Don’t be fooled — Amazon’s Astro isn’t a home robot, it’s a camera on wheels

Yesterday, Amazon announced its “home robot” — a wheeled device named Astro that has a display, an array of sensors, and a camera that periscopes out the top of its body like a mast. In advertisements for Astro, Amazon presents the device as an engineering breakthrough and the realization of a long-held sci-fi dream: to build a robot that can help around the house.

This is rubbish, of course. What Astro is — for better or worse — is a camera on wheels.

The physical limitations of Astro are obvious. It has no arms or manipulators; no way to interact with the world other than bumping into objects at shin height. It can’t navigate steps, and, according to employees who worked on the robot and spoke...

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Pandora Stories lets artists add commentary to their own playlists

Pandora launched Stories today, a tool that lets artists and creators add voice commentary to their own playlists. The Stories feature merges podcasts with music playlists, and is meant for artists to add context to an album, or for podcasters to experiment with new storytelling formats. The feature is part of Pandora AMP, the streaming service’s free Artist Marketing Platform that helps creators promote their work. To kick off the launch, Pandora’s prepared some Stories by artists like John Legend and Daddy Yankee, who tell listeners their personal stories interspersed between their own songs. There’s also a Stories playlist called Love Songs That Aren’t Really Love Songs , which includes commentary on individual songs like a podcast... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/2Xz1oNc

Android Addition Opens FIDO Password Killer to Billions

The FIDO Alliance hammered another nail into the passwords coffin with the announcement that devices running Android 7.0 or higher will be compatible with FIDO2. Certification of Android 7.0+ means devices running those versions of Google's mobile operating system will support FIDO2 out of the box or through a software update. FIDO2, introduced last year, provides a FIDO Web authentication standard that combines the World Wide Web Consortium's Web Authentication specification with FIDO's Client-to-Authenticator protocol. from TechNewsWorld https://ift.tt/2GQVG4f

Nomad’s 3-in-1 MagSafe Charger and the Sonos One are down to their best prices

Nomad’s minimalist Base One Max 3-in-1 is on sale for $95. | Image: Nomad Fancy phone chargers are nice, but they’re often too expensive to justify the cost. Nomad’s Base One Max 3-in-1 is one of those rare unicorns that delivers a lot of value for your money, however, thus making it worth the splurge. After all, the device can simultaneously charge a MagSafe-compatible phone, your Apple Watch, and a pair of AirPods (or another Qi-compatible device) — that’s something not even Nomad’s forthcoming Qi2 charger can do. What’s even better is that Nomad is currently selling the hefty, MagSafe-certified charger in both black and silver for its Black Friday price of $95 ($55 off). Designed with metal and glass, Nomad’s minimalist slab will look slick on any desk or bedside table. It’s also powerful, delivering up to... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/25YJfqR

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