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Google has revealed some new Assistant tricks in their official blog. The voice assistant brings some dearly needed talents in time for the holiday season.

As you might already know Assistant enabled devices, smart speakers and displays, already support broadcasts sent from smartphones. Now Google is adding a reply feature to smart speakers so you can easily tell your mom you heard dinner was ready.

Perhaps the most important update in time for holiday season is the new My Cookbook that allows saving important recipes. Google has also added a new Recommended Recipes card to the home screen that uses AI to figure out what kind of dishes you might be interested next.

In early October Microsoft released their newest October 2018 Update for Windows 10. Unfortunately the update had some major issues, including destroying some people's files, and had to be pulled indefinitely.

Now Microsoft has finally re-released the update a month later, and this time around it should be safe to install.

October 2018 Update, or I guess it should be November 2018 Update now, has been available for beta testers for a while now, but finally it's coming to worldwide audiences.

Microsoft is still taking a careful stance and is releasing it to the public in smaller batches.

All you can do is just to check your Windows Update section in the coming days and weeks to receive the update as there is not clear indication which systems will receive the update first.

Microsoft has also ensured that quality control is of the utmost importance in future updates.

October 2018 Update is a major update that brings changes to Cortana, Settings, Edge, Shell, and many more. It has things like Clipboard history and sync, dark theme for File Explorer, tabs in File Explorer and other apps, better screenshot utility, and more.

HBO's hit show Game of Thrones has been breaking records ever since it debuted in April of 2011. Next year we're going to witness the climax of the show as it concludes in season 9.

HBO has confirmed that the last season of Game of Thrones will premiere in April 2019. The launch was made official in a tweet yesterday by HBO featuring a 30 second trailer combining some of the key moments from previous seven seasons.

The tagline reads "Every battle. Every betrayal. Every risk. Every fight. Every sacrifice. Every death. All #ForTheThrone."

Unfortunately there's no teaser footage of the upcoming season or even an exact date yet. Then again there's still 5 months during which we'll probably learn more about the ultimate GoT season.

Netflix is seeking more business in Asia where the company's growth in the future largely lies.

The streaming giant has recently announced new Asian Originals from Taiwan to Thailand, and now it has confirmed to Bloomberg that it is trialing a new cheaper plan there as well.

Trying to compete with local competitors it has introduced a new cheaper plan that is meant for mobile streaming. This mobile-only plan gets you Netflix content for a mere $4 a month, but only on the go and with limited quality.

The plan is available at least in Malaysia where it costs 17 Malaysian Ringgit or $4.05. According to TechCrunch, a Netflix spokesperson confirmed that few countries were involved but didn't reveal the other countries.

There's no pressure to lower the prices of existing tier, however. After all the service has only gotten more expensive as Netflix invests more in original programming.

Steam has fixed a flaw that could have allowed users to download and play unlimited games for free.

The bug was discovered by researcher Artem Moskowsky, who received $15,000 for the discovery and an addition $5,000 for making a private disclosure. Steam's portal for game developers housed the flaw, allowing anybody to generate license keys for games.

The portal allows developers to generate license keys for their software. This allows developers to share games with journalists for review, for example. Mr. Moskowsky discovered that he could easily manipulate the feature to generate unlimited license keys for other software.

"I managed to bypass the verification of ownership of the game by changing only one parameter," he told The Register.

Like other outlets, Valve has an award program for security researchers who find and report flaws and vulnerabilities that can be exploited. It allows them to fix the problem before it could be used for malicious purposes. In this case, Valve determined that nobody had exploited the flaw to generate license keys.

Netflix will stop working on Nintendo's Wii console by the end of January 2019, the Japanese firm has confirmed.

The Wii is an aging console, having been released by Nintendo to much enthusiasm in 2006. It had support for many third-party services through apps, including Netflix. However, from January 2019, Netflix and other streaming apps will no longer work on the console.

Nintendo informed customers about the change through an email and also posted a notice on the web.

Nintendo has announced that it will close the Wii Shop Channel on the Nintendo Wii in 2019. As a result, all video streaming services on the Wii, including the Netflix Channel, are no longer available to new members as of July 31, 2018. Nintendo Wii U users are not impacted by this change.

Thankfully Netflix and other streaming apps are available across a plethora of devices, if not built directly into your television. Regardless, this will come as a bummer for some users who might have been using the Wii console primarily to stream content at this point.

With the closure of the Wii Shop channel, the Wii console will be useful only for playing offline games you already possess.

In the past five years or so the Chinese smartphone manufacturer OnePlus has managed to pull itself out of the niche market to be a proper competitor in the big leagues.

This year, however, it made a huge deal with T-Mobile which brought it first time ever to American carriers. Before the OnePlus 6T, released October 29th, OnePlus have had to rely only on its own online channels.

Now that they have their foot in the door for the first time, you would expect an improvement in the sales figure, right?

Well, it turns out that is exactly what you get. According to XDA, OnePlus.com and T-Mobile combined sales for OnePlus 6T was 86% higher on the first day than sales was for OnePlus 6 earlier this year.

Now, this is only the first day, we'll have to see how the rest of the quarter goes. However, it could be argued that T-Mobile carrying the phone will be even more important in the coming months that enthusiasts aren't the ones buying the device.

Netflix has announced that it will release a documentary called Our Planet, featuring Sir David Attenborough himself, in early 2019.

The nature documentary follows in the footsteps of BBC documentaries Planet Earth and Blue Planet, both of which were narrated by the great Attenborough.

Netflix ordered Our Planet from the makers of the shows mentioned as early as 2015, but at that point it wasn't announced that Attenborough would be narrating.

The premiere of Our Planet is set for April 5 and it includes eight full length episodes all of which will bring amazing 4K imagery of the amazing ecosystems of our planet.

