Wednesday 8 January 2020

Tech News Flash

Tech News Flash: Wednesday -- January 8, 2020

TechNewsWorld -- All Tech - All The Time
https://www.TechNewsWorld.com
Part of the ECT News Network

Headline Scan
Tech Strides, Tech Worries and Tech Visions: ECT News Roundtable, Episode 1
Samsung Debuts Sleek Galaxy Chromebook
New Feren OS Does Plasma Better
CES 2020: Prepare to Be Amazed
Don't Expect Too Much From Electric Trucks

Message From Our Sponsor
The Ultimate Guide to Digital-First Customer Service
Optimizing existing support organizations for the digital world
can be tricky if you don't have the right tools. Luckily, you can
get started with your transformational journey as soon as this
comprehensive guide hits your inbox. Download the eBook:
https://www.ectnews.com/adsys/link/?crid=10299/Helpshift_eBook

Today's Story Highlights

Tech Strides, Tech Worries and Tech Visions: ECT News Roundtable, Episode 1

If you're turned off by the mere thought of talking heads vying to speak
the loudest or the longest in a TV "discussion" of some pressing issue
of the day, read on for a refreshing dose of sanity. ECT News Network
recruited five smart people with plenty to say about the state of
technology, and we gave them plenty of time to say it. The result is a
far-ranging intercourse.
http://www.technewsworld.com/story/86436.html

Samsung Debuts Sleek Galaxy Chromebook

Samsung introduced a high-end Galaxy Chromebook at CES 2020 in Las
Vegas. The new model could serve as an extension of the company's
smartphone lineup and spawn a premium device demand in the category.
Samsung aims to position it as the company's flagship Chromebook to meet
potential demand for a more useful and powerful multipurpose premium
mobile device.
http://www.technewsworld.com/story/86440.html

New Feren OS Does Plasma Better

Feren OS now is built around Ubuntu Linux 18.04 and the KDE Plasma
desktop instead of Linux Mint. The Cinnamon desktop version could retire
later this year. The Feren OS community has released a mostly
maintenance snapshot update for the Feren OS Cinnamon version. This new
Feren OS release meets the goal of mixing the Cinnamon desktop with the
more capable KDE Plasma 5 to make a better distro.
http://www.technewsworld.com/story/86423.html

CES 2020: Prepare to Be Amazed

Every year I look forward to CES being over. That's not because it isn't
interesting -- it is. It's because the place is a nightmare to get
around, thanks to some incredibly stupid decisions that turn Las Vegas
into a gridlocked mess. Coming right after the holidays, it destroys
more family vacations than any other event short of a long driving trip
with very young children.
http://www.technewsworld.com/story/86433.html

Don't Expect Too Much From Electric Trucks

With the rise of electric cars, it was only a matter of time before
electric trucks hit the market. Several electric vehicle startups --
including Bollinger, Lordstown Motors, Rivian and Workhorse -- have been
working on developing electric pickup trucks for several years, but none
have come to market yet. However, it was Tesla's announcement of the
Cybertruck that ignited interest in the market.
http://www.technewsworld.com/story/86438.html

News Alerts From ECT News Network
Get the day's top business and technology news delivered
to your inbox as stories break. Sign up today -- it's free!
http://www.ectnews.com/adsys/link/?crid=2202/News_Alerts

How to Advertise in This Newsletter
To advertise in this newsletter or elsewhere on ECT News Network,
please call our sales department toll-free at (877) 328-5500, or view
our online media kit at
https://www.ectnews.com/advertising/

Subscribing and Unsubscribing
You are receiving the Tech News Flash in response to your request
on the TechNewsWorld Web site for our daily newsletter. If you wish
to make changes to your newsletter subscription, or if you wish to
receive other free newsletters from the ECT News Network, please click
here: Newsletter Management Wizard

If this e-mail was forwarded to you and you wish to subscribe to
this FREE newsletter, please use our newsletter sign-up wizard:
http://www.ectnews.com/perl/newsletter_registration.pl/

Feedback
We welcome your feedback. Contact us online at
https://www.ectnews.com/perl/contact_form.pl?to=editorial

Follow Us

Editor's Pick: Tech Strides, Tech Worries and Tech Visions: ECT News Roundtable, Episode 1

Tech Strides, Tech Worries and Tech Visions: ECT News Roundtable, Episode 1

Mick Brady Jan 8, 2020 11:43 AM PT
	If you're turned off by the mere thought of talking heads vying to speak the loudest or the longest in a TV "discussion" of some pressing issue of the day, read on for a refreshing dose of sanity. ECT News Network recruited five smart people with plenty to say about the state of technology, and we gave them plenty of time to say it. The result is a far-ranging intercourse. [More...]

