theverge--2020-01-23--Tech companies are ‘too big, and we’ve allowed them to exercise monopoly power,’ says House Antitrus

Tech companies are ‘too big, and we’ve allowed them to exercise monopoly power,’ says House Antitrust chairman David Cicilline

Last week , the House Antitrust Subcommittee held a unique hearing where executives from Sonos , Tile , Basecamp , and PopSockets laid out the challenges of working and competing with big tech companies like Apple , Google , and Amazon .
It felt like a turning point in the conversation about big tech platforms and the power they have over competition , something PopSockets CEO David Barnett called “ bullying with a smile.
” “ Help us Congress , you ’ re our only hope , ” said Basecamp ’ s David Heinemeier-Hansson .
It was like that .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ of a lengthy Antitrust Subcommittee investigation into the competitiveness of digital markets led by Chairman David Cicilline ( D-RI ) that ’ s been going on for some time — a bipartisan investigation that ’ s about to conclude with a report and recommendations for new laws and regulations that govern how big tech platforms work .
Cicilline joined Verge senior reporter Adi Robertson and editor-in-chief Nilay Patel for a special interview episode of The Vergecast this week where he talked about what he ’ s learned and how he plans to tackle @ @ @ @ @ @ @ excerpt has been lightly edited for clarity and length .
So we ’ re talking while opening arguments of impeachment are going on in the Senate .
It seems like there ’ s just a lot of polarization in the world .
But I was watching the [ antitrust ] hearing , and I was struck that there seems to be at least a bipartisan consensus on the problem , if not the substance .
You know , when we launched the investigation , that was done in a bipartisan way with the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Republican leader on the Judiciary Committee as well as the ranking member of the subcommittee , [ Rep. Jim ] Sensenbrenner .
So the investigation has been thoroughly bipartisan and in a very real way .
Our staffs are working closely together .
And I think you ’ re right .
I don ’ t know that we ’ ll have agreement on every single proposal or a recommendation that the final report makes , but I think there ’ s broad recognition from Republicans and Democrats that this market is not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ significant absence of competition and strong evidence of anti-competitive behavior by the dominant platforms .
And I think there is a real understanding and expectation that we ’ re going to do something about this as a Congress .
The American people are expecting us to .
So it ’ s been very bipartisan .
I hope it will stay that way .
One of the striking things from the hearing last week was how different the accusations against each of these companies was .
How much do you think the same remedy @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Apple and Facebook and Amazon ?
That ’ s a great question .
We ’ ve been very careful in this investigation to solicit information from the platforms , both in testimony and in documents relevant to the way those platforms are operating , because I think they ’ re not all the same , and their behavior has been different in many respects .
So I think we ’ re going to look at solutions that provide a response broadly to the marketplace .
There are some issues where I think there @ @ @ @ @ @ @ particular company in this area or this particular company in that area .
But I think this is very much about the marketplace generally , and you will not see recommendations that are specific to a company , just like the investigation is not about a company , it ’ s really about the marketplace broadly .
And so I hope the suggestions we develop , both in terms of legislation and in terms of proposed regulations , will address the marketplace broadly , but obviously respond to a number of different activities @ @ @ @ @ @ @ investigation .
Do you think that you can craft a single framework that ’ s going to address the whole spread of problems from that hearing ?
Yes , I do .
The goal is to create competition , to protect competition in that digital marketplace so that when Amazon says “ give us back money for selling your product at a lower cost , ” people have an opportunity to think about another platform because that other platform will have had an opportunity to grow and be successful and enter the marketplace @ @ @ @ @ @ @ examples is the solution , and making sure that we ’ re promoting competition and protecting folks from a whole range of discriminatory behavior or bullying .
I think you can imagine a number of ideas .
I would just say you can ’ t engage in behavior that does X , Y or Z that would apply broadly to all of the large digital platforms .
That ’ s a pretty classic conception of a behavioral remedy .
“ You can ’ t do this.
” We ’ re going to say @ @ @ @ @ @ @ You ’ re forbidden from doing it .
But there was a lot of talk about , especially with Amazon , the platforms self-dealing , cutting themselves better deals , selling their own products .
I spoke to Sen. Elizabeth Warren ( D-MA ) last year , and she said you can ’ t just do basic behavioral solutions .
You ’ ve got to do a structural solution .
And that ’ s why she was proposing breakups .
Do you agree with her on that ?
First of all , I @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has certain powers , and breaking up companies is actually not one of them .
So while we may have made a mistake by allowing some of these companies to get as large as they have — in fact , we have made a mistake .
I think we should have had much more rigorous antitrust enforcement that would have prevented a number of these companies from getting as big as they are .
That ’ s a problem .
And so I think what we have to figure out now is : @ @ @ @ @ @ @ review of some transactions ?
There ’ s no way to ensure that if the transaction is approved based on a set of expectations , that you then have an option to go and see if those expectations were bad or something different happened and learn from that .
But I think it ’ s harder for Congress to think about enacting a statute that breaks up companies .
But I do think that the other suggestion that Sen. Warren has made is a really interesting one and something I think about a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ can be either a platform or you can be a manufacturer or a producer of services , but you can ’ t do both.
” Sort of the Glass-Steagall of the internet .
It ’ s kind of an interesting idea because people go to a platform thinking , somehow , when they do a search , there ’ s some neutral way that evidence is reviewed , and you ’ re provided with a result from that search .
Well , we know that that is not the case , the way @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
And Amazon used its own private label to promote it or promotes its own goods .
It creates sort of an inherent conflict .
You know , you ’ re both a platform and a manufacturer of goods .
And so it ’ s kind of an interesting idea to think : should you at least separate out those functions and say you can be one or the other , but you can ’ t be both ?
I think these companies are too big , and we ’ ve allowed them @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to figure out how to correct that .
I ’ m looking at kind of what are the current antitrust tools that are available to antitrust enforcers , and how we might use those to promote competition .
But there is not a mechanism that I can think of that would allow us , as Congress , to go and break up a particular company .
I think we can do a lot of things to correct the absence of competition in that space .
Everything is on the table , in my @ @ @ @ @ @ @ long and hard about how we could , in a congressional enactment , actually break up a company .
I ’ ve had a bunch of Microsoft executives from the ‘ 90s tweeting me all day about how Microsoft ’ s antitrust suit didn ’ t actually accomplish anything .
And really , the question that they keep asking is : what shouldn ’ t you be able to integrate ?
So Tile was at the hearing .
They built tracking products .
We don ’ t know yet , but Apple is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Apple ’ s products will obviously have greater access to the operating system of the iPhone than Tile ’ s product .
Should that kind of conduct be prohibited ?
Should Apple have to have open APIs , which was part of the Microsoft consent decree ?
I would have to think about the example you gave .
But certainly if , in that example , Apple makes it much more difficult for people to access the Tile product using their software and ... they constantly get reminders [ asking ] , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ service ?
” or constantly prodding them to have to answer a prompt .
And that creates the kind of friction that ensures that their competitor doesn ’ t really have access to the marketplace .
Or if they do , it ’ s short-lived .
I think what we have to look at is if the behavior of the company can fairly be described as anti-competitive .
Are they using their market dominance to make it impossible for a competitor to enter the marketplace and survive , and as a result , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a reduction of choices for consumers , maybe ultimately increasing costs ?
They ’ re only able to do that because they have so much market dominance .
How do we deal with the reality that these four large technology platforms are so big and control so much of the market ?
That they can , with a change of an algorithm , make it more difficult to access their software , make it almost impossible for a competitor to survive ?
That ’ s not good for the economy .
It ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ It ’ s not good for innovation , and it ’ s not good for competition .
I ’ m curious about your view of the Microsoft / Netscape enforcement action , which seems to be the shadow over all of this .
Did it work ?
Did it not work ?
Did just knocking Microsoft back a little bit create the environment for Google to emerge ?
There are multiple interpretations of what happened .
I don ’ t think there ’ s any question it worked .
I don ’ t @ @ @ @ @ @ @ made space for an enormous amount of additional innovation and competition , just pursuing the enforcement action itself , not the consent decree .
Are you hoping for a similar result here ?
Are you hoping to take it one step further ?
This is not an investigation that results in an enforcement action investigation .
Congress is the only place that has the ability to actually change the statutes and update the laws and put proposed regulations in place that actually fix this marketplace .
So unlike an enforcement action that focuses @ @ @ @ @ @ @ gets directed to do a single thing — our work is much broader .
And it is actually more significant because if we do it right , we can get this digital marketplace working properly .
And that will benefit consumers .
It will benefit the next great company that ’ s going to come down the pike because competition was possible .
But if you write a bunch of new laws and regulations , and then you staff an agency with creative , enthusiastic people who want to do it , you @ @ @ @ @ @ @ bunch more enforcement actions , presumably .
Correct .
Or much better behavior by digital platforms .

