By Hisan Kidwai Free Fire Max is one of the most popular games on the planet, and for good…
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Source:: Fossbytes

Over the last decade, Slack has amassed millions of users. The average user has Slack open 10 hours a day and actively uses it a couple of hours daily.

A lot of enterprise knowledge flows through channels, direct messages, and meetings. Extensive new generative AI (genAI) features added in recent years assist in even better communication and collaboration. 

Slack, which is owned by Salesforce, hopes genAI will make its software a “work operating system” where digital labor can also communicate and orchestrate business processes. Some of the newer features include enterprise search, summaries, meeting notes, and translations.

And there’s more cooking. Rob Seaman, chief product officer at Slack, gave Computerworld a glimpse of the company’s thinking and experiments. (This interview was edited for length.)

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Slack

How are you balancing genAI integration with people’s conventional Slack habits?  “We think of AI in two forms — embedded AI and open-ended AI. Embedded AI helps within our existing interface. We automatically summarize PDFs so people don’t have to open files. In our activity feed, we’re scanning activity and extracting action items so you don’t read everything chronologically. 

“We can put assistants on the right-hand side, but I don’t think that’s how it’s going to end up. I don’t think we’ve figured it out yet.

“I don’t think today’s interfaces will hold with AI. You’re seeing search and assistants blend in consumer apps, and that may happen in Slack and enterprise software.

“The question is: how do you seamlessly go from AI search and assistant experiences to colleague communication without jarring context switches? We haven’t figured it out yet, but we’re prototyping internally.”

Can you share other examples of experiments? “I’ll give an example — I don’t know that we’ll ship it, but you could come into Slack and have a prompt bar and not see your sidebar with all channels. That’s a hyperbolic experiment we’ve got. 

“The comments, feedback, and reviews are mixed internally. We’ll do these [experiments] sometimes — and it’s like a pretty big change for some of our staunch users within our employee base.

“You might imagine coming into Slack without your sidebar, just an open-ended prompt that can search, communicate with colleagues, and handle agent tasks. That’s a big change from today.”

Are you thinking about alternatives to text-based chat? “We’re actively working on a feature that turns all your unread messages into a podcast of your chosen length and format. You can listen on your ride back home.

“We’ve done work to reduce meeting overload through asynchronous video and audio clip sharing. Summaries can help, so you don’t have to listen to everything.

“We’re looking at alternative content consumption forms and doing exciting work in text-to-speech.

Are you seeing any hesitation around AI adoption? “A lot depends on the trust the software builds. One is creating value, two is conveying trust. That’s where we spend tons of time. 

“Company adoption follows industry risk curves. Their data isn’t used to train, or it’s not going outside the firewall. Their data is their data.

“We’re working on ‘profile summaries.’ At large companies like Salesforce, I get DMs from people I don’t know. I mouse over — just name and title, which doesn’t help. We added a ‘Tell me more about person’ button. It’ll go off and we’ve prompted it to be positive and look at public channels. It writes a positive CV about their recent work and accomplishments.

“It’s not looking at direct messages and builds trust in the system. That’s what we’re working on — discovery in context of how you already use Slack, but also trust building.

Slack wants to use AI tools to help users learn more about colleagues they don’t know.
Slack

Do you see Slack as a communication layer for agents to talk and collaborate? “Absolutely. I think we have a continued role as a communication layer, but the emerging role for Slack is as the agent command center for users within teams and companies. Tasks are orchestrated and executed by agents on behalf of users.

“I look at AI-native companies for inspiration — Cursor, ElevenLabs, Vercel — they’re putting their agents in Slack because it makes sense. It’s a natural place.

“MCP and agent protocols are very exciting. I think Slack can be an MCP server and an MCP client. We’re working on the server part, but we could be an MCP client for other MCP servers on the desktop or in the browser.”

How do you get users to adopt and understand new AI features in Slack? “I’ll speak openly about what’s been a challenge for us, which is discovery. It’s something we’re spending time on — myself and Ethan [Eismann], our head of design.

“As we add more to Slack, we do not want to mess up the core communication experience. We need users to discover these things in their normal workflow in a non-distractive way that creates value, builds trust, then kicks out to deeper use.

“Gemini does this well — they make recommendations within the product, you try it, then kick out to dedicated Gemini experiences. You discover it, then go into a more dedicated experience.”

