.
Project Spartan was unveiled at the Windows 10 consumer preview event held in January.
Project Spartan will offer a reader friendly view to spare you from the usual distractions of a regular website. The browser can collect all that you read and lets you save any web page or PDF to let you access them in a distraction-free reading space.
If you want to take Project Spartan out for a spin, you need to sign-up for the Microsoft Insiders Program and get started for free. You would need to install the Windows 10 Technical Preview, Build 10049. As Project Spartan gains more prominence, Microsoft’s premier internet browser, the Internet Explorer will be pushed into the background. With Windows 10, Microsoft is attempting to take down its competition, who have got an opportunity to advance, thanks to its own folly called Windows 8. So Microsoft has to offer several unique features in Windows 10 to maintain its dominance in the operating system market.
The spectrum auctions have come to a close, and the government has received total payment of Rs. 1,09,874.91 crores this time around. But what might be a good amount of revenue for the government, might not be good news for the mobile subscribers in India says Moody, the global financial credit rating agency. It means that the telecom companies might soon hike their tariff’s to make up for lost resources.
Moody said that the high rates of spectrum will tremendously increase debts and is negative for the credit of the telecom companies, and they would increase their tariffs to address the issue. It said that the hike will be gradual so as to keep their market.
Moody also mentioned that the companies would be able to recover a good amount of their departed fortunes with the increase in demand for 3G data plans. Telecom Minister of India, Ravi Shanker Prasad said that as per expert analysis, the annual load on the companies will be Rs. 5300 crore.
The latest telecom auctions saw significant spending on the parts of the network providers. Idea Cellular made a commitment to pay Rs. 30,306.98 crore followed by Airtel at Rs. 29,130.20 crore and Vodafone with Rs. 29,959.74 crores. Other telecom companies too pitched thousands of crores to secure spectrum and stay in business.
It is also being said that due to the massive investment in spectrum acquirement, the companies might slow the expansion of their 3G and 4G services. They might hold off major investments for the next phases of upgrades. So this would also be a disappointment for the users who have been waiting to use their new LTE enabled smartphones to their maximum potential. So dear Indians, brace up, the hike is coming.
Microsoft’s Halo is one of the most popular games in the market. This year, the fifth installment will be up for grabs on October 27. The date of launch was mentioned in the two new trailers released by Microsoft during the season finale of “The Walking Dead.”
Both the trailers are shot in live action and seem like a juxtaposition of each other. It shows the scene, but the two characters are on opposite ends in both videos. According to some decrypters on the internet, it is said that a super soldier named Locke believes Master Chief, the protagonist from the previous “Halo” games, is a traitor, but the reason is unknown.
Halo 5: Guardians is developed by game makers. 343 industries who had also created the previous two offerings under the banner of Halo. It is said that the trailer indicates the possibility of controlling multiple characters in the latest version of the game.
Over the years, Microsoft has seen tremendous appreciation and demand for this game. The fifth edition will come to Xbox consoles on 27th October this year; so you know when to clear up your schedule and warm up your Xbox for unending Halo sessions.
Here are both the new trailers for Halo 5: Guardians.
There was recently rumours about an HTC’s new device known as the A55 which flaunted some amazing specs. The device was to be a part of the company’s Desire line of handsets. Now the company has gone ahead and quietly posted the A55 on its Chinese website but with a new name. It is now called the HTC One E9+.
The specifications for the device is close to what was previously rumored about the A55. It sports 5.5″ Quad HD display and is powered by a 64-bit, octa-core MediaTek MT6795M chipset along with 2GB RAM. It offers 16GB of internal storage which is expandable, but the limit hasn’t been stated yet. The device will be juiced up through a 2800 mAh battery.
It offers a 13 MP camera at the back and 4MP UltraPixel camera in the front. It features a metal frame design and would be a refreshing change over last year’s HTC One E8 which had an appealing design but was made of plastic. The device runs HTC Sense 7 UI based on Android Lollipop.
There are a few discrepancies in the websites relating to specs at the moment, so some of these specs may change with updates to the website. But looking at the features, it appears that like last year, HTC plans to bring a slightly stripped down version of its flagship, the HTC One M9. The One E9+ will be available in meteor grey, gold sepia, and two-tone classic rose gold colour options.
