Miscellaneous

New Delhi, Mar 6: Tech giant Google Wednesday unveiled a new app 'Bolo' that aims to help children in primary school learn to read in Hindi and English. The free app, which is being launched in India first, uses Google's speech recognition and text-to-speech technology. The app features an animated character 'Diya', who encourages children to read stories aloud and helps if the child is unable to

New Delhi, Feb 28: In a bid to promote digital transactions, the Indian Rail Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) on Thursday launched its much awaited payment aggregator system 'IRCTC iPay'. The exclusive digital payment gateway will provide better digital experience and improved online digital payment convenience to rail passengers availing online travel-related services through the website

Men still have more Internet access than women globally but low- and lower-middle-income countries narrowed the gender gap in 2018, a Facebook-led study has revealed. According to the Inclusive Internet Index (3i) prepared by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) for Facebook, there are demonstrable benefits from comprehensive female e-inclusion policies, digital skills programmes and targets for

New Delhi, Feb 25: A parliamentary panel on Monday asked micro-blogging site Twitter to address issues in real-time and engage more with the Election Commission of India (ECI) ahead of general elections and also summoned senior officials of other social media platforms Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram on March 6. This was informed by Anurag Thakur, chairman of Parliamentary Standing Committee on

California, Feb 21: After reports emerged about YouTube overlooking the loopholes that allow pedophiles to abuse the platform to network through comments on innocuous videos, some of the top brands are reportedly backtracking from advertising on the Google-owned platform. Major companies, including Nestle, Epic, Disney and McDonald’s announced that they have put on hold their advertising on

Washington, Feb 21: A statue depicting the famous scene of a sailor kissing a woman in New York's Times Square as people celebrate the end of World War II has been vandalized with red spray paint spelling out #MeToo. The graffiti covers the ankle-to-knee area of the left leg of the woman being kissed, said police in Sarasota, Florida where the statue is on loan to the city. The vandalism is

Washington, Feb 21: NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory will provide daily weather reports for Mars, thanks to the Red Planet's newest robotic resident, InSight, mission scientists announced Thursday. "The InSight lander is close to the Martian equator -- just north of the equator -- so it is experiencing Martian winter," said Don Banfield, the mission's lead for the lander's Auxiliary Payload

Thiruvananthapuram, Feb 20: As the Attukal Pongala celebrations are underway across the capital city of Thiruvananthapuram, around 3,861 ousted women employees of the Kerala State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC) are participating in the festival hoping for the state government to address their grievances. The women were seen preparing a ritualistic offering for Attukal Devi in front of the

New Delhi, Feb 18: The Supreme Court Monday refused to allow reopening of Vedanta's Sterlite plant in Tamil Nadu's Tuticorin, which was at the centre of massive protests over pollution concerns, but granted the company liberty to approach the high court. A bench headed by Justice R F Nariman allowed Tamil Nadu's appeal against the National Green Tribunal (NGT) order only on grounds of

Hey Alexa! Please play "Bhaja Govindam" by M.S. Subbulakshmi, goes the command every morning at my home and Alexa takes no time in obliging, playing the song by the legendary Carnatic vocalist as breakfast begins to roll. This has become a routine at millions of Indian homes, indicating a clear trend about voice becoming the next conversational platform between people and devices. As we head