Category: UNCATEGORIZED

In my review of Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey, I was blown away by the authenticity and level of detail in the game world. The game itself — well, it was fine. But the highlight was ancient Greece in all its classical splendor, and a new educational Discovery Tour mode aims to teach the history of that society through a gaming lens.

The free update, available now to anyone who owns the game, adds dozens of historical “tours” guided by a NPC, in which you can learn about the cities of ancient Greece, the life and crafts of the people who lived there, what they believed and how they were governed, and of course the many famous battles of the era.

It’s an expanded version of a similar feature created for Assassin’s Creed: Origins, which was set in ancient Egypt. It seemed wasteful then, as in Odyssey, to create such a rich world and just have you stab your way through it. Obviously others at Ubisoft felt the same way, especially Discovery Mode director Maxime Durand, who says he envisioned a feature like this a decade ago.

And how could you not with the Assassin’s Creed series? From the very first one players were immersed in a painstakingly recreated period of history that gave variously accurate but always compelling experiences of really living in that bygone era. All the work that went into making it convincing can easily — well, perhaps not easily, but directly — be applied to educating the player as well as thrilling them.

And quizzing them! The end of each guided tour will have an optional live quiz-type chat with the guide, which Ubisoft assures players will be fun and not for a grade. I’d probably skip it myself. But history teachers will probably make you do it for extra credit or something.

There are 30 discovery sites, each with its own tour and modern-day context, so for example an artist in-game may explain how they sculpt, but then you’ll also see a museum artifact showing the process in “real life.”

Here’s hoping the history lessons are a little less lenient on the topic of slavery than some of the quests were.

“I think learning is a lot about agency… as soon as someone tells you you have to learn about something, there’s some of the fun taken away from it,” said Ubisoft’s Alicia Fortier. “So if we look at learning as play and as exploring, we need to make sure players can focus on what’s interesting to them and then they’ll naturally get more curious.”

The Discovery Tour update is free for all players today. Go, learn something.

As California moves ahead with what would be the most restrictive online privacy laws in the nation, the chief executives of some of the nation’s largest companies are taking their case to the nation’s capitol to plead for federal regulation.

Chief executives at Amazon, AT&T, Dell, Ford, IBM, Qualcomm, Walmart, and other leading financial services, manufacturing, and technology companies have issued an open letter to Congressional leadership pleading with them to take action on online privacy, through the pro-industry organization, The Business Roundtable.

“Now is the time for Congress to act and ensure that consumers are not faced with confusion about their rights and protections based on a patchwork of inconsistent state laws. Further, as the regulatory landscape becomes increasingly fragmented and more complex, U.S. innovation and global competitiveness in the digital economy are threatened,” the letter says.

The subtext to this call to action is the California privacy regulations that are set to take effect by the end of this year.

As we noted when the bill was passed last year there are a few key components of the California legislation including the following requirements:

• Businesses must disclose what information they collect, what business purpose they do so for and any third parties they share that data with.

• Businesses would be required to comply with official consumer requests to delete that data.

• Consumers can opt out of their data being sold, and businesses can’t retaliate by changing the price or level of service.

• Businesses can, however, offer “financial incentives” for being allowed to collect data.

• California authorities are empowered to fine companies for violations.

There’s a reason why companies would push for federal regulation to supersede any initiatives from the states. It is more of a challenge for companies to adhere to a patchwork of different regulatory regimes at the state level. But it’s also true that companies, following the lead of automakers in California, could just adhere to the most stringent requirements which would clarify any confusion.

Indeed many of these companies are already complying with strict privacy regulations thanks to the passage of the GDPR in Europe.

JobTeaser, the graduate recruitment and career guidance platform, has raised £45 million in new funding to help it expand its careers service to more students across the U.K. and Europe.

The investment is led by Highland Europe, with continued backing from existing investors Alven, Idinvest Partners, Seventure Partners and Korelya Capital. It brings the total amount raised to £61 million since the company was founded all the way back in 2008.

JobTeaser says the funding will be used to expand JobTeaser’s partner network of schools and universities across the U.K. and Ireland.

That company’s aim is to become the official careers website for its education partners. The promise is that it can connect more students and graduates to the careers they seek and in turn help corporates and organisations plug gaps in the talent and skills they need.

