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Pinterest says its skin tone searches are now more accurate

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Pinterest's Try On feature with skin tone searches

Pinterest

Pinterest’s augmented reality Try On feature, through which you can virtually try on makeup via the Lens function, supports skin tone searches too. That way, you can see how different products look on people with skin tones similar to your own.

Try On now includes more than 10,000 “shoppable shades that are discoverable across 48 million beauty pins,” according to Pinterest. NARS, Cle de Peau and Thrive Causemetics are among the latest brands whose products are available for you to virtually test out though Try On.

Along with those updates, Pinterest just expanded skin tone searches beyond the US to the UK, Canada, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand.

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Google is making it easier to create apps using Chromebooks

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ChromeOS.dev also has customizable Linux terminals, which have integrated tabs and shortcuts, along with adjustable backgrounds, frames, fonts and cursor colors. Google added full Linux app support to Chromebooks in 2018.

Developers from Google, Chrome OS and the wider community will offer advice on making apps and delve into some challenges of creating them. You’ll find layout and user experience guidelines there, with tips on user interface components and navigation. The project itself is a progressive web app that you can access offline. ChromeOS.dev is also open source, so you can see how the Chrome OS team built it.

It appears to be a useful resource for folks who are just getting started in development, while making Chromebooks a more viable option for making apps for a variety of platforms. ChromeOS.dev is now available in English and Spanish. Support for other languages is on the way.

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Uber warns of temporary California shut down if it has to reclassify drivers

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This all started last fall, when California Governor Gavin Newsom signed the state’s Assembly Bill 5 labor law. The legislation was meant to fix the gig economy by reclassifying workers as employees, but companies like Uber and Postmates quickly filed lawsuits calling the move unconstitutional. 

Assembly Bill 5 was supposed to go into effect on January 1st, 2020. While Uber says it made changes and believes it’s in compliance, the state feels otherwise. Earlier this week, California won a preliminary injunction against Uber and Lyft. The court order could block the companies from classifying drivers as independent contractors. Uber and Lyft were given 10 days to appeal the ruling, and if things do not go in their favor, Khosrowshahi says Uber will temporarily suspend service in the state.

Shutting down Uber’s ridesharing service in California is obviously not ideal, especially when so many people are facing job insecurity due to the pandemic. But Khosrowshahi says Uber would have no other choice. The company would then wait until the November election, when California voters will be able to decide whether companies like Uber could keep drivers as freelancers.

Ultimately, if Uber is forced to classify its drivers as employees in California, Khosrowshahi says Uber’s model will change substantially. Users would likely see higher rates and fewer ride options. The service would also likely be concentrated in cities. Though, Khosrowshahi says he doesn’t believe that outcome is likely.

It does sound a bit like Khosrowshahi is giving the state and courts an ultimatum, but he insists that Uber would simply have no other option and would need time to switch from its current gig model.



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Only the new ‘Control Ultimate Edition’ will get next-gen upgrades

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Remedy is preparing an ‘Ultimate’ version of Control that includes the frankly-brilliant main game, post-launch patches and season pass expansions. The $40 package will be available on Steam — meaning the title is no longer an Epic Games Store exclusive on PC — PS4 and Xbox One. If you buy the game on console, you’ll also get a “next-gen optimized version” for PS5 or Xbox Series X once it’s available later in the year.

There’s just one problem: existing Control owners are excluded from that complimentary next-gen upgrade. “The free upgrade path to Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 version of Control is only available for Control Ultimate Edition,” publisher 505 Games confirmed in a blog post. So if you’ve already spent $60 on the base game and $25 on the season pass, you’ll need to spend another $40 — bringing your grand total to $125 — to play both the original and next-gen optimized versions. The Ultimate Edition is a great deal for newcomers, but feels just a tad harsh on early adopters who endured the game’s occasionally-inconsistent performance on console.

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Puerto Rico’s Arecibo radio telescope suffers serious damage

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Unfortunately, this is not the first setback Arecibo has endured. It faced dire financial trouble in 2008 and again in 2016. Then, like much of Puerto Rico, the observatory suffered significant damage during Hurricane Maria. Things seemed to be turning around in 2018 when a group led by UCF took over operations from the National Science Foundation, and last year, Arecibo got a boost from the $19 million NASA grant.

It’s unclear how long the observatory will be out of commission or how much repairs will cost. 

“We have a team of experts assessing the situation,” Francisco Cordova, director of the observatory, said in a statement. “Our focus is assuring the safety of our staff, protecting the facilities and equipment, and restoring the facility to full operations as soon as possible, so it can continue to assist scientists around the world.”

While Arecibo Observatory, built in the 1960s, is certainly not the newest telescope, nor the most advanced, it is still one of the largest in the world. According to Scientific American, it’s particularly good at finding gravitational waves and pulsars, and it’s been used repeatedly to better understand near-Earth asteroids. The observatory has certainly recovered from setbacks in the past. Hopefully, this time will be no different.

