Tech Talk

Five months after launching, and with millions of people stuck at home, Disney's streaming service Disney+ now has 50 million subscribers, reports Deadline . Disney+ in early February had 28.6 million subscribers, which means the streaming service has grown by 21.4 million subscribers in the last two months. Much of the boost can be attributed to recent launches of the service in the UK, Ireland, Germany, Italy, Spain, Austria, France, Switzerland, and India. 50 million subscribers is ahead of Disney's own figures. When unveiling the service, Disney estimated that it would garner 60 to 90 million subscribers worldwide by the end of 2024, and if growth keeps up, Disney will hit that goal this year. Apple has not released subscriber numbers, which means there's no direct comparison to Disney+. Since September, Apple has been providing a free year of service to everyone who purchases a new Apple device, so it will take over a year until Apple has large numbers of paying

Foxconn and other factories in China have implemented stringent measures to prevent the another viral outbreak in the country, according to an overview of the practices shared today by The Washington Post . Pages from a manual issued by Foxconn that covers rules employees must follow. Image from The Washington Post. Apple iPhone supplier Foxconn, for example, has organized workers into teams of 20 who stick together day and night for health tracking purposes. "The same group of employees work, travel, live, and eat together to ensure that employees' personal trajectories are fully traced," reads a notice from the Zhengzhou government where Foxconn is located. A Foxconn employee told The Washington Post that workers are provided with a face mask and have their temperatures checked regularly, plus there are infrared cameras to check people for fevers as they walk by. Foxconn said that it is also using nucleic acid tests and chest x-rays when required, and it has pr

The classic Hangouts app was shuttered earlier this year and bifurcated into Hangouts Chat and Hangouts Meet. What you need to know The Hangouts brand may be going to the Google graveyard soon. Based on changes in the company's communications, it seems like Google will be dropping the "Hangouts" from Hangouts Meet. Whether the change will be replicated with Hangouts Chat, and signify the end of the Hangouts brand entirely, remains to be seen. Hangouts, as a product, has had a troubled history since the beginning. Envisioned as Google's end-all, be-all chat and video calling solution to take on iMessage and FaceTime, it never really caught on with as many customers as Google would have liked. So, the company decided to shutter the classic app and split the product into two earlier this year: the consumer-focused Hangouts Chat and an enterprise-oriented video conferencing tool, Hangouts Meet. The latter, at least, may soon be dropping the Hangouts in its na

Last year Microsoft added a Spotify integration to its Xbox Game Bar on the PC, and now it will be able to offer far more third-party support. That’s because it has introduced a new Game Bar Widget Store, as well as an SDK for outside developers to p... Source: https://ift.tt/2Xlhooe

Rakuten Mobile announced the full commercial launch of its low-cost data plan in Japan today. Priced at 2,980 yen (about $27) per month, the plan gives users unlimited calls and data where Rakuten has its own networks. The company also raised the amount of domestic roaming data in response to increased usage of remote working and online education tools. Earlier this week, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe declared a state of emergency in seven prefectures, including Tokyo, after a new wave of COVID-19 cases in March. The order gives prefectural leaders the power to request closure of stores and businesses considered non-essential. Public schools in Tokyo and surrounding areas closed earlier this year and are not expected to re-open until early May. In addition to serving increased need for online services during the pandemic, Rakuten Mobile’s pricing may also help it compete against Japan’s largest carriers–NTT Docomo, KDDI and SoftBank. Rakuten Mobile uses what the company says is the wo

Phos , the U.K. fintech that offers a software-only PoS so that merchants can accept payments directly on their phones without the need for additional hardware, has raised €1.3 million in funding. The round was led by New Vision 3, an early-stage VC based in Bulgaria (where a part of the Phos team is based), with participation from a number of unnamed angel investors. It brings the total raised by Phos to date to €2.5 million, and will be used to grow the development team. This will see new features introduced, such as ‘PIN on Phone’, a Software Development Kit (SDK), and a new integrated loyalty system. Founded in 2018, Phos has developed software that turns any NFC-equipped Android device into a payments terminal, negating the need for additional hardware and reducing total cost of ownership. The startup says its solution is quick to deploy, and is “uniquely” phone and bank agnostic i.e. any bank can act as the acquirer. “Millions of traders and merchants do not accept card paym

The stable version of Chrome 81 has arrived for Windows, Mac and Linux after a couple of weeks of delay brought about by the coronavirus pandemic. As ZDNet notes, Google had to move some of the features it was supposed to ship with to future versions... Source: https://ift.tt/2UUebdQ