YouTube adds bedtime reminders to help you stop watching videos at night

An APK teardown of the YouTube app on Android (v15.13.33) early last month revealed that the platform was working on a new feature called Bedtime Reminders. Now, according to a recent report from The Verge, YouTube has officially announced the new feature to help users log off the platform at night.

The bedtime reminders feature, much like the break reminders feature, gives you the option to set up a bedtime beforehand. Once that’s set up, the app then reminds you to go to sleep if you’re still watching videos at bedtime. In case you’re in the middle of an interesting video and don’t wish to be disturbed by a reminder, the app gives you an option to defer the reminder until you’ve finished watching the current video. You’ll also be able to snooze the reminder for 10 minutes or dismiss it altogether.

To set a bedtime reminder, you’ll have to navigate to the app’s settings page, tap on General, turn on the ‘Remind me when it’s bedtime’ option, and then select a start/end time for the reminders. Alternatively, you can tap on your profile picture in the YouTube app and then open up the ‘Time Watched’ section to set up a reminder.

Much like the break reminders feature, the ultimate goal of bedtime reminders is to help you use YouTube more responsibly and get a good night’s rest instead of getting sucked into the YouTube vortex. In a blog post on the matter, YouTube claims that its Digital Wellbeing tools have been quite popular so far and the company has sent over 3 billion “take a break” reminders since the feature was launched back in 2018. YouTube is rolling out bedtime reminders to both the Android and iOS apps starting today and the feature should reach all users over the next few days.

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Source: YouTube Help

Via: The Verge

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[Update 3: Clearer Toggle Language] Researchers accuse Xiaomi web browsers of collecting browsing data – even in Incognito mode

Update 3 (05/21/2020 @ 01:48 AM ET): Xiaomi has updated its browser settings to be clearer in their purpose, removing previous confusion.

Update 2 (05/03/2020 @ 10:14 AM ET): In its blog post update, Xiaomi has mentioned that its browsers will be updated with an option to allow users to opt-out of tracking in incognito mode.

Update 1 (05/01/2020 @ 03:36 PM EST): Xiaomi has published a blog post in response to these allegations. Scroll down for the update. The original story, as published on May 1st, 2020, at 06:18 AM EST, is as follows.

Xiaomi smartphones are unanimously agreed to be one of the best value purchases available in the market at any point in time. Packing some insane hardware at some very lucrative price points, especially at the lower end of the smartphone market, these phones make an offer that a lot of people just can’t refuse. Xiaomi has also been receptive to the needs of the developer community, with decisions such as allowing bootloader unlocking without sacrificing the manufacturer’s warranty — a combination that a lot of other popular OEMs discard, as well as vastly improving upon their kernel source releases. These reasons make them one of the most popular devices in our forums, and they have rightfully earned that spot of popularity.

However, recent reports from security researchers point towards a worrying privacy issue observed on Xiaomi’s web browsers. Forbes’ cybersecurity contributor and associate editor Thomas Brewster, along with cybersecurity researchers Gabriel Cirlig and Andrew Tierney recently concluded in a report that Xiaomi’s various web browsers were sending data to remote servers. They allege that the data being sent included a history of all websites visited, including the URLs, all search engine queries, and all the items viewed on Xiaomi’s news feed, along with device metadata. What’s even worrying about this data collection allegation is that this data is being collected even if you seemingly browse with “incognito mode” enabled.

This data collection seemingly occurs on the pre-installed stock browser on MIUI, as well as Mi Browser Pro and Mint Browser, both of which are available for download through the Google Play Store. Together, these browsers have over 15 million downloads on the Play Store, while the stock browser is preloaded on all Xiaomi devices. The devices tested include the Xiaomi Redmi Note 8, Xiaomi Mi A1, Xiaomi Mi 10, Xiaomi Redmi K20, and the Xiaomi Mi Mix 3. There wasn’t a distinction between Xiaomi’s Android One or MIUI devices, as the collection code was found in the default browser anyway. As such, this issue does not appear to be MIUI-centric but depends on whether you use any of these three browsers on your device, irrespective of the underlying OS. Other browsers, like Google Chrome and Apple Safari collect far less data, restricting themselves to usage and crash analytics.

