✨ Good morning! So hey that life on Venus story is pretty interesting. Lots of links to it later. But tech won’t stop: today’s Apple ‘Time Flies’ event goes down at 10am PT, and by now you should know it will be a Watch and iPad event, not iPhone. We may still hear a little about the iPhone, though? In any case, stay tuned for a wrap tomorrow. In the meantime, there’s a lot to keep on top of...
Out of the blue, Google dropped that its next Google hardware launch event will happen on September 30, 2020.
What was announced:
The LG Wing is now official and I find it remarkable how useful this second twisting screen appears to be. The 1 min tease from LG is here.
This is one of those times when a few seconds of gifs can really tell you a lot more than words, and because Unbox Therapy was lucky enough to go hands-on with an actual device, we can take a look.
First, the mechanism itself which looks hugely enjoyable to just slide back and forth, with nice mechanics and soft-open to give it a nice feel:
LG has spec’d the swivel to last 200,000 rotations, so we should see durability here.
And then down to business, such as using it to run dual apps like YouTube and Chrome:
And the intriguing gimbal-style camera setup which was a complete surprise:
This is very cool! But! There is a lot missing from the whole picture
What's missing:
😎 Oculus Quest 2 specs leak points to a massively upgraded VR headset. Facebook Connect is tomorrow, by the way (Android Authority).
🔨 Leak: Samsung is manufacturing the Qualcomm Snapdragon 875 chipset on a 5nm process (Android Authority).
📽 YouTube officially launches its own TikTok competitor, Shorts — in early beta, only in India for now (Android Authority).
🔜 What Nvidia buying Arm means for your next smartphone (Android Authority).
🍎 What to expect from Apple’s ‘Time Flies’ event: Apple Watch Series 6, a redesigned iPad Air, and more
📷 Sony announces $1,799 A7c compact full-frame mirrorless camera (The Verge).
🤷♂️ Today was originally the day for TikTok to be sold, but the original ban now, in theory, comes into force, on September 20. Oracle did confirm it ‘won’, in the meantime (Reuters).
🎮 Sony cuts PlayStation 5 forecast by four million due to chip production woes (Bloomberg).
😬 Sweeping internal Facebook memo: “I have blood on my hands” (Ars Technica).
🦠 ‘Dr. Phosphine’ and the possibility of life on Venus (Wired).
🌌 Here’s a video explanation of the new findings from the Royal Observatory Greenwich (YouTube).
🧪 And here’s the relevant XKCD comic: Evidence of Alien Life (xkcd.com)
🦞 Microsoft’s test underwater data center was lifted up and inspected after two years. Interestingly, it had lower failure rates, possibly due to nitrogen and lack of human interactions. (It spent the two years Folding@Home, by the way) (Microsoft blog). Also, here’s some workers powerwashing it via Reddit.
👨✈️ ELI5: Why were ridiculously fast planes like the SR-71 built, and why hasn't it speed record been broken for 50 years? (r/ELI5)
Here’s a look at the Star Wars saga at the North American (domestic) Box Office, adjusted for inflation, and including Episodes 1 to 9 only.
Have a good one,
Tristan Rayner, Senior Editor
©2021. DGiT. All rights reserved.