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Martin Scorsese signs Apple TV+ deal after last year’s Netflix success

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This isn’t Scorsese’s first Apple partnership — he starred in a Siri ad way back in 2012 and remotely directed a shot in The Departed via iChat in 2007. This isn’t Apple’s first big movie signing, either. Tom Hanks’ WWII naval drama Greyhound premiered on the service last month.

According to Reuters, Killers of the Flower Moon, starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro, will land on Apple TV+ after it’s distributed in theaters by Paramount Pictures. Based on a book by the same name, the film (which has a $180 million budget) portrays an investigation into the murders of Osage Nation natives in Oklahoma in the 1920s, as well as a subsequent investigation that led to the creation of the FBI as we know it today.

We don’t know yet what other projects Scorsese will bring to Apple TV+.

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Amazon knocks $300 off Apple’s 16-inch MacBook Pro

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Buy 16-inch MacBook Pro (1TB) at Amazon – $2,449

The base model has that $2,099 sale price and it comes with a 9th-gen 2.6GHz Intel Core i7 processor, 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD. The upgraded model, with a 9th-gen 2.3GHz Intel Core i9 processor, 16GB of RAM and a 1TB SS, is $350 off coming in at $2,449.

Engadget’s Devindra Hardawar called the 16-inch MacBook Pro the “ultimate Apple laptop” and gave it a score of 90. It has a stellar CPU/GPU combo that’s built for power users and can handle almost any laborious task you throw at it without breaking a sweat. While you will hear its fans spinning, the laptop didn’t feel hot the the touch even while running our benchmark tests.

In addition to the pro-level internals, you’ll get a stunning 16-inch Retina display, a great speaker and mic combo and Apple’s updated Magic Keyboard. The company did away with the cumbersome (and often annoying) butterfly keys found on older MacBooks and brought back a more traditional scissor key mechanism. This makes typing on the 16-inch MacBook Pro much more comfortable and reliable.

But like most MacBooks, the 16-inch model suffers from a port deficit. It has just four Thunderbolt 3 ports, so you’ll still have to take dongles and adapters with you wherever you go. But at this point, that’s a sacrifice most people expect to make when they know they want to purchase a MacBook — and the tradeoff is often worth it. This sale on the 16-inch MacBook Pro is one to take advantage of if you need the most capable Apple laptop available. Those who prefer a smaller notebook that still packs a punch when it comes to power can consider the latest 13-inch MacBook Pros, which remain on sale at B&H Photo.

Follow @EngadgetDeals on Twitter for the latest tech deals and buying advice.



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TCL’s 6-series 4K 120Hz TVs pack mini-LEDs and start at $650

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TCL’s 6 Series TV THX-certified gaming mode

TCL

Best of all, the prices are reasonable, considering that Mini-LED tech is still pretty bleeding edge. The 2020 6-series starts at $649 for the 55-inch model, while the 65-inch and 75-inch TVs cost $899 and $1,399, respectively.

TCL also unveiled the 5-series TVs with even lower prices. You still get QLED tech, albeit with fewer local dimming zones (up to 80), along with Dolby Vision and TCL’s bezel-free design. However, the 50-inch model starts at just $400. The company is also selling 55-, 65- and 75-inch models with for $450, $630 and $1,100 each, respectively.

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Google Lens’ new ‘Homework’ filter will solve math problems from a photo

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Google has been giving students — and their parents — a few helpful tools to make studying from home a bit easier. Back in May, it launched an augmented reality feature within Search that lets you view 3D anatomy models and cellular structures. And soon the tech giant will help you solve math problems simply by taking a photo of them using Google Lens.

The company is using technology from mobile learning app Socratic, which it acquired last year, to power the upcoming Lens feature. When it arrives, all you’ll need to do is snap a pic of your study material and then highlight an equation or a particular problem you can’t seem to solve to get quick access to step-by-step guides and detailed explainers. The idea is to make it easy to look up mathematical concepts giving you trouble, since you need to be able to understand them to be able to apply them. Google didn’t say when the Lens feature will roll out, but Socratic itself is available as standalone apps for iOS and Android.

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MLB teams looking at using cameras to detect fans not wearing masks

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In early tests, the software identified proper mask use from security cameras with 80 percent accuracy. While it might not be used to find individual infractions, the system could spot “hot zones” for mask misuse, the company’s founder Jaz Banga told Bloomberg. Teams are reportedly considering non-threatening enforcement methods, like sending out someone in a nurse’s uniform to hand out free masks.

Facial recognition is already a controversial subject over privacy concerns, with firms like Clearview under heavy regulatory scrutiny. Using it as part of a strategy to bring back fans could rile critics, considering that the league hasn’t been able to control the virus among its own players. And even gentle enforcement might be problematic, given that mask-wearing has become such a political issue.

Banga emphasized that the system would use pixelization to make faces unrecognizable and said “we don’t even know how to” recognize faces. In any case, it would probably take a while to approve and implement the system, so the cardboard and virtual fans are likely here to stay for the foreseeable future.

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