Xiaomi responded by seemingly confirming that the browsing data it was collecting was fully compliant with local laws and regulations on user data privacy matters. The collected information was user-consented and anonymized. However, the company denied the claims in the research.

The research claims are untrue. Privacy and security is of top concern.

This video shows the collection of anonymous browsing data, which is one of the most common solutions adopted by internet companies to improve the overall browser product experience through analyzing non-personally identifiable information.

The researchers, however, found this claim of anonymity to be dubious. The data that Xiaomi was sending was admittedly “encrypted”, but it was encoded in base64, which can easily be decoded. Since the browsing data can be decoded in a rather trivial manner, and since the collected data also contained device metadata, this browsing data could seemingly be correlated to the actions by individual users without significant effort.

Further, the researchers found that the Xiaomi browsers were pinging domains related to Sensors Analytics, a Chinese startup also known as Sensors Data, known for providing behavioral analytics services. The browsers also contained an API called SensorDataAPI. Xiaomi is also listed as a customer on the Sensors Data website.

Xiaomi has responded to the report from Forbes with denial on several aspects:

While Sensors Analytics provides a data analysis solution for Xiaomi, the collected anonymous data are stored on Xiaomi’s own servers and will not be shared with Sensors Analytics, or any other third-party companies.

The researchers responded against Xiaomi’s denial with further proof of their data collection practice.

The parameter data_list is the one I am interested in.

URL decode.

base64 decode.

Gunzip.

JSON data.

I don’t think that should be there. pic.twitter.com/5CYH5FU9E4

— Cybergibbons (@cybergibbons) April 30, 2020

With the information available at hand, there does appear to be a worrying privacy issue in the way these browsers function. We’ve reached out to Xiaomi for further comment on these claims.

Source: Forbes

Update 1: Xiaomi Responds in Blog Post

In an official blog post on Mi.com, Xiaomi strongly denied the allegations that they were violating user privacy.

“Xiaomi was disappointed to read the recent article from Forbes. We feel they have misunderstood what we communicated regarding our data privacy principles and policy. Our user’s privacy and internet security is of top priority at Xiaomi; we are confident that we strictly follow and are fully compliant with local laws and regulations. We have reached out to Forbes to offer clarity on this unfortunate misinterpretation.”

The company confirms that they collect “aggregated usage statistics data,” which includes “system information, preferences, user interface feature usage, responsiveness, performance, memory usage, and crash reports.” They state that this information “cannot alone be used to identify any individual.” They confirm that URLs are collected, but that this is done to “identify web pages which load slowly” so they can figure out “how to best improve overall browsing performance.”

Next, the company states that individual browsing data history is synced, but that this is only done when “the user is signed on Mi Account…and the data sync function is set to ‘On’ under Settings.” They deny that browsing data, apart from the aforementioned aggregated usage statistics data, is being synced when the user has enabled incognito mode.

Xiaomi then published screenshots of code snippets from one of their browser apps (they did not specify which browser, though) that they claim demonstrate their points. The first code snippet, according to Xiaomi, shows a decompiled method for “how [they] create randomly generated unique tokens to append to aggregate usage statistics.” They state that “these tokens do not correspond to any individuals.” The next code snippet is seemingly from the browser’s source code and shows a method for “how the Mi Browser works under incognito mode, where no user browsing data will be synced.” The third code snippet demonstrates that the aggregated usage statistics that Xiaomi collects are “stored on Xiaomi’s domain” and aren’t passed to Sensor Analytics. Finally, the fourth image “shows that usage statistic data is transferred with HTTPS protocol of TLS 1.2 encryption.”