Last week, the House Antitrust Subcommittee held a unique hearing where executives from Sonos, Tile, Basecamp, and PopSockets laid out the challenges of working and competing with big tech companies like Apple, Google, and Amazon. It felt like a turning point in the conversation about big tech platforms and the power they have over competition, something PopSockets CEO David Barnett called “bullying with a smile.”
“Help us Congress, you’re our only hope,” said Basecamp’s David Heinemeier-Hansson. It was like that.
But the hearing was just one part of a lengthy Antitrust Subcommittee investigation into the competitiveness of digital markets led by Chairman David Cicilline (D-RI) that’s been going on for some time — a bipartisan investigation that’s about to conclude with a report and recommendations for new laws and regulations that govern how big tech platforms work. Cicilline joined Verge senior reporter Adi Robertson and editor-in-chief Nilay Patel for a special interview episode of The Vergecast this week where he talked about what he’s learned and how he plans to tackle the big platform monopolies.
The following excerpt has been lightly edited for clarity and length.
So we’re talking while opening arguments of impeachment are going on in the Senate. It seems like there’s just a lot of polarization in the world. But I was watching the [antitrust] hearing, and I was struck that there seems to be at least a bipartisan consensus on the problem, if not the substance.
You know, when we launched the investigation, that was done in a bipartisan way with the full support of the ranking member, the Republican leader on the Judiciary Committee as well as the ranking member of the subcommittee, [Rep. Jim] Sensenbrenner.
So the investigation has been thoroughly bipartisan and in a very real way. Our staffs are working closely together. And I think you’re right. I don’t know that we’ll have agreement on every single proposal or a recommendation that the final report makes, but I think there’s broad recognition from Republicans and Democrats that this market is not functioning properly, that there is a significant absence of competition and strong evidence of anti-competitive behavior by the dominant platforms. And I think there is a real understanding and expectation that we’re going to do something about this as a Congress. The American people are expecting us to. So it’s been very bipartisan. I hope it will stay that way.
One of the striking things from the hearing last week was how different the accusations against each of these companies was. How much do you think the same remedy is going to work for Google and Apple and Facebook and Amazon?
That’s a great question. We’ve been very careful in this investigation to solicit information from the platforms, both in testimony and in documents relevant to the way those platforms are operating, because I think they’re not all the same, and their behavior has been different in many respects.
So I think we’re going to look at solutions that provide a response broadly to the marketplace. There are some issues where I think there have been very serious concerns by a particular company in this area or this particular company in that area. But I think this is very much about the marketplace generally, and you will not see recommendations that are specific to a company, just like the investigation is not about a company, it’s really about the marketplace broadly. And so I hope the suggestions we develop, both in terms of legislation and in terms of proposed regulations, will address the marketplace broadly, but obviously respond to a number of different activities that we’ve seen throughout the investigation.
Do you think that you can craft a single framework that’s going to address the whole spread of problems from that hearing?
Yes, I do. The goal is to create competition, to protect competition in that digital marketplace so that when Amazon says “give us back money for selling your product at a lower cost,” people have an opportunity to think about another platform because that other platform will have had an opportunity to grow and be successful and enter the marketplace. So competition in each of these examples is the solution, and making sure that we’re promoting competition and protecting folks from a whole range of discriminatory behavior or bullying. I think you can imagine a number of ideas. I would just say you can’t engage in behavior that does X, Y or Z that would apply broadly to all of the large digital platforms.
That’s a pretty classic conception of a behavioral remedy. “You can’t do this.” We’re going to say you can’t do it. You’re forbidden from doing it. But there was a lot of talk about, especially with Amazon, the platforms self-dealing, cutting themselves better deals, selling their own products.
I spoke to Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) last year, and she said you can’t just do basic behavioral solutions. You’ve got to do a structural solution. And that’s why she was proposing breakups. Do you agree with her on that?
First of all, I think it’s hard. Congress has certain powers, and breaking up companies is actually not one of them.
So while we may have made a mistake by allowing some of these companies to get as large as they have — in fact, we have made a mistake. I think we should have had much more rigorous antitrust enforcement that would have prevented a number of these companies from getting as big as they are. That’s a problem.
And so I think what we have to figure out now is: are there ways to require a retrospective review of some transactions? There’s no way to ensure that if the transaction is approved based on a set of expectations, that you then have an option to go and see if those expectations were bad or something different happened and learn from that. But I think it’s harder for Congress to think about enacting a statute that breaks up companies.
But I do think that the other suggestion that Sen. Warren has made is a really interesting one and something I think about a lot: the notion of “You can be either a platform or you can be a manufacturer or a producer of services, but you can’t do both.” Sort of the Glass-Steagall of the internet. It’s kind of an interesting idea because people go to a platform thinking, somehow, when they do a search, there’s some neutral way that evidence is reviewed, and you’re provided with a result from that search.
Well, we know that that is not the case, the way items get into the Amazon buy box. And Amazon used its own private label to promote it or promotes its own goods. It creates sort of an inherent conflict. You know, you’re both a platform and a manufacturer of goods. And so it’s kind of an interesting idea to think: should you at least separate out those functions and say you can be one or the other, but you can’t be both?
I think these companies are too big, and we’ve allowed them to exercise monopoly power. We have to figure out how to correct that. I’m looking at kind of what are the current antitrust tools that are available to antitrust enforcers, and how we might use those to promote competition. But there is not a mechanism that I can think of that would allow us, as Congress, to go and break up a particular company. I think we can do a lot of things to correct the absence of competition in that space. Everything is on the table, in my view. But I have to think long and hard about how we could, in a congressional enactment, actually break up a company.
I’ve had a bunch of Microsoft executives from the ‘90s tweeting me all day about how Microsoft’s antitrust suit didn’t actually accomplish anything. And really, the question that they keep asking is: what shouldn’t you be able to integrate?
So Tile was at the hearing. They built tracking products. We don’t know yet, but Apple is rumored to be building a tracking product. Apple’s products will obviously have greater access to the operating system of the iPhone than Tile’s product. Should that kind of conduct be prohibited? Should Apple have to have open APIs, which was part of the Microsoft consent decree?
I would have to think about the example you gave. But certainly if, in that example, Apple makes it much more difficult for people to access the Tile product using their software and ... they constantly get reminders [asking], “Do you want to continue this service?” or constantly prodding them to have to answer a prompt. And that creates the kind of friction that ensures that their competitor doesn’t really have access to the marketplace. Or if they do, it’s short-lived.
I think what we have to look at is if the behavior of the company can fairly be described as anti-competitive. Are they using their market dominance to make it impossible for a competitor to enter the marketplace and survive, and as a result, leading to a reduction of innovation, a reduction of choices for consumers, maybe ultimately increasing costs? They’re only able to do that because they have so much market dominance.
How do we deal with the reality that these four large technology platforms are so big and control so much of the market? That they can, with a change of an algorithm, make it more difficult to access their software, make it almost impossible for a competitor to survive? That’s not good for the economy. It’s not good for consumer choices. It’s not good for innovation, and it’s not good for competition.
I’m curious about your view of the Microsoft / Netscape enforcement action, which seems to be the shadow over all of this. Did it work? Did it not work? Did just knocking Microsoft back a little bit create the environment for Google to emerge? There are multiple interpretations of what happened.
I don’t think there’s any question it worked. I don’t think there’s any question that made space for an enormous amount of additional innovation and competition, just pursuing the enforcement action itself, not the consent decree.
Are you hoping for a similar result here? Are you hoping to take it one step further?
This is not an investigation that results in an enforcement action investigation.
Congress is the only place that has the ability to actually change the statutes and update the laws and put proposed regulations in place that actually fix this marketplace. So unlike an enforcement action that focuses on the behavior — a single company gets directed to do a single thing — our work is much broader. And it is actually more significant because if we do it right, we can get this digital marketplace working properly. And that will benefit consumers. It will benefit the next great company that’s going to come down the pike because competition was possible.
But if you write a bunch of new laws and regulations, and then you staff an agency with creative, enthusiastic people who want to do it, you’re going to result in a bunch more enforcement actions, presumably.


theverge--2020-01-24--How much longer will we trust Google’s search results?

