Texting between Android and iPhones isn’t all the time the smoothest expertise. Photos and movies get pixelated, messages from Android customers present up because the dreaded inexperienced chat bubble on iPhone, after which there are emoji reactions. When an iPhone consumer hits the thumbs-up or coronary heart response emoji, that doesn’t translate to Android, and it reveals up as an ungainly textual content description of the emoji as a substitute.
Google has been making an attempt to repair a few of that, although it faces the unending problem of buy-in from Apple. This week, Google mentioned that updates coming to Messages will permit Android customers to answer iPhone texts with emojis. Other updates embody the flexibility to string responses to particular person messages, embed YouTube movies instantly in messages, and get automated transcriptions of voice messages on sure telephones. It’s a concerted effort by Google to make messaging on Android extra interesting and put strain on Apple to fulfill it midway.
Photograph: Google
The technical level of competition right here has been Rich Communications Services, a messaging customary that Google has been pushing its companions to undertake over the previous yr. RCS handles attachments and media higher than the SMS customary that has been the norm in messaging for many years. Thing is, Apple has its personal messaging customary between iPhones and different Apple gadgets, after which defaults to SMS when an iPhone consumer and Android consumer are exchanging messages. And Apple expressed precisely zero curiosity in switching to RCS. So quite a lot of messages get misplaced in translation between the platforms.
Last month, Google made a public plea for Apple to modify its requirements so iOS messages would play good with Android gadgets. But after Apple CEO Tim Cook’s withering dismissal of the concept, the stalemate between the tech giants continues. At least Android customers—or these contemplating the change—are getting barely higher messages with this newest replace.
Here’s another gadget information.
Come Along and Ride on a Fantastic … Advertising Voyage?
Anyone who has ever ridden in a New York City taxicab has seen their fair proportion of commercials on a loop, which through the years has developed from “Taxi TV” to straight-up programmatic promoting. So it appears inevitable that rideshare providers like Uber would need to capitalize on all that quiet, peaceable passenger downtime and fill your journey with adverts.
Uber has tinkered with promoting throughout rides earlier than, like when it added taxi-style ad billboards to the tops of vehicles in 2020. But in a press release this week, Uber laid out its plans to “capture consumers’ attention” by serving them adverts throughout practically each a part of an Uber interplay. Uber customers can sit up for audio adverts taking part in whereas they look forward to a journey and in the course of the journey. The firm can be planning to show distinguished adverts throughout the Uber Eats app, ship sponsored emails, and slap much more video adverts on tablets inside vehicles.
Remember people, it’s not in regards to the vacation spot; it’s about how a lot you purchase on the journey.
Sharing Is Caring, Unless You’re Netflix
In different bleak information from the land of capital extraction, Netflix is about to start out charging for all these additional customers siphoning off one particular person’s account. This week, Netflix mentioned it is going to lastly transfer to place an finish to people sharing their logins. The worth shall be $4 a head for every additional account that’s not thought-about in the identical house. Netflix has been testing the crackdown since March, although not within the US. But quickly, it appears, will probably be platform-wide. Netflix mentioned the brand new coverage will go into impact in 2023.
As if to preempt the choice, Netflix introduced earlier this week that it’ll now help you spin off a sub account into its own paying account. You’ll need to splurge on the total month-to-month charge, however at the very least it is going to preserve your watch historical past and preferences intact.
