Vlad Savov | Vox

Craig Wright claims he is the enigmatic Bitcoin inventor

2019-03-06T05:58:28-05:00

Craig Wright, the man already suspected of being the inventor of Bitcoin, has today come out and publicly claimed that he is indeed responsible for the cryptocurrency. The BBC reports that Wright “has provided technical proof to back up his claim using coins known to be owned by Bitcoin’s creator” and that prominent Bitcoin community members have also corroborated his claim. Beside the mystery of how Bitcoin actually works, the biggest puzzle around the digital currency was its origination, long attributed to the name of “Satoshi Nakamoto.” Wright has now confessed that was his pseudonym, revealing his true identity in what he says is an effort to restore the privacy of the people around him.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

The Best Time to Buy an Android Phone Is April

2019-03-06T05:38:24-05:00

The world of Android smartphones can often be chaotic and disorganized, but this year it seems to have settled on the month of April for the debut and availability of the widest range of attractive new devices. Six months after Google’s release of Android Marshmallow, all the hardware manufacturers are now ready to deliver a deluge of phones built around the latest version of the operating system. It’s already begun with handsets like the Xiaomi Mi 5 and Samsung Galaxy S7, but next month is when the choice and variety will explode.

Huawei’s P9 flagship and its dual-camera system are set to launch on April 6, which is also when Meizu will unveil its M3 Note. A week later, HTC will pull the curtain back on its 2016 flagship, expected to be called the HTC 10, and Oppo will join the fun at around the same with the international release of its R9 and R9 Plus. Whether it’s the R9’s 16-megapixel selfie camera, the revival of HTC’s BoomSound, or the prospect of another Huawei smartphone with a monster (3,900mAh) battery, there’s going to be something to tantalize most Android fans. And for the ultimate spec extravagance, there’s also the Zopo Speed 8, which lays claim to the title of being the first deca-core smartphone.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Microsoft Turning PC Into Walled Garden, Says Epic Games CEO

2019-03-06T05:37:36-05:00

In an op-ed for The Guardian this morning, Epic Games co-founder Tim Sweeney launched a withering attack on Microsoft and its Universal Windows Platform (UWP) initiative in Windows 10. “Microsoft has built a closed platform-within-a-platform into Windows 10,” said Sweeney, “as the first apparent step towards locking down the consumer PC ecosystem and monopolizing app distribution and commerce.”

UWP is part of Microsoft’s effort to create universal apps that run across all sizes and types of devices, and is closely tied to the Windows Store. Sweeney’s displeasure stems from the fact that Microsoft has launched new Windows features exclusively in UWP, incentivizing developers to get on board if they want access to those features. He sees that move as forcing developers to cede control over their app distribution — which would be done through the Windows Store — and to lose their direct relationship with customers, while also “curtailing users’ freedom to install full-featured PC software.”

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Qualcomm Is Back With a Vengeance

2019-03-06T05:12:43-05:00

The biggest winner of Mobile World Congress 2016 wasn’t a phone or a phone manufacturer, but a phone chip manufacturer: Qualcomm. Having endured a rough time in 2015 due to heat and power issues with its Snapdragon 810 flagship-class processor, the American chipmaker has returned to form with its new Snapdragon 820 generation. Practically every smartphone manufacturer in attendance at MWC had a Snapdragon-powered device to show off to the world.

Samsung introduced its new pair of flagship handsets, the Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge, which will rely on the Snapdragon 820 in the United States. LG broke all its previous records for hype and excitement with the modular G5, which will be powered by Qualcomm’s chip around the world.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Mark Zuckerberg Stole Samsung’s Galaxy S7 Show

2019-03-06T05:39:38-05:00

Samsung didn’t have many surprises left to announce with its thoroughly leaked new Galaxy S7 phones, so it decided to spring Facebook chief Mark Zuckerberg on an unsuspecting crowd. What Samsung itself might not have suspected, however, was just how raucous and frenetic the reaction would be.

The setup was great: Journalists were invited to watch a virtual reality demo using Samsung’s Gear VR headsets, and when the time came to remove them, there was Mark Zuckerberg standing in the middle of the stage, wearing his familiar gray T-shirt. Cue a moment of confused gasps of excitement, followed by an escalating stampede of journalists and photographers toward the stage. Zuckerberg was there to talk up Facebook and Samsung’s VR partnership, but his words went mostly unheard as everyone was too busy trying to capture an image of him. It was the tech celebrity equivalent of Bieber mania. And it was a little bit scary. Or maybe a lot, since Zuckerberg walked off the stage with sweat patches under his arms. In any case, the desired outcome of drumming up hype was achieved.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

LG’s G5 Is a Radical Reinvention of the Flagship Android Smartphone

2019-03-06T05:17:44-05:00

Today LG introduces its latest flagship Android smartphone, the G5. Launching alongside a raft of accessories and plug-in modules, the G5 will be defined in most people’s eyes by its extras, but I think it will be one of the more memorable devices of MWC 2016 simply because it’s a terrific phone in its own right.

