Wednesday, June 27, 2018 at 3:31PM 
Lost in Space
As we head into the Canada Day long weekend, Netflix Canada unveiled a fun list of content and behind-the-scenes that's home grown. In case it's too hot and humid outdoors, grab your tub of ice cream and celebrate our Canadian talent on screen, behind the screen as well as the storytellers. Put these on your Canadiana bucket list, eh?
Wednesday, June 27, 2018 at 9:00AM 
By Gadjo Cardenas Sevilla
We live in a time where smart speakers are as common as TVs and smartphones. Powering these smart speakers are intelligent assistants which can respond to queries, set timers, run searches and play back an incredible range of streaming music, news and online content.
Behind each intelligent assistant is a tech company and its ecosystem of products. Amazon has millions of items for sale, Google has a massive advertising model, and Apple wants to shoehorn users into its Neverland of apps, services and devices.
Many of the existing $500 smart speaker releases of late seem to be solutions in search of problems. Apple’s HomePod is a circular single speaker that claims to be able to generate stereo sound. The Google Home Max is a heavy and oversized boombox for the streaming age. Both are expensive and serve one purpose, to play back streaming music and serve as the link for expanded smart home functionality.
The Sonos Beam, now that’s a different story. The second smart speaker from Sonos is also their third soundbar product and it is the hat trick of smart speakers capable of solving many problems at once.
Tuesday, June 26, 2018 at 11:26PM 
The Material Design makeover for Google Maps isn’t just coming to a few Android users. Google has finally begun rolling out the new look to all Android devices. The tech company first introduced this redesign at Google I/O 2018 back in May. You’ll see a new user interface with new fonts, buttons, and colorful icons in contrast with the mostly white background. The biggest new thing though is the new Explore section which shows you information on what’s available near you. And this shows everything from food, services, shopping, and other areas of interest in your area like gyms, parks, nightlife, etc.
If the update hasn’t made its way to you yet, just be a bit patient. Google usually rolls out updates in stages. Also it’s coming to Android users first and we can’t say yet when iOS Google Maps users will be getting the update but the company does usually port the features it has on Android to iOS so don’t be surprised if the iOS version of Google Maps gets the update, too.
Source: BGR
Tuesday, June 26, 2018 at 10:56PM 
It took many, many months (or even a year or two) since Amazon has been able to add voice control support to its Amazon Alexa iOS app. It might have felt like this wasn’t going to happen but it’s finally here. The update will be rolling out to users in the coming days so keep an eye for it. What this brings to users is the ability to ask for help from Alexa. Since it’s not baked in natively, you’ll need to tap a button to interact with it. But once you do that, you can ask Alexa questions, access skills, listen to music, and control smart devices. There will also be a visual component in the app for queries related to weather, sports, movies, and calendar.
Source: TechCrunch
