Author: Tshepo Chauke

Xbox, a few weeks after its controversial price hike, has returned with a few new updates to soothe the pain. The gaming company has paired up with online retro gaming platform Antstream Arcade to bring over 50 classic arcade games to members of its online game subscription tier, Game Pass. Xbox dusts off old relics Retro Classics titles are fully restored and ready to play, and while users can get free but limited access to the games through the Antstream site, Game Pass members can also access the games while staying within the ecosystem, with some perks thrown in, too.…

The meme-printing, money-making battle royale hit Fortnite is officially back on the iOS App Store. Fortnite developer Epic Games has been at war with Apple over payment processing agreements for years now, and while the legal battle is still ongoing, Apple gamers won’t have to pay the ultimate price. Five years in a Fortnite Apple first yanked the popular online game off the App Store back in 2020, after Epic launched a still-unresolved litigation war between the two companies. The dispute initially stemmed from Epic’s use of its own payment processor on the iOS version of the game, instead of…

Rideshare company Bolt has updated its app with a flight tracking function, which also allows the app to reschedule ride pick-ups based on delays or cancelled flights. The update gives users one less thing to worry about when dealing with unreliable flight times. Bolt-ing to the corporate ladder Bolt claims its suite of business-friendly updates, implemented with corporate travellers in mind, has resulted in a 275% explosion in flight pre-bookings on the platform. This includes features like scheduled rides (now extended to 90 days), centralised billing, and detailed reporting. The rideshare platform says airports are by far its users’ most…

Various tech companies have been celebrating Global Accessibility Awareness Day (GAAD) today. Earlier this week, Apple introduced Magnifier and Accessibility Reader modes, and is also working on integrating with Braille displays. Google is pitching in with its own list of accessibility improvement projects, too. The company is cranking up its TalkBack screen dictation app, which can now converse with its visually impaired users. It’s also introducing expressive captions, making Chrome more easily navigable, and democratising speech recognition software, among others. Google goes all access on GAAD TalkBack allows users to get more context on whatever is onscreen by highlighting a…

A few months ago, short-form video hosting giant TikTok began experimenting with features to discourage late-night app use in teens. The “wind down” feature would show a calm, meditative prompt after 22h00, encouraging teens to log off, and was controllable by parents. The app is now choosing to roll out the feature for everyone, and is activated by default for all under-18s. TikTok makes teens take ten Any teen who finds themselves doomscrolling past 22h00 should see the relaxing, full-screen guided meditation exercise. The exercise encourages teens to meditate by giving them breathing exercises to slow down their mind and…

Good news for movie buffs everywhere. Popular movie reviewing and discussion forum Letterboxd is working on a movie rental platform, joining a long list of media-adjacent businesses trying their hand at the streaming game. The social media site announced the initiative at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, believing it can leverage its audience to start providing them the indie movies they love in one place. Letterboxd targeting the girls with a dragon tattoo Letterboxd is essentially Facebook for cinephiles. Users discuss and rate movies, and it has become a trusted source on movies for that insufferable person in your life.…

YouTube ads are about to get a lot trickier to dodge. The video streaming platform is rolling out a new ad strategy it calls ‘Peak Points’, which entails leveraging Gemini AI to detect the most emotionally impactful or most-watched moments of a video, and then feeding the viewer a targeted ad right after. YouTube pulls the purse strings Peak Points works on what’s known as emotion-based targeting, which tries to integrate advertising into the emotion of the programming. The idea seems to be that the more emotionally congruent the ad is with the content, the less jarring it is for…

A few days after Google announced Gemini’s image-to-video converter was headed to the Honor 400 family, TikTok has responded and democratised the technology for its audience with a feature it calls “AI Alive” that’ll turn any static photos you give it into “dynamic, immersive videos directly within TikTok Stories.” TikTok frames up The short video sharing app has largely avoided the excessive addition of AI features in a way that companies like Meta and X haven’t. This should prove to be a fun addition for its younger user base, who are always looking for ways to make their videos stand…

Spotify’s latest update finally allows users to skip the guessing game and make some quick verbal requests directly to the app’s AI-powered DJ. Every day, users take a step closer to not having to navigate the music app, now having more than one AI assistant to sort through all the chaff and get users the music they want sooner. Spotify makes the DJ your butler Previously, the app’s DJ could only manually add individual songs to the playlist. This new update allows users to digitally lean on the DJ’s decks and scream out a personal request, except this time, the…

Back in January of this year, Microsoft announced that it would cease online support for its iconic Office suite on Windows 10 from 14 October onwards, right as the company plans to stop handing out free security updates to all those still using Windows 10 (unless they’re willing to pay, of course). The software giant has now performed a massive reversal and extended the deadline for Windows 10 Office support by three years to 10 October 2028. Microsoft moves the goalposts Microsoft says it’s doing this “to help maintain security while you transition to Windows 11,” after which it “will…