Tuesday
Jan222019

Musi.sh lets you use Apple Music on the web

If you’re an Apple Music user, you’re probably heavily reliant on your phone to play music or have been forced to use iTunes when you’re on a computer. Now, if you wanted a web option, unfortunately that didn’t exist until now. Musi.sh is a new project that brings Apple music onto your web browser—for free. The site mostly echoes Apple Music design language and functionality, so there’s no learning curve here. This open-source project began with Apple Music-loving developers Filip Grebowski, Brychan Bennett-Odlum Raphael Vigee, and James Jarvis, who all wanted a way to use the service without draining their phones’ batteries. The team used Apple’s MusicKit and made the prototype at a 12-hour GitHub-sponsored hackathon. The team won with the project.

Right now, what’s missing is the Radio feature, because MusicKit currently doesn’t support radio stations through Apple Music. If you want to give it a try though, you can through this link. If you want to contribute to the project, you can through its GitHub page.

Source: The Next Web

Tuesday
Jan222019

Microsoft Education launches various products to battle dominant Chromebooks, including $40 Pen

Microsoft is serious about growing its presence in the educational market. The company teamed up with partners Lenovo, Dell and Acer to unveil more affordable education-focused Windows laptops and 2-in-1's. The company also unveiled a lower-cost version of its Surface Pen called the Classroom Pen which can work with Surface devices. 

The Classroom Pen is an education-only product, so consumers won't have an opportunity to buy these more affordable devices.

The educational market is a segment that Microsoft and Apple have been trying to retain a foothold in but which is currently dominated by Google's Chromebooks.

Apple released a more affordable iPad and with Pencil capability last year to remain relevant and Microsoft launched various products aimed at this market. The first was the Surface Laptop, then Windows 10 S and also the adorable Surface Go. With more affordable Windows devices now available, educators and teachers now have a variety of choice for educational computers.

Source: Thurrott

Tuesday
Jan222019

Apple CEO Tim Cook advocates for privacy in recent TIME Op-Ed

Photo by Gadjo Cardenas SevillaBy Gadjo Cardenas Sevilla

Today's leading technology companies and their CEO's look to provide leadership not just in the technology space but also in various moral and ethical areas. Microsoft's CEO Satya Nadella is pushing ethics in AI and Machine Learning as guiding principles for the future.

Apple and its CEO Tim Cook have been loudly beating the drum in protection of user privacy which has culminated in an Op-Ed Apple took out on Time magazine with Cook weighing in on user's right to privacy and the many steps that government and regulation can protect these rights.

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Tuesday
Jan222019

Samsung Galaxy Note 9, Google Pixel 3 earn top marks for selfie cameras from DxOMark's test

Today's flagship smartphones are all about camera performance and when it comes to taking selfies, the two best devices in the market according to DxOMark are the Google Pixel 3 and the Samsung Galaxy Note 9.

These two devices are noted for capturing natural skin tones and preserving details, vivid colours and depth. Since selfie camera use is as dominant as the rear feacing camera (being deployed 40 per cent of the time), DxOMark devised new criteria for testing front-facing shooters focusing on skin tone, colour accuracy, sharpness, exposure, contrast and depth. 

Google's Pixel 3, with its dual frong-facing camera setup (ideal for group selfies as well), and the Samsung Galaxy Note 9 garnered scores of 92. They were followed by the Xiaomi's Mi Mix3, Apple iPhone XS Max and the Samsung Galaxy S9 Plus which earned scores of 84, 82, and 81 respectively.

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