At The Nexus #136: Chicken Denied!

Ryan Rampersad and Matthew Petschl return from vacation with two weeks of condensed news! Microsoft ends their Xbox Entertainment Studios, but Xbox is doing great after the end of the Kinect, Amazon has amazing revenues and now they have a baffling Fire Phone commercial, Google+ does not care about your name and so much more.

Phone & Tablet

• BlackBerry’s next major smartphone will have a Siri-like virtual assistant | The Verge
• [Updated] Nvidia’s New Product Is A Shield Tablet With Tegra K1, Designed For PC And Android Gaming – Forbes
• Ultimate Quest
• Beat by LG: new mid-range smartphone drops the G3’s size and specs | The Verge
• Samsung to manufacture Qualcomm mobile app processors

Microsoft

• Lumia 530: Microsoft’s latest low-cost smartphone with Windows Phone 8.1 – Tech2
• Microsoft: Xbox One sales double in US following Kinect unbundling | Ars Technica
• Microsoft’s relationship with Android just got less complicated | ZDNet
• Microsoft starts taking EU ‘right to be forgotten’ requests | Reuters
• Microsoft to close Xbox Entertainment Studios | ZDNet
• Beyond 12,500 former Nokia employees, who else is Microsoft laying off? | ZDNet
• Microsoft layoffs of 18,000 employees begin | ZDNet
• Microsoft delivers OneNote for Amazon Fire Phone, Kindle Fire tablets | ZDNet

Amazon

• Amazon’s cloud price war with Google is starting to hurt – Quartz
• Is Kindle Unlimited worth it? – The Washington Post
• Amazon Quietly Launches Its Consumer-Facing Mobile Wallet App, Amazon Wallet | TechCrunch
• Introducing Amazon Fire Phone — Includes One Year of Prime – YouTube

Google

• Google gives an early look at completely new Chrome OS experience dubbed Project Athena | 9to5Google
• Google+ Ends Ban On Fake Names – InformationWeek
• Google’s $1B purchase of Twitch confirmed — joins YouTube for new video empire | GamesBeat | Games | by Dean Takahashi
• Motorola and Google reportedly developing a 5.9-inch Nexus phone codenamed ‘Shamu’ | 9to5Google

Other News

• Netflix testing privacy mode, for your incognito viewing needs | Android Authority
• Facebook testing Buy button that lets you shop without leaving Facebook | The Verge
• French blogger fined €1,500 for writing negative restaurant review | Ars Technica
• House approves Senate’s bill to legalize phone unlocking

This episode of At The Nexus has a Fringe episode. You should really listen to The Fringe #244: ATN #136 — With A Thesaurus!

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