Category: UNCATEGORIZED

Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the Extra Crunch series that recaps the latest OS news, the applications they support and the money that flows through it all.

The app industry is as hot as ever, with a record 204 billion downloads in 2019 and $120 billion in consumer spending in 2019, according to App Annie’s “State of Mobile” annual report. People are now spending 3 hours and 40 minutes per day using apps, rivaling TV. Apps aren’t just a way to pass idle hours — they’re a big business. In 2019, mobile-first companies had a combined $544 billion valuation, 6.5x higher than those without a mobile focus.

In this Extra Crunch series, we help you keep up with the latest news from the world of apps, delivered on a weekly basis.

This week we’re continuing to look at how the coronavirus outbreak is impacting the world of mobile applications. In particular, we have new data from App Annie that shows which app categories are gaining or losing as a result of the pandemic. We also take a look at other mobile news, including the new Android 11 preview, iPad’s new lidar, TikTok’s new advisory committee and more, as well as a few apps to help get you through this tough time.

Coronavirus Special Coverage

The impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic are continuing to play out on app stores and across the industry. This week, we’re leading with these stories, followed by other news.

Android apps reviews slow down

Google this week warned Android developers that Play Store app review times will be much longer than normal due to the COVID-19 crisis. Developers should expect app reviews to take up to a week or even longer, the company informed its community by way of an alert on the Google Play Console.

At long last, here’s an actually useful purpose for Twitter’s blue-check verification mark: Twitter last night announced that it is mobilising the badge system to help surface and signal more authoritative and verified voices that can provide “credible updates” on the topic of the coronavirus, and made a general call out for people that are experts to get all of their information up to date — including associating the word addresses with their accounts — to speed up this process.

This is the latest move from Twitter in what has been an ongoing effort to clear its platform of false information and the harmful spread of it as the pandemic increasingly takes its grip on the world.

The blue check mark was always intended to help steer people to know when they looking at more authentic voices or the official accounts for high-profile people or organizations, although it’s also been a huge vanity metric for many people, and so has often had a taint of the more ridiculous side of Twitter (the one where people also obsess over like and retweet counts). So harnessing it for a truly useful purpose is a great move.

It’s also one that is linking up with other efforts online: yesterday Google launched an updated search experience that includes a carousel of Twitter accounts Tweeting information related to the pandemic. This will help Twitter and Google populate that in a more informative and dynamic way.

If you are an expert who would like to use Twitter to broadcast more effective messages to the public, please read on. And if you are an authority who is not affiliated with one of the authorities working on fighting and managing the coronavirus outbreak, hold tight as Twitter said it will also be working on how to more quickly verify you, too.

Twitter said it is working with global health authorities — these include organizations like the WHO, the CDC, state health authorities and recognized academic institutions — to identify not just these organizations’ own accounts but those of experts affiliated with them. While it has it has “already Verified hundreds of accounts,” there are many more to verify, but the process is being slowed down by people not having all of their information in order. (Essentially these are some of the usual requirements for verification, applied specifically now to coronavirus experts.)

Specifically, Twitter said that experts needed to make sure that the email address that a person has associated with their Twitter account is their work emails. Instructions on how to do that here.

Then, Twitter said that a person’s bio needs to include references and a link to the place where they are working, and ideally that the page they are linking to also includes a reference back to the Twitter account (if it’s a link to a bio page). Instructions on how to update your profile here.

And accounts that are looking for verification, it goes without saying, have to follow the official Twitter Rules (which cover things like no harassment, impersonation accounts and so on), and specifically as it relates to coronavirus and Covid-19, Twitter’s guidance for that.

Twitter had, predictably, what looked like hundreds of responses to its Tweets on this subject, both from people simply saying, “Hey, what about me? Can I get verified today for my birthday?!” and those saying they also should be verified because of their authoritative position on Covid-19. Going about how to do the latter with accuracy will be a much bigger challenge that Twitter is still working out. “We’re also considering a way to take public suggestions, but first are reviewing the suggestions we have from global public health authorities and partners,” it concluded.

Google says Coronavirus has become its biggest search topic by a country mile this year, and to continue its efforts to harness that attention in the best possible way, late on Friday the company launched a new information portal dedicated to the pandemic as well as an improved search experience for desktop and mobile.

The search experience, Google says, was updated in response to “people’s information needs expanding,” while the new information portal also provides the basic, most useful information (for example around symptoms), plus a lot of links and on-site options to explore further.