Happy Friday to you !
I have been reflecting a bit on the controversy du jour : Google ’ s redesigned search results .
Google is trying to foreground sourcing and URLs , but in the process it made its results look more like ads , or vice versa .
Bottom line : Google ’ s ads just look like search results now .
I ’ m thinking about it because I have to admit that I don ’ t personally hate the new favicon -plus-URL structure .
But I think that might be because I am not a normal @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ve been on the web since the late ‘ 90s and I parse information out of URLs kind of without thinking about it .
( In fact , the relative decline of valuable information getting encoded into the URL is a thing that makes me sad . )
I admit that I am not a normal user .
I set up custom Chrome searches and export them to my other browsers .
I know what SERP means and the term kind of slips out in regular conversation sometimes .
I have opinions about @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
I ’ m a weirdo .
As that weirdo , Google ’ s design makes perfect sense and it ’ s possible it might do the same for regular folk .
The new layout for search result is ugly at first glance — but then Google was always ugly until relatively recently .
I very quickly learned to unconsciously take in the information from the top favicon and URL-esque info without it really distracting me .
...
Which is basically the problem .
Google ’ s using that same design language to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ obvious , visually distinct methods .
It ’ s consistent , I guess , but it also feels deceptive .
Recode ’ s Peter Kafka recently interviewed Buzzfeed CEO Jonah Peretti , and Peretti said something really insightful : what if Google ’ s ads really aren ’ t that good ?
What if Google is just taking credit for clicks on ads just because people would have been searching for that stuff anyway ?
I ’ ve been thinking about it all day : what if Google ads actually aren ’ t @ @ @ @ @ @ @ make so much is billions of people use Google ?
The pressure to make them more effective would be fairly strong , then , wouldn ’ t it ?
And it would get increasingly hard to resist that pressure over time .
I am old enough to remember using the search engines before Google .
I didn ’ t know how bad their search technology was compared to what was to come , but I did have to bounce between several of them to find what I wanted .
Knowing what was a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ good for Yahoo was one of my Power User Of The Internet skills .
So when Google hit , I didn ’ t realize how powerful and good the PageRank technology was right away .
What I noticed right away is that I could trust the search results to be “ organic ” instead of paid and that there were no dark patterns tricking me into clicking on an ad .
One of the reasons Google won search in the first place with old people like me was that in addition to its @ @ @ @ @ @ @ line against allowing paid advertisements into its search results than its competitors .
With other search engines , there was the problem of “ paid inclusion , ” which is the rare business practice that does exactly what the phrase means .
You never really knew if what you were seeing was the result of a web-crawling bot or a business deal .
This new ad layout doesn ’ t cross that line , but it ’ s definitely problematic and it definitely reduces my trust in Google ’ s results .
It @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as paid occlusion .
Today , I still trust Google to not allow business dealings to affect the rankings of its organic results , but how much does that matter if most people can ’ t visually tell the difference at first glance ?
And how much does that matter when certain sections of Google , like hotels and flights , do use paid inclusion ?
And how much does that matter when business dealings very likely do affect the outcome of what you get when you use the next generation of search @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of all : if Google is willing to visually muddle ads , how long until its users lose trust in the algorithm itself ?
With this change , Google is becoming what it once sought to overcome : AltaVista .
More from The Verge └ I trained with Tonal , the ‘ Peloton for weightlifting ’ └ Apple Watch gym partnerships give you perks for working out └ Google I/O 2020 will kick off on May 12th Every year Google does a little online game or coding challenge and every year it ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Google leaned into that and it seems to have worked .
It ’ s a little too early for me to guess what we can expect at I/O this year .
Google itself often doesn ’ t decide until the last minute .
Given everything that ’ s happened in the past year , though , I ’ l say this : if the entire keynote was just a frank discussion of Google ’ s privacy policies and how it intends to be more transparent about what data is has on us and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ wouldn ’ t complain .
└ How to FBI-proof your encrypted iPhone backups Barbara Krasnoff had to do way more legwork to get the full , accurate story here than you might think just by reading this .
I do think Apple could do a much better job simplifying the settings for people who don ’ t want Apple to have the keys for their backups .
But I also think writing a similar guide for Android would be similarly complicated .
└ Comcast plans price hikes for cable customers as it looks @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ?
Check .
Reduced investment in building out broadband infrastructure ?
Check .
Data caps ?
Check .
Exempting your own streaming video service from data caps ?
Check .
Huge cable company shamelessly exploiting the fact that net neutrality is dead and doing the very thing that net neutrality opponents promised wouldn ’ t happen , assuming that either nobody would notice or at the very least nobody would connect the dots between this and the lack of regulation that allowed it ?
Check check and check again .
( Disclosure : @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s parent company , Vox Media . )
└ Everything you need to know about the new coronavirus in China └ Samsung ’ s next foldable may have an ‘ ultra thin ’ glass display If this turns out to be true , it ’ s a huge deal .
And it will be a huge problem for Motorola , whose Razr will only have been on the market for five days when Samsung announces the Z Flip on the 11th .
Maybe it ’ s just because it ’ s a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ m getting more and more excited about folding phones .
For years we ’ ve watched phones get bigger and less pocketable and for whatever reason ( the reason is probably that they don ’ t sell well ) , nobody is making high-quality small phones anymore .
Foldables aren ’ t exactly that , but they ’ re at least heading in the right direction .
I will gladly take a little more thickness on the Z axis ( maybe THAT is why it ’ s called the Z Flip ! )
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ that doesn ’ t stick out of my pocket .
└ Sonos CEO apologizes for confusion , says legacy products will work ‘ as long as possible ’ It ’ s notable that nothing actually changed here policy-wise : Sonos is still going to try to support these speakers , it is still admitting it won ’ t be able to provide software updates , and it will still try to figure out a way to cordon these legacy products off so they don ’ t hold newer products back in people ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ important thing has changed : Sonos admitted it really screwed up the communication around these changes .
It ’ s been a mess since the recycling mode first came to light .
You can ’ t unring a bell , but it ’ s at least good to admit you screwed up in the first place .

Happy Friday to you! I have been reflecting a bit on the controversy du jour: Google’s redesigned search results. Google is trying to foreground sourcing and URLs, but in the process it made its results look more like ads, or vice versa. Bottom line: Google’s ads just look like search results now.
I’m thinking about it because I have to admit that I don’t personally hate the new favicon -plus-URL structure. But I think that might be because I am not a normal consumer of web content. I’ve been on the web since the late ‘90s and I parse information out of URLs kind of without thinking about it. (In fact, the relative decline of valuable information getting encoded into the URL is a thing that makes me sad.)
I admit that I am not a normal user. I set up custom Chrome searches and export them to my other browsers. I know what SERP means and the term kind of slips out in regular conversation sometimes. I have opinions about AMP and its URL and caching structure. I’m a weirdo.
As that weirdo, Google’s design makes perfect sense and it’s possible it might do the same for regular folk. The new layout for search result is ugly at first glance — but then Google was always ugly until relatively recently. I very quickly learned to unconsciously take in the information from the top favicon and URL-esque info without it really distracting me.
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...Which is basically the problem. Google’s using that same design language to identify its ads instead of much more obvious, visually distinct methods. It’s consistent, I guess, but it also feels deceptive.
Recode’s Peter Kafka recently interviewed Buzzfeed CEO Jonah Peretti, and Peretti said something really insightful: what if Google’s ads really aren’t that good? What if Google is just taking credit for clicks on ads just because people would have been searching for that stuff anyway? I’ve been thinking about it all day: what if Google ads actually aren’t that effective and the only reason they make so much is billions of people use Google?
The pressure to make them more effective would be fairly strong, then, wouldn’t it? And it would get increasingly hard to resist that pressure over time.
I am old enough to remember using the search engines before Google. I didn’t know how bad their search technology was compared to what was to come, but I did have to bounce between several of them to find what I wanted. Knowing what was a good search for WebCrawler and what was good for Yahoo was one of my Power User Of The Internet skills.
So when Google hit, I didn’t realize how powerful and good the PageRank technology was right away. What I noticed right away is that I could trust the search results to be “organic” instead of paid and that there were no dark patterns tricking me into clicking on an ad.
One of the reasons Google won search in the first place with old people like me was that in addition to its superior technology, it drew a harder line against allowing paid advertisements into its search results than its competitors.
With other search engines, there was the problem of “paid inclusion,” which is the rare business practice that does exactly what the phrase means. You never really knew if what you were seeing was the result of a web-crawling bot or a business deal.
This new ad layout doesn’t cross that line, but it’s definitely problematic and it definitely reduces my trust in Google’s results. It’s not so much paid inclusion as paid occlusion.
Today, I still trust Google to not allow business dealings to affect the rankings of its organic results, but how much does that matter if most people can’t visually tell the difference at first glance? And how much does that matter when certain sections of Google, like hotels and flights, do use paid inclusion? And how much does that matter when business dealings very likely do affect the outcome of what you get when you use the next generation of search, the Google Assistant?
And most of all: if Google is willing to visually muddle ads, how long until its users lose trust in the algorithm itself? With this change, Google is becoming what it once sought to overcome: AltaVista.
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Excellent review from Natt Garun.
Tonal is unique in this field for its focus on weight training instead of cardio. Think of the machine like a slimmer, low-profile Bowflex that mounts flush against the wall rather than taking up an entire corner of your room. With arms that can be adjusted and folded away, it’s also a bit less likely to end up as an expensive coat rack.
Every year Google does a little online game or coding challenge and every year it’s solved really quickly. This year Google leaned into that and it seems to have worked.
It’s a little too early for me to guess what we can expect at I/O this year. Google itself often doesn’t decide until the last minute. Given everything that’s happened in the past year, though, I’l say this: if the entire keynote was just a frank discussion of Google’s privacy policies and how it intends to be more transparent about what data is has on us and how we can control it, I wouldn’t complain.
Barbara Krasnoff had to do way more legwork to get the full, accurate story here than you might think just by reading this. I do think Apple could do a much better job simplifying the settings for people who don’t want Apple to have the keys for their backups. But I also think writing a similar guide for Android would be similarly complicated.
Price hikes? Check. Reduced investment in building out broadband infrastructure? Check. Data caps? Check. Exempting your own streaming video service from data caps? Check. Huge cable company shamelessly exploiting the fact that net neutrality is dead and doing the very thing that net neutrality opponents promised wouldn’t happen, assuming that either nobody would notice or at the very least nobody would connect the dots between this and the lack of regulation that allowed it? Check check and check again. (Disclosure: NBCU is an investor in The Verge’s parent company, Vox Media.)
If this turns out to be true, it’s a huge deal. And it will be a huge problem for Motorola, whose Razr will only have been on the market for five days when Samsung announces the Z Flip on the 11th.
Maybe it’s just because it’s a new form factor, but I’m getting more and more excited about folding phones. For years we’ve watched phones get bigger and less pocketable and for whatever reason (the reason is probably that they don’t sell well), nobody is making high-quality small phones anymore.
Foldables aren’t exactly that, but they’re at least heading in the right direction. I will gladly take a little more thickness on the Z axis (maybe THAT is why it’s called the Z Flip!) if it means having a big-screen phone that doesn’t stick out of my pocket.
It’s notable that nothing actually changed here policy-wise: Sonos is still going to try to support these speakers, it is still admitting it won’t be able to provide software updates, and it will still try to figure out a way to cordon these legacy products off so they don’t hold newer products back in people’s home.


