Apple is working on a secret iPhone feature to get you out of sticky situations

Future versions of iOS will include a new ‘SOS’ feature that allows you to make emergency calls with five quick taps of the power button.

Once enabled, the feature, triggers a short countdown timer (to avoid accidental calls) and emits a siren-like noise. Once the countdown reaches zero, it’ll connect the call to 911, or your region-specific emergency number. Mashable’s Karissa Bell gave us a glimpse at what it looks like in action:

You can, of course, disable the feature in settings.

For years, Apple has baked in the ability to make emergency calls from the lock screen, but SOS would add a simpler option for panic-stricken callers, or those under duress, to complete the call.

Developers that have the iOS 10.2 Beta 2 update already have the feature. There’s no word on when it’ll roll out to the public, but as Bell points out, it should hit the next public beta before becoming an official (public) iOS 10 feature addition.

Google responds to EU antitrust charges against Android

Google has now filed its official response to the EU’s antitrust charges against its Android mobile OS. The company had previously been granted a deadline extension by the European Commission, which kicked off a formal investigation into Android back in April.

According to Reuters the EC is intending to hit Google with deterrent fines over its behavior with Android, and also in another antitrust case against Google Shopping.

Among the complaints about Android that the EU Competition Commission has been investigating are —

that Google is allegedly “requiring and incentivizing” smartphone and tablet manufacturers to exclusively install its own services, and in particular its search engine

that it is allegedly bundling certain Google products with other apps & services

whether Google is hindering the ability of smartphone and tablet makers to use and develop other OS versions of Android (aka Android forks)

In a blog post detailing the general thrust of its arguments, Google’s SVP and general counsel, Kent Walker, rebuts these charges, arguing the Android OS has created a thriving and competitive mobile app ecosystem.

“The response we filed today shows how the Android ecosystem carefully balances the interests of users, developers, hardware makers, and mobile network operators. Android hasn’t hurt competition, it’s expanded it,” he writes, going on to argue that Google’s “voluntary compatibility agreements” for Android OEMs are a necessary mechanism for avoiding platform fragmentation which would make life harder for app developers.

Walker claims the EC is overlooking a large chunk of relevant competition by not factoring in Apple’s iOS when it considers the mobile app ecosystem.

However Android remains the dominant mobile OS in the region, with a marketshare of around 90 per cent as the EC sees it — hence the Commission’s focus on the platform. The EC is also factoring in Google’s regional dominance in general Internet search (circa 90 per cent of that market), which it has been investigating for some six years now — with the issue being how one dominant tech platform position might be being abused to cement another.

“To ignore competition with Apple is to miss the defining feature of today’s competitive smartphone landscape,” argues Walker, also referencing iOS as a motivating factor in Google seeking to simplify developing for the Android ecosystem vs Apple’s closed source platform.

“The Commission’s proposal risks making fragmentation worse, hurting the Android platform and mobile phone competition,” he adds.

Complainants in the antitrust case argue that Google’s “excessive control” of Android makes it more akin to closed than open source. In a statement given to Reuters, FairSearch lawyer Thomas Vinje said: “The truth is that Android is today a closed operating system, and any claim to the contrary is disingenuous. Google imposes severe sanctions on those who defy its insistence on conformity.”

Responding to criticisms of how it requires manufacturers to pre-load a suite of its own apps on devices if they want access to the Google Play store, Walker says Google does this to present a competitive offering vs rival platforms, with their own apps preloaded, while also arguing it’s easy for consumers to delete preloaded apps or download alternatives.

Although the competition point is really about whether the discoverability and visibility of a preload on a dominant platform is an unfair advantage, not that other apps are being blocked at a technical level.

He goes on to name-checking Spotify and Snapchat as two examples of third party app successes that have been possible despite Google’s own Android preloads.

