Canadian Reviewer Weekly Roundup 2/18-2/24

Hasbro takes a stab at crowdfunding, starts off with massive vintage Star Wars toy

Essential Phone set to come in new, limited edition colours

Lego appeals to ‘Iron Man’ fans with Hulkbuster buildable set

Pixel owners get behind the scenes look at 'Isle of Dogs' movie in VR

Samsung outs 30TB SSD with twice the speed of its predecessor

Canada's second-hand economy is thriving with over 2.3 billion items changing hands in 2017

SnapPower’s newest outlet cover plate doubles the USB charging ports with 2.1 amps of power

Spotify might be getting serious about entering the hardware game

Ford Mustang fans can now personalize badges, shirts and grille badges using Facebook

Lost in Space reboot coming on April 13 as a Netflix exclusive

Indoor Nest Cam IQ gets support for Google Assistant

WowWee partners with Quebec's Squeeze Studio to bring Fingerlings animation series to life

Payment Source and Canada Revenue launch In-Person Tax Payments at 6,000 Canada Post outlets

Intuit's app helps self-employed workers invoice, manage expenses, and file taxes

New Apple AirPods might launch ‘as soon as this year’

Airbnb moves to attract wealthier travelers with new offerings

Review: Acer Windows Mixed Reality Headset and Controller

Huawei sets date for P20 launch

Airbnb to offer more experiences in 2018 as it expands to 1,000 cities

J.J. Abrams confirms script for ‘Star Wars Episode IX’ is finished

Colour options for the Sony Xperia XZ2 and XZ2 Compact leak ahead of launch

Colour options for the Sony Xperia XZ2 and XZ2 Compact leak ahead of launch

With the upcoming launch of the Sony Xperia XZ2 and XZ2 Compact, we also get tons of leaked information about the two devices. One of the latest leaks involve the devices are the color options the two phones are coming in. The XZ2 will come in Black, White (or Silver), Pink, and Teal, while the XZ2 Compact comes in Orange and Green, aside from the standard Black and White/Silver. There also seems to be varying camera placements with the two devices. The XZ2 has the flash and additional sensors in a vertical layout, while the Compact’s placement is horizontal with the camera closer to the edge.

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Samsung is all about business with the new Galaxy S9

We’re just hours away from Samsung’s launch of the Galaxy S9 and S9 Plus at Mobile World Congress 2018. But ahead of the launch, Slashleaks just released the official promo video for the new devices. Instead of delving into the features though, the video focused on the value of the phones for the enterprise market. As was said in the three-minute video, “The perfect phone for you is the perfect phone for business.”

But as you can see, Samsung didn’t do much to change the looks of the device. It still looks like the Galaxy S8 but thankfully with a better placement for the fingerprint reader, as rumours have been showing for the past few months. The video focuses, though, on things like the newly improved DeX dock for easily turning the S9 into a mobile computer; the improved Samsung Knox 3.1, the company’s defense-grade security platform; and what they’re calling “Intelligence scan,” which seems to either be facial recognition or an iris scanner to make it easier to unlock the device. The phone will also have an enterprise edition, it seems, that comes with extended maintenance and security updates for up to four years. We also get confirmation that the phone is water resistant. But we can see this only tells one part of the story. But we’ll find out later all the other special features Samsung plans to offer its other customers.

Source: TechCrunch 

J.J. Abrams confirms script for ‘Star Wars Episode IX’ is finished

Jurassic World’s Colin Trevorrow was originally set to direct the upcoming Star Wars Episode IX but he was replaced by Force Awakens director J.J. Abrams. With the change, the release of the movie was pushed back from May to December of 2019. But now it seems at least the script for the new movie is done and filming will begin at the end of July. Abrams talked about the progress of the movie on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert. He said, "We have a script, which is a big deal for me. It starts shooting end of July. Sometimes having the script in advance is something I haven't always been lucky enough to have. But I'm writing this with Chris Terrio, who's a genius, and I'm having a great time."

Abrams was previously quoted saying they won’t be playing it safe with the new film. "I feel like we need to approach this with the same excitement that we had when we were kids loving what these movies were," he said. "But at the same time, we have to take them places that they haven't gone, and that's sort of our responsibility."

Source: Gamespot