Tech News

Google TV now has over 800 ad-supported free channels

Google TV is mimicking basic cable more and more. The business revealed today that it will be incorporating content from a number of new suppliers in order to make exploring ad-supported live TV channels a focal point of the platform. The information was released after it was claimed that the business was in talks with media organizations to add related content to YouTube.

As of right now, Google TV is expanding its library of Free Ad-Supported Streaming Television (FAST) channels to include those from Plex, Haystack News, and Tubi.

Also Read: Google workers in London stage walkout over job cuts

Also being added by Google are “built-in channels from Google TV that you can watch without even downloading or launching an app.” According to the corporation, the service now includes over 800 free channels.

The word “FAST” refers to “linear streaming content,” which is ad-supported and broadcast at set times like regular television shows. FAST channels, which have already been adopted by rivals like Roku, make streaming into a format akin to traditional channel-surfing, further demonstrating that live TV viewing has simply become cable delivered through a different conduit.

According to Google, the service will feature programs including Law & Order: SVU, The Walking Dead, and Westworld. It also features news material from NBC, ABC, CBS, and Fox. Additionally, it offers content from around the world in over ten languages, including Spanish, Japanese, and Hindi.

Additionally, Google claims that the redesigned TV guide, which organizes the content, makes browsing simpler and quicker. All of your live TV material will be available under the Google TV Live menu, along with YouTube TV and Sling TV (if you have a subscription).

Despite the fact that most of the experience will be pretty straightforward, some of the channels can require a download and setup procedure. To make it even simpler to enjoy the shows you already know and love, additional channels are being integrated into the new Live tab experience.

These services don’t charge any monthly fees, so you can watch a tonne of shows for free. All of that programs will be included in a new TV guide, making it simple to discover what you’re browsing for. It will also be possible to add a few of your preferred channels to the TV guide roster for quick and simple navigation.

Also Read: Google begins opening access to its ChatGPT competitor Bard

The Mountain View company revealed that the new live TV experience will be made available on all Google TV gadgets in the USA, including Chromecast with Google TV and TVs from Sony, TCL, Hisense, and Philips that already have Google TV integrated.

The new TV guide and free channels will be available to qualified Android TV devices later this year, Google TV stated last but not least. Google TV announced intentions to make the redesigned TV guide and free channels available to qualified Android TV devices at some point this year.

Sandhya Gupta

I am a law graduate from NLU Lucknow. I have a flair for creative writing and hence in my free time work as a freelance content writer.

Baidu sues Apple, app developers over fake Ernie bot apps

The Chinese search engine Baidu has filed a lawsuit against Apple & “relevant” app developers allegedly selling counterfeit versions of its newly released Ernie bot application on the App Store. The artificial intelligence-powered chatbot Ernie has been regarded as the most competitive substitute for the US-developed ChatGPT in China.

ChatGPT’s immediate rival is Baidu’s Ernie chatbot. It is a Baidu AI product that has reportedly been in production since 2019. Yet it was only made available a short time after ChatGPT went global.

Also Read: Amazon plans to trim employee stock awards amid tough economy

According to the business, Ernie is fully capable of processing natural language and can converse, answer questions live online, write articles, write codes, etc.

On Friday, Baidu declared that it has registered cases in Haidian People’s Court, Beijing, against Apple and also the app developers who created the knockoff editions of its Ernie bot. There isn’t yet an official Ernie app accessible, according to a comment from Baidu on its main “Baidu AI” WeChat account.

“At present, Ernie does not have any official app,” Baidu said in a statement late on Friday posted on its official “Baidu AI” WeChat account.

“Until our company’s official announcement, any Ernie app you see from App Store or other stores are fake,” it said.
Source: reuters.com

Baidu also uploaded a picture of its court document, emphasizing that until a formal notice is made, any Ernie apps that seem to be accessible through the App Store or any other stores are fake.

Apple has not made any comment on the circumstances yet. According to a search done by Reuters on Saturday, at least four applications with the Mandarin name “Ernie bot” are still available on the App Store, but they are all fake.

As per Baidu, those who have gotten legitimate access codes are the only ones who can access the Ernie bot. In its comment, the business also issued a warning against people who try to sell access codes.

Also Read: Meta releases AI model that can identify items within images

The AI-backed chatbot known as Ernie, meaning “Enhanced Representation through Knowledge Integration,” was introduced by Baidu in March of this year. Because of the popularity of ChatGPT powered by Microsoft, Chinese businesses and tech companies are racing to develop a rival.

Baidu’s cloud platform currently enables businesses to include the bot in their services by submitting a request. Originally, the Ernie bot was only obtainable to a small set of customers with invitation credentials.

