Month: January 2024
Apple’s Vision Pro will have Microsoft Teams, Word, Excel and other 365 apps at launch
Apple’s upcoming Vision Pro AR/VR headset will have a bunch of dedicated Microsoft 365 apps at launch on February 2, including Teams, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, OneNote and Loop. Apple has long described the Vision Pro as primarily a productivity device, so the addition of Microsoft products should make users, well, more productive.
These aren’t just slapdash remakes of correlating iPads apps, as many have built-in tools that take advantage of the headset. For instance, PowerPoint features a custom immersive environment that allows users to practice delivering a presentation to an actual audience. Excel will let users quickly move documents to other apps by using the headset’s pinch and drag functionality.
Microsoft
Microsoft Word will include a focus mode that blocks distractions so you can actually finish that novel you’ve been talking about for 15 years. Teams will take advantage of the headset’s persona feature, so your digital avatar can attend work meetings and creep everyone else out via the magic of the uncanny valley. The Zoom app on Apple Vision Pro will also include this feature.
Headset owners will also be able to access Microsoft’s AI-powered Copilot service. In other words, you’ll be able to use natural conversation to instruct the digital assistant to create drafts, summarize documents and even generate PowerPoint presentations.
Each of these apps will be available via the official App Store as soon as you unbox your expensive new gadget. There has been plenty of chatter about what software won’t be available at launch, like Netflix and YouTube, so it’s good to see that early adopters won’t be forced to exclusively use Apple-branded apps.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/apples-vision-pro-will-have-microsoft-teams-word-excel-and-other-365-apps-at-launch-195237957.html?src=rss
Apple’s upcoming Vision Pro AR/VR headset will have a bunch of dedicated Microsoft 365 apps at launch on February 2, including Teams, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, OneNote and Loop. Apple has long described the Vision Pro as primarily a productivity device, so the addition of Microsoft products should make users, well, more productive.
These aren’t just slapdash remakes of correlating iPads apps, as many have built-in tools that take advantage of the headset. For instance, PowerPoint features a custom immersive environment that allows users to practice delivering a presentation to an actual audience. Excel will let users quickly move documents to other apps by using the headset’s pinch and drag functionality.
Microsoft Word will include a focus mode that blocks distractions so you can actually finish that novel you’ve been talking about for 15 years. Teams will take advantage of the headset’s persona feature, so your digital avatar can attend work meetings and creep everyone else out via the magic of the uncanny valley. The Zoom app on Apple Vision Pro will also include this feature.
Headset owners will also be able to access Microsoft’s AI-powered Copilot service. In other words, you’ll be able to use natural conversation to instruct the digital assistant to create drafts, summarize documents and even generate PowerPoint presentations.
Each of these apps will be available via the official App Store as soon as you unbox your expensive new gadget. There has been plenty of chatter about what software won’t be available at launch, like Netflix and YouTube, so it’s good to see that early adopters won’t be forced to exclusively use Apple-branded apps.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/apples-vision-pro-will-have-microsoft-teams-word-excel-and-other-365-apps-at-launch-195237957.html?src=rss
Mark Zuckerberg forced to face families impacted by cyberbullying
At the Senate Judiciary Committee hearings today, GOP Sen. Josh Hawley demanded that Mark Zuckerberg stand and face the families
The post Mark Zuckerberg forced to face families impacted by cyberbullying appeared first on ReadWrite.
At the Senate Judiciary Committee hearings today, GOP Sen. Josh Hawley demanded that Mark Zuckerberg stand and face the families whose kids were harmed by online abuse — and he did. The Senate hearing was contentious, yet Zuckerberg stood and faced the families watching the hearing: “No one should have to go through the things that your families have suffered, and this is why we invested so much,” he said. Parents and other family members were holding up photos of their children as Zuckerberg spoke.
For the first time, five major social media platform giants were in Washington. CEOs of X, Snap, and Discord, Linda Yaccarino and Jason Citron, will testify before Congress. Speakers include Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, and Shou Zi Chew, CEO of TikTok, who have both addressed lawmakers before.
