Texting won't be the same again: Android creator building AI phone that can message
The design of the new mobile device isn’t like a standard smartphone.
By Bloomberg |
Getty Images
By Mark Gurman
Essential Products Inc., the consumer electronics startup run by Android creator Andy Rubin, is putting most projects aside to focus on development of a new kind of phone that will try to mimic the user and automatically respond to messages on their behalf, according to people familiar with the plans.
The company paused development of a planned home speaker, months after canceling a different smartphone that had been in the works, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the details are private. Sales of an earlier phone were disappointing, and the company is abandoning the effort partly because the product is too similar to others on the market. Essential had considered selling itself this year after a series of setbacks.
The design of the new mobile device isn’t like a standard smartphone. It would have a small screen and require users to interact mainly using voice commands, in concert with Essential’s artificial-intelligence software. The idea is for the product to book appointments or respond to emails and text messages on its own, according to the people familiar with the plans. Users would also be able to make phone calls from the planned device.
If this all sounds a bit like the sci-fi movie “Her,” that’s sort of by design. Rubin would like to capture people’s imagination with a product that’s truly different from alternatives. The planned device, which hasn’t been previously reported, could be Essential’s last hope to break into a market dominated by Apple Inc. and Samsung Electronics Co. A spokeswoman for Essential declined to comment.
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In an interview with Bloomberg last year, Rubin suggested a benevolent incentive for embarking on a project along these lines. “If I can get to the point where your phone is a virtual version of you, you can be off enjoying your life, having that dinner, without touching your phone, and you can trust your phone to do things on your behalf,” he said. “I think I can solve part of the addictive behavior.”
Although novel, the concept faces many practical challenges. People who have spent any time talking to Siri or Alexa know the limits of virtual assistants. As a result, Essential expects to market the product as a complement to people’s smartphones or as a phone for those who want to spend less time tethered to their screens.
Give Your Android Smartphone A Facelift With These 6 Browsers
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By Karan Bajaj
Still stuck with the browser that came with your Android smartphone?
You’re missing out because you can add speed, tabs, automatic ad-blocking, automatic blocking of trackers, background loading, better reading modes and a whole lot more by installing these free apps, says
By Karan BajajStill stuck with the browser that came with your Android smartphone? You’re missing out because you can add speed, tabs, automatic ad-blocking, automatic blocking of trackers, backgroun..
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Modern smartphones are built for multitasking but the varied content we access sometimes makes that harder to do. Flynx helps you focus on content by using background tabs.
Here’s how it works: let’s say you’re reading a news article and click on a link. Flynx will start loading that up and you’ll see a floating bubble.
Tap the bubble to see the webpage at any time. You can do this from within any other running app (you need to set Flynx as the default browser for this function).
It has a fast read feature which gets rid of any ads and unnecessary images to help you focus on reading the text. You also get the option to save articles for later reading as well as the option to sync web content via your Google account on multiple devices.
Modern smartphones are built for multitasking but the varied content we access sometimes makes that harder to do. Flynx helps you focus on content by using background tabs. Here’s how it works: let’s..
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This one is for those who like customising every aspect of their phone. You can configure each and every element of this browser, starting with the appearance.
You can choose placement, size as well as the font size of individual items including the menu, scrollbar, tab list, progress bar and so on.
Another feature you might appreciate is URL patterns — for instance, you can set Habit to open links of certain apps (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Google Maps) within those apps themselves (instead of a separate browser window).
The interface is clean and comes with a customisable speed dial option for faster access to your favourites. Another useful customisation is the the ability to set actions (save tabs, kill processes, clear passwords, clear history) that take place each time you quit the browser.
This one is for those who like customising every aspect of their phone. You can configure each and every element of this browser, starting with the appearance. You can choose placement, size as well ..
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If you click a link within an app, it will open in your default browser. You have to switch back to the app your were using once you finish reading.