Something notably absent on Google’s page or search experience are any links to conversation forums or places to hear and talk to other average people. Google has never been particularly successful in its many efforts to break into social media and this underscores that, while also helping it steer away from the fact that many of these forums are not always well managed. I would imagine that more tools for direct communication, such as the Google Hangouts product, and possibly others in that same category, might well be added or linked to as well over time.

Let’s dive into some more details.

The new search experience now not only includes search results but also a number of additional links to “authoritative information” from health authorities and updated data and visualisations.

“This new format organizes the search results page to help people easily navigate information and resources, and it will also make it possible to add more information over time as it becomes available,” Emily Moxley, Google’s product manager for search, writes in a blog post.

The search experience now also includes links to a Twitter carousel featuring accounts from civic organizations local to you, and also a new “most common questions” section related to the pandemic from the World Health Organization and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

This is rolling out first in the US in English and Google said it would be adding more languages and regions soon.

Meanwhile, the portal — also available first for the US — features tips on staying healthy and advice for those who are concerned; links to further official resources; links to more localised resources; links to fundraising efforts; the latest statistics; and an overview of all of Google’s own work (for example, the specific efforts it’s making for educators). We have asked the company when and if it plans to cover other regions beyond the US, and we’ll update this as we learn more.

This is an important move for Google. The internet has figured as critical platform from the earliest days of the Novel Coronavirus emerging out of China, but it hasn’t all been positive.

On one hand, there has been a ton of misinformation spread around about the virus, and the internet overall (plus specific sites like Google’s search and social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter) has played a huge role in being responsible for disseminating the majority of that bad news. (Not all those searches and clicks lead to the right information, or good data, unfortunately.)

On the other hand, it’s also been an indispensable resource: in countries where health services have already become overwhelmed by the influx of people seeking help, official online portals (like this one) are serving a very important role in triaging inbound requests before people resort to physically getting themselves into the system (if they need to). And the internet is the main place people will turn in the days and weeks ahead as they are asked to socially isolate themselves to slow down the spread of the pandemic, serving its role in providing information, but hopefully also some diversion and enrichment.

Google’s site is bringing together as many of the positive and legitimate strands of information as it can.

The main page focuses on the most important basics: an brief overview of the virus, a list of the most common symptoms, a list of most common things you can do to prevent getting infected or spreading the infection and a (very brief, for now) section on treatments.

From this, it goes on to more detailed links to videos and other resources for specific interests such as advice for the elderly, a map-based data overview to monitor what is going on elsewhere; and then resources for further help for topics that are coming up a lot, such as advice for people working from home, or for how to set up self-isolation, online education advice, cooking resources and more. Relief efforts so far only has one link, to the Solidarity Response Fund started by the UN Foundation, which has had a donation of $50 million from Google. \

There are a number of other relief and fundraising efforts underway, including those to help fund the race for research to improve the medical tools and medicine we have to fight this. I think the idea is that all of these sections will grow and evolve as the situation evolves.

India is turning to WhatsApp, the most popular app in the country, to create awareness about coronavirus pandemic.

Narendra Modi, India’s Prime Minister, said on Saturday that citizens in the country can text a WhatsApp bot — called MyGov Corona Helpdesk — to get instant authoritative answers to their coronavirus queries such as the symptoms of the viral disease and how they could seek help.

An individual is required to text +919013151515 (or click on this shortcut link) to connect with the bot.

The bot was built by Mumbai-based firm Haptik Technologies, which local telecom giant Reliance Jio acquired last year, and the information is being provided by the nation’s Ministry of Health.

Earlier this week, the World Health Organization also launched a WhatsApp helpline, in partnership with the Facebook-owned company, to provide people with accurate health information related to the coronavirus.

The WHO Health Alert provides tips on how people could protect themselves, the latest news updates and findings on the pandemic, and answers to some of the frequently asked questions. People can sign up to this bot by clicking here.

More to follow…

GM said Friday that it is working with Ventec Life Systems to help increase production of respiratory care products such as ventilators that are needed by a growing number of hospitals as the COVID-19 pandemics spreads throughout the U.S.

The partnership is part of StopTheSpread.org, a coordinated effort of private companies to respond to COVId-19, a disease caused by coronavirus.

Ventec will use GM’s logistics, purchasing and manufacturing expertise to build more ventilators. The companies did not provide further details such as when production might be able to ramp up or how many ventilators would be produced.

