Microsoft Corp said on Tuesday it will allow Epic Games Inc, Amazon.com Inc and other firms to integrate their app stores into the technology giant’s marketplace, giving more options to third-party developers.
The Redmond, Washington-based company also said it would not take a cut from app developers’ revenue, when the apps manage their own in-app payment systems.
“Microsoft is again leading the industry forward with Windows, now an open platform with an open store,” Epic Games Chief Executive Officer Tim Sweeney tweeted.
The move comes as Epic Games and Apple Inc have been locked in a legal dispute since last year when the “Fortnite” creator tried to get around Apple’s 30% fee on some in-app purchases on the App Store by launching its own in-app payment system.
Developers have long criticized Apple’s commissions of between 15% and 30% on many App Store purchases, what some developers see as an opaque and unpredictable app-vetting process.
Short video-making platform TikTok has crossed one billion monthly active users around the world.
The video-sharing platform, owned by ByteDance, said it had about 55 million global users by January 2018. That number grew to more than 271 million by December 2018 and 507 million by December 2019.
“On behalf of the TikTok team, I want to say thank you,” TikTok COO Vanessa Pappas said. “Wherever you are in the world, we definitely couldn’t do this without you.”
Social media giant Facebook in comparison in the second quarter had 3.51 billion monthly users across its family of apps, up from 3.45 billion in the first quarter.
Meanwhile, Youtube has over two billion monthly active users, having crossed the one billion mark in 2013, eight years after the company launched in 2005.
TikTok said that its biggest markets are in the US, Europe, Brazil and Southeast Asia, even though its parent company ByteDance is headquartered in China.
In a latest development, TikTok is adding new warnings to its in-app search that will alert users when results may include “distressing content”.
The app has employed “sensitive content” warnings on individual videos since last year, but the updated alerts will appear in search results for terms that could include such content.
In a blog post, TikTok uses the example of “scary makeup” as a search term that may prompt such a warning.
Last year, the Indian government said it was banning 59 apps developed by Chinese firms, including ByteDance’s TikTok over concerns that these apps were engaging in activities that threatened national security.Read Complete Article
Food delivery firm Swiggy (Bundl Technologies) said it has decided to change its daily grocery delivery service Supr Daily’s organisational structure to a Business Unit (BU) within Bundl. This will help Supr deal with with the unfair advantages that Swiggy has access to and accelerate its journey.
Over the last 15 months, Swiggy CEO Sriharsha Majety said it has made some exciting progress on its food delivery business. “We’re now comfortably surpassing our pre-covid peak, while also being on the path to overall profitability,” said Majety in a blog post.
While food delivery continues to be the firm’s flagship category, Swiggy also made some great progress in realising its larger vision of elevating the quality of life by delivering unparalleled convenience.
“We’ve done this on the back of strong traction in the grocery delivery business,” said Majety. “This business is 10x the size of the food services industry; I strongly believe that with the right investments and focus, we have the potential to build a category that is larger than our food delivery business.”
Swiggy’s foray into grocery delivery started with the acquisition of Supr Daily in 2018. Over the last three years, the business has grown by leaps and bounds. Supr Daily currently serves about 500,000 customers on a monthly basis and delivers around 200,000 daily orders across six cities. “The category has immense potential and we’ve been thinking through the several structures that best set it up for success in the long term,” said Majety.
With the organisational change, the support functions of human resources, administration, legal, IT and finance from Supr will be integrated into the relevant functions with Swiggy. It would immediately start tapping into the resources and structures available at Swiggy. The company acquired Supr Daily in 2018. Swiggy co-founder Phani Kishan will take over the reins as the CEO of Supr Daily.
“Supr Daily will continue to have dedicated business teams to ensure the necessary focus and nimbleness to achieve their goals,” said Majety. “Moments of change are moments of contemplation and after much reflection, the founding team of Supr Daily comprising Puneet (Kumar), Shreyas (Nagdawane) and Rohit (Jain) have decided to pursue new interests outside of Swiggy. I thank them for their contributions in helping Supr scale to where it is today and for building an amazing team,” he said.
Instagram has hit pause on a new app it is creating for kids, the photo-sharing service owned by Facebook Inc said on Monday, in a move that comes amid growing opposition for the project.
Instagram Kids had been touted as requiring parental permission to join, and was supposed to provide ad-free, age-appropriate content, but U.S. lawmakers and advocacy groups have urged the social media giant to drop its launch plans, citing safety concerns.
“We won’t stop pressuring Facebook until they permanently pull the plug,” said Josh Golin, executive director of Fairplay, an advocacy group focused on kids.
Instagram said in a blog post that building Instagram Kids was the right thing to do, but that it was pausing the work and would continue building on its parental supervision tools.