To cap it all off, Xiaomi then cites 4 certifications their software has received from TrustArc and British Standard Institution (BSI). These certifications include ISO27001:2013, ISO27018:2014, ISO29151:2017, and TRUSTe.

In response to this blog post, cybersecurity researcher Andrew Tierney took to Twitter to refute Xiaomi’s claims. He states that he and several others re-confirmed the findings across multiple devices—that there “is no doubt that the Mint Browser sends search terms and URLS whilst in Incognito mode.” He states that the code that Xiaomi published does not demonstrate that their “randomly generated unique tokens” can’t be correlated to individuals. The researchers note that the UUID seems to persist across browsing sessions and only changes when the browser is re-installed. Whether Xiaomi only stores the data on their own servers or elsewhere was not a point of contention for the researcher, too. In addition, the researcher states that Xiaomi wasn’t accused of sending the data to remote servers through insecure methods—Mr. Tierney notes that the issue at hand is the data itself that is being sent.

We’re glad to see Xiaomi address these allegations directly, but the explanation does not seem to satisfy the researchers at this point. We will keep an eye on this story for further developments.

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Update 2: Xiaomi to offer opt-out option in next browser update

Xiaomi has updated its blog post to announce that the next update to Mint Browser and Mi Browser will include an option in incognito mode to switch off the “aggregated” data collection. The software updates will be submitted to Google Play Store for approval today itself and should be available to users pretty soon.

It remains to be seen whether this data collection will remain enabled by default within the incognito mode, or not. We hope it isn’t. Still, having an option to opt-out works to address some privacy concerns.

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Update 3: Xiaomi is updating its Mi Browser and Mint Browser to clarify its incognito data collection toggle

While Xiaomi did address the privacy concerns with a new settings toggle, what actually happened was that the language used for the toggle was misleading, achieving the opposite of what was written. As Android Authority points out, the “enhanced incognito mode” toggle said: “Aggregated data stats won’t be uploaded when incognito mode is on”, which led users to believe that flipping the toggle on would make this statement true. But this was not the case. The wording reflected the current state of the toggle, and was not a true/false statement that you change by flipping the switch.

Old behavior

Now, Xiaomi has updated Mi Browser and Mint Browser to have better language on this toggle. The toggle is now called “Help us improve Mi/Mint Browser“, and the accompanying text says “Turn on to share usage stats with us when incognito mode is on“, with the text remaining the same when you flip the switch. This is much more clear to the purpose and the active state of the setting.

New behavior

In both the versions, the toggle needs to be in the off state if you wish to not have your data collected in incognito mode. It’s just the text that is changing to better reflect the state. The new update to both the browsers is being pushed to the Google Play Store.

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OnePlus, Realme, Black Shark, and Meizu join Xiaomi, OPPO, and Vivo’s file transfer alliance

Back in August last year, three Chinese OEMs — Xiaomi, OPPO, and Vivo — formed an alliance for the development of a new P2P file transfer protocol to simplify cross-device file transfers. The solution aimed to offer an AirDrop like experience in the Android ecosystem by allowing devices from different manufacturers to seamlessly share files between them. After months of development, it was finally rolled out earlier this year in February and now, a few more manufacturers are jumping on the bandwagon.

According to recent posts on Chinese social media platform Weibo, OnePlus, Realme, Meizu, and Black Shark have now joined the P2P file transfer alliance. Thanks to this, cross-device file transfer support will soon be coming to devices from these manufacturers, allowing users to easily share files without the need for any third-party applications. The move is expected to benefit over 400 million users around the world.

For the unaware, the file transfer protocol supports a variety of file formats and it even lets users share entire folders with each other. The protocol supports file transfer speeds in the order of 20MBps over a stable connection, which is significantly better than file transfers over Bluetooth.