Any other cool features coming soon? “There’s one, AI Explain. As a product person, I get pulled into incident channels all the time. When something’s wrong with Slack, there’ll be an incident commander, engineers. I literally don’t know what they’re talking about.

“When I look at messages with acronyms I don’t know, if I mouse over a message, we now have little stars on it. If I click it, it takes that message, all the ones around it, smartly breaks it apart into searches, executes searches, and comes back with an explanation for me.

“That would have been like 10 searches from my past. That’s a great candidate for launching into an agentic experience. I got an explanation, now let’s say I want to take a next logical turn. That’s where we can train users that Slack’s a lot more than just communication.”

With Ai Explain, Slack can help users better understand messages and context.
Slack

Source:: Computer World

How hard can it be to abandon a 10-year old operating system in favor of something more modern, more stable, and more secure? That’s the opportunity IT enjoys with the coming expiration of Windows 10 support in October, giving admins the freedom to make a better choice.

Sure, not everyone in IT is shifting to Apple. Many enterprises remain trapped in the Windows ecosystem through reliance on proprietary and/or third-party applications that do not support the Mac.

There’s also the pernicious nature of the Windows lock-in, which means many in IT have a vested interest in sticking with the platform, even when it doesn’t necessarily provide the best tools for the job.

It’s time to break free

Yet for many, and certainly those in regulated industries in which privacy and security are important, Apple’s platforms do deliver the best toys for the task; you can see this in Apple’s accelerating Mac market share. The fact you can run Windows in VM on a Mac is just a chef’s kiss to support the platform advantage.

For many, the problem is the transition itself. They know that migrating from Windows to Mac will generate some problems — employees will need to re-learn the system, certain software and security routines that are taken for granted will have to be revisited, and there will inevitably be some forgotten apps and services that must be replaced. (To be fair, Apple knows this, too, and continues to improve enterprise deployments across its products.)

That means that any migration to the Mac will take a great deal of planning — or, perhaps, support from one of the many enterprise-focused Apple specialists that exist now, from Addigy to Jamf, Fleet to Hexnode, Kandji to JumpCloud, Mosyle, ScaleFusion, and more.

Each of these firms can help you figure out some of the challenges to Mac deployments at your company, and you’ll find that at least one of these service suppliers can help build up the IT infrastructure you need to manage your new kit.

Be sure before you walk out the door

The big strategic picture is that if you want to make a move Mac-ward, you’re not alone — and if you live near an Apple retail store, you can avail yourself of help and resources provided by the company’s own small army of enterprise tech specialists.

While help is available, the extent of this learning curve might put off some IT decision makers who now need to upgrade their systems from Windows 10. But decision makers should also balance the risks and challenges of upgrading to Windows 11.

What about the impact on operational devices, third-party hardware such as printers or scanners, on-prem apps or even widely used shadow apps that might not have been disclosed? You can rest assured that the larger the scope of the Windows 11 deployment, the higher the associated costs.

Then there are the end users. I’ll be honest, I’ve heard nothing but frustration from users who’ve been forced to move to Windows 11 from 10. Anecdotally, they’ve found that pretty basic tasks (like PDF annotation) are much more challenging on the newer OS.

When you’re managing hundreds of users, small annoyances are consequential time stealers. Each one of those slices of ill-thought-through friction is another support ticket, and while it keeps tech admins employed, these trivial annoyances are budget line items on their own account. We already know that when given the choice, employees will usually opt for a Mac — and forcing them to use Windows software that doesn’t work like it should is not how to make your teams more productive. 

Life goes on

Accepting then that moving to Apple poses problems, and that migrating to Windows 11 also poses problems, IT should take a look at the Total Cost of Ownership between Mac and Windows. If they do, they’ll find that while Mac might seem slightly more expensive to purchase (but even then, not for long), the products last longer, require less tech intervention, are easier to manage, use, and run, hold value far longer, and have longer usable lives.

The modern Mac is also hugely performant, offering amazing computational power in every available machine. The current MacBook Air, for example, delivers far more computing power than the first M-series MacBook Pros. In other words, when you add it up, the Mac is likely to be more affordable than Windows. 

With so much to drive the argument and so little against it, it is of no surprise at all that the Windows 11 upgrade mania is translating into major Mac market share increases, according to IDC, Gartner, and Canalys.

Quite simply, Apple now seems to offer the best choice.

You can follow me on social media! Join me on BlueSky,  LinkedIn, and Mastodon.

