Bryan Hertz, CEO and co-founder of Voxox, looks pretty happy. Photo: Voxox.
Voxox, a VoIP company with feature-packed iOS and Android apps, today gobbled up Israeli-based PokeTALK, a competitor with a similar main focus: cheap long-distance calling.
Over the next three months, PokeTALK’s service will be phased out as Voxox absorbs PokeTALK’s weighty, 600,000-strong user base (the company will toss users a bone in the form of 100 free minutes if users stick with Voxox).
Google wants to use facial recognition to let viewers customize videos as they watch them.
Love Star Trek but cringe every time William Shatner opens his mouth? Google’s new method for customizing video could allow you to mute Captain Kirk’s melodramatic monologues, skip scenes in which the character appears, or even change the channel every time Shatner’s face graces the screen.
These novel ways of slicing and dicing video on the fly are outlined in a patent application entitled “Customized Video,” published Thursday by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and assigned to Google. The system would use facial recognition to identify actors, cartoon character, etc. — and give viewers a way to find (or avoid) other videos featuring the same people.
HTC’s Android 4.4 KitKat update for its flagship One has already rolled out in many markets all around the world — including the U.S. — but in typical Verizon fashion, the carrier is keeping its customers waiting. If you’re one of them, you’ll be pleased to know that it will be arriving “shortly.”
Since its inception, Android has had true multi-tasking allowing people to run multiple apps in the background without restricting their functionality. Back in the day, this was all one would have wanted from their Android device.
With time though, Android devices grew more powerful and started packing bigger screens. Soon, we had multi-view multitasking on Android devices, thanks to Samsung and other OEMs.
HTC may be planning a surprise return to the tablet market to manufacture Google’s next-generation Nexus slates. Reports in Taiwan claim the company has secured orders for a “high-end model of the Google Nexus tablet” that is expected to start shipping in the third quarter of 2014.