As of now, OnePlus, Realme, and Meizu haven’t revealed exactly when the feature will be released on their respective Android skins. However, as a recent report from BusinessWire points out, Black Shark’s new JoyUI 11 already includes support for the P2P file transfer protocol. The company recently rolled out JoyUI 11 for the Black Shark 2 and Black Shark 2 Pro, which means that these devices should already feature support for the file transfer protocol, along with the company’s latest Black Shark 3 series.

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Source: Weibo (1,2,3,4)

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AT&T and Verizon face heavy scrutiny for misleading 5G claims

The big buzzword for mobile carriers right now is “5G,” and there’s little chance the marketing and hype will slow down anytime soon. After all, 5G is a great opportunity for carriers to plaster big, impressive-sounding numbers on every billboard and TV commercial. The only problem is that a lot of what they’re hyping up means little to the vast majority of people. Thankfully, two of the biggest offenders of overhyping 5G, AT&T and Verizon, are facing heavy criticism within the industry for misleading consumers.

We’ll start with AT&T, which has already faced its fair share of scrutiny over its bogus “5G Evolution” marketing. T-Mobile and Verizon pushed back against the moniker, and Sprint even went as far as suing the company (though they later settled). Now, the Better Business Bureau (BBB) is recommending that AT&T stop its “5G Evolution” advertising. If you’re not familiar with the BBB, they’re a private, nonprofit organization that was set up with the goal to improve consumer trust in businesses. (The BBB has had its fair share of controversies over favoritism and being generally toothless, but businesses tend to self-adhere to BBB standards or at least listen to consumer complaints filed with the BBB in order to appear better than competitors.)

Why the BBB is relevant to this story is because the National Advertising Review Board, which is part of the BBB, said AT&T should discontinue advertising “5G Evolution” as being “The First Step to 5G.” The panel determined this claim is misleading “reasonable consumers into believing that AT&T is offering a 5G network” when industry tests have found 5G E to be slower than other carriers’ 4G LTE networks. AT&T said it “respectfully disagrees” with the decision, but that it will stop the advertisements nonetheless. More importantly, however, is that AT&T refuses to stop the “5G E” branding on devices.

Verizon, like AT&T, has its own situation brewing with the BBB. The National Advertising Division of the BBB has told Verizon to stop claiming that it’s “building the most powerful 5G experience for America” and recommends it make it clear to consumers that the availability of its 5G network is very limited. Verizon has agreed to update its disclosures but will appeal the decision on the network construction claims.

Another concern of the NAD is Verizon’s spotty coverage in cities, some of which is only in stadiums and airports. The NAD said that Verizon’s billboards implied 5G coverage was coming wherever the ads were placed and the small print was obscured by colors and video transitions. Humorously, AT&T is the one that brought forth the initial complaint about the misleading Verizon ads.

While AT&T and Verizon are both fielding criticism from the BBB, mobile analytics company OpenSignal has released its 5G report detailing the 5G networks of popular carriers. The report compares network speeds across South Korea, Australia, the UK, and the US. In terms of speed, Verizon came out as the clear winner. The carrier’s Ultra Wideband (mmWave) network had average download speeds of 506 Mbps which was significantly higher than speeds possible with the other US carriers. Sprint averaged 114 Mbps, AT&T had 62 Mbps, and T-Mobile was last with 47 Mbps.

Of course, speed is only one part of the equation. In the case of 5G, coverage is a much bigger issue. OpenSignal’s report also said that Verizon customers are only using 5G 0.5% of the time. This fact harkens back to the BBB and its criticism of Verizon inflating the actual availability of its 5G network. Even if you live in one of the cities that has Verizon’s UWB 5G network, you have to be in a pretty precise location to actually use it. The fact is that it’s just not available for many people, even if they do have a compatible phone.