Source:: Computer World

By Siôn Geschwindt Denmark is aiming to stake a bold claim in the global quantum race with plans to build the world’s most powerful quantum computer. Backed by €80mn from EIFO (Denmark’s export and investment fund) and the Novo Nordisk Foundation, the new initiative — dubbed QuNorth — aims to deploy the Nordic region’s first “Level 2” quantum system.   Microsoft and California-based Atom Computing will deliver the system, named Magne, after the mythological son of Thor. Microsoft will contribute its Azure Quantum software stack. Atom will provide hardware based on its “neutral atom” design. Magne is expected to include around 50 logical qubits…This story continues at The Next WebOr just read more coverage about: Microsoft

Source:: The Next Web

By Deepti Pathak Imagine you’re in a meeting, watching a movie at the cinema, or attending an event when…
The post How To Silence Your Apple Watch: 2025 Guide appeared first on Fossbytes.

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By Hisan Kidwai Free Fire Max is one of the most popular games on the planet, and for good…
The post Garena Free Fire Max Redeem Codes for July 17 appeared first on Fossbytes.

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By Siôn Geschwindt Norwegian industrial investment firm Aker has announced plans to build an AI “factory” in the Arctic. It’s the latest company heading to the far north to tap into abundant green energy and natural cooling for power-hungry data centres.  The facility will be located in the Norwegian coastal town of Narvik, which lies 220km within the Arctic Circle. Aker’s president and CEO, Øyvind Eriksen said that the site already had access to 230MW of power and was ready for construction to commence. He added that discussions with potential tech firms and partners for the project were ongoing.  However, Eriksen provided limited details…This story continues at The Next Web

Source:: The Next Web

For a while now, OpenAI has been rumored to be working to develop its own web browser, with the aim of challenging Google’s dominance in the segment. And that browser will apparently be named “Aura”, according to Bleeping Computer. The browser name was referenced in the code used by ChatGPT.

The interface in Aura is said to be reminiscent of ChatGPT — in other words, the focus will be on conversations rather than the traditional clicking of links. Alongside ChatGPT, Aura is expected to offer built-in support for the SearchGPT search engine and the AI agent Operator.

The launch of the new browser is expected to take place later this summer, possibly by the end of July.

Source:: Computer World

Engineers in China are maintaining US Department of Defense computer systems under a contract with Microsoft, a news report said Tuesday.

The arrangement relies on US staff known as “digital escorts” to supervise the Chinese workers, but the escorts often lack the skills to monitor the work effectively, the report by investigative news service ProPublica said.

“We’re trusting that what they’re doing isn’t malicious, but we really can’t tell,” Propublica quoted one of the escorts as saying.

The arrangement has been in use for almost ten years but has not previously been reported publicly, ProPublica said.

Allowing Chinese workers to access US government systems with inadequate supervision is surprising given the tensions that have arisen between the two countries in recent years.

In its 2023 Intelligence Threat Assessment, the US Office of the Director of National Intelligence identified China as “the broadest, most active, and persistent cyber espionage threat to US Government and private-sector networks.” A year later, China was still top of the threat list for defense security experts in the US and other Western countries. And in its 2025 Intelligence Threat Assessment, the ODNI doubled down, saying, “China stands out as the actor most capable of threatening U.S. interests globally.”

The steady drip of revelations about Chinese attacks on US critical infrastructure, businesses, government IT systems, contractors, and perhaps even courts has done little to calm matters. The trade war over tariffs and access to rare earth elements and other materials essential to IT vendors begun by US President Donald Trump when he took office in January has further aggravated the situation — although in June Trump claimed the relationship is excellent between the two countries.

Protecting sensitive data

Microsoft said that company staff and contractors with privileged access to US government cloud systems had to pass government-approved background screening controls, and that it adheres to FedRAMP (NIST 800-53) and Department of Defense Security Requirements Guide (DoD SRG) security requirements.

“For some technical requests, Microsoft engages our team of global subject matter experts to provide support through authorized US personnel, consistent with US Government requirements and processes. In these instances, global support personnel have no direct access to customer data or customer systems. Only authorized US persons with the appropriate clearances and training provide direct support. These personnel are provided specific training on protecting sensitive data, preventing harm, and use of the specific commands/controls within the environment,” said a Microsoft spokesperson.

The company “told ProPublica that it has disclosed details about the escort model to the federal government,” according to the report.

