Microsoft has announced that it is introducing a “push-to-talk experience” to its ‘Teams’ collaborative platform that turns employee or company-owned smartphones and tablets into walkie-talkies.

No Crosstalk or Eavesdropping

The new ‘Walkie Talkie’ feature will offer clear, instant and secure voice communication over the cloud.  This means that it will not be at risk from traditional analogue (unsecured network) walkie-talkie problems such as crosstalk or eavesdropping, and Microsoft says that because Walkie Talkie works over Wi-Fi or cellular data, it can also be used across geographic locations.

Teams Mobile App

The Walkie Talkie feature can be accessed in private preview in Teams in the first half of this year and will be available in the Teams mobile app.  Microsoft says that Walkie Talkie will also integrate with Samsung’s new Galaxy XCover Pro enterprise-ready smartphone for business.

Benefits

The main benefits of Walkie Talkie are making it easier for firstline workers to communicate and manage tasks as well as reducing the number of devices employees must carry and lowering IT costs.

One Better Than Slack

Walkie Talkie also gives Teams another advantage over its increasingly distant rival Slack, which doesn’t currently have its own Walkie Talkie-style feature, although things like spontaneous voice chat can be added to Slack with Switchboard.

Last month, Microsoft announced that its Teams product had reached the 20 million daily active users (and growing) mark, thereby sending Slack’s share price downwards.

Slack, which has 12 million users (a number which has increased by 2 million since January 2019) appears to be falling well into second place in terms of user numbers to Teams in the $3.5 billion chat-based collaborative working software market.  However, some tech commentators have noted that Slack has stickiness and strong user engagement and that its main challenge is that although large companies in the US use it and like it, they currently have a free version, so Slack will have to convince them to upgrade to the paid-for version if it wants to start catching up with Teams

Apple Watch Walkie-Talkie App

Apple Watch users (Series 1 or later with watch OS 5.3 or later, not in all countries though) have been able to use a ‘Walkie-Talkie’ app since October last year.

What Does This Mean For Your Business?

For businesses using Microsoft Teams, the new Walkie Talkie feature could be a cost-saving and convenient tool for firstline workers, and the fact that it integrates Samsung’s new Galaxy XCover Pro will give it even more value for businesses.

For Microsoft, the new Walkie Talkie feature, along with 7 other recently announced new tools for Teams focused firmly on communication and task management for firstline workers are more ways that Teams can gain a competitive advantage over rival Slack, and increase the value of Office 365 to valuable business customers.

In a recent blog post, ahead of the forthcoming US election, Monika Bickert, Vice President, of Facebook’s Global Policy Management has announced that the social media giant is banning deepfakes and “all types of manipulated media”.

Not Like Last Time

With the 59th US presidential election scheduled for Tuesday, November 3, 2020, Facebook appears to be taking no chances after the trust-damaging revelations around unauthorised data sharing with Cambridge Analytica, and the use of the platform by foreign powers such as Russia in an attempt to influence the outcome of the 2016 election of Donald Trump.

The fallout of the news that 50 million Facebook profiles were harvested as early as 2014 in order to build a software program that could predict and use personalised political adverts to influence choices at the ballot box in the last U.S. election includes damaged trust in Facebook, a substantial fine, plus a fall in the number of daily users in the United States and Canada for the first time in its history.

Deepfakes

One of the key concerns to Facebook this time around appears to be so-called ‘deepfake’ videos.  These use deep learning technology and manipulated images of target individuals (found online), often celebrities, politicians, and other well-known people to create very convincing videos of the subjects saying and doing whatever the video-maker wants them to. These videos could obviously be used to influence public thinking about political candidates, and as well as having an influence in election results, it would be very damaging for Facebook, which has been very public about trying to rid itself of ‘fake news’ and not to be seen as a platform for the easy distribution of deepfake videos.  No doubt Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg would like to avoid having to appear before Congress again to answer questions about his company’s handling of personal data, as he had to back in April 2018.

The New Statement From Facebook

This latest blog post statement from Facebook says that as a matter of policy, it will now remove any misleading media from its platform if the media meets two criteria, which are:

• If it has been synthesised i.e. more than just adjustments for clarity or quality to the point where the ‘average person’ could be misled into thinking the subject of the media/video is saying words that they did not actually say, and…
• If the media is the product of artificial intelligence or machine learning that has merged, replaced or superimposed content onto a video, in order to make it appear to be authentic.

