Netflix promotes ‘Black Mirror’ with ‘Little Black Mirror’ video series

Netflix taps Latinx social media stars to promote the upcoming season of Black Mirror with its short video series it’s calling Little Black Mirror. The three mini stories take inspiration from the tech dystopian universe created by Charlie Brooker and Annabel Jones. It’s aimed at the Spanish-speaking audiences and stars the likes of Maia Mitchell, Lele Pons, Rudy Mancuso, Hannah Stocking, and Alesso, to name a few. To promote the series, Netflix tapped YouTube personalities from across Latin America to create their own take on the series. These three mini episodes will launch on May 26, June 2, and June 6^th on the Netflix América Latina channel. Meanwhile, Black Mirror’s fifth season is coming out on June 5^th.

Source: Variety

Paramount delays release of ‘Sonic the Hedgehog’ movie to fix main character’s design

There was backlash when the first trailer for Sonic the Hedgehog dropped last month. The design had been, as Engadget describes it, nightmare-inducing. Now, Paramount just announced that it is pushing back the release of the film “to make Sonic just right.” The film was originally slated for a November 2019 release, but now it’s been pushed back to February 14, 2020. Let’s hope they’ll be able to get the look right. We think Detective Pikachu might have set the bar for how cute yet realistic these animated characters could be if done right.

Instagram’s IGTV now supports landscape videos

Instagram has conceded that vertical videos aren’t all their cracked up to be. The app’s IGTV feature will now support landscape clips. The change was made because of creators’ and users’ feedback. The company said in a blog post, “In many ways, opening IGTV to more than just vertical videos is similar to when we opened Instagram to more than just square photos in 2015. It enabled creativity to flourish and engagement to rise—and we believe the same will happen again with IGTV.”

While it wasn’t outright said, Instagram had trouble making IGTV flourish. While the creators who worked with Instagram to build IGTV content liked it, they weren’t able to monetize these videos. The vertical video format also meant that they had to optimize their videos for the platform. It felt like there was extra work for little return. And according to creators who talked to The Verge, view counts were lower on the platform than on others. It was only when Instagram started allowing them to share the story to their feeds did viewership numbers increase.

There’s a ‘Game of Thrones’ edition of the Samsung Galaxy Fold

In case you didn’t think the Samsung Galaxy Fold couldn’t get more expensive, Caviar decides to give the phone a pop culture makeover. They’re creating a version of the phone that’s inspired by the recently concluded show Game of Thrones and George R.R. Martin’s next book, The Winds of Winter. The foldable phone is customized to look like a book. It's stylized in front “into a cover of the long-awaited book." The front and rear panels feature exquisite bas-relief that’s covered in gold and shaped to represent different major houses of Westeros. There’s even an etched map of the said world at the back. When folded, it can be locked with a gold clasp. 

The inside and its specs remain similar to Samsung’s original model. This means you still get the Galaxy Fold with a Snapdragon 855 octa-core processor, 12GB of RAM, and 512GB internal storage. It has a quad camera setup at the back and dual front cameras. The battery is still at 4,380mAh. With no official word yet when Samsung plans to relaunch the Galaxy Fold, Caviar can’t announce when it’s version will be available. But the luxury brand said it’ll have a simultaneous launch date with Samsung. How much will this set you back? A very cool US$8,200. On the plus side, Caviar is offering free worldwide shipping for the units, which are very limited in number. There will only be seven units of this phone. 

Source: GadgetMatch + SlashGear