GM Chairman and CEO Mary Barra said in a statement that GM is working closely with Ventec to rapidly scale up production.

“We will continue to explore ways to help in this time of crisis,” Barra added.

The need for ventilators is urgent as cases of COVID-19 pop up with increasing frequency as widespread testing begins. While some people with COVID-19 reported more mild symptoms, others have experienced severe respiratory problems and need to be hospitalized.

The shortage has prompted automakers to investigate ways of ramping up ventilator production. Volkswagen and Ford have reportedly either talked to the White House or committed to looking at the problem. Volkswagen said Friday it has created a task force to look into using 3D printing to make hospital ventilators.

Elon Musk tweeted Friday that Tesla and SpaceX  employees are “working on ventilators” even though he doesn’t believe they will be needed. His confirmation on Twitter that both of the companies he leads are working on ventilators comes a day after New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio made a direct plea to Musk to help alleviate a shortage at hospitals gearing up to combat COVID-19.

Musk didn’t provide specifics what “working on ventilators” means, what Tesla factory might be used, the possible capacity or when he planned to begin production.

Panasonic is pulling its 3,500 employees from the massive Nevada factory it operates with partner Tesla over concerns about the spread of COVID-19.

The company said Friday it will ramp down operations early next week and then close for 14 days. The move only affects Panasonic employees. Tesla also employs thousands of workers at the so-called Gigafactory 1 in Sparks, Nevada.

Tesla could not be reached for comment.

Gigafactory 1, which broke ground in June 2014, is a critical ingredient in Tesla’s goal to accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable energy by expanding global battery capacity and reducing the cost of electric vehicles. And Panasonic has been its most important partner as a supplier and partner in that project.

The factory produces Model 3 electric motors and battery packs, in addition to Tesla’s energy storage products, Powerwall and Powerpack. Panasonic makes the cells, which Tesla then uses to make battery packs for its electric vehicles.

Here is the statement from Panasonic spokesperson Alberto Canal

Panasonic is committed to safeguarding the health and well-being of every employee. The Panasonic factory in Sparks, Nevada will begin ramping down operations early next week and will then close for 14 days. Employees impacted by the closure will receive full pay and benefits for the 14-day period. In the meantime, Panasonic has enacted several measures to enhance the cleanliness of the facility, encourage social distancing, and enable simple, safe and effective behaviors. During the 14-day period, the facility will undergo intensive cleaning.

Without Panasonic, Tesla could face a bottleneck in the supply chain. Tesla has agreed to suspend production beginning March 23 at its Fremont, Calif., factory, where it assembles the Model X, Model S, Model 3 and now the Model Y.

In a memo yesterday detailing relief efforts for small businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic, the California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control has temporarily allowed retailers to sell alcoholic beverages for takeout. This lifts a ban previously imposed on restaurants and bars to only sell alcohol in-house.

Bars can sell manufactured pre-packaged containers of liquid, such as pre-mixed drinks, cocktails, beer or wine, to customers to go when the beverage is purchased with a meal. If you sell an alcoholic beverage to go, you have to pack it in a container with a lid or cap without a sipping hole or opening for a straw.

While the notice temporarily lifted a ban on the sale of alcoholic beverages, it did not impact the open carry laws imposed by the state. If you pick up a beverage and want to drive home to enjoy it at a socially safe distance, you have to put the drink in the trunk. Not the utility compartment or glove compartment. You also can’t consume alcohol in public or in any area where open containers are prohibited, the memo notes.

Other relief efforts include allowing retailers to sell alcohol through drive-through windows or slide-out trays. This is in effect until further notice.

Efforts to get at-home test kits for the COVID-19 coronavirus are ramping up quickly, and two more health industry startups are bringing their own products to market, with both Carbon Health and Nurx starting shipping of their own in-home sample collection kits.

Both of these new offerings are the same in terms of approach to testing: They deliver swab-based sample collection hardware that people can use at home to collect a mucus sample which they then ship back using including safety approved, projective packaging to be tested by one of the existing FDA-approved commercial labs across the country.

These tests follow the PCR-based method, which tests for the genetic presence of the COVID-19 virus in a patient. These have a high degree of accuracy, at least when performed in a controlled setting and administered by a medical professional, and are the same tests that are available via drive-through testing stations being set up by state agencies.