“The reality is that kids are already online, and we believe that developing age-appropriate experiences designed specifically for them is far better for parents than where we are today,” it said, noting that there were app versions of Alphabet Inc’s YouTube and ByteDance’s TikTok for those under 13.
Nick Clegg, Facebook’s vice president of global affairs, said on Monday that the company is exploring features that would “nudge” a teen away from content on Instagram that its tech system perceives could be negative, or encourage them to take a break from the app. He spoke in an interview at the Atlantic Festival.
Four Democratic lawmakers including U.S. Senators Ed Markey and Richard Blumenthal said on Monday they were pleased by Facebook’s decision but said the pause “is insufficient.”
We are familiar with the wait for a document called Form 16 in order to file income-tax returns. Ever wondered what Form 16 really is and what it tells about the taxpayer?
Let’s talk about the significance of one of the most important documents for taxpayers in India.
A certificate detailing tax deducted at source by your employer
Issued by an employer to its employee under Section 203 of the Income Tax Act
Contains all the information you need in order to file your income tax return
What does Form 16 contain?
Salary details
Tax already deducted
Basically, it provides details about the salary you have earned during a financial year and the amount of tax that has been deducted by your employer and deposited with the I-T department.
Is it mandatory for employers to issue Form 16?
Yes, it is mandatory if any tax has been deducted at source from an employee’s salary
What if an employee has changed jobs in the same financial year?
If you have changed jobs or worked for more than one employer at the same time during a year, and the tax has been deducted by more than one employer, you will be issued separate Form 16s by these employers.
Now, you must have noticed that every Form 16 has two components – Part A and Part B. What do these parts contain?
Part A of Form 16 provides details of the tax deposited in the government’s treasury every quarter. It also has details of your permanent account number, your employer’s tax deduction account number, and other such information. Your employer can generate and download Part A of Form 16 through the TRACES portal.
The Centre has informed the Delhi High Court that Twitter has appointed Chief Compliance Officer (CCO), Resident Grievance Officer (RGO), and Nodal Contact Person in compliance with the new IT Rules.
The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MEITY), in a short affidavit, said Twitter has acknowledged that the personnel (CCO, Nodal Contact Person, and RGO) are appointed as the company’s employees and not as ‘contingent workers’.
Twitter has provided the names of the said appointed personnel and their respective positions also. The said affidavit (of Twitter) mentions their employment start date as August 4, 2021. Twitter has further enclosed their employment contracts along with the said affidavit as proof of such appointments, the ministry said.
The court had on August 10 directed the Centre to file a short affidavit in response to Twitter’s affidavit in which the company had shown compliance with IT Rules.
I submit that Twitter has appointed the personnel in compliance to the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021 hereinafter referred as IT Rules, 2021, N Samaya Balan, working as Scientist-E in the Cyber Law Group with the MEITY, said in the affidavit.
Justice Rekha Palli, who was hearing a petition alleging non-compliance of IT Rules by the US-based microblogging site, is scheduled to hear the matter on October 5.
The Centre’s affidavit further said the IT Rules, 2021 is a law of the land and Twitter is mandatorily required to comply with the IT Rules 2021 in its entirety.
Any non-compliance amounts to a breach of the provisions of the IT Rules, 2021 thereby leading to Twitter losing its immunity conferred under section 79(I) of the IT Act, 2000.
The exemptions conferred on intermediaries under section 79(I) is a conditional exemption subject to the intermediary satisfying the conditions under sections 79(2) and 79(3). Further, as per rule 7, failure to observe the IT Rules, 2021 will result in the non-applicability of Section 79(1) of the IT Act, 2000 to such an intermediary and the intermediary shall become liable for any punishment under any law for the time being in force in respect of the offending content, it said.
Telecom Department has approached TRAI seeking its recommendations on pricing, quantum and other modalities pertaining to radiowaves in multiple bands as it prepares the groundwork for holding 5G spectrum auction in the coming months.
The last round of spectrum auction, held in March this year, had raked-in winning bids of over Rs 77,800 crore for 855.6 MHz of spectrum.
When contacted, TRAI Secretary V Raghunandan confirmed that TRAI has indeed received a reference from Department of Telecom (DoT) on 5G spectrum but declined to divulge exact contents of the communication.
The regulator is currently examining the reference made by DoT, he said.
The reference is with regard to multiple bands and Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) will seek additional information, if needed.
“We will try our best to meet the expectations,” Raghunandan said when asked about the possible timelines for concluding the entire consultation process, including holding open house discussions (a standard practice followed by the regulator), and finalising its views.