“We believe the transition between University and the professional world is very difficult for young talent,” Adrien Ledoux, co-founder of JobTeaser, tells me. “A lot of young talent feel lost when it comes to choosing their career; in the survey that we conducted with WISE this year, we discovered that 9 out of 10 young people in Europe want better support to define their career choices”.

Ledoux says JobTeaser’s goal is to transform the way students and recent graduates find work by helping them choose a career path that fits with their aspirations and ambitions. “We are convinced that if each young talent puts their energy into the right job, all of society benefits from it,” he says

To achieve this mission, JobTeaser has built a platform that combines bespoke career guidance with internships, job opportunities and ongoing career and interview support.

In order to reach the largest number of students and recent graduates, JobTeaser provides its “Career Centre by JobTeaser” platform free of charge to universities. It then charges businesses a fee to advertise jobs to that captive audience.

“Businesses can access talent at the right place (the university) and at the right time (when they are looking for their first job),” explains Ledoux. “Our platform allows businesses to pay once to multi-post their job ads and employer-branded content in a single click, which then goes out to all of JobTeaser’s partner higher education institutions”.

It’s this business model that allows JobTeaser to reach businesses, universities and prospective young jobseekers across 19 European countries, says the JobTeaser co-founder.

Since its launch, JobTeaser says it has served 2.5 million students and recent graduates. The company works with more than 70,000 businesses, including Amazon, PWC, Deutsche Bank, Blackrock, L’Oreal and LVMH.

Apple is doubling down on personalization to help better sell its latest products. In addition to an expanded array of iPhone colors — hello mint green, lilac, etc. — the company today announced the launch of Apple Watch Studio, which will allow consumers to create the Apple Watch case and band pairing that they want, instead of having to choose one designed by Apple.

Before today, Apple would pair its Apple Watch cases with select bands. If you didn’t like the band that came with your Watch, however, you’d have to buy another at your own expense either from Apple or a third-party seller.

Apple Watch Studio will change that by allowing you to pick the case and band style you prefer, when shopping.

“Apple has always been the best place to help you customize and personalize your products. And now we’re going to take it even further with Apple Watch,” said Deirdre O’Brien, Apple’s senior vice president of Retail + People, speaking at the Apple press event in Cupertino this morning.

The experience will be available starting with the launch of Apple Watch Series 5 at Apple retail stores and online.

O’Brien said the new experience will offer “over 1,000” different ways for customers to customize their Watch, thanks to the many variations of case and band styles now available.

The Series 5, also announced at today’s event, will offer aluminum models that come in silver, gold and space gray. Its stainless steel models will come in gold, silver, and space black and a ceramic model will come in white, plus an all-new titanium model. Apple has also now launched a range of new band styles, some which complement the new colors of the iPhone 11 line.

Effectively, it debuted a fall collection of bands, with bands featuring deeper jewel tones like pine green, midnight blue, and aubergine (purple), alongside a few brighter colors like lemons and oranges and of course some classic blacks and browns, among others.

While Apple will still sell Apple Watch case/band pairings on its site, if you scroll down the page you can try out the new Apple Watch Studio starting today. The site displays an image of an Apple Watch that you customize it by selecting the size, case, and band. These options appear in a horizontal scroll bar, so you can easily tweak the design by clicking over to the next option on the right or left.

When finished, you just click “I’m Done” and complete the checkout process.

It’s a small change but one that could see more customers sporting bands made by Apple instead of knockoffs, as they’ll get one they actually like at purchase.

After a summer of beta test, Apple is about to release the next major version of macOS, macOS Catalina. But not so fast, the new version will arrive in October, according to Apple’s updated website.

As always, this update will be available as a free download in the Mac App Store.

This version completely rethinks the way you interact with media. Instead of using iTunes for everything, there are a handful of new apps specifically designed for each task — Music, Podcasts and TV.

Mac users will also notice a huge update to Photos. It borrows many of the new features that you can see in iOS 13, such as the ability to view photos by days, months or years with a curated selection of shots. The company tries to identify the best photos using artificial intelligence.

If you’ve been using Duet Display or Luna Display, macOS Catalina lets you use your iPad as a second Mac display. It’s as easy as opening the AirPlay menu and selecting your iPad to extend your desktop. The feature is called Sidecar.

Apple is also adding new accessibility features. For instance, you can open apps, click on dropdown menus and navigate apps much more easily with your voice.