theverge--2020-01-24--Big tech CEOs are learning the art of the filibuster

The Interface is a daily column and newsletter about the intersection of social media and democracy .
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You maniacs sold out our second-ever Interface live event , with Uncanny Valley author Anna Wiener , in record time .
Thanks to everyone who bought a ticket , and we ’ ll look into finding a bigger venue for the next one .
In the meantime , I ’ m looking forward to seeing a good number of you on February 4th !
The basic idea behind journalism is that there are things people don ’ t know that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ought to go find the people who do know about the things and ask them .
Most of the time when a journalist interviews someone , they learn something useful , and then report it all back to us so we can have a shared understanding of reality and make better decisions about how to live .
Historically , a person that lots of journalists have wanted to talk to is the big tech CEO .
As companies like Amazon and Apple grew in power , getting the chance to sit down with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ became wildly appealing .
Here were people who knew about many , many things — things that affected almost all of us — and could tell us about them with a candor that their employees typically will not permit themselves .
And yet when you think of what you have learned from reading the thoughts of tech CEOs over the past few years — well , what have you learned ?
If you hang around the darker , more thought-leader-y corners of Medium , it ’ s possible you ’ ll have gleaned @ @ @ @ @ @ @ recruiting .
But if what you ’ re after is a CEO ’ s worldview — or even just a moderately unvarnished look into their decision-making process — you typically come up empty .
I thought about all this today while reading Adam Lashinsky ’ s “ conversation ” with Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai in Fortune .
It ’ s the first long interview Pichai has given since being elevated to the role of Alphabet CEO , and Lashinsky asks him about many of the subjects you would expect from a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ why Alphabet exists , and whether Pichai will crack down on the spending of its non-Google companies .
He asks what companies Pichai considers to be his competition , and whether he has a plan to deal with the possibility that the US government will attempt to break up Alphabet on antitrust grounds .
And what Lashinsky gets back from Google is ... almost nothing at all .
Here ’ s a characteristically empty exchange : Who do you see as your biggest competitors ?
I ’ ve always worried as a company @ @ @ @ @ @ @ within , that you stop executing well , you focus on the wrong things , you get distracted .
I think when you focus on competitors you start chasing and playing by the rules of what other people are good at rather than what makes you good as a company .
Do you have a scenario you plan for in which regulators break up Alphabet on antitrust grounds ?
At our scale we realize there will be scrutiny .
We always engage constructively , and we take feedback to the extent there are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with it .
But obviously we understand the role of regulators .
So there you have it : Alphabet ’ s biggest competitor is itself ( ? )
, and its plan for an attempted breakup of the company is understanding the role that regulators play in society .
To be clear , I ’ m not not criticizing Fortune here .
These are questions that almost anyone would have asked .
And I doubt there are many reporters who would have gotten different answers .
But it ’ s clear that as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ darkened , tech CEOs see increasingly little value in having meaningful public conversations .
Instead , they grit their teeth through every question , treating every encounter as something in between a legal deposition and a hostage negotiation .
We saw this in 2018 , when the New Yorker profiled Mark Zuckerberg .
We saw it again last year , when Jack Dorsey went on a podcast tour .
At some point this year Tim Cook will probably give a zero-calorie interview to someone , and if it ’ s a slow-enough news @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for a fourth time .
To some extent , CEOs ’ reticence to engage is understandable .
When you are effectively a head of state , and staring down the barrel of potentially company-ending regulation , you have strong incentives to do as little thinking in public as possible .
But journalists , I think , have a responsibility to point that out in real time — to call a dodge a dodge .
For a long time I thought the point of journalism was to get into a room with the CEO @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was embarrassingly late to realize that the bigger story was almost always elsewhere , in the events unfolding just outside the CEO ’ s field of vision .
Access will always have its appeal , and I still wouldn ’ t turn down an interview with the CEO of any company I cover .
But as I wrote about Dorsey ’ s podcast tour : The solution , as ever , is to fall back on that oldest journalistic principle : talk to the people who know the things you want to find @ @ @ @ @ @ @ recognition that the CEO doesn ’ t have a monopoly on knowledge — and that to the extent he knows anything useful , he is probably going to do his best not to talk about it .
Yesterday , we included a link to this story about Facebook and Twitter having evidence that could keep people out of prison—but the Stored Communications Act forbids them from giving it up .
Alex Stamos pushed back against the article ’ s framing on Twitter , saying “ Updating these Reagan-signed laws is totally reasonable , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ t take into account the last decade of tech companies fighting to keep user data classified as stored communications content.
” Today in news that could affect public perception of the big tech platforms .
Trending up : Pinterest CEO Ben Silbermann is talking about his decision to pull all medical information from the platform after users started searching for vaccines .
He said “ we couldn ’ t ensure that we were giving people great information.
” Trending down : The spread of misinformation about climate change has increased during Australia @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of Facebook ’ s fact-checking program .
Fact checkers have focused on misleading photos and videos , but are leaving climate-related misinformation mostly untouched .
⭐ Clearview AI , the controversial facial-recognition company that has amassed a database of billions of photos , claimed it helped crack a case of alleged terrorism in a New York City subway station last August in a matter of seconds .
The cops say that ’ s not true .
Ryan Mac , Caroline Haskins and Logan McDonald from BuzzFeed report : Sixty years ago , Woody @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Today , his place in the field of facial recognition has been largely forgotten .
This profile dives into his story — and his relationship with the CIA , which seems to have become one of his clients .
( Shaun Raviv / Wired ) Adrian Chen writes about why facial recognition has suddenly become a hot-button issue .
“ The most obvious answer is that the technology has been improved , streamlined , and commercialized , ” he argues as part of a package of stories about facial recognition .
( @ @ @ @ @ @ @ People are retaliating against big tech by calling SWAT teams to executives ’ homes .
Facebook employees have been a particularly favorite target , with Instagram chief Adam Mosseri being swatted in November .
This is insanely dangerous , and police departments have been slow to acknowledge the threat .
Swatting is a violent crime and ought to be treated as one by the courts .
( Sheera Frenkel / The New York Times ) Facebook is about to face off with the IRS in a rare trial to capture billions that the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ onerous budget cuts have hamstrung the agency ’ s ability to bring the case .
( Paul Kiel / ProPublica ) Facebook is worried about Democrats winning the presidential election .
Many of them hold the social network responsible for Trump ’ s 2016 victory , assail it for allowing misinformation to spread , and have vowed to regulate it or break it up .
( Sara Fischer and Scott Rosenberg / Axios ) Rep. David Cicilline is the House Democrat leading the investigation into Amazon , Apple , Facebook and Google .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ or press criminal charges , he ’ s opted to convene high-profile hearings and give air time to smaller businesses frightened by the Big Four .
( Nancy Scola and Cristiano Lima / Politico ) Presidential candidate Mike Bloomberg wants to replicate and build off what Trump ’ s campaign did best , without mimicking his style .
And that means lots of Facebook ads .
( Mike Allen and Margaret Talev / Axios ) Twitter ’ s attempts to stop people from targeting ads using keywords that include sexist terms or racial @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
While users are still able to select those terms when targeting an ad , Twitter said the terms won ’ t “ register ” as keywords once the ad is published .
( Shoshana Wodinsky / Gizmodo ) The report from FTI Consulting that strongly implicates Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in the hacking of Jeff Bezos ’ iPhone X in 2018 has not fully convinced the cybersecurity community .
They say there are still open questions about the attack , starting with a most basic one : how exactly did @ @ @ @ @ @ @ / CyberScoop ) As India experiences the longest-ever internet blockade for a democracy , more countries are pressing the internet kill switch to snub dissent .
Experts warn that the tactic is being used as a form of protest suppression .
( Puja Changoiwala / OneZero ) ⭐ TikTok announced a new licensing deal with Merlin , a global agency that represents tens of thousands of independent music labels and hundreds of thousands of artists .
The deals allows TikTok to use music from the label on its platform and on its forthcoming @ @ @ @ @ @ @ from TechCrunch has the story : TikTok moved its operations to a new office in Los Angeles .
“ While we are a global company , having a permanent office in LA speaks to our commitment to the U.S. market and deepens our bonds with the city , ” writes Vanessa Pappas , TikTok ’ s general manager in the United States .
Twitter is rolling out a new feature that lets users add iMessage-like reactions to direct messages .
The company first started testing this emoji reaction feature last year , but @ @ @ @ @ @ @ out to all users on the web , iOS , and Android .
( Chance Miller / 9To5Mac ) American bathrooms have become the stage set of the moment .
With good lighting , acoustics , and privacy , they ’ re the ideal place for the dramatic entrances , exits , skits , dances and story times of TikTok .
( Taylor Lorenz / The New York Times ) Angelina Jolie is producing a BBC show to help kids spot fake news .
The show explains the stories behind news and offers @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the age of 13 make up their own minds on pressing international issues .
( Brian Steinberg / Variety ) Josh Constine makes the case that Facebook and Instagram should mark stories as “ watched ” so users stop seeing story reruns across both apps .
Co-signed .
( Josh Constine / TechCrunch ) TripAdvisor is cutting hundreds of jobs in an attempt to cut costs as competition from Google intensifies .
The search giant has launched a variety of travel search tools , as well as reviews of hotels and restaurants , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ appear at the top of the world ’ s most-used search engine .
( Mark Gurman and Olivia Carville / Bloomberg ) Tinder launched some new safety features , including a photo verification system that ’ ll place a blue check mark on daters ’ profiles .
The system requires daters to take a selfie in real time that matches a pose shown by a model in a sample image .
( Ashley Carman / The Verge ) Yesterday in this space , we brought you the story of United States senators flouting @ @ @ @ @ @ @ into the room for the ongoing impeachment trial of Donald Trump .
On Wednesday , senators were spotted wearing Apple Watches .
Today , Niels Lesniewski writes in Roll Call , they ’ re taking a decidedly analog approach to solving the agony of losing their smartphones : Another approach to resolving their boredom could be simply paying attention to the trial , but I realize that ’ s a big ask .
Send us tips , comments , questions , and your questions for Sundar Pichai : casey @ theverge.com and zoe @ @ @

