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Tech NewsNews
New Google Antitrust Lawsuit Could Be Filed As Soon As Thursday
A coalition of states is reportedly readying a new antitrust lawsuit against Google that will claim that the company changed its search infrastructure to the disadvantage of certain rivals that offer specialized search results. According to Politico, the complaint — led by Democratic Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser — could go live as soon as … Continued
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Tech NewsGoogle
Brighten Up Your Pandemic Life With One of Google Search’s 50 New AR Animals
Ever since I was young, I’ve always been a cat fan (although dogs are lovely, too). Nonetheless, my current landlord doesn’t allow me to have a cat, so I just settle for following cute ones on Instagram. Considering that I live alone, there have been many times during the pandemic where I’ve thought, “Wouldn’t this … Continued
By Jody Serrano -
Tech NewsNews
Spotify Adds Ability to Search Songs by Lyrics and Launches New App
This week, Spotify is rolling out the ability to find songs by searching for their lyrics. It’s a feature that’s been a long time coming and it will undoubtedly become second-nature for users in no time at all. Spotify designer Lin Wang first shared the news in a tweet on Monday. The new search function … Continued
By Rhett Jones -
Tech NewsNews
Google Says It’s Getting Rid of Search Suggestions About Candidates and Voting
With the 2020 presidential election looming close on the horizon, Google’s nixing autocomplete suggestions that “could be interpreted as claims for or against any candidate or political party,” the company said in a blog post Thursday. While you’ll still be able to search for whatever you want, phrases regarding the electoral process or particular candidates … Continued
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Tech NewsGoogle
Google Is Upgrading Search to Make it Easier to Find Live Sports and TV Shows
With a seemingly ever-increasing number of cable and streaming services, simply figuring out where to watch that one live event or show has become its own challenge. So in an effort to help cut down on the noise, Google is upgrading Google Search with some new features to help you find live sports, shows, and … Continued
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Tech NewsGoogle
Feds Explore How to Hinder Google’s Search Dominance in Latest Antitrust Probe: Report
State regulators and Justice Department officials are purportedly investigating ways to limit Google’s authority in the online search market as part of an antitrust probe. Gabriel Weinberg, the CEO of rival, privacy-focused search engine DuckDuckGo, told Bloomberg that federal and state authorities have approached the company within the last few weeks to ask about requiring … Continued
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Tech NewsGoogle
Google Sure Screws Around With Search Results a Lot, Investigation Finds
Google’s search algorithm is a powerful thing—the tiniest tweaks can tank businesses, subtly influence your purchasing decisions, and shape what information you see. Google has long stated that it “do[es] not use human curation to collect or arrange the results on a page,” but a Wall Street Journal investigation has found that the company does … Continued
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Tech NewsGoogle
Google Tweaks Search to Better Understand Your Gibberish Queries
Searching for information online sometimes takes creativity—depending on how you word a query, Google can bring back some wonky results. That’s why Google announced today that it’s improved search to better understand natural language for “queries [it] can’t anticipate.” Part of the issue is that we imperfect humans don’t always know how to spell what … Continued
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Tech NewsGoogle
List of Former Googlers Claiming Google Hates Conservatives Just Keeps Getting Dumber
In 2017, the world was introduced to James Damore, a Google engineer who published a document to the company’s internal message boards claiming (inaccurately) that genetic differences between men and women explain disparate representation in the engineering profession and that the company’s diversity initiatives had created bias in its hiring processes. After Google fired Damore, … Continued
By Tom McKay -
Tech NewsGoogle
Google Starts Rolling Out Options to Auto-Delete Web & App, Location Histories Every Few Months
Google has begun rolling out features first announced in May that will allow users to set a time limit after which the giant will automatically delete location history rather than continue to hoard it forever, per TechCrunch. Another feature to do the same with web and app histories also appears to have launched. To turn … Continued
By Tom McKay -
Tech NewsGoogle
Google’s Tweaking Search Results So You Won’t Get Bombarded With The Same Site
Ever google something and the results are all from the same site? Google’s aiming to fix that with a Search update that will give users more site diversity. In a tweet, Google SearchLiaison explained the update means you won’t see more than two top results from the same website. Of course, that still depends on … Continued
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Tech NewsGoogle
New Zealand Official Blasts Google for Publishing Name of Murder Suspect in Trending Newsletter
The government of New Zealand “admonished” search giant Google for publicizing the name of a man charged in the killing of backpacker Grace Millane in Auckland, with justice minister Andrew Little demanding that the company change its algorithms to prevent it from happening again in the future, the New York Times reported on Friday. According … Continued
By Tom McKay -
Tech NewsGoogle
Steve King Demands List of Google Staff So He Can Check If They’re God-Fearing Patriots
Google CEO Sundar Pichai finally swung by the House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday for a real clown show of a hearing which—including a denial that the company is planning to launch a censored Chinese search engine “right now”—contained little useful information. Instead, it was mostly Republican members of the committee yelling at Pichai for alleged … Continued
By Tom McKay -
Tech NewsPrivacy and Security
Malware Attack on Vendor to Blame for Delta and Sears Data Breach Affecting ‘Hundreds of Thousands’ of Customers
Delta Air Lines and Sears Holding Corp. on Thursday disclosed a data breach that may have exposed the payment card details of hundreds of thousands of online customers. The breach originated at a software vendor called [24]7, which provides Sears, Delta, and other businesses with online chat services. Less than 100,000 Sears customers were supposedly … Continued
By Dell Cameron -
Tech NewsGoogle
Google’s Quest For Dominance Continues With New AMP Formats For Email and News
Google is rolling out a bevy of new open-source Accelerated Mobile Page tools for developers this week, coming in two flavors: AMP for email and AMP Stories. While anyone who reads news online might have already seen AMP articles, these new tools have the potential to shape what people see and do online in Google’s … Continued
By Tom McKay -
io9Movies
All the Cool Films Premiering at This Year’s Sundance Film Festival
The 2018 Sundance Film Festival kicks off today, marking the debut of some of the year’s most exciting independent films, as well as shorts, VR experiences, and more. Although only a small portion of the festival’s content is in the scifi/fantasy/horror/science arena, there are still a lot of films worth pointing out—and we’ve collected them … Continued
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Tech NewsGoogle
Why Google’s Half-Assed Fact-Checking Widget Was Destined to Piss Off Conservatives
Last week, conservatives cried foul over Google’s latest attempt to provide past examples of fact-checking for news outlets. Right-wing pundits at The Daily Caller insisted that Google was targeting conservative outlets and giving left-leaning publications a pass. The answer is, expectedly, a bit more complicated than that. Google calls the feature that raised the ire … Continued
By Rhett Jones -
Tech NewsPrivacy and Security
Firefox May Soon Start Publicly Shaming Sites With Crappy Security
In the constant battle to ensure your privacy online, there are some precautions you can take to protect yourself, such as avoiding clicking random links and using different passwords for every site. But other measures require some help from the websites you visit, and based on a hidden option found in the latest Firefox beta, … Continued
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Tech News
Google Is Adding Wait Times For Restaurants Because It Follows You Everywhere
Google does a lot of bad and creepy things that often seem to benefit Google more than users. But, dear reader, I have to say that I hate waiting in line so much that the site’s newly announced “wait times” feature has me feeling great about the fact that my every movement is being tracked … Continued
By Rhett Jones