More interestingly, this new version of macOS opens up the ability to port iPad apps to the desktop using Project Catalyst. Some developers already said that they plan on taking advantage of that feature, such as Twitter, Gameloft and Atlassian.

On the back of the iPhone 11 Pro can be found three cameras. Why? Because the more light you collect, the better your picture can be. And we pretty much reached the limit of what one camera can do a little while back. Two, three, even a dozen cameras can be put to work creating a single photo — the only limitation is the code that makes them work.

Earlier in today’s announcements, Apple showed the base-level iPhone 11 with two cameras, but it ditched the telephoto for an ultrawide lens. But the iPhone Pro has the original wide, plus ultrawide and telephoto, its optical options covering an approximate 35mm equivalents of 13mm to 52mm, and 26mm.

“With these three cameras you have incredible creative control,” said Apple’s Phil Schiller during the stage presentation. “It is so pro, you’re going to love using it.”

Previously the telephoto lens worked with the wide-angle camera to produce portrait mode effects or take over when the user zooms in a lot. By combining the info from both those cameras, which have a slightly different perspective, the device can determine depth data, allowing it to blur the background past a certain point, among other things.

The ultra-wide lens provides even more information, which should improve the accuracy of portrait mode and other features. One nice thing about a wide angle on a dedicated sensor and camera system is the creators can build in lots of corrections so you don’t get crazy distortion at the corners or center. Fundamentally you’ll still want to back off a bit, because using an ultrawide lens on a face gives it a weird look.

While we’re all used to the pinch-to-zoom-in gesture, what you’re usually doing when you do that is a digital zoom, just looking closer at the pixels you already have. With an optical zoom, however, you’re switching between different pieces of glass and, in this case, different sensors, getting you closer to the action without degrading the image.

One nice thing about these three lenses is that they’ve been carefully chosen to work together well. You may have noticed that the ultra-wide is 13mm, the wide is twice that at 26mm, and the telephoto is twice that at 52mm.

The simple 2x factor makes it easy for users to understand, sure, but it also makes the image-processing math of switching between these lenses easier. And as Schiller mentioned on stage, “we actually pair the three cameras right at the factory calibrating for focus and color.”

Not only that, but when you’re shooting with the wide camera, it’s sharing information with the other two cameras, so when you switch to them, they’re already focused on the same point, shooting at the same speed and exposure, white balance, and so on. That makes switching between them mostly seamless even while shooting video (just be aware that you will shake the device when you tap it).

Apple’s improvements to the iPhone camera system this year are nowhere near as crazy as the switch from one to two cameras made by much of the industry a couple years back. But a wide, tele, and ultra-wide setup is a common one for photographers and no doubt will prove a useful one for everyone who buys into this rather expensive single-device solution.

Apple announced in a press release that iOS 13 will be available on September 19. Even if you don’t plan on buying a new iPhone, you’ll be able to get a bunch of new features.

But that’s not all. iOS 13.1 will be available on September 30. Apple had to remove some features of iOS 13.0 at the last minute as they weren’t stable enough, such as Shortcuts automations and the ability to share your ETA in Apple Maps. That’s why iOS 13.1 will be released shortly after iOS 13.

As always, iOS 13 will be available as a free download. If you have an iPhone 6s or later, an iPhone SE or a 7th-generation iPod touch, your device supports iOS 13.

watchOS 6 will also be released on September 19. Unfortunately, Apple will release iPadOS 13 on September 30.

Here’s a quick rundown of what’s new in iOS 13. This year, in addition to dark mode, it feels like every single app has been improved with some quality-of-life updates. The Photos app features a brand new gallery view with autoplaying live photos and videos, smart curation and a more immersive design.

This version has a big emphasis on privacy as well thanks to a new signup option called “Sign in with Apple” and a bunch of privacy popups for Bluetooth and Wi-Fi consent, background location tracking. Apple Maps now features an impressive Google Street View-like feature called Look Around. It’s only available in a handful of cities, but I recommend… looking around as everything is in 3D.

Many apps have been updated, such as Reminders with a brand new version, Messages with the ability to set a profile picture shared with your contacts, Mail with better text formatting options, Health with menstrual cycle tracking, Files with desktop-like features, Safari with a new website settings menu, etc. Read more on iOS 13 in my separate preview.