The 92-year-old Attenborough will be included in Netflix for all of the English speaking world but Netflix is also looking to recruit local talent to bring localized narration in some regions.

Both Planet Earth and Blue Planet are available on Netflix, so you can warm up for the Attenborough marathon in April.

Netflix has recently revealed new content from Asia. As the company is diversifying the content and bringing in Asian productions especially anime lovers should rejoice.

The streaming giant announced 17 new Originals from Asia that will increase next year's Asian coverage to a 100 new and returning Originals. This includes new Pacific Rim and Altered Carbon anime.

Previous Asian Originals have included the Indian thriller Sacred Games, japanese anime DEVILMAN crybaby, and Korean comedy BUSTED! that has also been confirmed for a second season.

Netflix also increases the content with local languages, which includes The Stranded from Thailand and Taiwanese Triad Princess. A new trailer from the Korean series Kingdom was released.

In addition to news from Asia, the company released a new trailer for the upcoming spin-off Narcos: Mexico, and revealed the launch date, December 7, for the anticipated triple A feature film Mowgli: Legend of the Jungle, featuring talent such as Andy Serkis, Christian Bale, Cate Blanchett and Benedict Cumberbatch.

Disney unveiled in 2017 that it won't continue working with Netflix after 2019. This wasn't a case of Netflix doing anything wrong necessarily, except racking profits.

See, Disney has been working on their own streaming service for years now, and finally they are ready to announce its launch.

Disney has revealed during the quarterly report that the upcoming streaming service will be launched in late 2019. As expected this coincides with the expiration of Netflix cooperation.

The service will be called Disney+ – not very original, I know – and in addition to Disney branded material it will include content from Pixar, National Geographic, as well as Marvel. Exclusive Star Wars content is also expected to land on the service.

Disney of course bought 21st Century Fox in December 2017, which gave them full access to Marvel characters among other things.

It remains to be seen how this affects Netflix. Especially when it comes to children's programming Disney should be a strong contender.

Google's latest and greatest smartphone, the Pixel 3, is definitely one of the most anticipated smartphones of the year. Unlike last year, if you remember the screen issues et al, it seems Google has avoided most of the pitfalls and controversies.

Now, however, a customer has received a device that was broken straight out of the package, and posted about it on Reddit. Well, we shouldn't say broken, it was more like smashed, tortured, and nearly disintegrated.

Not only were the back and front glass panels broken, the phone was bent and there were even cracks through the USB jack. The package told the same story, both the retail package as well as the brown parcel wrap were squished.

Of course we can't blame Google for all this, after all it was Fedex who delivered this mess. But the story doesn't end there.

After contacting the Google customer service, it was simply treated as a regular RMA. This of course means that there is no quick fix, and the customer who had to wait for a month for the initial delivery has to now wait quite a bit more.

After followups the customer hasn't heard back from Google.

Volkswagen is set to take on Tesla Motors and other manufacturers of electrics with its own all-electric that it aims to sell for less than €20,000, or about $23,000.

The German automaker is planning to convert three factories to make the all-electric vehicles, according to reports. Reuters cites a source in reporting that plans for the "MEB entry" will be discussed at a supervisory board meeting on November 16.

Plans call for a production volume of the all-electric vehicle in the 200,000 range. It also has plans for an electric van, the ID Buzz, according to the source.

Volkswagen is also set to discuss alliances with SK Innovation, a battery cell manufacturer. Its plans to enter the all-electric space comes at a time when cities are moving against diesel cars over health and pollution concerns associated with the vehicles. Additionally, Volkswagen has been working on its image since it was revealed that it had cheated diesel emissions tests.

Source: Reuters News Agency

Amazon has released an Alexa App for Windows 10 that is available to download now.

It has already been present on some Windows 10 devices but is not being rolled out to users in the United States, United Kingdom, and Germany. It will be rolled out to other territories next year.

To access it, users will have to use a hotkey or clicking a button, although some devices will support the use of the Alexa app hands-free. You can use the Alexa app to control things like music playback and smart home devices but there are some early limitations.

For example, there is no initial support for the Pandora or Spotify music apps. It also cannot be used to control voice or video calls. Those features will be supported soon, however.

More info: www.microsoft.com

Nintendo Switch users can now watch YouTube videos on the console, with support for 360-degree content.

The availability of YouTube for Nintendo Switch was strongly hinted at in recent weeks. It became available for the console on Thursday and can be used in handheld mode or docked to the television. To control YouTube on Switch, the user will need to use the right Joy-Con's analog stick.

One interesting nugget is that the Joy-Con can be used to control 360-degree videos on YouTube, meaning you won't have to physically move as you do on phones and other devices.

With YouTube on Switch you can access music videos, gaming live streams and everything in your YouTube subscriptions.

More Info: www.nintendo.com

Via: Engadget

Innovation used to be Samsung's ticket to success with ever better Android phones. As often happens with large companies, Samsung kind of forgot to innovate.

Recently the Korean conglomerate has tried to revive its roots in hardware innovation by introducing new features first in cheaper devices. This happened with the Galaxy A series phone earlier this year that features four cameras.

However, yesterday's Samsung event unveiled an innovation that the company has been working on for years and years.

The new Infinity Flex display makes it possible to create foldable smartphones/tablets. They even showed off one at the dimly lit stage.

Clearly Samsung doesn't want you to see the device yet, but the concept is there. It looks like the phone is extremely thick, which seems given if you fold any tablet in half.

Not that it matters really, since the device is very likely a prototype for a concept that hasn't even sure to hit the market.

Not to say Samsung isn't determined to bring it to the people. In fact, it seems that Samsung really needs something like this to turn the ship around.