 Google has finally broken its silence. Almost a year after U.S. President Trump blacklisted Huawei, forcing Google’s software and services from the Chinese giant’s new devices, Google has surprisingly ventured into the public domain with a clarification as to what it now means. “We have continued to receive a number of questions about new Huawei devices,” Tristan Ostrowski, Android’s Legal Director, said in a February 21 post. “We wanted to provide clear guidance to those asking these important questions.” The Google ban has been the headline issue in the Huawei blacklist affair. While the U.S. legal move was actually intended to scupper Huawei’s 5G equipment sales around the world, the impact has been felt more keenly on its consumer products. It turns out it’s easier to replace the supply chain of chips and widgets on a 5G base station than the software millions of customer demand on shiny new smartphones. The 5G battle between the U.S. and Huawei, with China weighing in, has become more a political fight and a battle of influence than anything technical. The latest tug of war between Washington and Shenzhen over the U.K., with Germany and France awaiting their turns, perfectly illustrates this. But consumers have proven inured to political meddling—Huawei has retained its number two spot for global smartphone shipments. That said, behind the headlines Huawei knows it is in for a rougher ride this year. The last new device to ship complete with Google onboard is almost a year old. Its Mate 30 fell flat outside China given the lack of full-fat Android. And the forthcoming P40 has a risk of doing the same. Another “gorgeous” device dashed by politics. When the Mate 30 launched in September, there was initial confusion as to whether there would be an almost official workaround—Huawei’s head of consumer products, Richard Yu, certainly hinted as much. When that was scuppered, there followed a raft of options online, complete with instructional videos, as to how Google’s primary apps could be sideloaded onto a sanctioned device. But that carries serious risk, Google is now warning. “Sideloaded Google apps will not work reliably,” it says. “Sideloading Google’s apps carries a high risk of installing an app that has been altered or tampered with in ways that can compromise user security.” As headlines pile up overexposed compromises on app security, taking such blatant additional risks is a huge gamble for users. Google wants nothing more than a return to business as usual. One can assume that losing access to the world’s number two smartphone maker, putting Samsung in an even more dominant position when it comes to full-fat Android, is not ideal. And in the post, the company confirms “we have continued to work with Huawei, in compliance with government regulations—and we will continue to do so as long as it is permitted.” Follow this thread and included links on OUR FORUM.  Facebook has called out the Singapore government for its use of the country's Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act (POFMA) to block access to a page on the social networking platform. The move goes against an earlier pledge that the legislation will not be used to censor voices, says the US internet giant. Singapore's Ministry of Communications and Information (MCI) on Monday instructed Facebook to block access to the States Times Review (STR) page after the latter repeatedly refused to comply with previous directives issued under POFMA. The "disabling" order, outlined under Section 34 of the Act, requires Facebook to disable access for local users. The order came two days after the ministry served a directive for the STR page on Facebook to be tagged a "Declared Online Location" (DOL). This required the author of the page, Alex Tan, to publish a notice on the page stating it had "a history of communicating falsehoods". The order, which was to take effect from February 16, was not complied with, prompting the directive for Facebook to block access to the page. The page is no longer accessible in Singapore. The STR had said on its Facebook page that it was "turning to YouTube for publication", due to a "censorship ban" in the country on its website. In response to ZDNet's queries, a company spokesperson on Tuesday confirmed Facebook was "legally compelled" to restrict access to the page, but expressed concerns about the use of POFMA to quash freedom of speech. The spokesperson said: "We believe orders like this are disproportionate and contradict the government's claim that POFMA would not be used as a censorship tool. We've repeatedly highlighted this law's potential for overreach and we're deeply concerned about the precedent this sets for the stifling of freedom of expression in Singapore." In defending the decision to issue the disabling order against the STR page, Minister for Communications and Information S. Iswaran said the government needed to "act swiftly" against falsehoods amidst the coronavirus outbreak. "Because if we don't, then these falsehoods can cause anxiety, fear, and even panic," the minister said Tuesday during a media doorstop. When the STR did not comply with any POFMA directives, the government then issued a further direction--the disabling access order--to prevent Singaporeans from access the site, Iswaran said. The POFMA was passed last May, following a brief public debate, and kicked in on October 2 with details on how appeals against directives could be made. The bill had passed amidst strong criticism that it gave the government far-reaching powers over online communication and would be used to stifle free speech as well as quell political opponents. To learn more visit OUR FORUM. This is a visualization about Most Popular Operating systems (Windows) 2003 - 2020 | Most Popular OS (windows) 2003 - 2020. We have gathered data about the market share of Microsoft Windows and we have tried our best to visualize the most popular operating systems I.e the most popular OS in windows family. The market share of operating systems indirectly shows the popularity of operating systems, so we have sorted out the most popular windows operating systems by a percentage of market share that the particular operating system has. The market share of OS is equivalent to the usage of OS which means the operating system which has the highest percentage of market share is the most used OS worldwide and it is also be considered as the best operating system. Obviously the operating system (OS) which has the highest market share may be considered as the best operating system and most used OS too. Microsoft Windows, commonly referred to as Windows, is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families, all of which are developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. Active Microsoft Windows families include Windows NT and Windows IoT; these may encompass subfamilies, e.g. Windows Server or Windows Embedded Compact (Windows CE). Defunct Microsoft Windows families include Windows 9x, Windows Mobile and Windows Phone. Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985, as a graphical operating system shell for MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces (GUIs). Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal computer (PC) market with over 90% market share, overtaking Mac OS, which had been introduced in 1984. Apple came to see Windows as an unfair encroachment on their innovation in GUI development as implemented on products such as the Lisa and Macintosh (eventually settled in court in Microsoft's favor in 1993). On PCs, Windows is still the most popular operating system. However, in 2014, Microsoft admitted losing the majority of the overall operating system market to Android, because of the massive growth in sales of Android smartphones. In 2014, the number of Windows devices sold was less than 25% that of Android devices sold. This comparison, however, may not be fully relevant, as the two operating systems traditionally target different platforms. Still, numbers for server use of Windows (that are comparable to competitors) show one third market share, similar to that for end-user use. Learn more by visiting OUR FORUM. |
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