On the iPad front, for the first time Apple is calling iOS for the iPad under a new name — iPadOS. Multitasking has been improved, the Apple Pencil should feel snappier, Safari is now as powerful as Safari on macOS and more.

 

Like clockwork, Apple has used its annual September event to announce a new generation of iPhones.

But they also crammed a bunch of other stuff in there for good measure. New iPads! New Apple Watches! Launch dates for Apple Arcade, and Apple TV+!

Didn’t have time to watch the event as it happened, but still want to know what went down? We can help. We’ve got all the news, condensed down to just the bullet points.

Apple Arcade

Apple Arcade, the company’s take on an all-you-can-eat, Netflix-for-games type service, will launch on September 19th in 150 countries. It’ll cost $4.99 per month for a family subscription, and offer a 1 month free trial.

Apple TV+

Earlier this year Apple announced that it was working on an on-demand video service, complete with original programming from folks like Reese Witherspoon, Oprah, Jason Momoa, and many others. They didn’t get too specific about the launch date, though.

The company now says that Apple TV+ will start rolling out on November 1st — and, like Apple Arcade, will cost $4.99 per month for a family subscription.

Oh! And a bit of an added surprise: all new iPhones, iPads, Macs, and AppleTVs will come with one year of AppleTV+, free.

The New 10.2″ iPad

As the iPad moves into its seventh generation, the 9.7″ model is being bumped up to 10.2″.

It’ll have a Retina display, a smart connector on its edge to connect it with a full size keyboard accessory, and work with the first-gen Apple Pencil. And for the TouchID fans out there, fret not: they’re keeping the home button.

It’ll cost $329 (or $299 for students); pre-orders start today, shipping on September 30th.

Apple Watch Series 5

Always on display! Whereas previous Apple Watches turned off the display when you lowered your wrist, Series 5’s display will stay on unless you deliberately turn it off.

When you lower your arm, the brightness drops and the screen’s refresh rate dips down to one refresh per second, but your complications and watch faces stay visible. It’s getting a built-in compass, and an “international emergency calling” feature that lets you call emergency services in 150 countries by pressing and holding the side button.

Apple says the battery should last about 18 hours per charge.

Apple Watch Series 5 will start at $399, or $499 for the cell-enabled models. Shipping will start on September 20th. There will be aluminum models (silver, gold, and space grey), stainless steel models (gold, space black, and polished), titanium (brushed metal, brushed space black), and ceramic.

Series 3, meanwhile, is getting a bit of a price drop, with the base price for the two-year old model going from $279 to $199.

The new iPhones

You can’t have an Apple event in September without a new iPhone or three, right?

First up was the iPhone 11. Here’s the breakdown:

• 6.1″ display, with the “toughest glass” ever in an iPhone
• A new dual camera system on the back — one 12MP wide angle camera (26mm f/1.8), and one 12 MP ultra wide camera (13mm f/2.4).
• The flash is 36% brighter
• A new night mode that uses adaptive bracketing for better low light shots
• The front camera — now 12MP, up from 7MP — can do 60 FPS 4k and slow motion video
• Running on Apple’s new A13 chipset, which they proclaim to be the fastest CPU/GPU ever in a smartphone

It’ll come in black, green, yellow, purple, red, and white, and start at $699.

Next up was the iPhone 11 Pro/Pro Max:

• The Pro line has three cameras, rather than two: a 12MP wide angle camera (26mm f/1.8), a 12MP ultra wide (13mm f/2.4), plus a 12MP telephoto camera (52mm f/2.0). All three cameras can shoot 4K at 60FPS.
• Pro has a 5.8″ display, while Pro Max comes in at 6.5″
• Also running on A13
• While they didn’t give a specific battery life estimate, Apple says the Pro will get four more hours of life per charge when compared to the iPhone Xs Max, while the Pro Max will get five more hours
• Both come with 18w fast chargers in the box
• A new “Deep Fusion” feature uses machine learning for dramatically improved low light shots. Before you press the shutter button, the camera is taking a series of short exposure shots. Press the button, and it takes one long exposure shot. Apple then uses neural networks to analyze the photos “pixel by pixel”, combining them into one high detail, low noise photo.

Pro will start at $999, while Pro Max will start at $1099. Both will start shipping on September 20th.

Apple’s triple-camera iPhone is real and it’s the first phone the company has dubbed “Pro.”