Not Satire

Facebook has been careful to point out that this policy change will not affect content that is clearly intended to be parody or satire, or videos that have been edited just to omit or change the order of the words featured in them.

Existing Policies

Any media posted to Facebook is subject to the social media giant’s existing comply-or-be-removed ‘Community Standards’ policies which cover, among other things, voter suppression and hate speech.

What Will Happen?

Facebook says that any videos that don’t meet its standards for removal are still eligible for review by one its independent third-party fact-checkers (which include 50+ partners worldwide) and that any photos or videos rated as false or partly false (by a fact-checker) will have its distribution “significantly” reduced in News Feed and will be rejected if it’s being run as an ad. Also, those who see it and try to share it, or have already shared it, will be shown warnings alerting them that it’s false.

Measures

Facebook has taken many measures to ensure that it is not seen as a platform that can’t be trusted with user data or as a distributor of fake news.  For example:

– In January 2019 Facebook announced (in the UK) that it was working with London-based, registered charity ‘Full Fact’ to review stories, images and videos, in an attempt to tackle misinformation that could “damage people’s health or safety or undermine democratic processes”.

– In September 2019, Facebook launched its Deep Fake Detection Challenge, with $10 million in grants and with a cross-sector coalition of organisations in order to encourage the production of tools to detect deepfakes.

– In October 2019, Facebook launched the ‘News’ tab on its mobile app to direct users to unbiased, curated articles from credible sources in a bid to publicly combat fake news and help restore trust in its own brand.

– Facebook has partnered with Reuters to produce a free online training course to help newsrooms worldwide to identify deepfakes and manipulated media.

Criticism

Despite this recent announcement of policy change to help eradicate deepfakes from its platform, Facebook has been criticised by some commentators for appearing to allow some videos which some could describe as misinformation in certain situations (apparently of its choosing).  For example, Facebook has said that content that violates its policies could be allowed if it is deemed newsworthy e.g. presumably, the obviously doctored videos of Labour’s Keir Starmer and US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

What Does This Mean For Your Business?

Clearly, any country would like to guard against outside influence in its democratic processes and the deliberate spread of misinformation, and bearing in mind the position of influence that Facebook has, it is good for everyone that it is taking responsibility and trying to block obvious attempts to spread misinformation by altering its policies and working with other organisations. Businesses that use Facebook as an advertising platform also need to know that Facebook users have trust in (and will continue to use) that platform (and see their adverts) so it’s important to businesses that Facebook is vigilant and takes action where it can.  Also, by helping to protect the democratic processes of the countries it operates in, particularly in the US at the time of and election (and bearing in mind what happened last time), it is in Facebook’s own interest to protect its brand against any accusations of not allowing political influence through a variety of media on its platform, and any further loss of trust by its public. This change of policy also shows that Facebook is trying to show readiness to deal with the most up to date threat of deepfakes (even though they are relatively rare).

That said, Google and Twitter (with its new restrictions on micro-targeting for example), have both been very public about trying to stop all lies in political advertising on their platforms, but Facebook has just been criticised by the IPA over its decision not to ban political ads that are using micro-targeting and spurious claims to sway the opinions of voters.

Internet companies are still none-the-wiser about the details of the proposed sale of the .org registry to private equity firm Ethos Capital following DNS overseer ICANN putting a temporary halt on the sale back on 9 December.

What Sale?

The rights to the .org domain registry, one of the largest internet registries in the world, with over 10 million names, was/is due to be sold by ISOC (aka the Internet Society), the parent company of PIR (the organisation that currently runs it) for an as-yet-undisclosed sum to Ethos Capital.

Always Not For Profit

The relatively sudden announcement of the sale caused shock and some dismay within the industry over the thought that a registry that has held its non-profit status since 2003 will now be ending up in private hands. Historically, .org domains have always been the outward sign of non-profit organisations.

About Ethos

Some industry commentators have also expressed concern about the lack of knowledge within the industry about Ethos Capital, and some worries have, therefore, been expressed about how qualified and able they may be to manage the .org registry.

Other Criticism

Other criticisms about the sale, which have been voiced online include:

– Suspicion about possible conflicts of interest e.g. around Fadi Chehade, a former CEO of ICANN who is credited by some with encouraging a free-market approach to internet addresses, and who some appear to believe is connected to Ethos Capital.

