Technology

A new update to popular podcast player Overcast includes a major overhaul of its Apple Watch app. The Apple Watch support is notable at a time when third-party app development for the platform is not necessarily in a great spot, though the Watch itself continues to grow in popularity. Overcast’s update reorganizes the app UI from top to bottom, adding some features that otherwise were only able to be accessed through the phone version. The main screen has large buttons for settings and syncing above a scrolling list of your shows and access to the “now playing” screen. That screen now includes a button on the bottom right that takes you to more detailed info on the podcast and lets you adjust its playback speed, as well as giving you the ability to skip directly through chapters on podcast...

Google TV, the search giant’s latest attempt at TV software, will include a new “Basic TV” mode that strips out a TV’s smart features in favor of providing simple access to live TV and HDMI inputs, 9to5Google reports. It’s a potential boon to anyone that ever wanted to dumb-down their smart TV because they prefer an external streamer or because they value privacy. Google TV debuted on the new Chromecast, where it offered a new interface built on Google’s existing Android TV software, but will soon be offered as built-in software for TCL and Sony’s upcoming TVs. According to 9to5Google, you can select the “Basic TV” mode at setup. Doing so strips out the operating system’s apps, content recommendations, and Google Assistant support. It’s possible to revert back to the standard interface at ...

Zoom plans to roll out support for automatic closed captioning to free accounts this fall as part of its efforts to make the service more accessible, the company has announced. If you’re a free account holder who needs access to the feature before then, Zoom is allowing users to manually request access to the Live Transcription feature via a Google Form linked to in its announcement. Automatic transcriptions aren’t an entirely new Zoom feature. The service has previously offered AI-powered live transcription for all its paid accounts. Otherwise, meeting hosts have had to manually add their own captions, or use a third-party service. But now the feature will become available to the millions of people that rely on Zoom’s services for free. A Zoom support page notes that its Live Transcriptio...

Nvidia has shared its Q4 2021 earnings, and despite the company’s GPUs being in extremely low supply, it didn’t seem to hurt how much money the company made. In fact, it reported a record $5 billion in revenue, which is up 61 percent year-over-year. What’s more impressive is that Nvidia expects to make another $5 billion in revenue during Q1 2022. This positive outlook is surprising given that Q1 is generally slower than other quarters, even for the biggest tech companies, as it follows the rush of people buying lots of products during the holiday period. It’s generally a slower period in general for product releases across tech and gaming. Also, let’s not forget the GPU shortage is still happening. Nvidia reiterated that sparse supply will continue through the next quarter, but that’s lik...

In just over a week, CBS All Access will become Paramount Plus, a rebranded version of the streaming service launching on March 4th. Paramount Plus will use combined franchises and assets from Viacom and CBS (who remerged in 2019) to offer more than 20,000 episodes of television and films from a number of networks. These networks and studios include BET, CBS, Comedy Central, MTV, Nickelodeon, Paramount Pictures. Every announcement made today can be read on ViacomCBS’ site. The streaming service will launch at two separate pricing tiers: an ad-supported version that includes full breadth of Paramount movies, Paramount Plus originals, a “massive portion of library,” according to streaming CEO Tom Ryan, and current seasons of CBS shows for $4.99. This is launching in June. The premium tier wi...

Wired has done an amazing piece on Margaret McKinnon, a researcher who survived a traumatic plane crash, then went on to become a leader in the field of memory and trauma. The article starts off with a harrowing recounting of the accident, but then goes on to explain her research around it, as she gathered other survivors from the crash to conduct a study on how people remember a disaster — one which she participated in. And so it was that, in 2004, as a guinea pig in her own research, McKinnon found herself lying face-up inside of a magnetic resonance imaging machine, staring up at a mirror reflecting a projection of B-roll from Dateline NBC: A plane taking off from a runway. A map of the flight route. Clips from Chocolat interspersed between plane animations. McKinnon’s own younger face ...

Activating the Google Assistant by saying “Hey Google” has been broken for months, according to a report from 9to5Google. Google tells The Verge it’s now working on a fix, saying that it’s “aware of the issues some users have been encountering” and will help its partners “address these and improve the overall experience.” There are a good number of users reporting the issue — a post on Google’s Issue Tracker has almost a thousand stars. Reading through the thread, it’s clear that many users with different smartwatch models are all reporting the same issue going back to November 2020. They say the assistant isn’t completely unusable, as users are still able to trigger it with a long button-press, but if the voice-activation feature hasn’t been working for that long, it likely doesn’t help t...

Cyberpunk 2077’s next big patch has been delayed following developer CD Projekt Red’s disclosure that it fell victim to a ransomware attack earlier this month. The next big patch, 1.2, is now scheduled for a release sometime in the second half of March. “While we dearly wanted to deliver Patch 1.2 for Cyberpunk 2077 in the timespan we detailed previously, the recent cyber attack on the studio’s IT infrastructure and extensive scope of the update mean this unfortunately will not happen — we’ll need some additional time,” CD Projekt Red said via the Cyberpunk 2077 Twitter account. Our goal for Patch 1.2 goes beyond any of our previous updates. We’ve been working on numerous overall quality improvements and fixes, and we still have work to do to make sure that’s what you get. With that in min...

Frasier is coming back — this time to Paramount Plus. Kelsey Grammer will play the famous psychiatrist that found a legion of fans when the show aired on NBC in the ‘90s in a new revival series. Details about the series are limited right now, but the show will exist exclusively on Paramount Plus. It’s unclear if characters like Niles, Roz, and Daphne will return for the show. The show was first rumored in 2018. What remains unclear is if the entire Frasier library will be available on Paramount Plus exclusively. Frasier is just one of many shows ViacomCBS announced today as part of its upcoming Paramount Plus lineup. A series based on The Italian Job, Flashdance, Fatal Attraction, and more are also heading to the platform. Paramount Plus, which is a rebrand of CBS All Access that uses all ...

Paramount is dramatically shortening the space between theatrical and streaming releases for some of its biggest films, with the company announcing that Mission: Impossible 7, A Quiet Place Part II, and Paw Patrol: The Movie will debut on Paramount Plus just 45 days after they first hit theaters. The rapid jump to streaming mirrors moves by other companies, like Universal (which has a deal with AMC to offer films as paid digital rentals just 17 days after they hit theaters) or Warner Bros., which is debuting all of its 2021 blockbusters day-and-date on HBO Max with their theatrical bows. Paramount also promised that future films from the studio will stream exclusively on Paramount Plus after their theatrical runs, including Snake Eyes, Clifford, Top Gun: Maverick, the upcoming Dungeons &am...

Paramount Plus is getting another Star Trek show, the company announced at its kickoff event: Star Trek: Prodigy, the animated kid-friendly spinoff of the iconic franchise. Prodigy was originally set to debut on Nickelodeon, but it will instead air all ten episodes of its first season on Paramount Plus before eventually heading over to the cable channel at a later date. In addition to the shift in location, Paramount also announced more details on the upcoming series, which will feature a group of teens adventuring on an abandoned starship throughout the Star Trek universe. Kate Mulgrew will return to voice Captain Kathryn Janeway, her character from Star Trek: Voyager. But Prodigy — the first Star Trek show intended for kids — will also feature a new crew of younger characters who, in a S...