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The New York Times removes its articles from Apple News
The New York Times is ending its partnership with Apple News.
Verizon and Disney think 5G can 'transform' entertainment
Verizon has announced at CES 2019 that it's teaming up with Walt Disney Studios to bring emerging technologies, namely 5G, to media and entertainment. The partnership is designed to deliver the network's 5G connectivity to every facet of the studio's work, from production to personal consumer experiences. According to Variety, the deal between the two companies will give Disney's StudioLab the ability to tap into Verizon's next-gen wireless broadband, which offers data transferring speeds of up to 10 gigabits per second.
Facebook responds to the New York Times' blockbuster exposé
The New York Times recently published a bruising Facebook report saying, among other things, that the social network knew about Russian interference well before it said, feared Trump supporters and lobbied against critics. The nature of the article stunned even jaded tech observers, but now Facebook has issued a point-by-point rebuttal. It denied that it knew about Russian activity as early as spring of 2016, prevented security chief Alex Stamos from looking into it and that it discouraged employees from using iPhones out of spite for Tim Cook's comments.
Does social media threaten the illusion of news neutrality?
For journalists, social media can be a double-edged sword. On the one hand, they can use platforms like Facebook and Twitter to share their opinion on a wide range of matters, from sports to politics. But at the same time, they have to remember to exercise caution, because whatever they say can be taken out of context and have major implications on the publications they work for. If a reader who follows your tweets or Facebook posts doesn't agree with you, that can motivate them to claim your entire newsroom is biased.
Apple's next self-driving phase is an employee shuttle
Apple famously planned to build an entire self-driving car, but abandoned that idea to focus on autonomous vehicle technology à la Uber and Waymo. Thanks to a New York Times report, we now know some of what happened and what Apple is doing now. It reportedly plans to test the tech by building a self-driving shuttle (called PAIL, for Palo Alto to Infinite Loop) that will take employees between its current campus and the new "Spaceship" HQ.
Watch NYT's immersive stories on Samsung Gear VR
Virtual reality is proving an accommodating medium for the art of storytelling. Even beyond gaming, a diverse pool of creatives (including award-winning filmmakers) and companies are exploring this brave new world. Among them The New York Times, which became one of the first major news outlets to launch a VR push in 2015. Two years later, its app for all things virtual is now heading to the Samsung Gear VR. Owners of the headset can grab it from the Oculus Store right now. According to the Times, most users will be able to watch the films in 4K resolution.
Scribd's all-you-can read service adds major newspaper articles
Scribd's transformation into an all-you-can-read subscription-based service hasn't always been smooth-sailing, but it's truly moving farther away from its PDF roots. The company has just announced that it's teaming up with its first newspaper partners and a few popular news brands, including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, The Financial Times, NPR and ProPublica.
Apple pulled New York Times' news app from China's App Store
China has imposed its will on Apple to remove anther app from The App Store. Except this time, it isn't one of Cupertino's own. The New York Times reports that its news apps were pulled from the Chinese App Store without warning in late December.
Brood with Hollywood's finest in VR film noir
As part of a magazine celebrating this year's best actors, the New York Times has put together a murky, monochromatic set of film noir vignettes. The kicker? They were all shot in 360 degrees, giving you complete freedom over the camera angle. You're also a participant of sorts -- a mute character, watching as Hollywood's brightest stars talk to you in flowery, cryptic tones. (The conversations are rather one-sided, of course.) In each video, you take on a different role -- a bartender, a reporter, or a cheating husband, for instance -- and get just a couple of minutes to piece together what's been happening. They're all short, but powerful scenes.
NYT's curated news app will shut down next month
Just about two and a half years after launching its NYT Now mobile experiment at South by Southwest, the New York Times has announced it will be "officially shelving" the app. After August, NYT Now will no longer be be available for download, but many of the features have already been rolled into the main NYTimes app or the paper's other digital platforms.
Experience the Paris vigils using the New York Times' VR app
The New York Times launched its virtual reality news app last month, and in the wake of the Paris attacks last week, it's giving readers a glimpse at the heartbeat of the city. The NYT VR app allows viewers to experience the vigils taking place in Paris, offering people in other parts of the world a look at some of the stories unfolding in the days following the tragic events. While The New York Times' use of VR is still in the early stages, it's already showing its potential. NYT VR provides a platform where readers are better able to relate to events and stories by stepping inside them rather than simply reading about them. "Our mission as journalists is to answer questions," an article accompanying the video explains. "In this case, we sought to answer the question of how a city gathers itself and begins moving forward." If you don't have access to a VR headset, you can watch the interactive piece via 360-degree videos on both Facebook and YouTube. [Image credit: LightRocket via Getty Images]
The New York Times VR app took me inside the news
I'm standing in the center of a rubble-filled classroom. The floor is ankle deep in books with overturned desks jutting up like volcanic islands in a sea of literature. At the chalkboard, a young boy is writing something. It's difficult to see what he's writing on the one item that establishes that kids used to learn in this room. I do know that the boy's name is Oleg and he's one of three child subjects of the New York Times' VR app (NYT VR) lead story, The Displaced. He starts telling me his story and I'm spinning trying to take in the virtual environment the publication has dropped me in. Everything is fuzzy at first while I adjust my iPhone in the Google Cardboard headset. Then after a few adjustments, everything lines up. It's not crystal clear, but the story starts to unfold without the technology getting too much in the way. That should be the end game for The New York Times. Tell stories without the tech getting in the way. The app is a good -- yet gimmicky -- start, but it'll need more adjustments to bring it into focus and really change the way we get our news.