But people involved in the work have told Microsoft those protections are inadequate, according to the report. Foreign engineers have access to detailed information about the federal cloud that could be exploited by hackers, and the digital escorts are insufficiently skilled to catch all suspicious activity, it said.

The Defense Information Systems Agency told ProPublica that digital escorts are used “in select unclassified environments” for “advanced problem diagnosis and resolution from industry subject matter experts” and that “experts under escort supervision have no direct, hands-on access to government systems; but rather offer guidance and recommendations to authorized administrators who perform tasks.”

That description matches a job posting for a “DoD Secret Cleared Escort” by contractor Insight Global, which illustrates the kind of work digital escorts perform — although it says nothing about the nationality of the workers who will be supervised. For between $18 and $28 per hour plus medical insurance, escorts are required to “act as the front door of the service” for work on Insight Global’s sovereign cloud serving US federal and state government customers, while “taking direction from the requesting engineers” (who may not have the necessary security clearance). Escorts run commands provided by the engineers and share results with them, and their activities can involve Exchange Server maintenance, Active Directory administration, working with SQL databases, managing virtual machines with Hyper-V, and network management.

Source:: Computer World

By Siôn Geschwindt Dutch file-sharing service WeTransfer is under fire after users spotted sweeping updates to its terms of service that appeared to let the company train AI models on their uploaded files. The company has now removed the controversial language, but users remain outraged. Here’s what’s going on — and why it matters. What did WeTransfer change? WeTransfer users discovered this week that the service had updated its policy with a clause granting it a perpetual, royalty‑free license to use user‑uploaded content, including for “improving machine learning models that enhance content moderation.” The changes were due to come into effect on August…This story continues at The Next Web

Source:: The Next Web

By Hisan Kidwai Water is the worst enemy of any electronic device, as it conducts electricity and damages the…
The post 4 Ways To Get Water Out Of Charging Port on Android & iPhone appeared first on Fossbytes.

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By Siôn Geschwindt A giant cargo ship is trapping carbon from its exhaust and turning it into cement for use in onshore construction. The technology, developed by UK startup Seabound, is billed as the world’s first commercial carbon capture system for boats. It’s installed on the UBC Cork, a cement carrier owned by Germany’s Hartmann Group. “These are the systems we intend to scale across hundreds, and eventually thousands, of vessels,” Alisha Frediksson, Seabound’s CEO and co-founder, told TNW. “We’re therefore very excited to get them out into the world — to gather valuable data, optimise future iterations, and most importantly, to show…This story continues at The Next Web

Source:: The Next Web

By Hisan Kidwai Inspired by the belovedBlue Lockanime series, Blue Lock Rivalsis a soccer/football game in which players compete…
The post Blue Lock Rivals Codes (July 2025) appeared first on Fossbytes.

Source:: Fossbytes

As I’ve noted before, it will take the better part of a decade for Apple or anyone else to manufacture smartphones in mass market quantities in the US. Getting there requires huge investments to solve big problems, including training, manufacturing, component sourcing, and raw materials supply.

And now, Apple is about to invest $500 million in the last of those, working with the only US rare earth supplier, MP Materials. The decision includes plans to purchase US-made rare earth magnets from the company in what is being billed as a win for the Trump Administration. Apple and MP Materials will build a new recycling facility in which to extract materials from used electronics, along with another factory to make components for Apple devices.

Unlocking the component supply chain

It’s a big deal because right now China produces around 60% of the globe’s rare earths and processes around 90% of that material. The investment puts at least some of that capacity in US hands, even though a recent deal with China saw the trade in those critical materials between the two nations resume. (The materials are available elsewhere, but they are so rare they are paid for in human misery.)

There’s a lot that matters in the news. First, the reality is that rare earths are essential to manufacture most modern electronic devices, from iPhones to satellites, cars to stealth bombers. Secondly, America’s reliance on external suppliers for these substances is a strategic problem that puts the brakes on any hope of bringing electronics manufacturing back to the US. A recent US Department of Defense decision to invest $400 million in MP Materials has contributed to interest across US rare earth stocks as investors sense opportunity.

“MP Materials is America’s only fully integrated rare earth producer with capabilities spanning the entire supply chain, from mining and processing to advanced metallization and magnet manufacturing,” the company’s website explains. “We extract and refine materials from one of the world’s richest rare earth deposits in California and manufacture the world’s strongest and most efficient permanent magnets.”