The other US carriers fared better in terms of coverage area. T-Mobile customers are using 5G 19.8% of the time, while AT&T customers use it 9.7% of the time. This is because both T-Mobile and AT&T have sub-6GHz 5G networks, which are considerably slower than Verizon’s mmWave 5G network but have dramatically better coverage. Still, if you’re only using Verizon’s hyper-fast 5G 0.5% of the time, maybe it’s better to be using the other carriers slower offerings more often? Even then, Verizon’s speed advantages may be slipping away, as PCMag reports that T-Mobile’s recent acquisition of Sprint’s mid-band 5G network have allowed for download speeds to exceed 1Gbps in New York City.

Well that was unexpected… Just two weeks after the 2.5GHz NYC launch, @TMobile upgrades the NR bandwidth from 40 to 60MHz!
NR spectral efficiency further improves… 1.2Gbps. pic.twitter.com/wDZBB6Ml4X

— Milan Milanović (@milanmilanovic) May 19, 2020

5G will continue to be a battleground when it comes to carrier marketing. The data is currently not on the side of the carriers and their boastful claims, however. Right now, consumers just aren’t seeing the benefits that carriers are touting. Did you know, for example, that Verizon just enabled uploads over its 5G network?

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Via 1: VentureBeat | Via 2: VentureBeat | Via 3: Android Central

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Android TV can now play casted audio in the background

Android TV is an excellent operating system for smart TVs and set-top boxes. It’s based on Android (although Google could be rebranding the name so the average user won’t know that) and has access to a special catalog of apps optimized for TVs in Google Play. One of the best features of the platform, though, is integrated support for the Google Cast protocol. All Android TV certified devices can act as a Chromecast receiver thanks to the pre-installed “Chromecast Built-in” app. If you’ve ever owned a Chromecast device, you’ll know how convenient this feature is. Now, Android TV’s built-in Cast functionality is getting a new feature: Playing casted audio content in the background.

Casted audio playing in the background while the home screen is showing. Image credits: Ben Schoon/9to5Google.

If you don’t have an Android TV right now, this news may come as a bit of a shock. After all, why would Android TV not allow you to play casted audio in the background? You have to keep in mind that we’re talking about TVs and set-top boxes connected to TVs, and as such, you’re probably not doing a lot of multitasking on them. But if you want to do it, now you can. All you have to do is open an app like Spotify or YouTube Music and then cast from your phone to your TV. (We should note that you can already play music in the background in some apps like Spotify for Android TV, but this new feature extends this functionality to other music apps you might use.)

9to5Google’s original coverage notes that backgrounding casted audio works with most music apps. It doesn’t work with casted video, though, as video content will cease when you press the home button. The notification itself provides you with basic controls: It shows the album art, the artist’s name, and of course, the song title. You also get a couple of buttons: “Open” to go back to the app that’s playing it and “Stop” to cease casting. If music is already playing from one app and you start media in another app, music playback will either continue or halt depending on the app. 9to5Google notes that Google Play Movies and Disney+ keep music playing while Hulu won’t.

It’s not clear when this functionality went live. It may have gone live at the same time that Android TV devices could be added to speaker groups in the Google Home app, which was enabled in a recent beta update to the Chromecast Built-in app.

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[Update 11: San Diego, 5G Uploads] Verizon 5G is Rolling Out to More Cities

Update 11 (5/20/20 @ 3:10 AM ET): Verizon enables uploading over its 5G Ultrawide Band (mmWave) network in 35 cities.

Update 10 (12/23/19 @ 9:20 AM ET): Verizon 5G is now live in Cleveland and Columbus, Ohio and Hampton Roads, Virginia.

Update 9 (12/20/19 @ 10:45 AM ET): Verizon wraps up the week by lighting up 5G in 7 more cities.

Update 8 (12/18/19 @ 11:15 AM ET): Verizon’s 5G network lights up in Hoboken, New Jersey.

Update 7 (12/17/19 @ 11:30 AM ET): The latest city to get Verizon’s 5G Ultra Wideband network is Des Moines, Iowa.

Update 6 (12/16/19 @ 10:40 AM ET): Verizon is rolling out 5G coverage in the Los Angeles area.