You maniacs sold out our second-ever Interface live event, with Uncanny Valley author Anna Wiener, in record time. Thanks to everyone who bought a ticket, and we’ll look into finding a bigger venue for the next one. In the meantime, I’m looking forward to seeing a good number of you on February 4th!
The basic idea behind journalism is that there are things people don’t know that they should know, and that someone ought to go find the people who do know about the things and ask them. Most of the time when a journalist interviews someone, they learn something useful, and then report it all back to us so we can have a shared understanding of reality and make better decisions about how to live.
Historically, a person that lots of journalists have wanted to talk to is the big tech CEO. As companies like Amazon and Apple grew in power, getting the chance to sit down with a Jeff Bezos or a Tim Cook became wildly appealing. Here were people who knew about many, many things — things that affected almost all of us — and could tell us about them with a candor that their employees typically will not permit themselves.
And yet when you think of what you have learned from reading the thoughts of tech CEOs over the past few years — well, what have you learned? If you hang around the darker, more thought-leader-y corners of Medium, it’s possible you’ll have gleaned a few insights into customer acquisition or recruiting. But if what you’re after is a CEO’s worldview — or even just a moderately unvarnished look into their decision-making process — you typically come up empty.
I thought about all this today while reading Adam Lashinsky’s “conversation” with Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai in Fortune. It’s the first long interview Pichai has given since being elevated to the role of Alphabet CEO, and Lashinsky asks him about many of the subjects you would expect from a journalist in his position.
Lashinsky asks why Alphabet exists, and whether Pichai will crack down on the spending of its non-Google companies. He asks what companies Pichai considers to be his competition, and whether he has a plan to deal with the possibility that the US government will attempt to break up Alphabet on antitrust grounds. And what Lashinsky gets back from Google is ... almost nothing at all. Here’s a characteristically empty exchange:
Who do you see as your biggest competitors? I’ve always worried as a company at scale your biggest competition is from within, that you stop executing well, you focus on the wrong things, you get distracted. I think when you focus on competitors you start chasing and playing by the rules of what other people are good at rather than what makes you good as a company. Do you have a scenario you plan for in which regulators break up Alphabet on antitrust grounds? At our scale we realize there will be scrutiny. We always engage constructively, and we take feedback to the extent there are areas where sometimes we may not agree with it. But obviously we understand the role of regulators.
So there you have it: Alphabet’s biggest competitor is itself (?), and its plan for an attempted breakup of the company is understanding the role that regulators play in society.
To be clear, I’m not not criticizing Fortune here. These are questions that almost anyone would have asked. And I doubt there are many reporters who would have gotten different answers.
But it’s clear that as prevailing sentiment about big tech companies has darkened, tech CEOs see increasingly little value in having meaningful public conversations. Instead, they grit their teeth through every question, treating every encounter as something in between a legal deposition and a hostage negotiation.
We saw this in 2018, when the New Yorker profiled Mark Zuckerberg. We saw it again last year, when Jack Dorsey went on a podcast tour. At some point this year Tim Cook will probably give a zero-calorie interview to someone, and if it’s a slow-enough news day I’ll write this column for a fourth time.
To some extent, CEOs’ reticence to engage is understandable. When you are effectively a head of state, and staring down the barrel of potentially company-ending regulation, you have strong incentives to do as little thinking in public as possible. But journalists, I think, have a responsibility to point that out in real time — to call a dodge a dodge.
For a long time I thought the point of journalism was to get into a room with the CEO and ask the big questions. I was embarrassingly late to realize that the bigger story was almost always elsewhere, in the events unfolding just outside the CEO’s field of vision. Access will always have its appeal, and I still wouldn’t turn down an interview with the CEO of any company I cover. But as I wrote about Dorsey’s podcast tour:
The CEO is traditionally in the best position to enact change. But we have learned that once social networks grow to a certain scale, they begin to operate beyond their creators’ control. You can ask the CEOs what they plan to do about it. But the answers will always tell you less than you hope.
The solution, as ever, is to fall back on that oldest journalistic principle: talk to the people who know the things you want to find out. And that starts with the recognition that the CEO doesn’t have a monopoly on knowledge — and that to the extent he knows anything useful, he is probably going to do his best not to talk about it.
Pushback
Yesterday, we included a link to this story about Facebook and Twitter having evidence that could keep people out of prison—but the Stored Communications Act forbids them from giving it up. Alex Stamos pushed back against the article’s framing on Twitter, saying “Updating these Reagan-signed laws is totally reasonable, but I really dislike reporting that doesn’t take into account the last decade of tech companies fighting to keep user data classified as stored communications content.”
The Ratio
Today in news that could affect public perception of the big tech platforms.
🔼 Trending up: Pinterest CEO Ben Silbermann is talking about his decision to pull all medical information from the platform after users started searching for vaccines. He said “we couldn’t ensure that we were giving people great information.”
🔽 Trending down: The spread of misinformation about climate change has increased during Australia’s bushfires, demonstrating the limits of Facebook’s fact-checking program. Fact checkers have focused on misleading photos and videos, but are leaving climate-related misinformation mostly untouched.
Governing
⭐ Clearview AI, the controversial facial-recognition company that has amassed a database of billions of photos, claimed it helped crack a case of alleged terrorism in a New York City subway station last August in a matter of seconds. The cops say that’s not true. Ryan Mac, Caroline Haskins and Logan McDonald from BuzzFeed report:
As it emerges from the shadows, Clearview is attempting to convince law enforcement that its facial recognition tool, which has been trained on photos scraped from Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and other websites, is more accurate than any other on the market. However, emails, presentations, and flyers obtained by BuzzFeed News reveal that its claims to law enforcement agencies are impossible to verify — or flat-out wrong. For example, the pitch email about its role in catching an alleged terrorist, which BuzzFeed News obtained via a public records request last month, explained that when the suspect’s photo was “searched in Clearview,” its software linked the image to an online profile with the man’s name in less than five seconds. Clearview AI’s website also takes credit in a flashy promotional video, using the incident, in which a man allegedly placed rice cookers made to look like bombs, as one example among thousands in which the company assisted law enforcement. But the NYPD says this account is not true.
Sixty years ago, Woody Bledsoe invented technology that could identify faces. Today, his place in the field of facial recognition has been largely forgotten. This profile dives into his story — and his relationship with the CIA, which seems to have become one of his clients. (Shaun Raviv / Wired)
Adrian Chen writes about why facial recognition has suddenly become a hot-button issue. “The most obvious answer is that the technology has been improved, streamlined, and commercialized,” he argues as part of a package of stories about facial recognition. (Adrian Chen / California Sunday Magazine)
People are retaliating against big tech by calling SWAT teams to executives’ homes. Facebook employees have been a particularly favorite target, with Instagram chief Adam Mosseri being swatted in November. This is insanely dangerous, and police departments have been slow to acknowledge the threat. Swatting is a violent crime and ought to be treated as one by the courts. (Sheera Frenkel / The New York Times)
Facebook is about to face off with the IRS in a rare trial to capture billions that the tax agency thinks Facebook owes. But onerous budget cuts have hamstrung the agency’s ability to bring the case. (Paul Kiel / ProPublica)
Facebook is worried about Democrats winning the presidential election. Many of them hold the social network responsible for Trump’s 2016 victory, assail it for allowing misinformation to spread, and have vowed to regulate it or break it up. (Sara Fischer and Scott Rosenberg / Axios)
Rep. David Cicilline is the House Democrat leading the investigation into Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google. Since he can’t issue fines or press criminal charges, he’s opted to convene high-profile hearings and give air time to smaller businesses frightened by the Big Four. (Nancy Scola and Cristiano Lima / Politico)
Presidential candidate Mike Bloomberg wants to replicate and build off what Trump’s campaign did best, without mimicking his style. And that means lots of Facebook ads. (Mike Allen and Margaret Talev / Axios)
Twitter’s attempts to stop people from targeting ads using keywords that include sexist terms or racial slurs have created a confusing user experience. While users are still able to select those terms when targeting an ad, Twitter said the terms won’t “register” as keywords once the ad is published. (Shoshana Wodinsky / Gizmodo)
The report from FTI Consulting that strongly implicates Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in the hacking of Jeff Bezos’ iPhone X in 2018 has not fully convinced the cybersecurity community. They say there are still open questions about the attack, starting with a most basic one: how exactly did the hack work? (Shannon Vavra / CyberScoop)
As India experiences the longest-ever internet blockade for a democracy, more countries are pressing the internet kill switch to snub dissent. Experts warn that the tactic is being used as a form of protest suppression. (Puja Changoiwala / OneZero)
Industry
⭐ TikTok announced a new licensing deal with Merlin, a global agency that represents tens of thousands of independent music labels and hundreds of thousands of artists. The deals allows TikTok to use music from the label on its platform and on its forthcoming music service, Resso. Ingrid Lunden from TechCrunch has the story:
The news is significant because this is the first major music licensing deal announced by TikTok as part of its wider efforts in the music industry. Notably, it’s not the first: I’ve confirmed TikTok has actually secured other major labels but has been restricted from going public on the details. The Merlin deal is therefore a template of what TikTok is likely signing with others: it includes both its mainstay short-form videos — where music plays a key role (the app, before it was acquired by Bytedance, was even called ‘Musically’) — as well as new music streaming services.
TikTok moved its operations to a new office in Los Angeles. “While we are a global company, having a permanent office in LA speaks to our commitment to the U.S. market and deepens our bonds with the city,” writes Vanessa Pappas, TikTok’s general manager in the United States.
Twitter is rolling out a new feature that lets users add iMessage-like reactions to direct messages. The company first started testing this emoji reaction feature last year, but it’s now rolling the capability out to all users on the web, iOS, and Android. (Chance Miller / 9To5Mac)
American bathrooms have become the stage set of the moment. With good lighting, acoustics, and privacy, they’re the ideal place for the dramatic entrances, exits, skits, dances and story times of TikTok. (Taylor Lorenz / The New York Times)
Angelina Jolie is producing a BBC show to help kids spot fake news. The show explains the stories behind news and offers facts and information that helps kids over the age of 13 make up their own minds on pressing international issues. (Brian Steinberg / Variety)
TripAdvisor is cutting hundreds of jobs in an attempt to cut costs as competition from Google intensifies. The search giant has launched a variety of travel search tools, as well as reviews of hotels and restaurants, that directly compete with TripAdvisor — and appear at the top of the world’s most-used search engine. (Mark Gurman and Olivia Carville / Bloomberg)
Tinder launched some new safety features, including a photo verification system that’ll place a blue check mark on daters’ profiles. The system requires daters to take a selfie in real time that matches a pose shown by a model in a sample image. (Ashley Carman / The Verge)
And finally...
Yesterday in this space, we brought you the story of United States senators flouting their own rules against bringing electronic devices into the room for the ongoing impeachment trial of Donald Trump. On Wednesday, senators were spotted wearing Apple Watches. Today, Niels Lesniewski writes in Roll Call, they’re taking a decidedly analog approach to solving the agony of losing their smartphones:
Sen. Richard M. Burr is trying to help out his antsy Senate colleagues. The North Carolina Republican is providing an assortment of fidget spinners and other gizmos to his GOP colleagues at this week’s Thursday lunch.
Another approach to resolving their boredom could be simply paying attention to the trial, but I realize that’s a big ask.
Talk to us