It was reported that all of the CEOs exited the room quickly after the hearing
It was reported that all of the CEOs exited the room quickly and quietly after the hearing — taking no questions and leaving through a side door. But what type of legislation will it take to pass both houses of Congress? As pointed out, Washington has been discussing these issues for years with nothing done about it. One notable comment from Klobuchar, “It’s been 28 years since the internet. We haven’t passed any of these bills … The reason they haven’t passed is because of the power of your companies, so let’s be really, really clear about that what you say matters. Your words matter.” — Klobuchar, on the lack of legislation.
https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/live-blog/senate-hearing-online-child-safety-big-tech-live-updates-rcna136235/rcrd32776?canonicalCard=true
Zuckerberg pushed back on Sen. Blackburn’s comment about “Meta’s social media sites are trying to be “the premier sex trafficking site in the country.” Zuckerberg: “That’s ridiculous.”
However, Sen. Peter Welch, D-Vt said, “There is a consensus today that didn’t exist, say 10 years ago, that there is a profound threat to children to mental health, to safety.” The statement gave hope to many in the room. After questioning the CEOs about layoffs, Welch noted that it is alarming that the reductions have been on those very people who were protecting things.
The post Mark Zuckerberg forced to face families impacted by cyberbullying appeared first on ReadWrite.
The latest Xbox controllers feature a nifty bowling ball aesthetic
The Xbox Design Lab is neat in that you can customize the colors of your controller pretty much however you like. Microsoft is offering players more customization options for their Xbox controller with the Vapor series. These six top case options have swirling color patterns that will provide your peripheral with your ideal look if you’re aiming for that bowling ball aesthetic.
The variants include Nocturnal Vapor, which blends dark green and grey; the bold pink and purple Cyber Vapor; and the red and orange Fire Vapor. You’ll still be able to customize the button colors and swap in metallic triggers and D-pads, and rubberized side and back grips. Players can add a personalized engraving to the case too.
Xbox
Those who don’t feel like fiddling around in the Design Lab but still want a controller with this kind of vibe can pick up the latest Xbox special edition controller, the Dream Vapor. While it uses the pink and purple top case from the Vapor collection, Xbox has included unique, matching purple rubberized side grips and soft pink ABXY buttons with purple accents. Snap up the $70 controller and you’ll also get an exclusive dynamic background for your Xbox Series X/S.
It’s not exactly the first time Xbox has embraced this vibe. The Stormcloud Vapor controller has been around for a while. But the fact Microsoft is wading further into these swirly waters has us suspecting there’s perhaps a really big Pete Weber fan on the Xbox team.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/the-latest-xbox-controllers-feature-a-nifty-bowling-ball-aesthetic-194233908.html?src=rss
The Xbox Design Lab is neat in that you can customize the colors of your controller pretty much however you like. Microsoft is offering players more customization options for their Xbox controller with the Vapor series. These six top case options have swirling color patterns that will provide your peripheral with your ideal look if you’re aiming for that bowling ball aesthetic.
The variants include Nocturnal Vapor, which blends dark green and grey; the bold pink and purple Cyber Vapor; and the red and orange Fire Vapor. You’ll still be able to customize the button colors and swap in metallic triggers and D-pads, and rubberized side and back grips. Players can add a personalized engraving to the case too.
Those who don’t feel like fiddling around in the Design Lab but still want a controller with this kind of vibe can pick up the latest Xbox special edition controller, the Dream Vapor. While it uses the pink and purple top case from the Vapor collection, Xbox has included unique, matching purple rubberized side grips and soft pink ABXY buttons with purple accents. Snap up the $70 controller and you’ll also get an exclusive dynamic background for your Xbox Series X/S.
It’s not exactly the first time Xbox has embraced this vibe. The Stormcloud Vapor controller has been around for a while. But the fact Microsoft is wading further into these swirly waters has us suspecting there’s perhaps a really big Pete Weber fan on the Xbox team.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/the-latest-xbox-controllers-feature-a-nifty-bowling-ball-aesthetic-194233908.html?src=rss
Microsoft’s new OneDrive design starts rolling out for consumers
Image: Microsoft
Microsoft is starting to roll out a new design for its OneDrive cloud storage service for consumers. The software maker first unveiled a Fluent design refresh for OneDrive last year, and it will be available to all OneDrive personal users by the end of February.