At-home use is relatively new to market, and could introduce some potential for error in the collection part of the process, but both Caron Health and Nurx are offering consultation with medical professionals to help ensure that samples are collected properly, and that results, when available, are correctly interpreted and provided with guidance on next steps for those taking the tests.

None of these tests are free – the Carbon Health test costs $167.50, and the Nurx test costs $181, including shipping and assessment. These are in line with other offerings, including the one from Everlywell we covered earlier this week, which retails for $135. These are described as essentially at-cost prices, and all parties say they are subject to coverage by FSA or HSA money, or potentially by insurers depending on a person’s plan.

One big question around these types of tests is how much supply will be available. Nasopharyngeal swabs used for the in-person type of testing are already reportedly in short supply in some regions, and testing needs are only growing. Carbon is using different swabs to collect a simple saliva sample, which it notes are not in as short supply as the nasopharyngeal version. Other types of tests, including a ‘serological’ one being developed by startup Scanwell, instead work by analyzing a patient’s blood, and could provide some relief for the swab-based tests, especially now that the FDA has expanded its emergency guidance to include their use.

Nurx, which also offers at-home HPV screening, says that it will have 10,000 kits available to patients “over the coming weeks,” and hopes to expand to cover “over 100,000 patients” in the “near future.” Carbon Health CEO and co-founder Eren Bali tells me that it should ramp to around “10,000 per day capacity in about two weeks” through its medical device partner Curative Inc, and that it can do 50 per day today, with an estimated increase to 150 per day by Monday and 1,000 per day by end of week.

All of these tests are gated by a screening and assessment questionnaire, and the round trip time is likely to take a few days even with round-trip shipping due to testing times. It may seem like a lot of these are popping up, but these startups at least have proven track records in healthcare services, and there will be a need for very widespread testing in order for any broad attempt to flatten the curve of the virus to prove successful, so expect more of these providers to come on line.

NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine has been sharing regular updates about how his agency is approaching the rapidly changing global coronavirus pandemic situation. This week, NASA escalated its response multiple times due to changing circumstances, including changing the state of working conditions at all of its facilities across the country, and on Friday the agency summarized the current status of each of its facilities and major projects in a comprehensive update.

Work continues on a few missions the are deemed critical, and on projects where remote and telework are possible. These include the Commercial Crew Program, which is set to return human spaceflight capabilities to American soil via private partners. Boeing and SpaceX are NASA’s partners for this program, and NASA says that this is going ahead despite the requirement of in-person operations because it represents “a critical element to maintaining safe operations on the International Space Station and a sustained U.S. presence on the orbiting laboratory.” SpaceX and NASA confirmed earlier this week that they still plan to launch the first crewed Dragon mission to the ISS in mid- to late May.

For the purpose of keeping ISS crew “fully supplied and safe,” NASA says that it will continue to operate its commercial resupply missions, too, which ferry experiments, food, water and more to the space station using vehicles including SpaceX’s Dragon cargo capsule. For similar reasons, it’ll keep the Mission Control Center at Johnson Space centre open, with flight control personnel in place, though it’s adding “additional measures” to ensure the safety of those present.

Meanwhile work on the James Webb Telescope in California is temporarily suspended, which means that the integration and testing that was happening in preparation for its planned launch next March. Preparations for NASA’s Mars 2020 launch, which includes reliving its Perseverance Rover and Mars Helicopter exploration vehicles also continue: that mission is scheduled for July 2020 right now.

There’s also virtual inspection work being done on the X-59 piloted supersonic test plane that’s being developed in California, and Lockheed Martin, which is building the aircraft for the agency, is continuing in-person work on that project. NASA is keeping the lights on at Ames Research Center in California, too, in order to ensure that the agency’s IT security and supercomputing operations can continue uninterrupted.

Existing spacecraft mission support will continue, as does astronaut training (which is generally subject to strict isolation protocols to prevent illness anyway). Earlier this week, the agency did announce that it would suspend work on both the SLS spacecraft and the Orion capsule that it will carry, both the fundamental components of its Artemis program, which aims to get humans back to the Moon, and eventually to Mars. Artemis has been sticking to a stated 2024 timeframe for its mission of returning people to the surface of the Moon, but these setbacks in total represent the most sure sign yet that we’ll probably see that window slip, though may skeptical of the schedule have suggested it would actually be later than that anyway.