theverge--2020-01-24--Samsung to debut AirDrop competitor alongside Galaxy S20, report claims

Samsung is developing its own alternative to Apple ’ s AirDrop file sharing service that will launch with the upcoming Galaxy S20 , XDA Developers reports .
Screenshots of the feature show that it will work similarly to AirDrop , allowing you to “ share instantly with people nearby , ” so long as their device has Quick Share turned on .
You ’ ll also be able to restrict who can send you files to just people in your contacts , or else leave it wide open so that strangers can send you pictures of space sloths .
Despite @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and macOS since its initial launch in 2011 , Android has struggled to come up with a viable competitor .
For a while Android included an NFC-based version called Android Beam , but this was discontinued with Android 10 .
Google ’ s Files app also contains similar functionality , but it ’ s not the same as having the feature built directly into Android .
Android doesn ’ t currently have a competitor to AirDrop There are signs that this could change soon .
XDA Developers has reported multiple times on an @ @ @ @ @ @ @ appears to be accessed directly from the operating system ’ s quick settings panel .
The feature was first spotted under the name Fast Share back in June 2019 , but appears to still be under development as of earlier this month .
As well as letting you share with other Samsung smartphone users , Quick Share also lets you transfer data to SmartThings devices .
To do so , it uploads your file to Samsung Cloud , before downloading it on the device itself .
This mode appears to be more limited @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at a time , up to a maximum of 2GB a day .
Samsung isn ’ t the only Android manufacturer working on an AirDrop competitor .
Last year , three of China ’ s biggest smartphone manufacturers — Xiaomi , Oppo , and Vivo — announced that they are working on a peer-to-peer transfer protocol that will work across their devices .
The feature is expected to launch next month .
Meanwhile , OnePlus also has its own file transfer system called FileDash , which is limited to its own devices .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ to launch on February 11th , where we could also see Quick Share officially detailed .
XDA Developers says the feature is likely to come to all devices launching with One UI 2.1 or later , but speculates that it may end up on older Samsung devices in time .

Samsung is developing its own alternative to Apple’s AirDrop file sharing service that will launch with the upcoming Galaxy S20, XDA Developers reports. Screenshots of the feature show that it will work similarly to AirDrop, allowing you to “share instantly with people nearby,” so long as their device has Quick Share turned on. You’ll also be able to restrict who can send you files to just people in your contacts, or else leave it wide open so that strangers can send you pictures of space sloths.
Despite how useful AirDrop has been on iOS and macOS since its initial launch in 2011, Android has struggled to come up with a viable competitor. For a while Android included an NFC-based version called Android Beam, but this was discontinued with Android 10. Google’s Files app also contains similar functionality, but it’s not the same as having the feature built directly into Android.
Android doesn’t currently have a competitor to AirDrop
There are signs that this could change soon. XDA Developers has reported multiple times on an upcoming Android feature called Nearby Sharing which appears to be accessed directly from the operating system’s quick settings panel. The feature was first spotted under the name Fast Share back in June 2019, but appears to still be under development as of earlier this month.
As well as letting you share with other Samsung smartphone users, Quick Share also lets you transfer data to SmartThings devices. To do so, it uploads your file to Samsung Cloud, before downloading it on the device itself. This mode appears to be more limited, with a data cap of 1GB at a time, up to a maximum of 2GB a day.
Samsung isn’t the only Android manufacturer working on an AirDrop competitor. Last year, three of China’s biggest smartphone manufacturers — Xiaomi, Oppo, and Vivo — announced that they are working on a peer-to-peer transfer protocol that will work across their devices. The feature is expected to launch next month. Meanwhile, OnePlus also has its own file transfer system called FileDash, which is limited to its own devices.


theverge--2020-01-23--Ikea and Teenage Engineering launch co-developed speakers and party products

Two and a half years after Ikea first announced its collaboration with Swedish design collective Teenage Engineering , the products are going on sale .
The Frekvens range ( which translates to “ frequency ” ) will be rolling out in US stores from today through February 1st , according to Ikea .
Teenage Engineering is best known for its music products like the iconic OP-1 synthesizer , so it ’ s no surprise that the Frekvens collection sees Ikea continue its expansion into the world of home audio .
There are two speakers in the range , a $ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 19.99 option with a belt clip , along with a $ 149 subwoofer combo and a $ 10 light-up speaker base .
“ The Items got narrowed down towards sound , ” Teenage Engineering founder Jesper Kouthoofd says .
“ What we said was ‘ why do you have to hide speakers .
They are furniture in their own right.
’ Sounds should not be hidden .
So when you start to build a modular system and add fronts and accessories on , it ’ s a more fun way to think about @ @ @ @ @ @ @ includes more traditional Ikea products and is designed to help you host a stylishly minimalist home party .
There are various lights , furniture , crockery , and other somewhat incongruous items like a cajón and a reflective raincoat .
Many of the lights and speakers are able to be connected together .
“ We know that for younger people spontinuity is key , ” Ikea creative design leader Michael Nikolic says .
“ The idea of gathering some friends could become a reality in minutes .
What is needed to have a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s what we wanted to investigate with Frekvens .
Together with Teenage Engineering , we have explored the possibilities of taking the party with us.
” Here are some selected items from the collection :

Two and a half years after Ikea first announced its collaboration with Swedish design collective Teenage Engineering, the products are going on sale. The Frekvens range (which translates to “frequency”) will be rolling out in US stores from today through February 1st, according to Ikea.
Teenage Engineering is best known for its music products like the iconic OP-1 synthesizer, so it’s no surprise that the Frekvens collection sees Ikea continue its expansion into the world of home audio. There are two speakers in the range, a $69.99 model and a more portable $19.99 option with a belt clip, along with a $149 subwoofer combo and a $10 light-up speaker base.
“The Items got narrowed down towards sound,” Teenage Engineering founder Jesper Kouthoofd says. “What we said was ‘why do you have to hide speakers. They are furniture in their own right.’ Sounds should not be hidden. So when you start to build a modular system and add fronts and accessories on, it’s a more fun way to think about sound.”
It’s just not a party until someone pours a martini on a table tennis racquet on the floor.
The rest of the range includes more traditional Ikea products and is designed to help you host a stylishly minimalist home party. There are various lights, furniture, crockery, and other somewhat incongruous items like a cajón and a reflective raincoat. Many of the lights and speakers are able to be connected together.
“We know that for younger people spontinuity is key,” Ikea creative design leader Michael Nikolic says. “The idea of gathering some friends could become a reality in minutes. What is needed to have a good party at home? That’s what we wanted to investigate with Frekvens. Together with Teenage Engineering, we have explored the possibilities of taking the party with us.”
Here are some selected items from the collection:
Speaker with subwoofer, $149
Portable speaker, $19.99
Cups, $9.99 for four
Side table, $29.99
Eating set, $17.99
Cajón drum, $29.99
LED multi-use light, $40
Blanket, $49.99


theverge--2020-01-24--US pulls rule that would have made it harder for American companies to sell to Huawei

The US Department of Commerce has pulled a potential regulation would have made it more difficult for US companies to sell to Huawei , according to sources who spoke with the Wall Street Journal , after the Pentagon and Treasury Department protested the rule .
Right now , US companies can sell chips or other electronic goods to Huawei from their overseas locations without an export license as long as those goods are made with less than 25 percent of materials or patents that aren ’ t made by US companies .
However , the Commerce Department had proposed a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and Budget ( OMB ) that would have lowered that percentage to 10 percent .
The Pentagon apparently objected to that change because it believed it would hurt US companies by limiting how much they could sell to Huawei , and the Commerce Department pulled the rule from the OMB .
Huawei remains effectively blacklisted by the US after President Trump declared an executive order last May that barred American businesses from working with the company without a license from the US government .
That means , for example , that Google can @ @ @ @ @ @ @ use on Huawei phones .
But some companies still do sell to Huawei in part , and the rule that was just pulled by the Commerce Department would have made selling to Huawei even more difficult than it already is .
Huawei and the Department of Commerce didn ’ t immediately respond to requests for comment .

