You can now just tell Google Assistant to 'stop' without saying 'Hey Google'

Photo by Moritz Kindler on Unsplash

If you missed that update, you no longer need to say "Hey Google" before telling your Google Assistant-powered smart home speaker or display to stop speaking. Now, you can just say "stop" for it to work. This feature comes in handy when the device is reading out your schedule or news and you've reached a point where you got the information you needed. It's a minor update, but it does make the interaction more natural.

As The Verge pointed out, this isn't a universal "stop making sounds" feature. And Google didn't say it was one anyway. Of course, when you're listening to a song, you still have to say the magic words, a.k.a. "Hey Google."

Canadian Reviewer Weekly Roundup – 1/23 – 1/29

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Joni Mitchell wants her song Spotify over COVID-19 misinformation concerns 

Joni Mitchell wants her song Spotify over COVID-19 misinformation concerns

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Joni Mitchell joins Neil Young in asking her music to be taken off Spotify over worries of COVID-19 misinformation on the streaming service. In a message on her site, the Canadian singer said she stands in solidarity with Young and the "global scientific and medical communities." 

She doesn't cite Joe Rogan, whose popular podcast is a Spotify exclusive, in her desire to pull her music from the service. Instead, she did link an open letter from a group of scientists and medical professionals that criticized Spotify for hosting's The Joe Rogan Experience. The letter accuses Rogan of spreading misleading claims on his show and provoking distrust in medicine and science. The group wanted Spotify to "take action against the mass-misinformation events which continue to occur on its platform."

Source

Netflix officially lists HDR support for Google Pixel 6, 6 Pro, 5A

Photo by Jonas Elia on Unsplash

If you wanted to watch HDR or HD content on Netflix on some of the newer Pixel devices, your wait is over. The streaming service has officially added the Pixel 6, 6 Pro, and the 5A to its list of devices that support HDR and HD streaming. The update to its support pages seems to have happened sometime after January 14. 

It isn't clear why Netflix hasn't added the Pixel 6 lineup to these lists earlier. But The Verge noted that some users were reporting on Reddit that their phones couldn't play HDR content properly, while it worked fine for others. Perhaps that was a problem they wanted to address first. Hopefully, it works fine for everyone now.