The complexity management business

Apple has been in the current US government’s cross hairs in recent weeks, under pressure to build up manufacturing of Apple products in the US. Apple has, no doubt, argued that it has taken steps to reduce reliance on China and invested billions in making products in India and elsewhere. Still, the company has been slammed for not doing enough, even though moving manufacturing is not simple and requires extensive investments in everything from skills development to infrastructure enhancement, not to mention the logistics of component supply.

Apple must hope that by committing half a billion dollars to a US rare earth supplier it will be seen as showing a willingness to invest in the country on a journey toward future expansion of US manufacturing. I see it as most likely that any Apple products made in the US will either be very high-end advanced technologies, or lower-end products that require less skill to manufacture — the US just doesn’t have enough trained staff.

Jaw-jaw beats war-war

Apple CEO Tim Cook’s determination to continue to negotiate with people even where he doesn’t agree with them may be paying off, at least a little. Commenting on the arrangement a White House official told Fox News, “Apple deserves a lot of credit for stepping up.”

While it remains open to question whether the government sees the full significance of this step, it is significant all the same. The principle in play is that if Apple can source raw materials in the US, it is one giant step closer to being able to manufacture some of the more advanced components it uses in its devices. While the practicalities of production and supply mean many of the rest of these components will continue to come from elsewhere, the opportunity to move toward final assembly in the US grows a little each time Apple manages to source components in the US. 

Nothing will – or can – happen overnight. But it is certainly not at all true that Cook’s complex approach to working with sometimes opposing intergovernmental demands has failed – because while there’s no doubt its complicated, he continues to find incremental positives within an incredibly complex politico-business environment.

You can follow me on social media! Join me on BlueSky,  LinkedIn, and Mastodon.

Source:: Computer World

The relationship between Microsoft and OpenAI, once the biggest bromance in the tech industry, has deteriorated so badly that the companies are now mulling taking “nuclear options” against one another — actions that could seriously damage both companies. 

At issue is how much Microsoft’s $13 billion investment in OpenAI will be worth if OpenAI goes public, as it plans to do. The companies are locked in an increasingly bitter battle over how Microsoft’s investment should be valued.

OpenAI has already hinted at moves that could get the US government to prosecute Microsoft for AI-related antitrust violations, which could force the company to spin off its AI products. Microsoft, in turn, might shut off negotiations with OpenAI, putting any IPO — and the company’s future — at risk.

Now OpenAI is going straight for Microsoft’s jugular: It’s considering launching a productivity suite with generative AI (genAI) tools built in, a direct attack on Microsoft’s multibillion dollar Microsoft 365 office suite business.

OpenAI’s plans for a productivity suite remain hush-hush, but some details have leaked. Here’s what we know now, and what the consequences of launching one might be.

What might OpenAI’s productivity suite include? 

The little reporting done about OpenAI’s suite says it will focus on collaborative document editing, include automated meeting transcriptions, have team chat capabilities, and be tightly integrated with ChatGPT. 

Beyond that, little is known. Will it have a full suite of applications, including a word processor, spreadsheet, presentation software, and email? Will there be more than that, along the lines of Microsoft’s Clipchamp for video creation, or Project for project management? What collaboration capabilities would it have? And how would it all linked to genAI?

Most important of all: What in the suite would make enterprises abandon Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace for OpenAI’s offering? So far, mum’s the word.

At first glance, it seems as if there’s little room in the market for a third enterprise-focused office productivity suite. Google and Microsoft take very different approaches to their suites, which leaves OpenAI with very little to offer that either of them doesn’t have already.

Microsoft takes a maximalist, everything-plus-the-kitchen-sink approach with Microsoft 365. Each app is stacked with so many features, there’s very little they can’t do. When was the last time you needed to print envelopes or do mail merges? Probably never. But they’re available in Word if you want them. The same holds true for all the other apps in the suite.

Google has taken a different approach. Workplace isn’t nearly as feature-rich as Microsoft 365, but Google’s collaborative tools are much better than Microsoft’s. 

With such a clear differentiation, it’s relatively easy for enterprises to decide which suite they prefer: Microsoft 365 for a full feature set, Google Workspace for collaboration.

That seems to leave no room for an OpenAI’s productivity suite. It’s unlikely to improve so much on Google’s traditional collaboration tools or Microsoft’s feature set that it can gain a foothold. Trying to split the difference between the suites and offer a wishy-washy application somewhere between the two won’t help at all.