Suhani Jain

I am a student pursuing my bachelor’s in information technology. I have a interest in writing so, I am working a freelance content writer because I enjoy writing. I also write poetries. I believe in the quote by anne frank “paper has more patience than person

Amazon plans to trim employee stock awards amid tough economy

Leave a Comment / News, Tech News / By Suhani Jain

As the world’s largest online retailer experiences an unstable economic climate, Amazon.com Inc said it will limit employee stock grants, a component of its compensation scheme.

Employees of Amazon are given shares of Amazon stock as just a component of their complete compensation scheme. These stocks are known as Restricted Stock Units (RSUs). These stocks vest throughout time as opposed to being granted at one time.

The tech behemoth stated in March that it intended to eliminate 9,000 employees, making it the most recent business in that sector to do so in the context of a potential downturn.

Also Read: Meta releases AI model that can identify items within images

Adding to a surge of job losses that have rocked the tech industry as a challenging economy compels corporations to get smaller, this announcement comes weeks since Amazon declared a new round of major layoffs.

“We made the decision to reduce RSU (restricted stock units) awards in the final outlook year by a small amount (other years are not impacted),” an Amazon spokesperson said in an emailed statement, without specifying the period of the final outlook year.
Source: economictimes.indiatimes.com

The announcement comes with Amazon’s announcement of a 2nd round of huge job cuts a few weeks earlier, adding to a surge of job losses that have rocked the technology industry since tough economic times compel firms and various businesses to become smaller.

The proposed adjustment to the firm’s pay scale was initially reported by Business Insider, which also stated that Amazon would re-evaluate 2025 salary during the initial quarter of 2019 to prepare for stock variation

“The company was weighing the possibility of adjusting its compensation model in the future to be more balanced between base cash compensation and equity, after looking at the combination of an uncertain economy and its compensation budget,” the spokesperson said.
Source: livemint.com

Following a nearly 50 percent share decline in 2022, Amazon’s share price has increased this year by more than 20 percent.

Also Read: Google Workers in London stage walkout over job cuts

As a part of massive layoffs, Amazon.com Inc. fired around 100 staff from its video-game businesses, Game Growth, including Prime Gaming, and the firm’s San Diego facility.

Even with its Crown channel which is an entertainment channel on the Twitch streaming video service, Amazon has had difficulty making the most of its gaming tools.

Suhani Jain

Meta releases AI model that can identify items within images

Leave a Comment / News, Tech News / By Sandhya Gupta

On Wednesday, Meta, the owner of Facebook, released a collection of image annotations that it claimed was the biggest ever of its kind combined with a model based on AI that can identify specific items within an image. The final dataset contains over 1.1 billion masks of segmentation from over 11 million licenced and privacy-preserving photos.

The organization’s research department said in a blog article that the company’s Segment Anything Model, or SAM, could recognise objects in pictures and videos even when it hadn’t seen those objects during training.

Also Read: Google Workers in London stage walkout over job cuts

SAM allows users to select objects by clicking on them or by entering text commands. Typing the word “cat” in one demonstration caused the tool to generate boxes around each of the multiple cats in a picture.

Meta noted, “Meta stated, “Our objective was to build a foundation model for image segmentation… a promotable model that is trained on a variety of data and can adapt to specific tasks, analogous to the use of prompting in models of natural language processing.”

However, in contrast to images, videos, and text, the segmentation data required to train such a model is not easily accessible online or anywhere else. So, with Segment Anything, we set out to simultaneously create a segmentation dataset of unprecedented scale and develop a general, prompt segmentation model.”

Since Microsoft-backed OpenAI’s ChatGPT chatbot became an internet hit in the fall, sparking a surge of investments and a race to dominate the area, large tech firms have been bragging about their artificial intelligence advances.

Though it hasn’t yet made a product available, Meta has teased a number of features that use the generative AI made famous by ChatGPT, which generates entirely new material rather than just recognising or categorising data like other AI.

Examples include a programme that creates surrealist films from word cues and another that turns prose into pictures for children’s books.

Also Read: UBS to cut up to 30% of the global workforce

According to Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg, adding these generative AI “creative aids” to Meta’s products is a top focus for this year. Internally, Meta does make use of SAM-like technologies for tasks including tagging photographs, removing objectionable information, and choosing which articles to promote to Facebook and Instagram users.

The corporation said that the introduction of SAM will increase access to that kind of technology. A non-commercial licence will be required to download the SAM model and dataset. Users who upload their own photographs to an associated prototype must also consent to use them strictly for study.

Sandhya Gupta

I am a law graduate from NLU Lucknow. I have a flair for creative writing and hence in my free time work as a freelance content writer.

Google workers in London stage walkout over job cuts

Leave a Comment / News, Tech News / By Sandhya Gupta

Following a dispute regarding layoffs, hundreds of Google workers organized a protest at the company’s London offices on Tuesday.