Update 5 (11/20/19 @ 9:10 AM ET): Verizon finally has detailed 5G coverage maps for every city on its website.

Update 4 (11/19/19 @ 9:25 AM ET): Verizon’s 5G network lights up in Boston, Houston, and Sioux Falls.

Update 3 (10/25/19 @ 12:45 PM ET): Verizon expands its 5G network coverage to Omaha and Dallas.

Update 2 (9/26/19 @ 1:15 PM ET): Verizon launches 5G service in New York City, Boise, and Panama City.

Update 1 (8/22/19 @ 12:15 PM ET): Verizon has announced the 5G rollout in Phoenix and a partnership with Boingo.

While many people are still skeptical about 5G, Verizon continues its rollout plans. Today, the company flipped the switch for four new cities: Atlanta, Detroit, Indianapolis, and Washington DC. Verizon is already selling a couple of 5G devices, but the list of available cities is still relatively small. So the continued expansion is good news.

Verizon’s 5G Ultra Wideband network is mmWave, just like AT&T, but different from Sprint’s sub-6Ghz network. One of the limitations of mmWave is you have to be in very specific locations to get the advertised 5G speeds. For example, read the description for Indianapolis below.

Indianapolis:

In Indianapolis, 5G Ultra Wideband service is initially available in parts of the following neighborhoods, Arsenal Heights, Bates Hendricks, Castleton, Crown Hill, Fountain Square, Grace Tuxedo Park, Hawthorne, Historic Meridian Park, Lockerbie Square, Ransom Place, Renaissance Place, St. Joseph Historic Neighborhood, Upper Canal and Woodruff Place and around such landmarks and public spaces as Garfield Park, and Indiana University School of Medicine.

Even if you have a 5G device and live in these cities, you may not be in the covered areas. These four new cities bring Verizon’s list up to nine, but they are still planning to have 5G in more than 30 cities by 2020. Soon, they will add the Galaxy Note 10 5G to the list of capable devices as well. Whether the market is ready or not, Verizon marches on with 5G.

Washington DC:

In Washington DC, consumers, businesses and government agencies can initially access Verizon’s 5G Ultra Wideband service in areas of Foggy Bottom, Dupont Circle, Cardozo / U Street, Adams Morgan, Columbia Heights, Le Droit Park, Georgetown Waterfront, Judiciary Square, Shaw, Eckington, NOMA, National Mall and the Smithsonian, Gallery Place / Chinatown, Mt. Vernon Square, Downtown, Penn Quarter, Brentwood, Southwest Waterfront, Navy Yard, and nearby Crystal City, VA, as well as around landmarks such as the Ronald Reagan National Airport, United States Botanical Gardens, Hart Senate Building, National Gallery of Art, Lafayette Square, The White House, Freedom Plaza, Farragut Square, George Washington University, Capital One Arena, Union Station, Howard University Hospital, George Washington University Hospital, and Georgetown Waterfront Park.

Atlanta:

In Atlanta, 5G Ultra Wideband service will initially be concentrated in parts of the following neighborhoods: Downtown, Midtown, Tech Square, and around such landmarks as The Fox Theater, Emory University Hospital Midtown, Mercedes-Benz Stadium, Home Depot Backyard, Centennial Olympic Park, Georgia Aquarium, World of Coca Cola, and parts of Renaissance Park.

Detroit:

In Detroit, 5G Ultra Wideband service will initially be concentrated in parts of the following areas: Dearborn, Livonia, and Troy, including areas around the Oakland-Troy Airport.

Source: Verizon

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Update 1: Phoenix Launch + Boingo Partnership

Verizon’s 5G coverage is coming to Phoenix, AZ, bringing the list of 5G cities up to 10. The network will go live on August 23rd. Verizon also announced a partnership with Boingo to bring 5G Ultra Wideband service to indoor and public places.