So, it’s likely OpenAI’s suite will play to its strengths and offer genAI-centric collaboration for creating, editing, and finalizing documents, possibly turning the way people create documents on its head. Rather than have a single author write a document, then send links to others so they can collaborate on editing it, OpenAI’s suite might well use collaborative AI from the get-go, allowing people to use AI prompts together to create documents from scratch. They would also collaboratively edit it using AI. It could also use genAI-guided brainstorming and even genAI graphic-creation tools as well.

This way, the suite won’t need to replicate Microsoft 365’s bells and whistles or take a back seat to Google Workplace for collaboration. It could be pitched as the future of the genAI-driven workplace.

Follow the money

Just as no one knows the exact feature set of the suite, no one knows how much OpenAI might charge for it if it’s launched. Pricing is one area where Microsoft is extremely vulnerable. Enterprise versions of Microsoft 365 cost anywhere from $7.75 per user per month to $35.75 per user per month, depending on the feature set. Adding Microsoft 365 Copilot costs $30 more per user per month, tripling the cost of Microsoft 365 with AI for some companies — and doubling the price or more for most others. Given that many enterprises have thousands or tens of thousands of Microsoft 365 users, that’s a tremendous price increase. 

Beyond pricing, it’s not clear that workers in enterprises are particularly taken with Copilot’s capabilities. Bloomberg reports that ChatGPT is far more popular with enterprise workers than Copilot, and that companies that have bought Microsoft 365 Copilot are having serious problems convincing their employees to switch from ChatGPT to Copilot.

That doesn’t mean, of course, that companies will be willing to abandon Microsoft 365 for a new OpenAI productivity suite. But it does offer OpenAI at least an opening. And if it lowballs the price of its productivity suite at $10 or $15 a month per user, that would be a big incentive for enterprises to at least test it out, given that many have to pay more than $65 per month per employee for Microsoft’s office suite with AI included.

The upshot

We don’t know much yet about the OpenAI productivity suite, or even if the company is serious about launching it. It could be that the company is only using the threat of selling it as a bargaining chip in its negotiations with Microsoft.

Either way, though, Microsoft should be worried about OpenAI’s suite. If Microsoft wants its AI investment to pay off, it’s going to have to get serious about improving Microsoft 365 Copilot to fight off the potential challenge from OpenAI.

Source:: Computer World

By Siôn Geschwindt London-based insurtech startup Laka has raised $10.4mn in Series B funding as it eyes profitability at the end of next year. Laka offers “collective” insurance for bikes and e-scooters, pooling claims across a community of riders. Instead of fixed, upfront premiums, customers pay a variable monthly fee based on the total number of claims across the entire user base. The fee is capped at a maximum amount based on the value of their gear. Fewer claims mean lower costs for everyone.   Laka provides the insurance cover both directly and through retailers like Decathlon, Brompton Bikes, Gazelle, and Ribble Bikes.  Tobias…This story continues at The Next Web

Source:: The Next Web

The US Department of Defense’s Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Office (CDAO) on Monday announced it had awarded contracts worth up to $200 million each to four leading generative AI (genAI) companies to develop AI capabilities needed for “critical national security issues.”

The contracts with Anthropic, Google, OpenAI, and xAI will, CDAO said, “enable the Department to leverage the technology and talent of US frontier AI companies to develop agentic AI workflows across a variety of mission areas.” 

The department defines frontier AI companies as those that “lead development of the most advanced AI models and technologies, conduct insightful research into the use of frontier AI, and pioneer efforts to address both the potential benefits and risks of frontier AI technologies.”

CDAO is also providing access to all four companies’ genAI models for general purpose use in multiple defense departments, including the Office of the Secretary of Defense, and will provide wider access via embedded AI models within Department of Defense (DoD) enterprise data and AI platforms. It is also partnering with General Services Administration (GSA) to bring AI technologies to the US government as a whole, while aiming to control the costs of AI production and required computing resources through combined buying power.

“The adoption of AI is transforming the Department’s ability to support our warfighters and maintain strategic advantage over our adversaries,”  Chief Digital and AI Officer Doug Matty said in a statement. “Leveraging commercially available solutions into an integrated capabilities approach will accelerate the use of advanced AI as part of our Joint mission essential tasks in our warfighting domain as well as intelligence, business, and enterprise information systems.”

In a separate announcement, xAI today unveiled Grok for Government, a suite of products for US federal, state, local, and national security customers. In addition to what’s in the company’s commercial offerings, it includes custom models, additional support, custom AI-powered applications, and soon, models in classified and other restricted environments.

