While many businesses are struggling to survive the crippling impact of the COVID-19 outbreak, others are seeing a surge in demand. The increased traffic spans bicycle stores, video-based social networking, and, perhaps unsurprisingly, “vice industries.” With social-distancing and self-isolation widely acknowledged as the best ways to counter the spread of COVID-19, demand for goods such […]
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Mobile game designers feel like the mad scientists of the development world. They work fast and are constantly adjusting formulas based on the tiniest changes in player data. And when one experiment blows up in their face, they’re ready to move on to whatever is next. On this week’s episode of How Games Make Money, […]
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On April 3, 2020, Apple’s iPad tablets will officially be 10 years old, and I’ll celebrate 10 continuous years of using at least one of them literally every day. I’ve been a fan of the platform since before it was officially released — actually before it was even named — and on most days, I […]
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Skillz, which has a platform for mobile esports, is launching mobile game tournaments to raise donations for the American Red Cross. Starting on Saturday and running over the weekend, Skillz will host mobile game tournaments where players can donate to the American Red Cross, in hopes of alleviating severe blood shortages caused by COVID-19. Through […]
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Another week has gone by, and the game industry has rolled with the punches of the coronavirus. It demonstrates how resilient game companies are and how they can adapt to almost anything. But our collective experience shows it’s hard to dodge something as apocalyptic as a pandemic that shuts down many parts of the global […]
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This month, under the strain millions of people self-quarantined by COVID-19 have placed on broadband infrastructure, Netflix, Facebook, Disney, Microsoft, Sony, and YouTube agreed to temporarily reduce download speeds and video streaming quality in countries around the world. Nearly 90 out of the top 200 U.S. cities saw internet speeds decline in the past week, […]
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(Reuters) — Senior officials in the Trump administration agreed to new measures to restrict the global supply of chips to China’s Huawei, sources familiar with the matter said, as the White House ramps up criticism of China over coronavirus. The move comes as ties between Washington and Beijing grow more strained, with both sides trading […]
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Today, following the launch of a Facebook program that’s matching developers with organizations to build solutions that inform people about COVID-19, Facebook revealed the steps it’s taking to help Messenger users stay connected. Via a new hub — the Messenger Coronavirus Community Hub — the network is providing tips and resources to help users stay […]
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Tribe Gaming has raised $1.04 million to expand its mobile esports teams and media business. The Austin, Texas-based company has courted celebrities, and investors in the deal include Gordon Hayward of the NBA’s Boston Celtics, Kristian Segerstrale (CEO of Super Evil Megacorp), Claudio Castagnoli (Cesaro) of the WWE, and angel investor Victor Krahn. Tribe Gaming was […]
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Coronavirus quarantines have sent downloads soaring for social video apps as millions of people search for ways to connect socially and professionally. As has been widely noted, Zoom’s video conference service has been one of the biggest beneficiaries of the new isolation regimes. Even amid an historic stock market sell off, Zoom’s stock has risen […]
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Microsoft today announced it is acquiring Affirmed Networks, a startup that offers fully virtualized, cloud-native mobile network solutions, for an undisclosed amount. The company wants to integrate Affirmed Networks’ technology into Microsoft Azure to let the telecommunications industry deploy and maintain 5G networks via software and the cloud rather than just hardware. Affirmed Networks offers […]
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If you follow tablet computers, you know new iPad Pro releases tend to be important since Apple always reserves its fastest A-series processors and latest top-of-line features for its premium-priced flagships. While some of these capabilities later trickled down to other models, iPad Pros were Apple’s first tablets with Pencil and Smart Connector support, four […]
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Huawei has officially announced a new voice-activated virtual assistant that will be made available outside of China, as the Chinese technology titan continues to build out its own versions of Google’s services. While Huawei has offered its own version (called “Xiaoyi”) of Alexa, Siri, and Google Assistant in China for a while, it has long […]
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SendBird, a platform that makes it easy for developers to integrate chat and messaging features into their apps, is extending its service to include voice and video capabilities too. The timing could not be more apt, as video communication apps such as Zoom and Houseparty experience a surge in popularity due to social distancing measures […]
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(Reuters) — Global smartphone sales tumbled 14% in February as the coronavirus spread in China and overseas, Counterpoint Research said on Thursday, a likely harbinger of more declines as outbreaks worsen in many parts of the world. The outbreak prompted Apple and other smartphone makers to shut their China stores in February and government data […]
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Digital Legends Entertainment, one of Spain’s premier mobile game developers, has released Respawnables Heroes worldwide on the Apple App Store today. Respawnables Heroes is a tactical team-based action game with the a focus on quality graphics and player-versus-player multiplayer matches where four players square off against four others. Thanks to the popularity of franchises like […]
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As confirmed COVID-19 cases and deaths escalate globally, both the public and private sectors are working toward new solutions to track — and curtail — the spread. In the past couple of days alone, at least two collaborative projects have emerged that are designed to help people report their current health status, update it if […]
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Pokémon Go saw global player spending reach $23 million during the week of March 16, according to mobile market researcher Sensor Tower. That is up 66.7% from the previous week. Niantic’s mobile hit has players walking around the real world and catching Pokémon. Considering the recent issuing of shelter-in-place orders across the world in an […]
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In a study published this week on the preprint server Arxiv.org, Google and University of California, Berkely researchers propose a framework that combines learning-based perception with model-based control that when applied to a wheeled robot enables autonomous navigation around obstacles. They say it generalizes well to unseen buildings and humans in both simulation and real-world […]
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Like a lot of other companies, Sayollo is putting advertisements inside mobile games. But the Israeli startup has a different approach, as its ads are on billboards that look like they belong inside the mobile game world. Rehovot, Israel-based Sayollo has figured out that gamers appreciate ads that aren’t intrusive. But if they put a […]
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Although mobile industry association 3GPP pushed up the initial 5G standard’s release to kickstart millimeter wave and sub-6GHz hardware deployments across the world, it left many important details unresolved pending future standardization meetings and votes. Now the group says it’s delaying work on two critical updates to the 5G standard due to the coronavirus pandemic, […]
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Publisher Glu Mobile has launched its Disney Sorcerer’s Arena mobile game on iOS and Android. Hopefully this will keep more people occupied while dealing with stay-at-home rules around the world. Sorcerer’s Arena features Disney and Pixar characters in a kind of battle not unlike Star Wars Galaxy of Heroes, another Disney-based hit in the $86 […]
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As countries struggle to contain the COVID-19 pandemic by forcing people into isolation, the reduced movement has resulted in fewer carbon emissions and a healthier planet. When China went into lockdown, NASA satellite images revealed a decline in pollution, a trend that first emerged near the source of the outbreak in Wuhan and spread across […]
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