– After ICANN lifted the price caps on .org domains for the next 10 years (allowing unlimited price increases on the millions of .org domain names) many high-profile non-profit organisations have rejected ICANN’s claim that the move was simply to make the process consistent with the base form registry agreement and have accused ICANN of disregarding the public interest in favour of ICANN’s own administrative convenience.

– Worries that ICANN’s decision to approve the proposed sale may have been subject to bias and may not have reflected the true strength of feeling against the sale.

– Concerns were even expressed by those who supported the proposal e.g. ICANN’s At Large Advisory Committee (ALAC) and Non-Commercial Stakeholder Group (NCSG).

– Anger that ICANN appeared to move ahead with the decision to lift caps without any explanation, and that there still appears to be a level of secrecy surrounding the sale.

– Suspicion by some that the deal has long been the subject of informal discussion among key players.

Temporary Halt

A temporary halt was placed on the proposed sale of the .org Registry right to Ethos Capital in early December and since then, the Packet Clearing House (PCH) has argued (in a letter to ICANN) that the sale and move to non-profit status would mean less money being spent on .org’s operational costs, and could affect stability and could disrupt “critical real-time functions” of organisations using .org domains.

Silence

There is now a sense of frustration from many parties in the industry over the apparent silence, and the distinct lack of information since the temporary halt was placed on the sale.

What Does This Mean For Your Business?

There are many important organisations that use .org domains e.g. air traffic control, and these, as well as the 10 million others who have .org domains, will be concerned not just about the possible price rises of .orgs due to the lifting of the price cap, but also about the possible disruption and instability that the sale of this kind could cause.

There also appears to be a good deal of anger, concern, and unanswered questions in the Internet market about the decision to sell and the details of the sale, as well as apparent feelings of a possible lack of transparency and feelings that things may possibly have been rushed through with important arguments against the sale not being adequately addressed. That said, ICANN must have seen good enough reason to put a temporary halt on the sale, for the time being.

It remains to be seen exactly what happens next but in the interests of the industry and .org owners, the hope is that there will more communication, information and transparency very soon.

New research results from the University of Manchester suggest that the popularly accepted wisdom that the sharp blue light emitted by our smartphones and laptops is harmful to our health and disruptive to our sleep may be wrong.

Blue Light

The current thinking, which has led to device makers adding filters to our devices (e.g. Night Shift in the iPhone 11 and even the Windows 10 Night Mode) that show warmer colours at night is based on the idea that too much exposure to artificial blue light emitted by our devices at night is bad for us. For example, as highlighted by Samsung (on its Australian website), too much blue light displayed on the screen of a device has been thought to suppress the production of sleep-inducing hormone ‘melatonin’, hence the need to filter out the blue and replace it with warmer colours. Samsung also suggests that its filter could “reduce digital eye strain”.

Mixed Messages

The new results presented by the University of Manchester researchers show that not only is this belief about blue light (and the need for warmer light filters at night) likely to be mistaken, but also that using warmer light filters may be sending our bodies mixed messages.

Why?

The new research, which was carried out using mice, has revealed that blue colours associated with twilight have a weaker effect than white or yellow light of equivalent brightness. The research results appear to show that, in fact our eyes naturally associate warmer, brighter colours with daytime, and dimmer and cooler colours (blue and darker) with night as our body clock synchronises with the environment. These cool colours are signals to the brain that it’s twilight and, therefore, time to start getting ready for sleep.

Meaning?

This means that rather than suppressing sleep-inducing hormone ‘melatonin’, the emission of blue light (in dimmed conditions) may actually be more restful than yellow light, and that showing ‘warmer’ colours (via a filter) rather than blue light could be sending the wrong message to the brain. If this is so, it may be the warmer colours of the filter that are more likely to suppress the production of melatonin rather than the blue light glow from our devices.

What Does This Mean For Your Business?

For device-makers who have developed filters based on the opposite of theses findings, these research results may be unexpected, embarrassing, and highlight an area where costs have been incurred unnecessarily. That said, the view that blue light needed to be filtered at night was widely supported by many credible, expert sources and these filters were developed by device makers with the customer’s wellbeing (and a marketing/value-adding brand benefit) in mind, based on what appeared to be correct information at the time. Also, these new results were based upon one study involving mice, not humans, and that more research is likely to be needed before this new opposite idea about blue light can be widely accepted as the new truth.