Facebook was pioneered with VR Oculus and they are committed to being the first platform to deliver premium VR content to users. VR is difficult, and unless the company has the resources and infrastructure, as Facebook does, it's pretty difficult to get it right. Facebook has been in the market for almost half a decade now and notices only that they dominate the market and they almost kill it. As Rift finally ships to customers, their advantage will become stronger over time. This week, however, saw the VR story (pun intended) an interesting development for Oculus. The company closed its VR movie studio. And yes, that's the same studio that produced the Emmy-winning short film Henry. Jason Rubin, vice president of content at Oculus, explained that Facebook's state-owned company is shifting its focus to outside creators of funding and has set aside $50 million for the same. The company says they remain fully committed to the growing ecosystem of VR movies and creative content. "Now that there is a large community of producers and developers working on the narrative VR art form, we'll be focusing on funding and supporting their content," Jason said.
An Oculus spokesperson also confirmed that some of the major experiences released through Oculus Studios are currently released for major VR games like Rock Band VR and Robot Recall. The double $50 million pledge is the hypothetical minimum figure that will be drawn from the $250 million in funding that currently supports games and movies. The spokesperson said that Story Studio's core team members can transition between Oculus or new Latest Mailing Database characters, whether the transition is left to other creative pursuits. Oculus will keep Quill's VR illustration tool Story Studio's latest (and, apparently, final) film created by Dear Angelica . But it doesn't sound like there will be further development, and it's unclear whether Oculus will continue to work with comic book artists who develop virtual reality with quills. Story Studio opened in early 2015, and it produces a total of three short films: Debut Lost , follow-up Henry and Dear Angelica . All three are highly praised and have been some of the most recognizable virtual reality films of all time -- making it unclear whether the industry is actually mature enough to fill the void story Studio will leave. Still, Rubin wrote, closing Story Studios "to allocate our resources and create the best way to have an impact on the ecosystem." Only time will tell what awaits Oculus. Let's hope the future of VR looks good.
Microsoft needs the launch of MacBooks and Surface laptops
Apple has dominated the mobile market for a decade now, while rivals from Microsoft, on the other hand, have dominated the PC space since its inception. Apple makes great computers, but no doubt its target is a very specific audience. It's for professionals and creators. Ideas with solid experience are driving sales for Apple even if they are far behind Microsoft. The MacBook Air has been the go-to laptop for people who like to stay on the go all the time. It's designed for easy portability and productivity. Microsoft sees this as a threat to their business, and this week they launched their first full-fledged laptop called the Surface Laptop . The Surface Laptop is a direct hit on the MacBook Air. It's portable, it's premium, and it's geared toward the same user base that Apple has dominated for years.
On top of the specs, the Surface Notebook has a 3:2, 1080 13.5-inch touchscreen and keyboard encased in the same material used in the premium Surface Pro 4's keyboard. There's a conventional USB port, SD card slot, mini DisplayPort and regular Surface power connector - USB-C isn't on this device. The Surface Laptop weighs 2.76 pounds running an Intel Core i5 CPU (or an i7 processor with a paid upgrade), 4GB of RAM, and has 128GB of SSD storage. When the notebook starts to look interesting is in front of the OS. Instead of running a full version of Windows 10, Surface laptops run a stripped-down version of Windows 10 called Windows 10 S. Now, this isn't a new genre from Microsoft, if you recall, the original Surface tablet ran Windows RT, This is basically a similar approach to Windows 10, aka Bar Down. Microsoft is targeting this important market through its Surface strategy. Rather than only partnering with hardware manufacturers such as HP or Dell, Microsoft also releases hardware devices designed in-house. Microsoft confirmed it has the chops to design and release market-leading products, the latest devices in the Surface family. The Surface Laptop will come in four colors, and will cost $999. You can pre-order it right now, and it's coming June 15.
Google Allogene is getting some sweet new features
Google showcased Allogene at its annual conference, Google I/O last year, and the service has matured significantly over the past year. The app is already available to a ton of users, and just in case you just can't get on it, Google has rolled out some new features that allo lure you into using it as your main chat app. Let's take a look at what the new update brings. The first feature is an incognito mode for bases.
This feature will encrypt your chats and store them for up to only a timer you set. After the timer goes off, the message disappears as usual. End-to-end encrypted chat already enables one-to-one chat incognito. This latest feature brings the same encryption group. From the WhatsApp air page, Allogene brings a backup and restore option in chats. Now, you can back up your chats if you want to restore them later. Finally, there's link preview, which is by no means a unique feature, and it's already available in most chat apps. If you're not already familiar, it's basically a box that tells you what the link was before you opened it. With these new features, Google is sure to get a bunch of new users, but will it ever be able to go against WhatsApp? Only time will tell.
Microsoft launches new version of Windows 10 called Windows 10 Seconds
In addition to surface laptops, Microsoft has also managed to make some news with the launch of Windows 10 S, an operating system designed for educational systems and low-cost computers. What does the S stand for? Well, nothing special, but Microsoft says Windows 10 S is stripped down for security, simplicity and speed. This will hood 15 seconds faster than a traditional Windows 10 machine. The biggest difference between Windows 10 S and other versions of Windows is that it can only run apps downloaded from the Windows Store, so the system is locked down from harmful software installations, doubling down on security.
Windows 10 Seconds will also work with Microsoft's BitLocker encryption system to protect your files in the event of theft. So, the biggest caveat with new versions of Windows will be the lack of apps, full-fledged desktop apps not available through the Windows Store, and to make such apps compatible with Windows 10S as developers will have to bundle their own apps program in a specific way. Thus raising the age-old problem of convincing developers to build on Windows. What do you think? Will it succeed in Windows 10's stand or will it suck like Windows RT? Let us know in the comments below.
Google suffers massive phishing attack with Google Docs
This week Google suffered a massive phishing scam via Google Docs, and many users got to collaborate on Google Docs. It was a phishing attack, not an email. The main difference between this and a very simple email phishing scheme is that this doesn't just take you to a fake Google page that collects your passwords - something you can detect by looking at the page's URL.