Source:: Computer World

This morning, I found an interesting Canalys report shared by analyst Runar Bjorhovde that shows — despite everything Apple does— people still don’t seem to think iPhones are all that durable. That’s strange, given how much cash Apple spends improving iPhone durability and the device’s reputation as leading second-user markets.

I contacted Bjorhovde to get more insight.

The perception reflected the opinion of more than 8,000 consumers across Europe and shows that while Apple continues to outpace most of the rest of the industry on privacy and security, Samsung over-indexes on durability while Apple seems to score lower than it should. 

Apple has a strong brand value

“Our respondents associate Apple with being [a] reliable brand representing quality design, though being expensive,” Bjorhovde told me by email. “Personally, I think the expensive price perception — and consistently high price tag — is what makes Apple so desirable in many cases through its status.

“Apple’s perhaps greatest benefit compared to its smartphone and PC competitors, is that people have strong opinions about the brand and a clear idea of what it represents,” Bjorhovde said. “Risk aversion amongst buyers can be a massive hurdle for any company seeking to succeed in an establish category.”

But Apple lags when it comes to consumer perception around durability. Here’s the chart that shows the data.

Canalys

Why is this? 

I think Apple is a scapegoat in this perception because of its size and popularity, which means that when an iPhone gets smashed, Apple gets the blame. It is also worth pointing out that Apple was first to market with a modern smartphone back in 2007, and with so much new technology the original device was more prone to breakage than subsequent generations.

The devices were so new and so exciting that everything about them (good and bad) was reported, including screen breakages, which baked in an assumption that they break. The messaging we picked up then were the first impressions of the modern smartphone industry, and those messages stick. The phone cover and case market among iPhone users remains vibrant as a result.

“There are stories going far back around — for example, around reducing battery capacity over time — that might still be holding Apple’s durability perception back,” the analyst said. “Apple has also been subject to fierce opinion pieces and lawsuits towards its repairability, a lot stemming from companies that have a strong stake in the second-hand value of iPhones,” he added. “More than anything, I think the poor durability score is a result of Apple not owning its durability narrative well enough.”

Follow the money

It’s a perception that is amplified in another way, as repair industry stores tend to focus on iPhones in their advertising, reflecting how popular those devices are. This builds the perception of fragility of Apple products. 

iPhones aren’t the only advanced and expensive devices that break. “Even though the most advanced smartphones today are made with space age materials like titanium, Armor Aluminium, and Ceramic Shield screens, they’re still susceptible to damage when dropped on a concrete sidewalk,” Jason Siciliano, vice president of marketing and global creative director at Allstate Protection Plans, said in a statement.

The perception that iPhones break more often remains, though the data also shows that for innovation, privacy and security, the iPhone indexes well, as it does for the camera. So, perhaps it can afford a little misconception around durability.

Like many prejudices, it isn’t completely true

I think Apple should attack this perception head on. It should not be too hard to break it, either, given that iPhone dominates the used-phone markets. People are happy to buy a second-user iPhone because they know their new/old devices will keep working longer — and this extends to durability.

Ask yourself: How could a device that lasts longer be less durable? “The reality is that Apple might be the most criticized vendor in the smartphone industry when it comes to durability,” Bjorhovde said, “but that doesn’t mean that it actually represents reality.”

In 2024, there were 5.14 billion active smartphones, of which 21% were iPhones, standing several percentage points ahead of Apple’s market share of newly sold devices, according to data from Canalys (now part of Omdia). “iPhones have a longer lifetime and more value in the second-hand market than any other brand,”Bjorhovdehe said. 

He pointed out that other vendors like Samsung even “subsidize the trade-in values of their own smartphones to help them match Apple in attractiveness.”

Europe’s other plan

There is one more thing to consider. Europe has yet another idea to attack Apple, this time in the form of its weirdly formulated energy efficiency labelling scheme, which threatens to be inconsistently applied.

Apple generally scores very well, but has been highly critical of the unclear methodology of that scheme. “The EU Energy Labelling regulation has a number of significant ambiguities in the prescribed transitional test methods,” the company said. (The concern is that Europe might use these tests as yet another way to attack US tech.)

“Apple leans towards durability more than most other vendors,” the analyst told me.

Of course, the problem with erroneous beliefs once they do bed in is that they are remarkably hard to shift. But perhaps sharing a few facts will help change perception. 

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Source:: Computer World

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