Today’s Tech Sightings:
FILE – A computer user poses in front of a Google search page in this photo illustration taken in Brussels, Belgium. (Reuters)
Google Search Just Got a Lot More Personal
If you are using any of Google’s products, then everything you do is being tracked so advertisers can pay big money for your data. But the information also allows Google to personalize your search. A new “Personal” tab in the search menu shows you results based on words you use in Google Photos, Calendar and Gmail. If you don’t fancy being tracked to this level of detail, you can adjust search settings to prevent the use of private data.
Android Creator Andy Rubin Wants Essential Phone to Fix ‘Weird World’
Former Googler and Android creator Andy Rubin holds himself partly responsible for helping create a “weird new world where people are forced to fight with the very technology that was supposed to simplify their lives.” His new Essential Phone, unveiled Tuesday, is a modular device with clip-on parts, and its screen extends to both side edges and the top. But the phone is noteworthy because of its ‘modular’ feature. Google tried its hand with modular devices for a while with Project Ara, but later abandoned the effort.
Robot Priest Unveiled in Germany to Mark 500 Years Since Reformation
Germany’s small town of Wittenberg is celebrating the birth of the Reformation movement that started 500 years ago when Martin Luther King called for church reform in Europe. Marking the occasion is BlessU-2, a robot priest on exhibition that dispenses blessings in five languages and emits light from its hands. Appropriately, Blessu-2’s mission is to challenge Europe’s religious institution once more, raising questions about its future in the age of artificial intelligence.
More:
- The Threats Facing Our Smart Cities
- Robots May Help Defuse Demographic Time Bomb in Japan, Germany
- Change.org Raises $30 Million From Reid Hoffman, Bill Gates, Others
- Android Alert: This Cutesy Malware Has Infected Millions of Devices
- Is ‘I Forget’ a Valid Defense When Court Orders Demand Smartphone Password?
- Five Big Reasons Why People Are Still Skeptical About Bitcoin
- Intel Unveils Massive 18-core Core i9 Chip