This is important because Verizon’s current 5G network is essentially unusable indoors, a limitation of the technology they are using. The partnership should bring 5G to places like airports, stadiums, arenas, office buildings, hotels, etc.

Last, but not least, the Samsung Galaxy Note 10+ 5G will be available from Verizon tomorrow, August 23rd. The full retail price is $1,299.99.

Source: Verizon

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Update 2: NYC, Boise, Panama City

Verizon’s 5G coverage is expanding to 3 more cities: New York City, Boise, and Panama City. In New York City, coverage will be in areas of Manhattan, Brooklyn, the Bronx, and around several landmarks. Verizon’s 5G technology limits coverage to very specific areas, so be sure to check the source below for all the exact locations you can access 5G in these cities.

Source: Verizon

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Update 3: Omaha & Dallas

Today, Verizon has expanded 5G coverage to two more cities: Omaha, Nebraska and Dallas, Texas. This brings the number of cities with 5G coverage from Verizon up to 15. As with the previous announcements, the actual coverage areas are extremely specific. So if you live in these cities, be sure to check the link below to find out where you can get 5G speeds.

Source: Verizon

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Update 4: Boston, Houston, and Sioux Falls

Verizon has announced that its 5G network is now live in three more cities across the US: Boston, MA, Houston, TX, and Sioux Falls, SD. This brings the total number of cities with Verizon 5G coverage up to 18. Just like the previous 15 cities, 5G is only accessible in these cities in very specific locations due to limitations with Verizon’s network technology. Be sure to visit the link below to see the exact locations where you can use 5G.

Source: Verizon

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Update 5: 5G Coverage Map

Verizon has been flipping the switch for 5G in US cities for months, but they’ve never really had detailed coverage maps. You can now visit this page on Verizon’s website and select a city to see the 5G coverage. Maps show where 5G Ultra Wideband is strongest and you can zoom in to see LTE coverage as well. Verizon’s 5G coverage is very specific, so these maps are handy if you’re looking to try it out. The website also lists 10 cities that will get 5G next: Cincinnati, Kansas City, Charlotte, Little Rock, Cleveland, Memphis, Columbus, Salt Lake City, Des Moines, and San Diego.

Source: Verizon

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Update 6: Los Angeles

Verizon 5G Ultra Wideband service is now available in areas around Los Angeles. As Verizon’s 5G network is limited to very specific locations, it’s not available city-wide. The exact locations are explained below, but Verizon will also have more detailed coverage maps available for the area on December 20th.

Parts of Downtown, Chinatown, Del Rey, and Venice around landmarks such as: Grand Park, Los Angeles Convention Center, Union Station, LA Live, Staples Center, and Venice Beach Boardwalk.

Source: Verizon

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Update 7: Des Moines, Iowa

The 20th city to get Verizon’s 5g Ultra Wideband service is Des Moines, Iowa. As with all cities, the coverage does not blanket all areas. Verizon will have a detailed coverage map for Des Moines on December 20th. Until then, you can read the description below.

5G Ultra Wideband service will be available in parts of Downtown, East Village, and West Des Moines around landmarks such as: Iowa State Capitol, Hyvee Hall, Wells Fargo Arena, Pappajohn Sculpture Park, Principal Park, Jordan Creek Town Center and MercyOne West Des Moines.

Source: Verizon

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Update 8: Hoboken, New Jersey

Verizon continues to light up 5G in new cities every day this week. Next up is Hoboken, New Jersey, the 21st city with Verizon’s 5G Ultra Wideband. The detailed coverage map for the city will be available on December 20th.

5G Ultra Wideband service will be concentrated on Willow Ave between 1st and 16th Streets; 5th Street between Marshall Drive and Garden St, Adams St between 2nd and 7th Streets. It will also be located around landmarks such as: Hoboken University Medical Center, Church Square Park, Hoboken Public Library and Mama Johnson Field.