Lynket aims to make things easier by providing a full-screen browser window within any running app. This means you can browse without leaving the original app — when you want to go back, just tap the close button and you will be back to the original app you were using.
Lynket works with your existing browser so you need to choose if it uses Chrome, Firefox, Brave or Samsung’s browser to render pages. You can choose to merge tabs and apps in the recent app screen for ease of access.
What we liked most was the option to configure how Lynket behaves with individual apps — you can choose to have an incognito mode or secondary browser mode for apps of your choice.
If you click a link within an app, it will open in your default browser. You have to switch back to the app your were using once you finish reading. Lynket aims to make things easier by providing a f..
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With a download size of 812kb, Via is one of the lightest browsers you can get from the Play Store.
This makes it great for entry-level smartphones with low storage space. However, don’t assume that it skips any features just because it is a small download.
You get a night mode, privacy protection, resource sniffer, ad blocker, built-in translator, desktop mode as well as a data saver. In addition to all this, the browser is blazing fast in opening webpages and that too without the pesky ads.
It has a clean interface allowing for more viewing space (navigation buttons are at the bottom of the screen). Unlike other browsers, this one won’t send you any irritating push notifications.
With a download size of 812kb, Via is one of the lightest browsers you can get from the Play Store. This makes it great for entry-level smartphones with low storage space. However, don’t assume that ..
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Many browser-based games use Adobe Flash – a plugin that most mobile browsers do not have. Except Puffin, that is.
Puffin is for the casual, online gamer. When you open up a webpage with a game, you can enable theatre mode — this hides everything else and brings the gaming window to front. You can then use the onscreen gamepad which many gamers will appreciate.
It also has a mouse pointer that you can control via touch. Finally, Puffin auto encrypts all connections for safety and comes with a builtin data saver.
Many browser-based games use Adobe Flash – a plugin that most mobile browsers do not have. Except Puffin, that is. Puffin is for the casual, online gamer. When you open up a webpage with a game, you ..
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This is the one you need to get if privacy and data protection are top of mind. With Brave, you get the basic features such as automatic ad blocker and a data saver.
As for advanced features, you get encrypted data with use of https everywhere, script blocking, cookie blocking, a pop-up blocker and even tracking protection.
Brave claims that it can offer between 2x to 4x speed boosts when compared to other browsers. There is also the option of private tabs which is the same as incognito mode (no history is saved).
A battery optimisation feature makes it great for phones with basic hardware. If you want even more advanced privacy and security features on your smartphone browser, check out Ghostery Privacy browser.
This is the one you need to get if privacy and data protection are top of mind. With Brave, you get the basic features such as automatic ad blocker and a data saver. As for advanced features, you get..
Essential is backed by about $300 million, making it Silicon Valley’s most ambitious consumer-electronics upstart in years. The Palo Alto, California-based company started selling a product called the Essential Phone last year, to great fanfare for pioneering an edge-to-edge design before the iPhone X. Since the release of the first Essential Phone and Apple’s premium product, many phone makers have followed. But the Essential Phone struggled to sell due to its relatively high price and software bugs.
In the last year, the company has been clouded by sexual harassment allegations involving Rubin’s time at Google. Rubin denied claims of sexual misconduct and took a brief leave of absence from Essential last November. In the first half of this year, Rubin put the company up for sale and canceled a second version of the Essential Phone, Bloomberg reported in May.
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By the time Essential decided to put the home-speaker project on hold, it had already lost key engineers working on the project amid disagreements over the prospects for launching such an ambitious device. Rubin imagined it as a single hub with its own voice-command technology that could run queries through Siri, Alexa and Google Assistant -- a feat that would likely require cooperation from three competitors.
Rubin, who laid foundation for the modern smartphone business with his work at Google, hopes to achieve a second act with the new, AI-dependent gadget. Essential aims to have a first prototype of the phone finished by the end of the year, a person familiar with its development said. The person said the company may show off the device to industry partners as soon as January at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, the same venue where it talked up its original phone last year.
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