NYT: AC/DC's dirty deeds coming to Apple Music, Rdio and Spotify
Seeing as how it's impossible to write a three-chord intro with words, this sentence is just going have to do for now: AC/DC is coming to Spotify and Apple Music. The Australian rock group's catalog will go on the aforementioned streaming services in addition to others like Rdio and Deezer starting today, according to The New York Times. In case you've sworn off classic rock radio, Brian Johnson and Angus Young's tunes should help fill in the gaps between Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd in your playlists. Just think, there's a very real chance that you'll be able to shake it off all night long.
Facebook 'Instant Articles' plug in content from NYT and Buzzfeed
Facebook wants to do for news content what it's done with native video, and the first bit of self-hosted editorial content ("Instant Articles") could go live tomorrow. It's starting with The New York Times and will include Buzzfeed, NBC News and National Geographic if unnamed sources speaking to New York Magazine are to be believed. Apparently NYT's business side is why a deal that surfaced in late March is only coming to fruition now, with CEO Mark Thompson's push for "the most favorable" terms causing delays.
NYT Now news app goes free, ending a subscription experiment
Say goodbye to the $8 a month curated news app NYT Now, and say hello to the free, ad-supported news app of the same name. More than a year after launching NYT Now, which was basically a way for the New York Times to test out an inexpensive subscription offering, the paper is changing course. The basic gist of the app is the same: It serves up a hand-picked selection of NYT stories, which are continuously refreshed throughout the day. The paper's editors are also highlighting even more stories from around the web, which makes NYT Now feel more like a social news app like Feedly or Flipboard. The revamped app is yet another sign that the NYT is trying to be nimble in a time where major newspapers are struggling to hold onto subscribers and stay relevant.
The New York Times wants you to help identify old newspaper ads
Unless you're clipping coupons, advertisements are the last thing you look for when you pick up the newspaper. They're also the part of the New York Times archives that the newspaper wants you to look at the most, but not just for the sake of revenue. Madison, a new project from the New York Times' research and development lab seeks to document the paper's long history of advertising by crowdsourcing its advertisement identification project. That is, asking the public to view archives of old papers and sort out if a specific section of a paper is an ad, who it is advertising for, and to help transcribe the text.
NYT Now curated news app coming to iPhone April 2nd for $8 per month
At a cocktail-fueled meet and greet at SXSW, we met with New York Times editors Jill Abramson and Clifford Levy to discuss the news organization's 2014 lineup of services, including a new enterprise dubbed NYT Now. Created as an iPhone (and iPod touch)-only application, NYT Now is the company's latest subscription-based product. On the surface, it appears to be simply a "lite" version of the paper's daily content, but The Times is reassigning nearly a dozen editors to Now full time to curate internal content as well as articles from third-party news orgs, such as Engadget. Now is not without its challenges, though. Full access will run you $8 per month, which, while a far cry from the $45 you'll fork over for a full digital subscription with Times Premier, is still a significant amount. You'll be able to download the app on April 2nd, with free access to headlines, summaries and 10 articles each month. The $8 fee (billed every four weeks) will enable full access to any article that appears in the NYT Now app.
NYT Now is a mobile news platform with a dedicated staff curating stories
SXSW is a veritable playground for journalists, with panels catering to media professionals and -- most importantly -- no shortage of free food. We're not surprised, then, that The New York Times chose Austin as the venue for an announcement this week. Perhaps "tease" is more apt than announcement, though, since we aren't allowed to capture any pictures of the upcoming NYT Now app at this time (the bar menu above was the only documentation we're permitted to publish).
Apple reportedly testing inductive, solar and motion charging for its unannounced smartwatch
We've heard that when Apple reveals its first smartwatch product, there's going to be a heavy focus on health and fitness, but there might also be a way to charge the wearable without plugging it in, according to a report from The New York Times. Inductive charging came in a wave of smartphones last year, including Google's Nexus 4 and Nokia's Lumia 920 range, although we don't often see it in anything smaller than a phone (or camera) form factor. Apple, however, is looking into cramming the same technology into its iWatch, or whatever it eventually calls its debut wearable. It works like this: Electromagnetic fields are generated from a charging base, which are then picked up by metal coils and transformed into for-real electricity that charges your device. The Cupertino company is experimenting with other new charging methods too, although these are apparently years away from consumer products. Sources close to the matter also mentioned the inclusion of a solar layer beneath the device's display, while the company has also looked into kinetically charging its wearables -- something that is already used in many modern (non-smart) timepieces.
Daily Roundup: HTC 8XT for Sprint, Windows 8.1 heads to manufacturers, Galaxy Gear, and more!
You might say the day is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workday, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Daily Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past 24 hours -- all handpicked by the editors here at the site. Click on through the break, and enjoy.
