Author: Brett Venter

Vivo has launched a new trio of its Y-series smartphones in South Africa, springing the Y29, Y19s Pro, and Y04 (256GB edition) onto the local market for not much money at all. Pricing ranges from R8,000 at the top end to just R3,000 at the bottom. Finding a smartphone between those two markers isn’t hard in South Africa. Finding something decent, on the other hand, is a tougher ask. Vivo’s pending launch could well be partly behind Samsung’s recent financial demotion of its lower-end Galaxy A lineup, since the Chinese outfit is packing at least a few interesting perks. Oh,…

Everyone knows the comic stereotype of the older person mystified by technology. Uber’s new Ride Easy update takes the trope seriously and attempts to simplify the ride-sharing experience for those of… somewhat advanced years. The feature also has a less catchy name — senior accounts, designed for users over the age of 60. Changes to the user interface include larger text and simpler-to-follow directions, just in case those pesky digital screens attempt to trip up granny and grandpa. Take the Ride Easy Ride Easy’s senior accounts are part of an Uber user’s Family profiles feature, meaning that a younger person…

South African Android users looking to upgrade their wearables without resorting to Samsung or (shudder) Apple could cast their eyes in the direction of the Oppo Watch X2. Officially launching in South Africa from 20 June, the upgraded version of Oppo’s last wearable will set you back R7,000. Worth switching up? That’s something we can only definitely answer once it arrives, but Oppo certainly thinks its new hardware is worthy of investing in. Well, they would. It’s in the job description. Watch X2 (not the movie) Buyers can expect a 1.5in 466 x 466 sapphire crystal LPTO AMOLED display (that’s…

Volvo, the company that gave the world the three-point seat belt (Literally. Look it up), has reinvented the technology for the modern age. Whether the company will give the technology to all and sundry again remains to be seen, but it’ll appear first in the company’s upcoming EX60, due in 2026. The “multi-adaptive safety belt” has plenty in common with the less intelligent versions most of us use. It’ll buckle across the chest, clip in around your hip, and probably start an annoying chime if you forget to buckle it in and attempt to drive. But that’s not all Volvo’s…

Amazon, like most massive companies, will do almost anything if it means making more money at the end of the quarter. One of those things, according to a report from The Information, is using humanoid robots to deliver packages. The online retail giant is working on replacing its delivery humans with robotic replicas, the report claims, citing people familiar with the matter. But don’t go thinking that the future is just around the corner, because it won’t happen quite so fast. Artificial Amazon The main component in development is the software needed to control the company’s new robot overlords package…

Samsung’s new partnership with InMobi’s Glance AI, an AI-powered advertising platform that will (thankfully) only be active in the States at launch, is an early look at how artificial intelligence will be exploited by advertisers in the future. Something like Glance AI’s service, which pairs advertising with device screens during downtime, is already done. Amazon’s Kindle range has an ad-supported version that comes with the benefit of a reduced price tag. Spotify is free, as long as you’re fine with ads. However, asking you to opt into ads on your smartphone’s lock screen is a step we weren’t expecting until……

One of the main features of fake internet point collection depot Reddit was that anything users posted, replied to, or interacted with was visible to… everyone. That’s going away. Instead, users of one of the busiest websites on the internet will have the option to curate their profiles, concealing some activity from view. This doesn’t mean users can conceal a single boneheaded comment, but it does mean that their participation in any particular subreddit can be hidden away. There are also a handful of similar changes elsewhere, detailed below. Me? On Reddit? Prove it It’s not the first major change…

Having Starlink finally appear on the South African landscape could significantly change how some parts of the country function. BEE laws might alter (a bit), foreign investment policies could be modified, and folks might wind up having infrastructure-free internet access in remote locations. There’s one other segment that could have new issues to cope with: astronomy. South Africa’s astronomy program is a sophisticated one, particularly in the field of radio astronomy. The country is a major contributor to an intercontinental program called the Square Kilometre Array (SKA). Comprising two facilities, one in South Africa and the other in Australia, the…

OpenAI is one of the largest names in artificial intelligence, if not the largest name. Backed by Microsoft and a literal ton of other people’s money — Japan’s SoftBank has been instrumental in sourcing around $40 billion of investment in 2025 alone — it’s also got a lot to lose. Perhaps that’s why company head Sam Altman appears willing to say anything, and nothing, to keep the hype going. Most recently, Altman spoke about the development of AI and his expectations for 2026 (Reuters via Yahoo Finance). He believes that next year AI users “can not only use the system…

Huawei has kept a tight lid on its upcoming Pura 80 smartphone, but we won’t need to pry into any corners for too much longer. The smartphone maker intends to lift that lid on 11 June, showing off the sequel to a somewhat flawed but still impressive predecessor. Huawei teased the device in its announcement on the Chinese social media platform Weibo, showing only the camera unit from the Pura 80. That’s probably not the sole design we’ll encounter, since we’re expecting a family of devices, but it’s probably the headliner. Pending Pura 80 The secrecy probably would have held…