“It’s both a visual and functional upgrade designed to help you get to your files quickly and keep your content organized in multiple ways,” says Miceile Barrett, a Microsoft product manager. “The improved visual design reduces clutter and distractions, allowing you to focus on what’s important – your content.”
Image: Microsoft
The before and after.
The new visual interface for OneDrive more closely matches Windows 11 and changes to Microsoft’s various Office apps. While the main interface has been simplified and modernized, there’s also a new people view so you can find files and documents by looking at the faces of family or friends with whom you regularly share documents. I often remember who shared a spreadsheet with me, but I can never remember the exact name of the file in a long list, so this interface will be super useful to me personally.
Microsoft has also added new file filters to this updated OneDrive UI, so you can filter the interface by Word, Excel, PowerPoint, or PDF files. The ‘add new’ button now includes options for both file uploads and new document creation using Office apps. That’s much better than the two separate buttons that exist in OneDrive for file uploads and new folders / documents.
There are many more changes planned for OneDrive and, in particular, business users. Microsoft is adding offline support, faster load times, and much more.
Image: Microsoft
Microsoft is starting to roll out a new design for its OneDrive cloud storage service for consumers. The software maker first unveiled a Fluent design refresh for OneDrive last year, and it will be available to all OneDrive personal users by the end of February.
“It’s both a visual and functional upgrade designed to help you get to your files quickly and keep your content organized in multiple ways,” says Miceile Barrett, a Microsoft product manager. “The improved visual design reduces clutter and distractions, allowing you to focus on what’s important – your content.”
Image: Microsoft
The before and after.
The new visual interface for OneDrive more closely matches Windows 11 and changes to Microsoft’s various Office apps. While the main interface has been simplified and modernized, there’s also a new people view so you can find files and documents by looking at the faces of family or friends with whom you regularly share documents. I often remember who shared a spreadsheet with me, but I can never remember the exact name of the file in a long list, so this interface will be super useful to me personally.
Microsoft has also added new file filters to this updated OneDrive UI, so you can filter the interface by Word, Excel, PowerPoint, or PDF files. The ‘add new’ button now includes options for both file uploads and new document creation using Office apps. That’s much better than the two separate buttons that exist in OneDrive for file uploads and new folders / documents.
There are many more changes planned for OneDrive and, in particular, business users. Microsoft is adding offline support, faster load times, and much more.
Study finds that once people use cargo bikes, they like their cars much less
Even some one-car households ditched vehicles in favor of cargo bike-sharing.
Enlarge / It’s not likely to totally replace your car, nor will it probably be your only bike. But access to a cargo bike can reduce car trips, and even car ownership, a study from Germany suggests. (credit: John Timmer)
Cargo bikes started as something you’d see in images from Europe—bakfiets loaded up with groceries or sometimes kids. Now they’re getting more popular, and seemingly for good reason. A new study out of Germany suggests that once you let people try them, they tend to have a real impact on car use, and even car ownership.
The study, from Transportation Research Part F: Traffic Psychology and Behaviour, surveyed people using a cargo bike share (CBS) system from 58 different programs and initiatives in Germany, controlling a collective 751 cargo bikes. Out of the 2,386 active CBS users surveyed, 45.8 percent had one car in their home, and 54.2 percent lived without a car. As you might notice, this mix of cargo bike shares and car ownership is not representative of the US, but using a cargo bike, even one they didn’t technically own, still impacted ownership decisions in even one-car households.
A bit more than 18 percent of survey respondents said they either got rid of their car or decided against buying a car, and 80 percent of those people said they did so for environmental reasons. Nearly 49 percent said they ditched a car for financial reasons, 42 percent because they had “no interest in driving a car,” and about 10 percent due to the safety risks of driving a car (with the survey allowing for multiple reasons).
