Snapchat has announced today that they are releasing “Bitmoji Deluxe.” According to TechCruch there are now 40 skin tones instead of 25, 50 hair colors instead of 25, and 50 hair treatment options to customize yourself with.



1.999 septillion avatar options. That’s a lot. I don’t personally use snapchat so I don’t have much to add here. Did you know Snapchat’s mascot was designed by Ghostface Killah from Wu-Tang Clan?

The feature offers an easier front-end builder that instantly previews changes on your Bitmoji, with the option to take a selfie to guide your personalization…though there’s still no automatic facial recognition to do it for you. The update also makes Bitmoji more flexible on the backend so Snapchat can add new variation options more frequently. That could pave the way for brand-sponsored Bitmoji clothing, accessories, make-up and more, though Snap tells me it has nothing to share about the Bitmoji sponsorship idea for now.

Discussion

Source: [H]ardOCP – Snapchat Now Has 1.9 Septillion Avatar Options

DUDE! Curling in VR on February 12th! Mixed doubles too! In all seriousness, Eurosport is broadcasting much of the Winter Olympics in a VR format that will be available to damn near anyone with a smartphone. This is almost certainly a big portion of how VR will intersect sports in our future. Below is a schedule of the live events on local Korean time. (South Korea is 15 hours ahead of Central Time – ie 11:13 AM Tuesday, Central Time (CT) is 2:13 AM Wednesday, South Korea (GMT+9)) There will be a highlights airing the following day as well. If you are not familiar, this sort of tech can give you a “ringside” seat.

There is a VR FAQ here that should answer all your questions. You can grab the app here for Android.



The goal of our VR app is to give you a taste of what it’s like at the Winter Olympics with both 360° and 180° video. For live events, you will have the freedom to choose your camera angle to see the action from your favorite point of view or lean back and watch the director’s cut by selecting “VRCast.” Our app also gives you schedules, leaderboards, and medal counts to stay up to date on the standings for the world’s greatest athletic pursuits.

What content will I see in the App? – You will be able to enjoy both live and VOD immersive content for 30 events at the Olympics, including the Opening and Closing Ceremonies

Discussion

Source: [H]ardOCP – Winter Olympics in VR Thanks to Eurosport

For the first time in North America, a coalition of Canadian companies is calling for regulators to establish a piracy site blocking program. The coalition called “Fairplay Canada” consists of members including Bell, Cineplex, Directors Guild of Canada, Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment, Movie Theatre Association of Canada, and Rogers Media. The coalition calls for a block list to be maintained by a not yet established non-profit called “Independent Piracy Review Agency.”



I’m truly not a fan of censorship like this. In my opinion this is overreaching, and goes too far. And this just a day after research showed that piracy actually helps music sales.

“Bell is pleased to work with our partners across the industry and the CRTC on this important step in ensuring the long-term viability of the Canadian creative sector,” says Randy Lennox, President of Bell Media. “Digital rights holders need up-to-date tools to combat piracy where it’s happening, on the Internet, and the process proposed by the coalition will provide just that, fairly, openly and effectively,” he adds.

Discussion

Source: [H]ardOCP – Canadian Anti-Piracy Coalition Calls For Website Blocking

Done deal for $1.1B. Good deal. Maybe I can upgrade my old phone, the camera is so bulky.



Rick Osterloh – Senior Vice President, Hardware: As our hardware business enters its third year, we remain committed to building and investing for the long run. Today, we start digging in with our new teammates, guided by the mission to create radically helpful experiences for people around the world, by combining the best of Google’s AI, software and hardware.

Discussion

Source: [H]ardOCP – Google Now Owns HTC’s Pixel Team

..like post movie trailers on slow news days. It was either this or another story about how volatile cryptocurrency is and how bad it is screwing gamers trying to buy video cards.



Discussion

Source: [H]ardOCP – I Do Some Dumb Things…

Done deal for $1.1B. Good deal. Maybe I can upgrade my old phone, the camera is so bulky.



Rick Osterloh – Senior Vice President, Hardware: As our hardware business enters its third year, we remain committed to building and investing for the long run. Today, we start digging in with our new teammates, guided by the mission to create radically helpful experiences for people around the world, by combining the best of Google’s AI, software and hardware.

Discussion

Source: [H]ardOCP – Google Now Owns HTC

Cake is a new mobile browser that is supposedly reimagined for mobile-specific usages. It seems to be based on the fact that mobile users should not be faced with lists of more links to click on, but instead expand your needs out to a series a pages that are swipeable. Your first three search results already on their own pages. Not sure if that is good or not. Read more about the specifics here. Cake just got $5M in funding, so maybe this will get some traction, maybe not. In other news, this guy on Cake’s website just found his mom’s amatuer channel on pr0nhub when the entire page was presented to him in his MILF search.



Skip the list of links—Cake immediately loads the first 3 results for a search query and allows the user to swipe through the content. Subsequent results are then loaded as the user continues to swipe.

Discussion

Source: [H]ardOCP – Have Your Browser and Eat it Too

I know we have our fair share of Android users here on [H] and I noticed a new feature, totally by accident yesterday, while clearing notifications. You can snooze a notification now by swiping it halfway right, instead of swiping it fully away. Now if you don’t need to deal with it right now, you can the notification come back, up to 2 hours later. Sweet. Not sure if this is old or new, but it was new to me.



Snoozing: Users can snooze notifications, which causes them to disappear for a period of time before reappearing. Notifications reappear with the same level of importance they first appeared with. Apps can remove or update a snoozed notification, but updating a snoozed notification does not cause it to reappear.

Discussion

Source: [H]ardOCP – Cool Android Oreo Feature – Notification Snooze