The immediate reaction when picking up the G5 and inspecting its aluminum-clad body is that it looks and feels very much like a smaller version of Google’s Nexus 6P. LG’s fingerprint scanner is positioned in the same spot as the 6P’s Nexus Imprint, and the G5’s camera module also protrudes ever so slightly from the body. Both phones are housed in anodized aluminum and available in silver and gold colorways, and both have beautiful, high-resolution (2560 x 1440) displays. LG enjoys a couple of subtle advantages: with a 5.3-inch screen, the G5 has higher pixel density than the 6P or LG’s 2015 flagship G4, and the new phone’s unibody shell is undisturbed by any antenna lines. They are still there, but LG uses a process it calls micro-dizing to perfectly disguise the antennas.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

HTC Vive Priced at $799, VR Headset Available in Early April

2019-03-06T05:12:25-05:00

The HTC Vive, which made its big debut at Mobile World Congress last year, returns to Barcelona today with an official $799 price and a February 29th preorder date. Announcing the price of the Vive Consumer Edition a day before MWC’s official kickoff, HTC has detailed the full kit that will come with the Vive and also added the news of smartphone functionality for the VR headset. The Vive will include integrated phone functions that allow the user to answer calls, check text messages, and view calendar reminders without removing the headset or stopping play. iOS and Android will be the two supported mobile operating systems.

In the Vive Consumer Edition box will be the head-mounted display itself, the two wireless controllers, a pair of Vive base stations, a Vive Link Box, and a pair of Vive ear buds. The headset tethers to a PC via a cable at the back, and offers a headphone jack that allows you to plug in either the provided buds or your own earphones. HTC says it’s made a number of refinements from the Vive Pre, including an improved head-strap, more polished finish, superior ergonomics, and the addition of a built-in microphone. Like everything else on the Vive, the microphone will have an open API and HTC and Valve hope developers will “go nuts” when coming up with creative uses for it.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

The TV Is Where Failed Mobile Operating Systems Go to Thrive

2019-03-06T05:40:27-05:00

To look at the tech industry from afar, you’d think it’s an unforgiving, bruising competition where only the consistently successful companies and products survive. That’s broadly true, but there’s one safety net, one little gift from the smirking tech gods, that keeps giving solace to failed software projects: The TV.

When a mobile operating system fails, it doesn’t disappear, it’s just converted into a TV operating system. Palm’s webOS didn’t make it in the mobile realm, but it lives on today through LG’s flagship TV series. Samsung’s current OS for televisions is Tizen, which is the culmination of a long line of mobile failures, starting with Nokia’s Maemo and Intel’s Moblin, which merged into MeeGo, only to merge again with Samsung’s unsuccessful Bada. And this week at CES, Panasonic announced a new range of Firefox OS-powered UHD TVs. This comes a month after Mozilla killed off the Firefox phone.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

The Fingerprint Company That Samsung Never Bought Is Now Everywhere

2019-03-06T05:43:11-05:00

Two years ago, a press release was posted to the website of Fingerprint Cards AB, announcing that the Swedish fingerprint sensor maker would be acquired by Samsung in a $650 million deal. That announcement was later retracted and bizarrely debunked as false, and Fingerprint Cards has basically been absent from the public eye ever since. But the Gothenburg-based firm has kept busy behind the scenes, and now it finds itself enjoying a leading role, highlighted most recently by the use of its sensors in Google’s Nexus 5X and 6P smartphones. That’s right, the company that Samsung didn’t buy is now responsible for Nexus Imprint, the technology that Google is using to enable fingerprint verification in the latest version of Android and the newly introduced Android Pay service.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Cablevision Sells to European Telecom Altice for $17.7 Billion

2019-03-06T05:34:45-05:00

Altice is not a readily recognizable name, but it’s a company with big ambitions to be a global player in the cable TV market, and today it’s made its splashiest acquisition in the United States by announcing the $17.7 billion takeover of Cablevision.

This follows the $9.1 billion purchase of majority control of St. Louis-based Suddenlink Communications in May, which was Altice’s initial entry into the U.S. Already established with a number of significant brands in Western Europe, Altice provides the so-called quad-play package of Internet connectivity, fixed and mobile telephony and pay-TV services. The combined footprint of Cablevision and Suddenlink immediately vaults it to the position of fourth largest U.S. cable provider.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.