The restaurant industry might look a lot different once we come out of this pandemic. As social distancing and lockdowns ripple across the nation in an attempt to fight COVID-19, some restaurants won’t be able to handle the lack of income and might tip into bankruptcy. Some might never reopen again. Earlier today, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo implemented a 90-day moratorium, or temporary prohibition, on evictions for residents and businesses such as restaurants.

Ayr Muir, the owner of Clover, a chain of veggie-friendly fast food joints, filed for unemployment recently. Clover is on hiatus, but it is working to connect its farmers and suppliers directly to customers to help them stay afloat. 

“It’s easy to say ‘there’s unemployment benefits’ or ‘there are SBA loans,’ but when you get down to the details it’s a lot more nuanced,” Muir said. “I have staff who are scared to apply for government benefits, some fear it will impact their legal status, like if you’re here on a student visa. And the process can be really confusing.”

He added: “I filled out my own unemployment application the other day… and I’m really not sure I did it correctly. This just adds to the feeling of uncertainty and stress.” 

Entrepreneurs from all over the country are trying to unlock different ways to help vulnerable local restaurants buy themselves some time. It’s often in the form of buying gift cards from your neighborhood favorite. The trend, much like other ways big tech is helping others out during this pandemic through free promos or access to services, can be looked at in two ways. First, it’s a way to make this transition less stressful. Second, and perhaps more cynically thanks to capitalism, offering free services is a way to pipeline eventual customers down the road. 

Let’s focus on the former, because it is Friday, I miss writing about good news, and these efforts deserve a fist bump for being a net positive for local shops.

SaveOurFaves.org

Started by Kaitlyn Krieger and her husband, Mike Krieger, the co-founder of Instagram, SaveOurFaves wants to help Bay Area residents buy gift cards for nearby restaurants. You can divide by neighborhood and region, like San Francisco, East Bay, Marin or South Bay, and pick a local business.

For what it’s worth, some San Francisco restaurants have already temporarily closed, even though they could stay open and sell take out. La Taqueria, one of the city’s most famous burrito spots, is one high-profile example. 

On the site, the duo notes that restaurants have tons of fixed costs, like rent, labor, loan repayments, insurance, supplies, repairs — the list goes on. Even “successful restaurants have razor thin margins of 3-5%, and a third have struggled to pay employees at least once.”  

Help Main Street 

Lunchbox, Eniac Ventures and a huge group of volunteers started a website so residents around the country could buy gift cards for their favorite businesses. The goal is to help local businesses recover lost revenue, and businesses range from Abettor Brewing Company in Winchester, Ky. to 45 Surfside in Nantucket, Mass. We wrote about it when it launched a couple days ago, and Eniac’s Nihal Mehta said there will be a Patreon-of-sorts option coming soon. 

Open Table

Open Table, a company that lets you book reservations at restaurants, has a feature that lets users buy gift cards from restaurants. 

Toast

Toast, a Boston-based unicorn startup, created Rally for Restaurants to help people buy gift cards for businesses and challenge their friends to do the same. This covers restaurants across the nation. 

USA Today’s Support Local 

This service does the same as the sites above, with more pickings from San Francisco and Austin than other cities. 

Help Your Hood 

Help Your Hood is another marketplace for people to visit and buy gift cards. On the website, it notes that if you don’t already have a gift card system set up in your business, the Gift Up App has agreed to waive their fees for the first $5,000 in vouchers for each business that comes through Help Your Hood. 

A Google doc to list your restaurant on a ton of these lists

Arteen Arabshahi, an investor at WndrCo, created a Google doc form so restaurants could sign up to be featured on these services in one fell swoop. 

I worked at a local coffee shop during my last year of college right down the street from a Starbucks, Dunkin’ Donuts and a Caffe Nero. The owners lived a five-minute walk, one-minute sprint away. The cook, Brandon, came in at 4 a.m. to make fresh cranberry scones. If you brought a crying baby in, Ali, the old owner, couldn’t resist giving you kind eyes and a fresh espresso brownie for free. And one customer came in every morning to grab four coffees to go, and came back every afternoon to return the tray so we could reuse it tomorrow.

That coffee shop is closed indefinitely, and like many restaurants, it is donating its inventory to people who might need it. The charm can’t be remanufactured, and I hope it opens again soon.

I’ll end with a note from Clover’s Muir. He said that gift cards are a “nice expression of good will but they’re not going to halt the giant wave that threatens to wipe out restaurants everywhere.”

So, let’s start small and give back. And then let’s hope that we see more government officials show up to help restaurants more massively.