Much has happened in the world of tech over the past week. In fact “last week” is comprised of 11 days since I decided to publish on Tuesdays moving forward. Starting next week I will focus on one important news per week.
Uber: Class-action lawsuit no longer settled
Let’s start by talking about Uber. On friday last week a federal judge in the U.S. overturned the $100-million settlement that Uber and a group of 380,000 Uber drivers had agreed upon. Judge Edward Chen deemed the agreement unfair. Uber is being sued by its drivers who allege that thy are being treated as employees as opposed to independent contractors. Uber obviously wants the class-action lawsuit to go away since its whole platform is dependent on leveraging independent contractors who make use of their own vehicles and assume the associated operating costs.
Google’s new Duo app
Google recently released a video conferencing app named Duo. It’s like Facetime, Google Hangout, Facebook Messenger but with a twist: It’s simplistic and you can’t make any in-app purchases. Duo, which is is available on iOS and Android, allows users to call each-other over WiFi or cellular. In an attempt to keep it simple the application relies on a user’s phone number and doesn’t even ask for an email address. This makes it easy to setup compared to its competitors and will hopefully make it easier for friends to connect. So far the reviews are positive and some are calling it “the FaceTime that let’s you talk to your Android friends”.
Apple’s new watch won’t have LTE
Many who have tried the Apple watch love it. One of its main drawbacks is that it requires constant communication with an iOS device (such as an iPhone) in order to offer its full set of features. Since Apple hasn’t revealed much about the next generation of Apple Watch even though the first one has been out for a while, many had assumed big changes were in the works. One such change was the addition of cellular. Unfortunately Bloomberg confirmed last week that the next iteration of the Apple Watch won’t have an LTE connection since its inclusion would consume too much battery.
There is already a lot going on this week so sit tight for the next week’ tech news roundup that will be posted on Tuesday August 30th.
-Phil Alexandre