Photo-sharing platform Instagram on Wednesday said it is testing ‘Instagram Lite’ app in India that occupies less space on Android phones and consumes lesser data, before it rolls out the offering globally.

Over the past many months, the Facebook-owned company has tested and rolled out a number of features in India first, including its short video offering – Reels.

“India is an important market for us and has been a testing ground for innovation… India was one of the first few countries where we tested Reels, and the first country where we launched the Reels tab…In order to expand the appeal of Instagram to users across the country, today we’re announcing the test of Instagram Lite in India,” Vishal Shah, VP of Product, Instagram at Facebook, said at the Facebook Fuel for India 2020 event.

He added that ‘Instagram Lite’ is less than two megabytes in size, and has been built to provide access and high quality experience to users in India, irrespective of the device, platform and network that they are on.

The experience on the new app is similar to the core Instagram app experience, though there are some features that are not currently supported such as Reels, Shopping and IGTV.

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Chinese short video-making app TikTok will now place warning screens on graphic videos to prevent the users from viewing disturbing content.

Part of its new community guidelines, the warning screen will give two options — either view the clip or skip it entirely.

More extreme content is already being removed from the platform entirely but the new warning labels cover content that might be allowed for “documentary reasons,” scenes from horror movies, or violent scenes of animals hunting. TikTok also announced a new text-to-voice accessibility tool that would read out text as it appears in a video.

The company informed that it is adding vaccine information to its coronavirus resource hub.

“The hub will be updated to include commonly asked questions and answers about COVID-19 vaccines from public health experts like the Centers for Disease Control.

According to the company, the coronavirus resource hub has been viewed over two billion times in the last six months.

TikTok is also planning to allow its users longer, three-minute videos in an apparent bid to take on YouTube.

TikTok currently allows creators to upload videos up to a minute in length.

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Xiaomi on Wednesday expanded its smart TV portfolio in India with the launch of Mi QLED TV 4K. Priced at Rs 54,999, the smart television features Dolby Vision HDR, Dolby Audio, Vivid Picture Engine, Android TV 10, and more. The TV comes in 55-inch screen model with aluminum alloy frame. It boasts an almost bezel-less horizon display for a 96 per cent screen-to-body ratio, according to the Chinese electronics maker. The smart TV supports the commonly available high dynamic range codecs including, Dolby Vision, HDR10+, HDR10 and Hybrid Log-Gamma (HLG).

The Mi QLED TV boots Android TV 10 operating system with Google Assistant and Chromecast built-in.

Like other Xiaomi TVs, the Mi QLED TV is powered by company’s Patchwall user interface, which is touted to bringing together content from more than 25 content partners. Additionally, the PatchWall features universal search, user centre, kids mode, smart recommendations and live TV utilities.

The TV comes with three HDMI 2.1 compatible ports. It has a feature named ALLM (Auto Low Latency Mode), which automatically switches the TV to game mode for low input lag of just 5ms at 4K @60fps — according to the company. The device also supports HDMI e-ARC. Powering the TV is the MediaTek’s 64bit quad-core A55 processor, coupled with Mali G52 graphics.

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A picture-perfect growth story: Instagram has grown by 66% in India

In the last 12 months, the number of Indian users of Facebook’s picture and video sharing app Instagram grew by more than 66 per cent — from 77.4 million to 129 million — according to data from NapoleonCat, a social media management tool, which analyses data on apps globally. Read More

Piramal group plans to merge its financial services business with DHFL

The Piramal group is planning to merge its financial services business with DHFL and has sweetened its Rs 35,550-crore offer for fixed depositors by setting aside an additional Rs 300 crore for them. Read More

DCB Bank, RBL, Federal Bank bosses’ terms to come up for renewal

The tenures of corner-room occupants at three private banks — DCB Bank, RBL Bank, and Federal Bank — will be up for review in 2021, and will make it clear if the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) will hardcode the maximum tenure for the helmsmen at 15 years.

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The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) is looking to unleash the potential of spectrum and is exploring meaningful applications for 5G technology, a top official of the department said on Tuesday.

At the CII Partnership Summit 2020, Telecom Secretary Anshu Prakash also said the government is soon going to come up with an incentive scheme to encourage manufacturing of telecom equipment in India where the government will look at more value addition from the country in making the gears.

“We are going to unleash the potential of spectrum, remove all the bottlenecks, explore what new can be done with the spectrum,” Prakash said.

He said the government wants to encourage wirelines, internet-leased line, FTTH (fibre-to-the-home) and FTTX connections.