According to sources, DoT’s reference seeks views of TRAI on base price, quantum and all other modalities for spectrum across multiple bands. These include bands such as 700 MHz, 800 MHz, 900 MHz, 1800 MHz, 2100 MHz, 2300 MHz, 2500 MHz bands as also 3,300-3,600 MHz bands (that were not put up for auctions in the last round), and millimetre-wave band (that is 24.25-28.5 GHz).
Indian scientists have for the first time developed a thermally stable and cost-effective electronic polymer-based sensor for rapidly detecting nitro-aromatic chemicals used in high-energy explosives, the Department of Science and Technology (DST) said on Friday.
The detection of explosives without destroying them is essential for protection, and criminal investigations, minefield remediation, military applications, ammunition remediation sites, security applications, and chemical sensors play a vital role in such cases, it said.
Explosive poly-nitroaromatic compounds can be analysed usually by sophisticated instrumental techniques. But the requirements for quick decision making in criminology laboratories or reclaimed military sites or to detect explosives in possession of extremists often require simple, cheap, and selective field techniques, which will be non-destructive in nature, the DST said.
Non-destructive sensing of nitroaromatic chemicals (NACs) is difficult, it said.
While earlier studies are based mostly on photo-luminescent property, detection on the basis of conducting property has not been explored so far, it said.
Detection on the basis of conducting property helps in making a handy detection device where results can be seen with the help of LED, the department said.
To overcome such disadvantages, a team of scientists, led by Neelotpal Sen Sarma from the Institute of Advanced Study in Science and Technology, Guwahati, an autonomous institute of the DST, has developed a layer-by-layer (LBL) polymer detector consisting of two organic polymers — poly-2-vinyl pyridine with acrylonitrile (P2VP-Co-AN) and copolysulfone of cholesteryl methacrylate with hexane (PCHMASH), it said.
This undergoes a drastic change in impedance (resistance in an ac circuit) in the presence of very low concentration of NACs vapour within a few seconds, the DST said.
Here, picric acid (PA) was chosen as the model NAC, and a simple and cost-effective electronic prototype was developed for visual detection of PA. The team has filed a patent for the novel technology funded by the Department of Electronics and Information Technology, it said.
“An electronic sensing device build around a polymer gas sensor can quickly detect the explosive on-site,” said Sarma.
The Indian Navy said on Sunday that it was closely monitoring the movement of Cyclone Gulab and kept naval ships and aircraft on standby for rescue and relief operations.
Gulab is likely to cross between Gopalpur in Odisha’s Ganjam district and Kalingapatnam in Andhra Pradesh around midnight, the India Meteorological Department said.
The Eastern Naval Command in Visakhapatnam and naval officers in charge of Odisha have carried out preparatory activities to combat the effects of the cyclone, according to an official statement.
The Navy is in constant liaison with the state administrations for rendering assistance as required and closely monitoring the movement of the cyclonic storm, it said.
As part of the preparedness, flood relief teams and diving teams are prepositioned in Odisha and ready at Visakhapatnam to render immediate assistance, it added.
Two naval ships are at sea with humanitarian assistance and disaster relief material, and medical teams will render assistance in the most-affected areas.
Aircraft are kept ready at naval air stations INS Dega in Visakhapatnam and INS Rajali near Chennai to undertake an aerial survey of the most-affected areas, casualty evacuation and airdrop of relief material, the statement said.
Meanwhile, the East Coast Railway has cancelled 34 pairs of trains due to Cyclone Gulab.
Tech giant Microsoft has launched its second folding smartphone — the Surface Duo 2 along with the next-generation Surface devices.
Available in glacier or a new obsidian, Surface Duo 2 starts at $1499.99 and is available for pre-order in select markets.
“Surface Duo 2 brings new and improved design to the Surface Duo line. Still emphasizing the ability to multitask, Surface Duo 2 features larger screens, increased durability, a dynamic triple-lens camera, lightning-fast 5G, and a spine that displays notifications when the device is closed,” the company said in a statement.
The OLED display, each, measures 5.8-inches in size, screen resolution of 1344 x 1892 pixels, is connected by a hinge and is protected by Corning’s Gorilla Glass.
Both screens have a smooth 90Hz refresh rate and measure 8.3 inches diagonally when unfolded
The new device features a triple-lens camera setup at the back with a 16MP ultra-wide lens, a 12MP wide angle lens and a 12MP telephoto lens.
Under the hood, the device is powered by Qualcomm SnapDragon 888 system on chip, with 5G support for eSIM and NanoSIM, 8 GB of RAM, and storage up to 512 GB.
It runs Google’s Android 11 along with the company’s own custom skin on top.
The firm has also announced Surface Go 3 with 10.5-inch display, Dolby Audio and a webcam.
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