Samsung talks folding phone design, says innovation isn’t dead

The Samsung foldable phone.

Between triple cameras and slider designs, it’s tough to argue that we’re not seeing at least some innovation in the smartphone space. But Samsung (unsurprisingly) thinks the real innovation will come in the display arena.

In a blog post written on the Samsung website, a company executive said “modest smartphone sales” have signaled that innovation has reached a bottleneck. This view is shared by analysts from the likes of Counterpoint Research, following a worldwide sales decline in Q3 2o18.

But Hark-sang Kim, a senior vice president at Samsung Mobile, reckons the foldable phone represents a “new era” for the smartphone.

Bringing the foldable phone to life

Kim explained that it took the company seven years to perfect the foldable technology and user experience. The executive said Samsung made “significant” investments in developing the material used in the foldable display, adding that they created a “natural and durable” folding mechanism.

“We also had to rethink the placements of the battery, cooling system, and camera so that they can be placed inside the slim body efficiently,” the executive said. Finally, Kim said you can expect an intuitive user experience featuring apps that seamlessly switch between small and large displays.

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It’s all good having a foldable phone, but will people and developers gravitate towards the form factor? The latter is especially key, as having compatible apps could help drive adoption. But app support will likely need to be meaningful in order to make the form factor viable. After all, who cares if all you’re getting is a blown-up UI on the larger screen, right?

Samsung showed off a prototype of its foldable phone last year which had a 7.3-inch foldable display (1536 x 2152 resolution), with an outward-facing screen at 4.5-inches (840 x 1960 resolution). We won’t have to wait long to see more details though, as the firm is expected to show off the device in some capacity at the Galaxy S10 event on February 20.

NEXT: Pocophone F2 wishlist — Keep the good, improve the bad

Source: Android Zone

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Google expanding Chrome ad-blocking initiative to global markets this July

Google will expand Chrome’s recent adblocking endeavors beyond the U.S., Canada, and Europe later this year, the company has announced. From July 2019, Chrome will filter online ads across the globe that don’t comply with the Coalition for Better Ads‘ (CBA) standards in an effort to improve the user experience.

Google introduced the new ad-blocking initiative with Chrome version 71 in December. This browser version blocked disruptive ads on websites that continually breached the advertising guidelines drafted by the CBA.

The CBA’s guidelines identify 12 types of ad experiences web users find intrusive. Among them are auto-playing ads with sound, flashing animated ads, and ads occupying inordinately large areas of the display.

A diagram of twelve types of bad advertising practices. Coalition for Better Ads

Google says the overall aim isn’t to block bad ads, but to encourage outlets to improve the way they deliver them — and it seems to be working. The search giant says two-thirds of the websites previously breaching the guidelines have altered their strategy to comply with them, and that it has only filtered one percent of ads using this scheme out of millions it investigated.

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It’s actually in Google’s best interests to tackle this problem as its predominant revenue stream — by a huge margin — is advertising. It’s been great news for those of us in the U.S., Canada, and Europe so far, as it means tens of thousands of websites no longer display those aggressive adverts. Six months is still a long wait for those of you living in other territories, though.

Source: Android Zone

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