“In the realm of 5G, we want to come up with meaningful applications. Applications that are not merely enhanced mobile broadband but which touch all lives in agriculture, health and education, disaster management, public safety, traffic management etc,” Prakash said.

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This month, Google forced out a prominent AI ethics researcher after she voiced frustration with the company for making her withdraw a research paper. The paper pointed out the risks of language-processing artificial intelligence, the type used in Google Search and other text analysis products.

Among the risks is the large carbon footprint of developing this kind of AI technology. By some estimates, training an AI model generates as much carbon emissions as it takes to build and drive five cars over their lifetimes.

I am a researcher who studies and develops AI models, and I am all too familiar with the skyrocketing energy and financial costs of AI research. Why have AI models become so power hungry, and how are they different from traditional data center computation?Today’s training is inefficient

Traditional data processing jobs done in data centers include video streaming, email and social media. AI is more computationally intensive because it needs to read through lots of data until it learns to understand it – that is, is trained.

This training is very inefficient compared to how people learn. Modern AI uses artificial neural networks, which are mathematical computations that mimic neurons in the human brain. The strength of connection of each neuron to its neighbor is a parameter of the network called weight. To learn how to understand language, the network starts with random weights and adjusts them until the output agrees with the correct answer.

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Apple is reportedly planning to bring iPhones with larger screens that could have Touch ID fingerprint reader and antennas embedded into the display.

The iPhone maker might be working on offering its users better signal reception while still providing a secure user authentication system as well. This would also lead to thinner bezels and notches, offering more screen estate to its customers, reports AppleInsider.

In the past, reports claimed that Apple is working on an in-display fingerprint reader for its Touch ID system. Various patents had surfaced over the course of last year, which touched on topics like acoustic imaging, infrared, and more.

Even the renowned Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo has predicted that Apple could bring the in-display fingerprint sensor on Touch ID on future iPhone models.

In addition, a patent previously revealed that the RF antenna will be covered under several layers of the display.

The antenna needs to be exposed to be able to receive signals, which is why Apple patented something called the “Display Integratable Hybrid Transparent Antenna”.

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I am amazed to known that instant cameras also come in different variants despite being a niche products. After recently reviewing the Fujifilm Instax Mini 11 (review), I got my hands-in the Instax Square SQ1, which is another instant camera but aimed at entirely different audience compared to the former. Successor to the Instax Square SQ6, the Square SQ1 is a square-shaped instant camera that is touted be a better imaging device compared to commonly available instant cameras like the Instax mini 11.

In terms of design, the Instax SQ1 has a minimal profile and it looks like an instant camera from all sides. It is, however, a bit large for an instant camera and weights around 500g with the film. Its big size and heavy weight makes it unsuitable for one hand operations but these are the only deterrents in terms of design and the camera otherwise looks appealing.

The camera has a rotatable ring around the lens to switch it on or to activate the selfie mode. On the top side, it has the flash light, which is activated for use in all scenarios and there is no option to turn it off. This leads to flash light working even in scenarios where artificial light is not required. Therefore, it ruins the picture quality in good light conditions.

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Taking on Chinese short-video making platform TikTok once again, Facebooks has launched a new iOS app called Collab for making and mixing music with friends in the pandemic.

The experimental app for making collaborative music videos is now available on the App Store in the US.

Part of the Facebook’s app-focused New Product Experimentation (NPE) team, the app allows users to create short-form music videos by combining up to three independent videos of 15-second timeframe.

According to a report in TechCrunch, the users can either create a collab by playing along with someone else’s video or “just swipe on one of the three rows to choose a different video to slot into the mix from those available”.

“As you discover musicians you like to play along with, you can favourite them in the app to be notified when they post new clips. This also personalises the main feed,” the report said late on Monday.

Facebook has made several improvements to the app’s audio-syncing capabilities and other technical aspects during its Beta testing period since May this year.

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Samsung Electronics took the number one position in the global foldable smartphone market this year with the launch of new devices, a report said on Tuesday, as the company tries to further solidify its status in the burgeoning sector.

According to the latest report from industry tracker Display Supply Chain Consultants (DSCC), Samsung is estimated to take up an 88 percent share in this year’s foldable smartphone market in terms of shipments, reports Yonhap news agency.

Samsung unveiled the vertically folding Galaxy Z Flip in February and launched the Galaxy Z Fold 2 in September.

“By model, the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip and the Z Fold 2 are expected to be the two best-selling foldables in 2020 on both a unit and revenue basis,” DSCC said.

Its display-making affiliate, Samsung Display Co., accounted for 96 percent of the foldable panels shipped in the third quarter of 2020 and is estimated to take an 87 per cent share for the whole 2020, DSCC added.

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