More Picks:

Facebook to Kick Out Some Deepfakes
Facebook has promised to remove certain "misleading manipulated media": videos edited or synthesized in ways that likely would mislead viewers to believe that video subjects said words they did not say; products of artificial intelligence or machine learning that merge, combine, replace, or superimpose content onto a video, creating a fake video that appears to be authentic. [More...]

New Feren OS Does Plasma Better
Feren OS now is built around Ubuntu Linux 18.04 and the KDE Plasma desktop instead of Linux Mint. The Cinnamon desktop version could retire later this year. The Feren OS community has released a mostly maintenance snapshot update for the Feren OS Cinnamon version. This new Feren OS release meets the goal of mixing the Cinnamon desktop with the more capable KDE Plasma 5 to make a better distro. [More...]

Samsung Debuts Sleek Galaxy Chromebook
Samsung introduced a high-end Galaxy Chromebook at CES 2020 in Las Vegas. The new model could serve as an extension of the company's smartphone lineup and spawn a premium device demand in the category. Samsung aims to position it as the company's flagship Chromebook to meet potential demand for a more useful and powerful multipurpose premium mobile device. [More...]

Chatbot or Human? Combine Both to Achieve Customer Service Success
Companies across industries are shifting toward an automated approach to customer relations. With the help of chatbots, businesses can reduce their customer service costs by up to 30 percent and save both employees' and customers' valuable time. In fact, many customers welcome chatbots in the customer service process. So, if chatbots offer all of these advantages, why not automate everything? [More...]

Follow Us

This Editor's Pick alert is a premium service provided to ECT News Network newsletter subscribers. If you wish to make changes to your subscription settings, please click to manage your account.

Copyright 2020 ECT News Network, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
ECT News Network, Inc. 16133 Ventura Blvd., Suite 700, Encino, CA 91436

ECT News Network Weekly Newsletter

ECT News Network Weekly Newsletter: Wednesday -- January 8, 2020

ECT News Network -- Where Business Meets Technology
https://www.ectnews.com
E-Commerce Times | TechNewsWorld
CRM Buyer | LinuxInsider

Message From Our Sponsor
The Ultimate Guide to Digital-First Customer Service
Optimizing existing support organizations for the digital world
can be tricky if you don't have the right tools. Luckily, you can
get started with your transformational journey as soon as this
comprehensive guide hits your inbox. Download the eBook:
https://www.ectnews.com/adsys/link/?crid=10299/Helpshift_eBook

This Week's Top News Headlines From the E-Commerce Times

Facebook to Kick Out Some Deepfakes
(Posted 08-Jan-20)
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/86443.html

Few Households Have Taken the Gigabit Broadband Leap
(Posted 07-Jan-20)
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/86441.html

Recommerce: The New Art of Secondhand Sales
(Posted 06-Jan-20)
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/86439.html

In 2020, Enterprises Will Unlock Hidden Value in Their Own Workforces
(Posted 03-Jan-20)
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/86437.html

This Week's Top News Headlines From TechNewsWorld

Samsung Debuts Sleek Galaxy Chromebook
(Posted 07-Jan-20)
http://www.technewsworld.com/story/86440.html

CES 2020: Prepare to Be Amazed
(Posted 06-Jan-20)
http://www.technewsworld.com/story/86433.html

Don't Expect Too Much From Electric Trucks
(Posted 04-Jan-20)
http://www.technewsworld.com/story/86438.html

This Week's Top News Headlines From CRM Buyer

Chatbot or Human? Combine Both to Achieve Customer Service Success
(Posted 07-Jan-20)
http://www.crmbuyer.com/story/86442.html

This Week's Top News Headlines From LinuxInsider

New Feren OS Does Plasma Better
(Posted 07-Jan-20)
http://www.linuxinsider.com/story/86423.html

News Alerts From ECT News Network
Get the day's top business and technology news delivered
to your inbox as stories break. Sign up today -- it's free!
https://www.ectnews.com/adsys/link/?creative=2202/News_Alerts

How to Advertise in This Newsletter
To advertise in this newsletter or elsewhere on ECT News Network,
please call our sales department toll-free at (877) 328-5500, or view
our online media kit at
http://www.ectnews.com/advertising/

Subscribing and Unsubscribing
You are receiving this newsletter in response to your request on an
ECT News Network site. If you wish to make changes to your
newsletter subscription, or if you wish to receive other free
newsletters from the ECT News Network, please click here:
Newsletter Management Wizard

If this e-mail was forwarded to you and you wish to subscribe to this
FREE newsletter, please use our Newsletter sign-up wizard:
https://www.ectnews.com/perl/newsletter_registration.pl/

Feedback
We welcome your feedback. Contact us online at
https://www.ectnews.com/perl/contact_form.pl?to=editorial

Follow Us

Dell's Concept UFO is like a Switch for PC gaming

Engadget Email Newsletter

Now available on your smart speaker and wherever you get your podcasts

Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Google Play | iHeart Radio

It's Wednesday, January 08, 2020.

