Geek News

Microsoft Garage makes all kinds of mobile apps for iOS and Android. Some, like the Hub keyboard for iPhone, are experiments; others, like the News Pro app , are a bit more long-term. The team's most recent foray into mobile apps is Photos Companion , an app that easily moves photos from your phone to your Windows 10 PC over WiFi. According to Microsoft , when its Photos app was redesigned in 2017, the product team headed out to various US and European classrooms to see how teachers were incorporating videos and images into their curriculum, and to encourage them to use the app. The biggest issue wasn't the app itself, the team found, but the hassle of getting media from smartphones to classroom PCs. The new app was created to help kids get content from multiple phones into one project PC, from which they could assemble their multimedia presentations. With the Photos Companion app on your iOS or Android phone, you just scan a code on your Windows 10 Photos app, then sele...

Silicon valley has a diversity problem . Sexism and racism are everywhere in the technology sector, and it's time to put an end to it. The Internet Association, a lobbying group for some of the biggest names in tech (think Amazon, Airbnb, Uber, Facebook, Google and Twitter) has promised to hire a new person to focus on these issues. According to Recode , the new push comes in response to the threat of regulation from the Congressional Black Caucus. Two members of Congress wrote to the Association last November. In it, Emanuel Cleaver, II, and Bonnie Watson Coleman asked for more transparency and better policies to ensure the diversity of hires in the technology industry, ending with a bit of a threat. "If these issues go unchecked Congress will be left with few options and will demand increased regulations to address these issues," they wrote. The Internet Association's leader Michael Beckerman responded to this missive with a letter of his own (it was obtaine...