Lastly, Walker says Google requiring Android OEMs to use Google search by default is effectively its payment for offering device makers use of the entire suite for free, i.e. without a licensing fee. “This free distribution is an efficient solution for everyone — it lowers prices for phone makers and consumers, while still letting us sustain our substantial investment in Android and Play,” he argues.

He also describes open source platforms as “fragile” and argues the Commission’s approach risks upsetting the “balance of needs” between users and developers, as well as suggesting their action could signal they favor “closed over open platforms”.

But again here, complainants would argue that the way Google controls Android makes it akin to a closed platform at this stage.

The EC can fine Google up to 10 per cent of its global revenue — some $7.5 billion — if it finds the company has breached European competition law. Google has already faced antitrust fines in Russia over how it operates Android.

Last week Google also responded to the two other European Union antitrust charges — relating to its Google Shopping price comparison service, and its AdSense ad placement service.

In the Shopping instance, Walker argued the online shopping ecosystem has evolved beyond price comparison sites — making them irrelevant in what he described as a vibrantly competitive market, focused on other channels for reaching consumers such as retailers’ own mobile apps.

Regarding AdSense, Google said it has made some changes to how it operates the service — in the hopes of satisfying the Commission.

Google says there are now 2 billion active Chrome installs

Google is hosting its Chrome Dev Summit today. There hasn’t been a lot of news out of the event, but one number that stood out in today’s keynote by Chrome Engineering VP Darin Fisher was that there are now 2 billion Chrome installs in active use across desktop and mobile.

This is the first time Google has shared this number. Sadly, Google didn’t announce any new user numbers for Chrome today. The latest stat for active Chrome users remains at 1 billion — a number Google shared in April. While this number is surely higher today than it was six months ago, the company decided to focus on the number of active browser install today.

“I wanted to make this point that there are a lot of Chrome browsers out there,” Fisher said. “What’s exciting about this to you all is that when you think about building for the web, there’ a lot of browsers out there that implement the latest web standards — that implement the latest and greatest web features.”

As Google likes to say, it now has seven products with more than a billion users (Gmail, Android, Chrome, Maps, Search, Youtube and the Google Play store).

PillDrill gets $3 million in funding for its medication tracking system

Announced earlier this year, the PillDrill is a simple system designed to take some of the pain out of remembering to take medication – taking things between those big plastic pill boxes with the help of a little 21st century connectivity.

The system is built around the Pill Drill Hub, which offers up an audio/visual reminder when the time comes to take a dose. Once the pills are taken and a barcode is waved in front of the scanner, the WiFi connected system sends updates to friends and family members, keeping them abreast of the user’s daily dosage.

The Las Vegas company, which launched the system back in April has closed a $3 million round of angel investor funding, courtesy of undisclosed parties. The money is set to go toward distribution for the $200 at-home medication device.

PillDrill is also using the occasion to announce that it’s scored an innovation award at next year’s CES and added retired MedVenture Associates founder Annette Campbell-White to its board of directors.

A USB stick that can test HIV levels in under 30 minutes

Scientists at Imperial College of London have teamed with UK biotech company DNA Electronics to develop a USB stick-based HIV test capable of sophisticated detection in a fraction of the time of a standard test.

The computer plug-in just needs a single drop of blood to go to work, measuring the levels of HIV-1, changing the acidity and transmitting the results as an electrical signal that can be sent to a computer or mobile device. The whole process occurs in less half an hour to complete (with most tests averaging around 21 minutes), rather than the multiple day-long wait and lab requirements of other test.

The test in its current form looks to be most useful for patients who already know they have the virus, rather than serving as first-time detection, a function already fulfilled by a number of drug store kits. Since the test is capable of detecting the level of the virus in the blood, rather than relying on the presence antibodies, it could be valuable to patients on retroviral drugs, detecting whether the medication is doing its intended job and keeping HIV levels down, or whether the virus has developed a resistance to the drugs. 