The US Department of Commerce has pulled a potential regulation would have made it more difficult for US companies to sell to Huawei, according to sources who spoke with the Wall Street Journal, after the Pentagon and Treasury Department protested the rule.
Right now, US companies can sell chips or other electronic goods to Huawei from their overseas locations without an export license as long as those goods are made with less than 25 percent of materials or patents that aren’t made by US companies.
However, the Commerce Department had proposed a new rule to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) that would have lowered that percentage to 10 percent. The Pentagon apparently objected to that change because it believed it would hurt US companies by limiting how much they could sell to Huawei, and the Commerce Department pulled the rule from the OMB.
Huawei remains effectively blacklisted by the US after President Trump declared an executive order last May that barred American businesses from working with the company without a license from the US government. That means, for example, that Google can’t license Android to Huawei to use on Huawei phones. But some companies still do sell to Huawei in part, and the rule that was just pulled by the Commerce Department would have made selling to Huawei even more difficult than it already is.


theverge--2020-01-24--All of the updates on the new coronavirus

Share All sharing options for : All of the updates on the new coronavirus A new coronavirus appeared in Wuhan , China at the start of December , and has already infected hundreds of people in nearly a dozen countries .
The World Health Organization said that it ’ s too early to declare a public health emergency globally , although the outbreak is a major emergency in China .
Coronaviruses are common in many types of animals , and can sometimes jump to humans .
In this case , the virus probably came from a bat .
Two other @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of SARS and MERS in 2002 and 2012 , respectively .
This time , scientists were able to quickly sequence the virus and develop a diagnostic test .
The new coronavirus appears to cause symptoms like fever , cough , difficulty breathing , and other respiratory symptoms .
It causes severe illness in around a quarter of cases , and can be deadly .
Public health officials are working to understand how dangerous this virus is , how fast it ’ s spreading , and how to contain it .
As that work @ @ @ @ @ @ @ around the world .
Follow all the updates on this evolving story here .

The earliest reports of a novel virus causing an unusual pneumonia emerged in December 2019. In the weeks that followed, the global scientific community identified the virus — a coronavirus, like the viruses that caused SARS and MERS — and named the disease it causes: COVID-19. It spread quickly around the world, upending the rhythms of day-to-day life, changing the patterns of human behavior, stressing health care systems, and killing millions.
An unprecedented effort to quickly develop vaccines paid off in late 2020, when pharmaceutical companies like Pfizer and Moderna released data showing that their shots were highly effective. A vaccination campaign quickly helped protect people in higher-income countries like the United States and the United Kingdom, preventing hundreds of thousands of deaths. But vaccinations lagged in lower-income countries, and vaccine equity continues to be a major issue.
New highly contagious and immune-evading variants, like delta and omicron, drove resurgences of the virus around the world through 2021 and 2022. Broad exposure to the virus and vaccine coverage helped limit the damage.
Experts say that the coronavirus isn’t going to go away. Population-level immunity and broader access to vaccines will defang its threat, and COVID-19 won’t always be an active public health emergency. But it’s another addition to the list of respiratory viruses we contend with each year.


theverge--2020-01-24--Clayton Christensen, who coined the term ‘disruptive innovation,’ dies at 67

Clayton Christensen , the business scholar who coined the term “ disruptive innovation , ” died at a Boston hospital this week , the Deseret News reports .
He was 67 .
You may not immediately recognize his name , but the tech industry — and every resulting industry — is built on the framework of technology disruption and innovation that Christensen devised .
The crux of Christensen ’ s theory is that big , successful companies that neglect potential customers at the lower end of their markets ( mainframe computers , in his famous example ) are ripe for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ more nimble competitors that can do almost as good a job more cheaply ( like personal computers ) .
One need look no further than the biggest names in Silicon Valley to find evidence of successful disrupters , from Napster to Amazon to Uber to Airbnb and so on .
And scores of notable tech leaders have for years cited Christensen ’ s 1997 book The Innovator ’ s Dilemma as a major influence .
It ’ s the only business book on the late Steve Jobs ’ must-read list ; Netflix CEO @ @ @ @ @ @ @ team when he was developing the idea for his company ; and the late Andy Grove , CEO of Intel , said the book and Christensen ’ s theory were responsible for that company ’ s turnaround .
After summoning Christensen to his office to explain why he thought Intel was going to get killed , Grove was able to grok what to do , Christensen recalled : They made the Celeron Processor .
They blew Cyrix and AMD out of the water , and the Celeron became the highest-volume product in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 1997 , and the next year Grove gave the keynote at the annual conference for the Academy of Management .
He holds up my book and basically says , “ I don ’ t mean to be rude , but there ’ s nothing any of you have published that ’ s of use to me except this.
” As Jill Lepore wrote ( in a piece critical of Christensen ’ s theory ) for The New Yorker in 2014 , “ Ever since ‘ The Innovator ’ s Dilemma , ’ everyone @ @ @ @ @ @ @ There are disruption consultants , disruption conferences , and disruption seminars.
” While his initial theory suggested that it was extremely difficult to recover from such disruption , it was possible , and there are examples , Christensen later wrote : He later refined his thinking on disruption , introducing the concept of “ jobs to be done , ” which stressed the need to focus on customers ’ needs , and acknowledged that disruption was a great way to start a company , but not a good way to grow a company @ @ @ @ @ @ @ manual for how to grow or how to predict what customers want .
[ Jobs to be done ] is the second side of the same coin : How can I be sure that competitors won ’ t kill me and how can I be sure customers will want to buy the product ?
So it ’ s actually a very important compliment to disruption.
” Anyone who ’ s listened to a tech exec on a podcast in the past five years has heard someone mention “ jobs to be done ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to conventional wisdom .
Christensen was born in the Salt Lake City area , received a bachelor ’ s degree from Brigham Young University , a master ’ s from Oxford University , and an MBA and a doctorate from Harvard , where he later became a professor .
He started the Clayton Christensen Institute for Disruptive Innovation , and founded venture capital firm Rose Park Advisors .
He wrote numerous books and hundreds of articles , and while he ’ s best known for his writing on disruption , not all of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ As a devout Mormon , his faith was intertwined with his thinking on how companies and people should conduct themselves .
His 2012 TEDx talk titled “ How Will You Measure Your Life ” was based on an address he gave to Harvard Business School ’ s 2010 graduating class , which he gave while he was battling cancer .
Christensen took the principles of his business theories and used them as a basis for how to achieve personal happiness .
“ When I have my interview with God at the end of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ going to ask me to show how high I went in anybody ’ s org chart or how much money I left behind in the bank when I died , ” Christensen said .
“ It ’ s actually really important you succeed at what you ’ re succeeding at , but that isn ’ t going to be the measure of life .
”

Clayton Christensen, the business scholar who coined the term “disruptive innovation,” died at a Boston hospital this week, the Deseret News reports. He was 67. You may not immediately recognize his name, but the tech industry — and every resulting industry — is built on the framework of technology disruption and innovation that Christensen devised.
The crux of Christensen’s theory is that big, successful companies that neglect potential customers at the lower end of their markets (mainframe computers, in his famous example) are ripe for disruption from smaller, more efficient, more nimble competitors that can do almost as good a job more cheaply (like personal computers). One need look no further than the biggest names in Silicon Valley to find evidence of successful disrupters, from Napster to Amazon to Uber to Airbnb and so on.
And scores of notable tech leaders have for years cited Christensen’s 1997 book The Innovator’s Dilemma as a major influence. It’s the only business book on the late Steve Jobs’ must-read list; Netflix CEO Reed Hastings read it with his executive team when he was developing the idea for his company; and the late Andy Grove, CEO of Intel, said the book and Christensen’s theory were responsible for that company’s turnaround. After summoning Christensen to his office to explain why he thought Intel was going to get killed, Grove was able to grok what to do, Christensen recalled:
They made the Celeron Processor. They blew Cyrix and AMD out of the water, and the Celeron became the highest-volume product in the company. The book came out in 1997, and the next year Grove gave the keynote at the annual conference for the Academy of Management. He holds up my book and basically says, “I don’t mean to be rude, but there’s nothing any of you have published that’s of use to me except this.”
As Jill Lepore wrote (in a piece critical of Christensen’s theory) for The New Yorker in 2014, “Ever since ‘The Innovator’s Dilemma,’ everyone is either disrupting or being disrupted. There are disruption consultants, disruption conferences, and disruption seminars.” While his initial theory suggested that it was extremely difficult to recover from such disruption, it was possible, and there are examples, Christensen later wrote:
Develop a disruption of your own before it’s too late to reap the rewards of participation in new, high-growth markets—as Procter & Gamble did with Swiffer, Dow Corning with Xiameter, and Apple with the iPod, iTunes, the iPad, and (most spectacularly) the iPhone.
He later refined his thinking on disruption, introducing the concept of “jobs to be done,” which stressed the need to focus on customers’ needs, and acknowledged that disruption was a great way to start a company, but not a good way to grow a company. “It’s not a manual for how to grow or how to predict what customers want. [Jobs to be done] is the second side of the same coin: How can I be sure that competitors won’t kill me and how can I be sure customers will want to buy the product? So it’s actually a very important compliment to disruption.”
Anyone who’s listened to a tech exec on a podcast in the past five years has heard someone mention “jobs to be done” — it has gone beyond management framework to conventional wisdom.
Christensen was born in the Salt Lake City area, received a bachelor’s degree from Brigham Young University, a master’s from Oxford University, and an MBA and a doctorate from Harvard, where he later became a professor. He started the Clayton Christensen Institute for Disruptive Innovation, and founded venture capital firm Rose Park Advisors.
He wrote numerous books and hundreds of articles, and while he’s best known for his writing on disruption, not all of his books were specific to business. As a devout Mormon, his faith was intertwined with his thinking on how companies and people should conduct themselves. His 2012 TEDx talk titled “How Will You Measure Your Life” was based on an address he gave to Harvard Business School’s 2010 graduating class, which he gave while he was battling cancer. Christensen took the principles of his business theories and used them as a basis for how to achieve personal happiness.


