Android

Mosseri, who now heads up Instagram, talked a bit about the project in response to a post from our EIC Nilay Patel about the HTC First.

If you want to do some time-traveling, check out Dieter Bohn’s review from 2013.

If you signed up for Google’s waitlisted feature that lets you ask Gemini questions to surface photos and videos, you might be getting it soon, as 9to5Google reports that the feature seems to be going live for some who’ve joined the list.

If you’re not already on the waitlist, you can jump in the queue by signing up on Google’s site.

That’s according to Google’s head of Android security, David Kleidermacher, who is publicly pushing back on the claims made by Epic Games in its new lawsuit against Google and Samsung.

Earlier, Samsung said it plans to “vigorously contest Epic Game’s baseless claims.”

Google, too, wouldn’t confirm or deny whether it worked with Samsung on the feature, which is now the target of a new Epic Games lawsuit against both companies.

Instead, Google tells The Verge that it’s “a meritless lawsuit”; Samsung tells us it plans to “vigorously contest Epic Game’s baseless claims.”

Instead of a swipe up to answer screen, Android Authority reports that an alternate screen found in a recent APK features a decline button on the left and an answer button on the right, resembling Apple’s iPhone setup.

Some Android OEMs like Samsung use a similar screen (with the answer button on the left), but so far, not Google.

We want our kids to grow up in a world that’s better than this one. I grew up in an awesome world for developers and opportunity, the early days of Apple II computers and PCs, and anybody growing up, coming of age in this industry right now, is best case going to be an Apple and Google serf. That has to change. That must change.

Not surprising to hear the man behind “Nineteen Eighty-Fortnite” say this, but it really does encapsulate his war with the tech industry. More on the latest lawsuit here.

Not as fast as Epic might have hoped — it’s targeting 100 million by the end of the year — but CEO Tim Sweeney tells journalists that goal is still “totally achievable.”

Meanwhile, it’s suing Samsung and Google over the “Auto Blocker” feature that, by default, stops users from installing that store on new Samsung phones.

After 12 years, today EA announced that its free-to-play city building mobile game is shutting down. D’oh!

We have made the difficult decision to sunset Tapped Out. In-app purchases have been disabled, and the game will be removed from the app stores October 31, 2024. You may continue playing until January 24th, 2025, at which point servers will be turned off and TSTO will not be accessible.

I forced the update after it came out yesterday but rebooted into a mostly blank screen saying “add tile,” which also happened to a few other people who posted about problems on Google’s support forum and Reddit.

After a fastboot reset (video walkthrough here), I was up and running, but you may want to hold off on this one.

Google’s $99.99 Chromecast successor isn’t scheduled to launch until the 24th, but 9to5Google points out people in the UK, Germany, and Canada (below) who have already brought them home.

If you’re wondering how much storage space is free out of 32GB, one person reported it starts with 26GB available.

Google will let you make birthday events directly in Google Calendar, starting on Android and coming to web and iOS “in the future.”

Pulse oximetry features were recently removed from new Apple Watches due to Masimo's patent infringement claim. Now the medical device maker has announced deals with Qualcomm and Google for Wear OS reference platforms.

They say that OEMs who use them will design the wearables exteriors and software, but with internal hardware, software, and sensors designed/tested by Masimo.

9to5Google reports that late Saturday / early Sunday something started causing the Google app to close as soon as it's opened for some people on Android, and I'm seeing that issue on my Pixel 8 Pro.

There's no word from Google on what the issue is, but the Chrome search bar still works, as well as this Reddit suggestion of uninstalling all updates from the Google app.

Update: The problem appears to have been resolved overnight, as noted on Google’s status dashboard.

When it launched on Android in June, the app only supported the Samsung Galaxy S23, S24, and the Google Pixel 7/8 lineups. Compatibility with OnePlus and Xiaomi phones running Android 13 was added later, but Blackmagic has released another update adding features like recording timecode, plus support for the Samsung Galaxy Flip 5/6 and Fold 5/6 phones.