Uber starts rolling out in-app chat for drivers and riders

Sometimes it’s just easier to message your Uber driver than try to call him or her. And that’s why Uber has started to roll out globally an in-app messaging feature to make it easier to get in touch with your driver. When you tap on the Contact button below the driver’s name you’ll see a chat window there. Your messages to the driver will be read to them, so they can continue driving safely. If they need to respond, they can just do so with one tap and a thumbs up icon will be sent to the rider. But if you still need to call the driver, there will be a phone icon on the upper right hand of the window.

Source: The Verge

Google CEO cancels diversity all-hands meeting, cites employees concerns about safety and online privacy

CNET

Google was set to hold an all-hands town hall meeting yesterday at 4 p.m. but was cancelled at the last minute. According to the company’s CEO Sundar Pichai, the meeting was cancelled because several employees have expressed concern about being harassed online with their questions and names being published outside of the company. Google is currently facing a diversity-related controversy when one former Google engineer argued in a 10-page manifesto called “Google’s Ideological Echo Chamber” that biological differences between men and women are the cause of the gender gap at Google and in the tech industry in general.

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Consumer Reports: Microsoft Surface has worst failure rate in the industry

Independent consumer advocacy group Consumer Reports has pulled their recommendation of Microsoft's Surface products stating they have the 'worst failure rate in the industry."

According to a Consumer Reports survey of over 90,000 tablet and laptop owners, an estimated 25 percent of those with Microsoft Surface devices will experience “problems by the end of the second year of ownership.” This failure rate is the worst in the industry by far among mainstream PC makers, the publication says, this has resulted in them pulling its “recommended” designation for all Surface products. 

This is an alarming development for Microsoft, who has evolved its Surface devices over the years and aggressively added to the model lineup with the Surface Book, Surface Studio and most recently, the Surface Laptop.

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Samsung wins class action lawsuit in South Korea over the Galaxy Note7

While Samsung is busy preparing for the launch of the Galaxy Note8, it’s still working on the aftermath that the Galaxy Note7 left in its disastrous wake. One of these is a class action lawsuit the company finds itself in its home turf. A group of Galaxy Note7 owners in South Korea filed a case against Samsung for the inconvenience the recall has supposedly caused to them. The claimants for the suit grew to 1,900 people with them claiming KRW 935 million (around CA$1.3 million, around CA$680 per person). But the local court ruled in Samsung’s favour saying that the recall and the inconvenience it might have caused wasn’t “unacceptable.” The company is also facing a similar suit in the US but that case is still ongoing.

Source: GSMArena