theverge--2020-01-24--Here’s the logo for Trump’s Space Force, and it looks awfully familiar

President Donald Trump on Friday revealed the official logo for the Space Force , the newest branch of the armed forces and part of the existing United States Air Force department , in a tweet .
The Space Force , a fixation of Trump ’ s throughout his presidency , became a reality last month when Congress passed a $ 738 billion military bill that created the sixth branch of the military .
And now the Air Force is responsible for branding , uniform design , and the various other requirements involved with creating a new armed force .
However @ @ @ @ @ @ @ from the fictional logo of Starfleet from the Star Trek universe .
Vocal Trump critic and former Star Trek cast member George Takei also weighed in .
Analyst and former national security policy advisor John Noonan , who was a member of the USAF , commented on Twitter shortly after the announcement to point out that the Space Force logo , while similar in design to the Starfleet one , is in fact based on an existing Air Force command logo .
Adding another wrinkle to the situation is that Trump ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ America Great Again Committee , was polling voters back in 2018 about which Space Force logos they liked the best .
And the six options provided all look drastically different then the end result we have today , with quite a few featuring NASA-inspired iconography and type faces alongside retro-futurist aesthetics .
It ’ s not entirely clear how the team responsible for branding the Space Force went from that to what Trump revealed this afternoon .
But here we are .
Although , as one user on Twitter noted , the designers @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the NASA logo , predominantly the exact placement of the stars that appear to have been copied over directly .
CBS , which owns the rights to Star Trek , was not immediately available for comment .

President Donald Trump on Friday revealed the official logo for the Space Force, the newest branch of the armed forces and part of the existing United States Air Force department, in a tweet.
The Space Force, a fixation of Trump’s throughout his presidency, became a reality last month when Congress passed a $738 billion military bill that created the sixth branch of the military. And now the Air Force is responsible for branding, uniform design, and the various other requirements involved with creating a new armed force.
However, the logo appears to borrow heavily from the fictional logo of Starfleet from the Star Trek universe.
Vocal Trump critic and former Star Trek cast member George Takei also weighed in.
Analyst and former national security policy advisor John Noonan, who was a member of the USAF, commented on Twitter shortly after the announcement to point out that the Space Force logo, while similar in design to the Starfleet one, is in fact based on an existing Air Force command logo.
Adding another wrinkle to the situation is that Trump’s political action committee, the Trump Make America Great Again Committee, was polling voters back in 2018 about which Space Force logos they liked the best. And the six options provided all look drastically different than the end result we have today, with quite a few featuring NASA-inspired iconography and type faces alongside retro-futurist aesthetics.
It’s not entirely clear how the team responsible for branding the Space Force went from that to what Trump revealed this afternoon. But here we are.
Although, as one user on Twitter noted, the designers did seem to take some cues from the NASA logo, predominantly the exact placement of the stars that appear to have been copied over directly.


theverge--2020-01-24--If you’re feeling nervous about the coronavirus, you’re not alone

Your risk of catching the new coronavirus is probably low if you haven ’ t recently been to Wuhan , China ( where the virus originated ) or been in contact with people who were there recently .
But you might still be anxious about the spread of the virus .
That ’ s perfectly normal , says Jane Timmons-Mitchell , associate professor in the department of psychiatry at the Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine — and there are some easy ways to cope with those anxious feelings .
“ There ’ s a lot of good stuff @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” Timmons-Mitchell says .
“ It ’ s not big deal stuff , it ’ s stuff you can do on your own in your home.
” This interview has been lightly edited for clarity .
I ’ m in New York , and while there have been a few suspected cases in the state , I know the risk of me getting this disease is really low .
Why am I still feeling anxious about this virus ?
It ’ s normal to feel anxious when something is well publicized and is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ big is going on , but I think the reaction is largely to all the coverage .
We focus on what ’ s new , as opposed to what ’ s a part of how things usually are .
Thousands and thousands of people die from the flu every year , but we ’ re thinking about the new thing .
It ’ s sometimes harder for me control my anxiety when it ’ s about illnesses than it is when I ’ m worried about other things .
Why is that ?
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
But if we ’ re thinking about a physical illness , if you know what the symptoms are , you could focus on or be hyperaware of anything in your body that could be those symptoms — if you have a bit of a tickle , or feel like you maybe have a low-grade fever .
Those are all things that could happen as manifestations of feeling anxious and looking for it .
The body is strange in that way .
Anxiety can cause stress , which can cause physical reactions .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ anxious ?
One of the things is to try and keep it in perspective .
In that sense , you could think about all the things you do every day that incur some risk .
You live in a place that could be dangerous in a number of ways — like it could catch on fire .
You go outside of that place , and you could be struck by lighting .
But we don ’ t think about those things .
We have decided those are acceptable risks and they occur at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is worth it .
You can apply the usual coping strategy , which is to weigh the acceptable risk .
try and keep it in perspective Instead of reading every article and going to every website , staying away from the web is probably a good idea if you ’ re concerned .
You can get a lot of bad information and anecdotal reports that have nothing to do with what ’ s likely happening to you or anyone else .
Pursue constructive activities instead of hyper-focusing on the thing that you ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ can help are following the usual structure of your day .
Include exercise as much as you can .
When you ’ re exercising , you have a physiological response that combats anxiety .
Social connection also helps .
Do things with people you know that are not centered around specific symptoms — doing something you usually do , that you enjoy , is a really good way to not focus on what you ’ re anxious about .
Avoiding the news is something that ’ s pretty hard for me as a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for other people to stay informed without getting overwhelmed and making their anxiety worse ?
Pick sources of news that you trust and are well-vetted .
Something everyone can do is go to the CDC website , and if there ’ s something you need to be aware of , they will have a banner to let you know .
If you ’ re extremely anxious but still want to check in , you could try checking that website only once a day .
Distance yourself if you can .

Your risk of catching the new coronavirus is probably low if you haven’t recently been to Wuhan, China (where the virus originated) or been in contact with people who were there recently. But you might still be anxious about the spread of the virus.
That’s perfectly normal, says Jane Timmons-Mitchell, associate professor in the department of psychiatry at the Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine — and there are some easy ways to cope with those anxious feelings. “There’s a lot of good stuff we can do to help ourselves,” Timmons-Mitchell says. “It’s not big deal stuff, it’s stuff you can do on your own in your home.”
This interview has been lightly edited for clarity.
I’m in New York, and while there have been a few suspected cases in the state, I know the risk of me getting this disease is really low. Why am I still feeling anxious about this virus?
It’s normal to feel anxious when something is well publicized and is something new and potentially dangerous. Something big is going on, but I think the reaction is largely to all the coverage. We focus on what’s new, as opposed to what’s a part of how things usually are. Thousands and thousands of people die from the flu every year, but we’re thinking about the new thing.
It’s sometimes harder for me control my anxiety when it’s about illnesses than it is when I’m worried about other things. Why is that?
There are many ways anxiety can manifest. But if we’re thinking about a physical illness, if you know what the symptoms are, you could focus on or be hyperaware of anything in your body that could be those symptoms — if you have a bit of a tickle, or feel like you maybe have a low-grade fever. Those are all things that could happen as manifestations of feeling anxious and looking for it. The body is strange in that way. Anxiety can cause stress, which can cause physical reactions.
What can I do to feel less anxious?
One of the things is to try and keep it in perspective. In that sense, you could think about all the things you do every day that incur some risk. You live in a place that could be dangerous in a number of ways — like it could catch on fire. You go outside of that place, and you could be struck by lighting. But we don’t think about those things. We have decided those are acceptable risks and they occur at such a low rate that the benefit is worth it. You can apply the usual coping strategy, which is to weigh the acceptable risk.
try and keep it in perspective
Instead of reading every article and going to every website, staying away from the web is probably a good idea if you’re concerned. You can get a lot of bad information and anecdotal reports that have nothing to do with what’s likely happening to you or anyone else. Pursue constructive activities instead of hyper-focusing on the thing that you’re worried about.
Other things that can help are following the usual structure of your day. Include exercise as much as you can. When you’re exercising, you have a physiological response that combats anxiety. Social connection also helps. Do things with people you know that are not centered around specific symptoms — doing something you usually do, that you enjoy, is a really good way to not focus on what you’re anxious about.
Avoiding the news is something that’s pretty hard for me as a health journalist, but are there ways for other people to stay informed without getting overwhelmed and making their anxiety worse?