Author: Brett Venter

It was about this time last year that companies were pulling out of Mobile World Congress (MWC), the largest event in the smartphone industry. The cancellations, coming amid the growing threat that is COVID-19, culminated in the event being cancelled outright. That’s not happening this year. Moving MWC Instead, Mobile World Congress is being shifted around. MWC Shanghai will take place this month, as an in-person event, followed by Mobile World proper, from 28 June to 1 July this year. And it’s an awful idea. GSMA Limited CEO John Hoffman, speaking to Mobile World Live, explained a little about what…

Samsung magically turned out a bunch of awesome audio tech (starting at about the same time they bought an awesome audio company — funny that), eventually culminating in this: Samsung’s Galaxy Buds Pro. The company’s newest in-ears are a fair chunk more expensive than the range’s immediate predecessors, the Galaxy Buds Live, are. Does Samsung offer enough to make you switch up to (kinda) the same thing in a slightly different format? Read on to find out. The best of Buds? Until you uncrate them from the identically-sized lozenge-shaped case, the Buds Pro look a whole lot like their predecessors.…

Clubhouse might be the popular new kid on the block, with other social media companies already scrambling to make their own version of the voice-based social network (we used to call that ‘talking’), but you could argue that Twitter was always heading in that direction. And now Twitter has moved a little further towards that point, rolling out voice DMs for three new countries as part of a continuing experiment for the service. If you’re a resident of Brazil, India or Japan, you have the ability to send shiny new voice DMs. More than one Clubhouse https://twitter.com/TwitterIndia/status/1361900922465644544? The short voice…

Folding smartphones are only just getting started and, while Samsung is currently winning the race, it looks like LG Display might be giving Apple a bit of a boost. The South Korean company, according to a report from Digitimes, has been commissioned to develop a folding display for Apple, of all people. LG keeping the lights on Which makes a strange sort of sense, if you think about it. Even though the tech-maker still has some interesting ideas, it’s also rumoured to be getting out of the smartphone game. And there’s probably some spare smartphone screen R&D lying around, doing…

Sonos is a bit of a maestro when it comes to audio technology, with its multi-room speakers and soundbars setting all sorts of benchmarks for what sort of audio you want to have in your home. On reflection, it seems a little weird that the company doesn’t have a set of noise-cancelling headphones yet. But that’s about to change. Sonos, canned The audio tech manufacturer has been rumoured to have a set of noise-cancelling cans waiting in the wings (or in development in the wings). Hints of it turned up in the US Patent and Trademark Office last year but…

If you were there at the beginning, swapping “files” at a LAN in between bouts of Warcraft 3 mod Defence of the Ancients (bet Blizzard feels a little silly right about now), could you have guessed that the eventual standalone game, Dota 2, would receive its own TV show? Of course not, you were probably a stupid teenager then and Netflix wasn’t even around. But that’s just what’s happened. Dota 2 has been converted into an anime series (because what else would you do with it?), one that’s set to broadcast on Netflix from 25 March this year. One way…

Under Armour’s sports gear is among the most technologically advanced on the planet — plus, the company really has its product placement sorted out. The newest addition to Under Armour’s lineup is the Flow Velociti Wind running shoe, which is designed with “…responsiveness and energy return” in mind. Globally launched this evening during a virtual event, Under Armour’s newest is destined for South Africa in a little over a month. It’ll turn up in stores from 18 March this year — here’s why you’re going to want a pair on your feet. Gone with the Wind Running shoes aren’t just…

Way back in November last year, rumours were swirling about Samsung’s Galaxy Fold 3. One of those concerned is an under-display camera for the new folding handset, a cool feature that may or may not have happened — depending on how difficult it was to implement. It seems that the feature is still on track, at least according to leaker Ice Universe. Know when to Fold ’em https://twitter.com/UniverseIce/status/1361264591007739907 According to the leak, Samsung’s Fold 3 has its eye on UPC — which stands for Under-Panel Camera, rather than that other acronym you can’t quite get off the front of your…

Noted tech investor and occasional musician Jay-Z, along with Twitter founder Jack Dorsey, have launched a new Bitcoin development fund in Africa. And India, if we’re being totally accurate, but we live entirely in Africa so… The project is called ₿trust, which is a really hard thing to type. But it has at its disposal 500 Bitcoin (which has an approximate value of around R340 million) and its stated aim is to “make Bitcoin the internet’s currency.” Who can you ₿trust? https://twitter.com/jack/status/1360114881978982403? How the partnership of Jay-Z, Jack Dorsey, Twitter, teams from Africa and India and three board members to…

The rumours of BlackBerry’s death seem to have been greatly (or at least partially) exaggerated. The smartphone maker is set to launch its first 5G smartphone, thanks to the company’s new owner OnwardMobility. And that’s… about all we know. OnwardMobility’s CEO Peter Franklin has said that the handset will launch with a physical keyboard as well as a “…suite of end-to-end security solutions.” Beyond that, we’ve got little idea what it might look like. Picking a new BlackBerry But website MENAFN has a few ideas. A wide touchscreen and the physical keyboard are almost a given, and the revived BlackBerry…