The presence of such technology could allow patients to monitor HIV levels at home with the disposable device in much the same way diabetics do with blood sugar. It could also prove valuable to those in remote locations who don’t have immediate access to medical care.

Android is the crown jewel in Google’s vast empire of software and web services, and its unprecedented success has inevitably attracted the scrutiny of European Union regulators. Today, Google steps up its public efforts to diminish European concerns over its mobile market dominance, and it’s doing it with the power of GIFs.

Google

You don’t think we offer choice, says Google, but have you seen how little choice iPhone buyers are getting? All the preloaded apps on an iPhone come from Apple. 39 out of 47 preloaded apps on Windows 10 phones come from Microsoft. But less than a third of preloaded apps on Samsung’s Galaxy S7 come from Google. So what’s the big deal?

Extending the point beyond apps, Google argues that it’s impossible for Android to have a market monopoly when the iPhone exists. "To ignore competition with Apple," says Google, "is to miss the defining feature of today’s competitive smartphone landscape."

The problem at the heart of the European investigation is actually Google’s control of its Play Store, which is the central portal for app distribution on Android and pretty much essential to any new Android smartphone. And since Apple doesn’t license or open-source iOS, and Microsoft’s Windows 10 has no mobile ecosystem to speak of, any new smartphone in Europe that isn’t an iPhone is compelled to carry Google’s apps.

Because Android manufacturers have to have the Play Store on their phones, Google can practically dictate whatever terms it wants to the companies signing up for the privilege. And that’s how it is that the basic suite of Google Play services and apps are installed on every new Android smartphone by default, including such apps as Google Maps, Google Play Music, Chrome, and YouTube. Granted, most of these are the best apps in their class, but the European Commission’s antitrust body is more worried about unfair market power.

But Google’s GIF counterarguments are strong. The Mountain View company also points out that apps like Snapchat, Spotify, and Dropbox have enjoyed hundreds of millions of downloads on Android, which runs counter to the notion that Google is suppressing competition. Google has its own messaging, music, and cloud storage services, and yet its mobile platform is open enough to sustain more popular alternatives without a problem.

What Google is saying, in a nutshell, is that Android is too flexible and manipulable by the user to ever really be locked down and anti-competitive. Okay, so Samsung, LG, HTC, Huawei, and anyone else wanting to sell an Android phone is practically forced to ship it with Google apps on board. Is that really such a big deal if people can get their favored apps for free anyway? And moreover, Google makes the economic argument that "distributing products like Google Search together with Google Play permits us to offer our entire suite for free," so if you really like Google’s mobile apps and don’t want to pay extra for them, you should be happy with the status quo.

That’s Google’s argument, and the question now is how compelling the Euro regulators will find it when they reconvene to consider imposing substantial fines on Google’s practices.One more GIF, just to complete the set:

Robot solves Rubik’s Cube in just 0.637 seconds, but can it feel love?

I guess the fun part about teaching robots to do pointless tasks much better than humans is that it's their time we’re wasting as well as our own. We could be teaching poor machines about art or poetry or what fresh grass feels like underfoot after too long living in the city, but no, they get to solve a Rubik’s Cube and don’t even feel good about it.

Anyway, chipmaker Infineon built the machine above to demonstrate how good its microprocessors are. The company claims its attempt is a world best, but it hasn’t yet been recognized by the Guinness World Records organization. It’s perhaps worth noting as well, that although the chips in Infineon’s robot are the same as those it wants to sell to autonomous car-makers, solving a Rubik’s Cube quickly is as much about mechanical dexterity as processing speed. Which is to say that this is a stunt rather than a demonstration.

In related news, a human person also recently claimed a new Rubik’s Cube speed record, solving the puzzle in just 4.74 seconds. (Again: unrecognized by the Guinness World Records organization, but faster than any known time.) Solving a Rubik’s Cube remains a functionally pointless task, but look, look: the human is much happier about it than the robot. That's worth something, I think.