Source: Verizon

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Update 9: 7 new cities

Verizon has been busy lighting up cities across the US with 5G Ultra Wideband this week. The culmination is 7 more cities: Charlotte and Greensboro, North Carolina; Grand Rapids, Michigan; Miami, Florida; Salt Lake City, Utah; Spokane, Washington; and Memphis, Tennessee. This brings the total number of cities up to 28. Verizon’s updated 5G coverage map should be available soon for all the cities announced this week. Check out the full location descriptions at the link below in the meantime.

Source: Verizon

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Update 10: Cleveland, Columbus, Hampton Roads

Today, Verizon announced that it met its goal of 30 cities with 5G in 2019. Cleveland and Columbus, Ohio and Hampton Roads, Virginia put the number at 31. The John Glenn International Airport in Columbus also becomes the first US airport with 5G coverage. Visit the link below to see the detailed locations of where 5G is accessible in these cities.

Source: Verizon

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Update 11: San Diego, 5G Uploads

Since our last update, Verizon has continued to bring 5G access to more cities. Parts of Little Rock, Kansas City, and Cincinnati were added in January, and San Diego is the most recent addition. You can find more information about precise access locations on Verizon’s coverage map. The other big announcement is 5G uploads.

You may be surprised to learn that it wasn’t previously possible to upload over 5G on Verizon’s Ultrawide Band (mmWave) network. Everyone talked about the amazing download speeds, but uploads were not possible. That changes now as customers in all 35 5G cities and supported venues can upload over 5G with speeds “about 30 percent faster than 4G LTE.”

Source: Verizon

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[Update: Small Rollout] Twitter plans to allow users to limit who can reply to tweets

Update (5/20/20 @ 3:00 PM ET): Twitter is officially starting to roll out the ability to limit who can reply to your tweets.

CES 2020 is well underway and Twitter’s director of product management, Suzanne Xie, has unveiled some new changes that are coming to the platform later this year. These changes all primarily focus on conversations that you can have on the platform and aim to prevent bullying and harassment. The biggest change relates to “conversation participants.” Rather than hiding your Tweets from people who you don’t want to see it, you can simply prevent people from replying instead. You can limit your tweet to one of four groups: “Global, Group, Panel, and Statement.”

“Global” is exactly what it says on the tin, anyone can reply and interact, just like a regular public tweet. After that is where things get interesting. “Group” is made up of the people you tag and the people you follow, “Panel” is only the people you specifically tweet at, and “Statement” entirely prevents all replies. Xie says that Twitter is “in the process of doing research on the feature” and that “the mockups are going to be part of an experiment we’re going to run” in the first quarter. The feature will then hopefully be globally launched later in the year, taking on board feedback from the public testing.

“Getting ratio’d, getting dunked on, the dynamics that happen that we think aren’t as healthy are definitely part of … our thinking about this,” Xie said. A major concern then would be the attempt at spreading misinformation, which Xie mentioned the possibility of quote tweeting as a solution. Even still, Xie said that possibility is “something we’re going to be watching really closely as we experiment.”

Xie also mentioned that the company is working on other features such as threading, to allow all of a Twitter conversation to be displayed on one screen. Lines drawn on the screen would make it easier to then see who is replying to who. Twitter is always messing with things and beta testing new features, which you can enable some of through Tweeks, an Xposed module.

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Via: The Verge

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Update: Small Rollout

Testing, testing…

A new way to have a convo with exactly who you want. We’re starting with a small % globally, so keep your out to see it in action. pic.twitter.com/pV53mvjAVT

— Twitter (@Twitter) May 20, 2020

Twitter is officially beginning to roll out the ability to limit who can reply to your tweets. This feature was initially announced way back at CES, and now Twitter is finally ready for people to use it. The company is starting with a “small % globally,” so it won’t be available to many people to start. Once you have the feature, you will be able to compose a tweet and decide who can reply. The default is everyone, but you can choose “People you follow” or “Only people you mention.” This could drastically change the way people use Twitter.

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