GM Reverses All-In EV Strategy to Bring Back Plug-In Hybrids
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Aim Security raises $10M for its GenAI security platform
Securing generative AI-based applications from prompting attacks, ensuring that they don’t leak sensitive data or create malicious output or results that may violate privacy regulations is becoming a real business. We’ve already seen some startups in this space and today, Tel Aviv-based Aim Security is joining the fray with a new GenAI security platform and
© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Securing generative AI-based applications from prompting attacks, ensuring that they don’t leak sensitive data or create malicious output or results that may violate privacy regulations is becoming a real business. We’ve already seen some startups in this space and today, Tel Aviv-based Aim Security is joining the fray with a new GenAI security platform and […]
© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Crypto mines will have to start reporting their energy use in the US
Bitcoin mining machines in a warehouse at the Whinstone US Bitcoin mining facility in Rockdale, Texas, on October 10, 2021. | Photo by MARK FELIX/AFP /AFP via Getty Images
The US Department of Energy (DOE) will begin collecting data on crypto mines’ electricity use, following criticism from environmental advocates over how energy-hungry those operations are.
“We will specifically focus on how the energy demand for cryptocurrency mining is evolving, identify geographic areas of high growth, and quantify the sources of electricity used to meet cryptocurrency mining demand,” Joe DeCarolis, administrator of the Energy Information Administration (EIA), said in a press release today.
“We will specifically focus on how the energy demand for cryptocurrency mining is evolving.”
The EIA, the statistical agency of the Department of Energy, announced that it is “initiating a provisional survey of electricity consumption information from identified cryptocurrency mining companies” starting next week. The cryptocurrency mining companies will have to comply, per an “emergency collection of data request” the Office of Management and Budget authorized last week.
Getting to this point has been a slog. After a ban on Bitcoin mining in China in 2021, the US became the world’s biggest hub for Bitcoin mining. The mining boom raised flags for lawmakers and activists because of the energy demands of the process. Bitcoin mines managed to resurrect fossil fuel power plants and raise electricity costs for some residents in New York.
In 2022, Democratic lawmakers asked the biggest crypto mining companies in the US to disclose their electricity consumption and associated pollution. None of the companies responded with all the data they were asked to provide, and Congress subsequently asked the DOE and EPA to require that crypto companies publicly share the information.
In letters between the agencies and Democratic lawmakers shared exclusively with The Verge last year, Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm wrote a letter to Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) saying that the EIA has the authority to require crypto operations to report their energy use. Doing so would “require development of a new survey to collect this information,” the letter says. It looks like that’s what’s happening now. According to the letter, the EIA can potentially also require utilities to share information about how much electricity they sell to crypto companies.
A spokesperson for the Blockchain Association didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Bitcoin mining machines in a warehouse at the Whinstone US Bitcoin mining facility in Rockdale, Texas, on October 10, 2021. | Photo by MARK FELIX/AFP /AFP via Getty Images
The US Department of Energy (DOE) will begin collecting data on crypto mines’ electricity use, following criticism from environmental advocates over how energy-hungry those operations are.
“We will specifically focus on how the energy demand for cryptocurrency mining is evolving, identify geographic areas of high growth, and quantify the sources of electricity used to meet cryptocurrency mining demand,” Joe DeCarolis, administrator of the Energy Information Administration (EIA), said in a press release today.
The EIA, the statistical agency of the Department of Energy, announced that it is “initiating a provisional survey of electricity consumption information from identified cryptocurrency mining companies” starting next week. The cryptocurrency mining companies will have to comply, per an “emergency collection of data request” the Office of Management and Budget authorized last week.
Getting to this point has been a slog. After a ban on Bitcoin mining in China in 2021, the US became the world’s biggest hub for Bitcoin mining. The mining boom raised flags for lawmakers and activists because of the energy demands of the process. Bitcoin mines managed to resurrect fossil fuel power plants and raise electricity costs for some residents in New York.
In 2022, Democratic lawmakers asked the biggest crypto mining companies in the US to disclose their electricity consumption and associated pollution. None of the companies responded with all the data they were asked to provide, and Congress subsequently asked the DOE and EPA to require that crypto companies publicly share the information.
In letters between the agencies and Democratic lawmakers shared exclusively with The Verge last year, Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm wrote a letter to Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) saying that the EIA has the authority to require crypto operations to report their energy use. Doing so would “require development of a new survey to collect this information,” the letter says. It looks like that’s what’s happening now. According to the letter, the EIA can potentially also require utilities to share information about how much electricity they sell to crypto companies.
A spokesperson for the Blockchain Association didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.