According to a report from 9to5Google, activating the Google Assistant by saying “Hey Google” has been broken for months.
Google said it is now working on a fix, saying that it is “aware of the issues some users have been encountering” and will help its partners “address these and improve the overall experience.”
There are a good number of users reporting the issue — a post on Google’s Issue Tracker has almost a thousand stars. Reading through the thread, it’s clear that many users with different smartwatch models are all reporting the same issue going back to November 2020.
Google has not made it clear how long it will be until the issue is fixed, but hopefully it gets attention now.
While Wear OS may not be core to Google’s strategy, the Assistant seems to be, and it’d be nice for people who have chosen to put Google’s OS on their wrists to have easy access to it.
Google is working to get “Hey Google” working on Wear OS
Joby Aviation goes public and reveals its electric aircraft in flight
Joby Aviation, an electric aviation company based in Northern California, is the latest futuristic mobility company to go public via a reverse merger with a special purpose acquisition or SPAC. And to celebrate, the company is releasing the first footage of its electric aircraft in flight.
Joby is backed by Toyota and has recently acquired Uber’s flying taxi division. The company is also merging with Reinvent Technology Partners, a “blank check” company run by LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman and Zynga founder Mark Pincus. The new company, which will have a post-money valuation of $6.6 billion, will be listed on the New York Stock Exchange.
Joby, as part of the deal, will get $1.6 billion in cash; $690 million of which will come from Reinvent’s cash in trust and $835 million from private investors The Baupost Group, funds and accounts managed by BlackRock, Fidelity Management & Research LLC, and Baillie Gifford. Hoffman will join Joby’s board.
Museum Alive is dioramas but AR, with narrations by David Attenborough
Experience the childhood joy of seeing dioramas courtesy of Museum Alive, an augmented reality iPhone app released on Wednesday featuring narration by Sir David Attenborough.
Museum Alive is an extension of his Natural History Museum Alive film and has three interactive AR exhibits.
Each exhibit features an extinct animal in a recreation of its specific habitat. The app directs to see a flat surface and pinch to zoom the image to the right scale. After that, the habitat comes to life and a 3D animation starts with Attenborough’s narration.
If you think three AR exhibits are not enough, there’s a promise of an upcoming fourth addition of a dodo, though it’s not clear if the app, which costs $2.99, will get updates beyond that. This is an experience that will likely be enjoyed by kids and the child at heart.
AT&T and Verizon spent almost $70 billion on spectrum to improve their 5G Networks
The highly anticipated results of the FCC Auction 107 are in, with At&T and Verizon spending big on the coveted C-band spectrum.Verizon in particular spent nearly twice as much as AT&T, with a total spend of $45.4 billion.
AT&T’s total bid adds up to $23.4 billion. T-Mobile is in a distant third at $9.3 billion, which was also expected thanks to the strong midband spectrum holdings that the company already had following its acquisition of Sprint.
Whether the new spectrum will help either carrier catch up to T-Mobile remains to be seen.
Ultimately, the new frequencies won’t be available until the end of the year and they will only be available in limited locations first.
Nvidia made $5 billion during a GPU shortage
Nvidia has shared its Q4 2021 earnings. Despite the company’s GPUs having been in low supply, it didn’t seem to hurt how much money the company made.
Nvidia, even reported a record $5 billion in revenue, which is up 61 percent year-over-year.
The company also expects to make another $5 billion in revenue during Q1 2022.Nvidia said it expects most of that $5 billion revenue estimate in Q1 2022 would come from the gaming market.
Since the launch of the RTX 30-series desktop graphics cards, leading with the RTX 3080, 3090, 3070, and followed by other products, Nvidia hasn’t been able to meet the demand — though it’s not the only company affected.
NASA’s Perseverance Rover’s First 360 View of Mars
The video shows the first 360-degree view of the landing site of NASA’s Perseverance rover on Mars. The key objective for Perseverance’s mission on Mars is astrobiology, including the search for signs of ancient microbial life.
The future of Qualcomm Snapdragon processors
Qualcomm has bought a company called Nuvia. It was started by the former chief CPU architect at Apple, with the goal of making high-performance, energy efficiency processors. Gary Sims shares how that tech will now be folded into Qualcomm’s Snapdragon processors.
Adobe: Audio Masterclass
In the video, Jason will highlight Audition’s mixing and sound design capabilities.
Qualcomm’s AR “Smart Viewer” lets you pin virtual screens to your walls
Chip maker Qualcomm introduced a new reference design for its augmented glasses: an AR ” smart viewer” where you can tether to a PC or phone via USB-C.
It’s called the XR1 Smart viewer, the system is meant to look like sunglasses and be lightweight. The first glasses based on its design are set to be released in mid-2021.
The XR1 is designed as a consumer-focused “must-have accessory” for phones and computers, rather than a self-contained product.. Like most AR glasses, however, they have a relatively limited field of view of 45 degrees, which is roughly similar to the Microsoft HoloLens 2.
Qualcomm spent the last years for the adoption of AR glasses, which it thinks could stimulate the nascent 5G cellular market through popularising high-bandwidth mixed-reality apps.
