Amazon is reportedly planning to offer a free Fire TV video news app

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Amazon might be channeling Roku with rumours that the company plans to offer a free video news updates app. It’s being reported that Amazon has already approached a number of news organizations and Verizon, who owns Yahoo News and Finance, with hopes of getting them to distribute their content in the app that will come with the Fire TV streaming devices. Amazon is reportedly targeting to release this in the next few months. It makes sense from a business perspective for the company to do this. It could give them an opportunity to rake in more ad dollars by running advertisements between segments. According to The Information, Amazon hopes to integrate its news video app into Alexa, but they didn’t expand on this idea.

Source: The Verge

Google accidentally leaks possible Nest smart display

Google made a boo-boo and accidentally unveiled what could be a new Nest smart display. The company updated the connected home section of the Google Store and the new product surfaced there. It showed off the benefits of the new Nest Hub Max, which is a product that doesn’t exist yet. It’s said to feature a 10-inch HD display with built-in Nest Camera and stereo speakers. With Nest’s extensive smart home product lineup, it makes sense the company dip into the smart display market. It would be a central hub to control the company’s products.

Source: The Verge

Apple cancels AirPower

After the really long wait for it to arrive, we’re no longer getting Apple’s taking on the wireless charging mat. The company announced it was cancelling the AirPower because of the difficulty in achieving the company’s “high standards” for the product. It was announced back in September 2017 when the iPhone X was launched. It was initially pegged to get a 2018 release but then the company went silent for 18 months without announcing or shipping the device.

The device was supposed to charge up to three devices at once—namely the Apple Watch, AirPod headphones, and iPhone. It was supposed to make use of multiple coil technology to allow you to charge your device anywhere on the mat. A software overlay was supposed to use the iPhone to show the current charge of all three devices. Overheating issues and engineering challenges were being rumoured before.

Source: The Verge

‘Hyper Light Drifter’ will become an animated series

Independent RPG Hyper Light Drifter is going to be turned into an animated series. Leading the charge is the game’s creator Alx Preston and producer Adi Shankar, who was behind Netflix’s adaptation of Castlevania. According to Preston, this project is still very much in its infancy. Shankar and Preston are still working out how to turn this 2D pixel game into a series. He told Polygon that they are “leaning a lot more towards something that’s representative of the game on the style side.” We’re not sure what he means by that, but we hope to hear more about the project soon. It isn’t known if the show will be a silent series or have dialogue. Right now the duo are reaching out to writers to see who can work on the script.