The iPhone 11 Pro comes in two flavors with 5.8″ and 6.5″ varieties at $999 and $1,099 respectively.

The bizarre-looking camera is the real star of the release. There are a trio of 12 megapixel lenses with varying fields-of-view — a telephoto, a wide, and an ultra wide lens. The variety of lenses makes for a very strange nodule on the rear of the phone, but the shots Apple detailed in its keynote highlighted the level of detail that the new combination camera can bring when you switch between the lenses.

There wasn’t much said about the front-facing camera system, but Apple did details that FaceID will now detect your face at wider angles. The phones will continue to shoot 4K HDR footage.

Apple has shifted to a three-year redesign cycle and in its third year, not much has changed with the iPhone 11 Pro looks-wise beyond the camera square. In terms of looks, there’s a new “midnight green” textured matte finish which actually looks quite nice among the more classic hues.

The new Pro devices ship with the company’s new A13 bionic chip which has been optimized for high intensity low-power computing. The gains mean more usage between charges, the iPhone 11 Pro gets 4 more hours of usage per charge than the iPhone XS and the iPhone 11 Pro Max (what a mouthful) gets 5 hours more. The new phones ship with a 18-watt charger so that you can replenish your battery quickly, you’re probably going to want to dump those 5W charger blocks.

The new naming scheme doesn’t seem to denote a widening gap between the new phones Apple has release. The differences between the iPhone 11 Pro and iPhone 11 seem similar to the iPhone XR/XS relationship, the emphasis seems to be on boosting sales of the cheaper LCD iPhone while not making people feel like they’re buying the bargain iPhone.

Pre-orders for the iPhone 11 Pro go live this Friday and the phones ship on September 20.

As 33 states investigate roughly 450 lung illnesses that may be associated with vaping, the billionaire former New York City mayor and founder of Bloomberg, Michael Bloomberg, is committing $160 million to combat vaping.

Bloomberg has long been an advocate for anti-smoking campaigns and has spent millions on getting folks to quit smoking. Now he’s turning his attention to vaping, the new scourge of teens everywhere.

What Bloomberg hopes to accomplish is nothing short than a ban on flavored e-cigarettes and the complete cessation of marketing vaping products to minors.

Companies like Juul, which Bloomberg Philanthropies singles out by name, are already taking steps to curb the use of vaping products among minors, according to their own statements.

However, these recent efforts by Juul to change its marketing tune, may be too little, too late. There roughly 3.6 million middle school and high school students in the U.S. who are vaping, accounting for one-third of all e-cigarette users, according to Bloomberg Philanthropies.

It’s no secret that Juul used to market heavily to young adults in its early promotional materials and there are still social media accounts dedicated to the company’s product filled with user generated memes and short videos that appeal to kids. Earlier this year, Juul was accused of using the tactics honed by big tobacco companies to hawk its own products to susceptible populations.

The Bloomberg Philanthropies initiative is launching even as federal health and consumer protection agencies take a closer look at the products.

In early September the CDC urged people to stop vaping as it investigated a rash of lung illnesses cropping up among e-cigarette users around the country.

Yesterday, the Food and Drug Administration put Juul, the leading manufacturer of e-cigarettes and pods, on  notice for making false claims about the safety of its products and a continued effort to target teen users.

 

“The federal government has the responsibility to protect children from harm, but it has failed – so the rest of us are taking action. I look forward to partnering with advocates in cities and states across the country on legislative actions that protect our kids’ health. The decline in youth smoking is one of the great health victories of this century, and we can’t allow tobacco companies to reverse that progress,” said Michael R. Bloomberg, Bloomberg Philanthropies Founder and WHO Global Ambassador for Noncommunicable Diseases, in a statement.

With the $160 million commitment, Bloomberg Philanthropies and its partners will look to achieve five main goals including the removal of flavored e-cigarettes from the market; ensure that e-cigarette products are reviewed by the FDA before they reach the market; stop companies from marketing to kids; halt online sales until a satisfactory method of age verification can be developed; and finally, track underage e-cigarette usage.

“It is important to gain a deeper understanding of the long-term health effects of e-cigarettes on youth, and the CDC Foundation’s focus is on gathering and evaluating data to better inform effective policies,” said Judith Monroe, MD, chief executive officer of the CDC Foundation. “We appreciate the support of Bloomberg Philanthropies and partners in helping tackle this epidemic to protect our youth.”