Hey, good morning!

The more data leaks that occur, the more likely Apple is to talk about how great its privacy practices are. And the company's triumphant return to CES -- Apple's last official outing was in 1992 -- was a predictable touting of its security chops.

The company's senior director for global privacy, Jane Horvath, was part of a roundtable discussion with other privacy experts from the FTC, Facebook and Procter & Gamble. And even though the past year has seen a couple of skirmishes over privacy -- Apple vs Facebook, Facebook vs the FTC -- everyone stuck to their lines.

Apple talked up its privacy practices. Facebook strenuously tried to make the same case. Rebecca Slaughter, the FTC commissioner, reminded us all we have no idea where our data ends up. Hopefully that won't still be the case 28 years from now when Apple chooses to turn up again.

-Chris

The company's kooky camera glass will even help when taking photos.

OnePlus's Concept One phone offers a cure for the common camera hump

The OnePlus Concept One is beautiful, clad in the same papaya-hued leather McLaren uses in some of its supercars. It's powerful, too. But the major feature here is an incredibly thin slice of a material called electrochromic glass over the phone's rear cameras, which turns opaque and transparent when voltage is applied to it. This is hardly new technology; the Concept One relies on the same sort of tech that makes those really cool airplane windows work. Getting it to work on a smartphone scale is still quite a feat, though. Chris Velazco took a look.

It's also meant for military and employee training.

This massive 8K VR headset was built for NASA

VRgineers has been making VR headsets for years, but for 2020, it has unveiled the XTAL, which comes with a whopping 8K resolution, providing it with what’s meant to be a crystal clear VR image. Because of the size of the thing, it offers a 180-degree field of view in virtual reality. It’s not for Half Life, though. This is for enterprise applications, such as employee safety training. Older versions of the XTAL are already in use at the Department of Defense, the US Navy and NASA, and this new version will cost $8,000.

It transfers data at a super-fast 20Gbps.

SanDisk unveils a portable 8TB SSD prototype

You know what Engadget readers love? Tiny storage solutions. And SanDisk never disappoints. So, straight to the storage lust. The company is showing off an 8TB SSD prototype at CES. Since this is a prototype, there's no telling when SanDisk will actually release a portable 8TB SSD, but with so few 4TB drives available, it may take a while for the market to be ready for such a large -- and expensive -- option. That said, it wouldn't be a surprise if SanDisk were the first to market with an 8TB SSD -- the company was the first to debut a 1TB microSD card earlier this year.

Learn these 10 useful skills in 2020.

I've had worse!

I skipped breakfast, but Samsung had a robot make me a salad

Chris Velazco’s breakfast came courtesy of Samsung's Bot Chef, which the company affectionately refers to as a "cobot," or collaborative robot. Despite its name, Bot Chef isn't meant to prepare your meals from scratch, though I wouldn't be surprised if it could. Instead, you're meant to work side by side with it: Bot Chef can download and display recipes on a nearby screen so you could mutually participate in meal prep.

Since Samsung couldn't procure the permits needed to have open flames on the show floor, the recipe was pretty basic, but it still deftly diced a block of soft tofu and pushed the pieces around an oiled-up frying pan with a spatula. The Bot Chef can also connect to the internet and download new skills, like the ability to operate what appeared to be a Nespresso coffee maker. Samsung (understandably) doesn't have a firm launch window in mind yet. It did say, however, that it engineered these arms with accessibility in mind -- in other words, they're not supposed to be super expensive.

Bigger is better sometimes.

Intel's Horseshoe Bend prototype is the biggest foldable tablet yet

Foldables were big in 2019, and it looks like they're only going to get bigger in 2020. We've seen folding phones and even tablets, but the trend is even larger screens, with Intel showing off a new 17-inch foldable tablet prototype called Horseshoe Bend. It is meant to help Intel and its partners figure out how to make a large foldable work. The biggest challenge? Ensuring it doesn’t break when you fold it.

But wait, there's more...

1. LG Display is cramming curved and bendable OLEDs into every part of your life

2. A dispatch from inside Sony's prototype electric car

3. Watch AMD's CES 2020 keynote in 10 minutes

4. Apple's rare CES appearance was another privacy pitch

The Morning After is a new daily newsletter from Engadget designed to help you fight off FOMO. Who knows what you'll miss if you don't subscribe.

Now available on your smart speaker and wherever you get your podcasts:
Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Google Play | iHeart Radio

Craving even more? Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.

Have a suggestion on how we can improve The Morning After? Send us a note.