Google’s parent company Alphabet revealed in January that it would be laying off 12,000 workers globally, or 6% of its total workforce.

The decision was made in the midst of a wave of layoffs sweeping corporate America, especially in the tech industry, where companies have so far fired over 290,000 employees since the year’s beginning, according to tracking website Layoffs.fyi.

Also Read: UBS to cut up to 30% of the global workforce

The trade union Unite, which has hundreds of Google workers in the UK as members, claimed that the company had disregarded employee complaints. According to Unite regional officer Matt Whaley, “Our members are clear: Google needs to listen to its own advice of not being evil.

They and Unite will not back down until Google allows workers full union representation, engages properly with the consultation process, and treats its staff with the respect and dignity they deserve.”

Speaking anonymously out of concern for retaliation, a Google employee who was present at the walkout told Reuters that discussions with company management turned out to be “extremely frustrating.” He stated, “It has been difficult for those involved. We have a redundancy process for a reason so that employees can make their voice heard,” they said. But it feels as if our concerns have fallen on deaf ears.”

In many European countries, Google’s top management has held layoff discussions in accordance with local labor laws. Employee representatives claimed that Google had rejected their suggestions to limit job cuts, and employees at the company’s Zurich branch in Switzerland conducted a walkout akin to this one last month.

A representative for Google stated, “As we said on January 20, we’ve made the difficult decision to reduce our workforce by approximately 12,000 roles globally.

We know this is a very challenging time for our employees. In the UK, we have been constructively engaging and listening to our employees through numerous meetings, and are working hard to bring them clarity and share updates as soon as we can in adherence with all UK processes and legal requirements.”

Also Read: Google Drive now caps the number of files you can create

In the UK, Google has a workforce of over 5,000 employees. The Sundar Pichai-led corporation said it was ready for “a different economic reality” and that the CEO accepted “full responsibility” for the choices that resulted in the layoffs when it announced them in January.

In an effort to prepare for a global economic slowdown, a number of other tech firms, including Microsoft, Twitter, and Meta, among others, have fired thousands of employees. Apple Inc. reportedly cut staff within particular corporate store teams earlier this week, signaling a change in the way the company handles layoffs.

Sandhya Gupta

I am a law graduate from NLU Lucknow. I have a flair for creative writing and hence in my free time work as a freelance content writer.

Google Drive now caps the number of files you can create

Leave a Comment / News, Tech News / By Suhani Jain

As previously disclosed by Ars Technica and CNET, Google has put a restriction on the number of files you can upload and save to Google Drive. Even though you paid for more storage, the firm announced to The Verge that the update enabled users to generate a total of 5 million items in Drive. Google, however, quickly undid the adjustment and promised to come up with an alternative.

“We recently rolled out a system update to Drive item limits to preserve stability and optimize performance,” said Google in a tweet. “While this impacted only a small number of people, we are rolling back this change as we explore alternate approaches to ensure a great experience for all.”
Source: theverge.com

Also Read: UBS to cut up to 30% of the global workforce

There was a 5 million file limit, but it only related to the number of files you could create in Drive, not to the total number of files that could be shared with your Drive. In other words, if the files weren’t all your creation, you might have had more than 5 million of them in the system.

Ross Richendrfer, a Google representative, first claimed that the modification was made to ensure high performance and dependability and that it would assist stop misuse of the company’s systems. Richendrfer stated that if you exceed the limit, you will be notified and can approach Google customer support to resolve the situation.

While it would seem ludicrous for a single person to upload 5 million files, some people have exceeded that figure. A customer with 7 million documents in Drive claims, in a Reddit post seen by Ars Technica and CNET, that Google abruptly stopped allowing them to add new files in February, even though they had not yet reached the 2TB storage limit they had paid for.

Several additional users claim to have experienced the file restriction at approximately the same time and that they originally thought it to be a bug on Google’s problem tracker website.

An individual with 2TB of capacity and an aggregate file size of over 400KB would exceed their file cap before when they went out of storage space, as was noted in the Reddit thread. Secondly, unless they choose to reduce their documents into zip folders, some customers may be spending even more space than they utilize.

Also Read: Netflix Might Be Putting Its Video Games on TVs

User responses suggest that Google may not have informed those who would be affected by the new restriction ahead of its deployment, leaving them scrambling to transfer or reduce files once the policy took effect.

While it does indicate that shared Workspace folders can store a total of 400,000 files, it doesn’t appear that Google changed its Google One or Workspace help sites to notice the limit. Google could have at least provided those who do with a proper warning, even if the bulk of users probably don’t have 5 million data held in Drive.

Suhani Jain

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