Author Archives: JC Torres

Apple is really going all out on its hard stance on privacy, especially considering the positive reception its upcoming anti-tracking features have had on consumers and advocates at the expense of the likes of Facebook. That, however, isn't the only step it will be taking to ensure its users' safety. Starting iOS 14.5, even Google's Safe Browsing function will use Apple servers as a proxy to avoid any privacy leak at all.

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Square Enix might be best known for publishing the Final Fantasy series but it does have quite a handful of JRPG franchises under its belt. Not all of those make it big outside of Japan and a few fans across the world but one, in particular, struck a chord in the hearts of gamers of all ages. Kingdom Hearts' mix of serious RPG mechanics and characters from popular Disney shows and movies helped make it one of the most requested games to be ported to PCs. That day is finally coming, thanks to a partnership between Square Enix and Epic Games.

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Humanity as a whole has taken a lot of photos in the past years, whether using our handy smartphones or using dedicated standalone cameras. Sometimes, we also press the shutter button repeatedly, worried we might miss a fleeting moment, and end up with multiple shots of the same thing. Going through dozens if not hundreds of photos to clear up space can be a very daunting prospect, especially if doing it one by one. Thankfully, Canon is launching a new Photo Culling app that utilizes AI to automate that process.

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PCs, particularly laptops, have experienced a surge last year, mostly due to new work and education arrangement during the COVID-19 pandemic. Although analysts predict the high numbers won't last long, PC makers are nonetheless putting out as many devices as they can while the positive situation lasts. Just last month, LG announced the latest models in its Gram line of lightweight laptops and most of those are now available for purchase in the US, at least if you're not aiming for the 2-in-1 convertible kind.

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Although it's relatively easier to figure out Samsung Galaxy S naming convention, the same can't be said of the Galaxy A series. The company once promised to consolidate its myriad confusing models but ended up just shifting the confusion to the Galaxy A and Galaxy M lines. The Galaxy A51 last year stood out from the rest thanks to its affordable 5G offer and it seems that the Galaxy A52 and Galaxy A72 this year will also leave a mark in a different way.

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Former US President Donald Trump tried to finish as many pending tasks before his term ended but there were still many that were left unresolved. In the tech industry, one of the biggest was the fate of TikTok and its forced sale to a US company. Although the parties involved, including Oracle and Walmart, have already come into an agreement, they're still waiting for the US government approval that won't be coming anytime soon because the matter is now being reviewed again by the Biden administration.

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Apple's App Store has been in the center of some high-profile controversy and rhetoric last year when Epic Games made a bold move that, according to some sources, has been planned months ahead. An action as simple as offering a different in-app purchasing method set off a chain that now involves lawsuits filed across several countries, all of them accusing Apple and Google of monopolistic practices. Although this proposed bill in a single US state doesn't directly reference the Apple vs. Epic Games tussle, its effects, if passed, will turn things in the game developer's favor.

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The Internet has definitely made the world a smaller place but that does have its price. Being an Internet-dependent culture means that when Internet services go down, many have no recourse but to sit it out and wait for things to go green again, hopefully, sooner rather than later. That's especially true for critical services like email and search but even games these days can be blocked by a remote server outage. That's apparently the case with Sony's PlayStation Network that suffered a sudden and unexplained outage across many of its services.

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The transition to the Biden administration may have sparked some hope in Huawei but, if recent news is any indication, it might still be fighting a losing battle. Biden's pick to lead the Commerce Department already indicated her stance on keeping the status quo. Huawei is now picking up another fight in a different arena, this time challenging once more the constitutionality of the FCC's recent decision to label Huawei as a threat to the national security of the US.

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Every so often, we hear about software updates that bring their own set of bugs even as they fix others. Most of the time, these bugs only affect software features but there are rare times that they may affect even a device's hardware. The past few days have been a stressful one for MacBook Pro owners exactly because of that rare case of bad luck over battery issues and Apple is now offering free battery replacements for those affected by a highly inconvenient bug.

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It may have lost favor with Apple but Hyundai naturally has its hands in other futuristic endeavors related to mobility. From its upcoming electric vehicles to robots that move individuals or groups, the South Korean carmaker is applying any and all aspects of design, engineering, and creative thinking to envision the vehicles of the future. Its latest concept is just as out of this world and could probably even be used out of this planet in the future.

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Xiaomi has just launched its early 2021 flagship in and, unsurprisingly, it checks off most of the boxes in terms of specs. The more impressive detail, however, is its price, which is lower than its premium peers, depending on the market and currency conversions, of course. Those details won't matter, though, if the phone crashes and burns at the smallest accident. JerryRigEverything puts the Xiaomi Mi 11 to find out if that's the case and it's not hard to see why he walked away satisfied.

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