News - Softonic English

Facebook is testing trending topics for the News Feed

Following the introduction of hashtags, embedded posts and a short video service for Instagram, Facebook is testing yet another Twitter-like feature this week. The social network is experimenting with a Trending Topics banner in the news feed, which will show you what topics are currently popular on Facebook, among your friends and others.

On Monday, Facebook detailed how it was working hard to make the News Feed more relevant for users. Older posts that are still relevant now stay visible for longer, for example, thanks to Facebook’s algorithms. Trending Topics is being tested first on the mobile version with a small number of US users – when you click on a topic, you’ll see what your friends are saying about it, and then what other users are saying, outside your friends.

AllThingsD managed to see the Trending Topics banner in action, which you can see below. You can see how Jeff Bezos (Amazon CEO), Shark Week and baseball’s Alex Rodriguez are all popular this week in the US on Facebook. This is an attempt to increase activity and time on Facebook, by taking advantage of the fact that many people now use Facebook to discuss political points and protests, as well as celebrities and products.

Download Facebook for iOS, Android, or visit the site.

[Source: AllThingsD]

Apple launches iOS 7 Beta 5

Following last week’s beta 4, Apple has released iOS 7 beta 5 today. Intended for developers, it’s a free update for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch.

iOS Beta 5 is available on devices that already have previous betas installed and is an over-the-air update. It includes a number of graphical improvements, with more color in the interface, especially in Settings.

Turning off your iDevice now has a new look.

The call interface is bigger, and the buttons are now circled.

Some icons have changed, including Twitter’s.

iOS 7 is developing very quickly, and you can be sure there will be plenty of other changes and tweeks to the upcoming operating system before its public release in the Fall.

Check out our features on Apple’s operating system – Everything you need to know about iOS 7, and iOS 7 vs. Android 4.2.2.

Facebook updates News Feed to resurface old, but relevant stories

Facebook announced a change in its ranking algorithm for its News Feed that should resurface relevant stories that users may not have seen. One of the problems with the News Feed is that content gets pushed down as more and more updates are posted. A post may still be getting a lot of interaction from users but other users won’t get to see it since it’s buried under new updates.

With the changed algorithm, Facebook’s algorithm is looking at which posts are popular and will resurface them from time to time. The company provided early data from tests of the updated News Feed and cites a 5% to 8% increase in likes, comments, and shares.

This news is great for companies and users with Facebook Pages to promote their work. Facebook hopes to push older content up the News Feed to create an organic way of bringing back popular content.

To find out more about the algorithm change for News Feed, check out the source link below.

Source: Facebook

Don Bradman Cricket 14 announced, release later this year

Big Ant Studios have announced its game Don Bradman Cricket 14 will be released later this year. Cricket games on PC have been thin on the ground since Codemasters’ Brian Lara and EA’s Cricket series were retired back in 2007. The only well known game that’s still around is International Cricket Captain, which is a management-only game.

Don Bradman is possibly the best batsman of all time, and Australian studio Big Ant Studios says it has been working for four years to make this the best game possible. It claims it will be ‘far superior to any cricket game in the market.’ However, that’s a pretty low bar to set, as there is almost no competition at the moment!

Here’s the full list of features in Don Bradman Cricket 14:

Career Mode, allowing you to take control of an aspiring young cricketer and take him through the ranks to International glory.
Unique Batting and Bowling Controls, giving full 360 Shot control and Line and Length delivery without pitch markers.
A fully featured fielding system that allows you to run down the ball and slide to prevent a Four, catch a high ball on the boundary rope, or knock down the stumps to take a vital run out. You are always involved in the play at every stage of the game!
Ball Physics giving realistic Edges, bat pad catches and movement off the pitch.
A complete player physics system with individual attributes including weight and height – imagine running in a 2 meter bowler to delivery that perfect bouncer!
Appeal and Electronic Review system allowing for the first time challenges of the umpires decision.
Practice Nets, Hone your skills to perfection before taking to the field.
Dynamic time of day, Weather System and Pitch Degradation that are based on real world data with effects occurring in real-time throughout a days’ play.
The Cricket Academy, allowing for unparalleled customization of your Cricket experience, creating Teams, players, Tours, Competitions, Match Types and even Umpires.
More than 4000 Community created Players and teams ready to download and use in game.
An online Save system that lets you continue your match whenever you want with online opponents.

Are you excited about a new cricket game for PCs?

Kaspersky Internet Security 2014 and Anti-Virus 2014 released

Kaspersky has released Kaspersky Internet Security 2014 and Anti-Virus 2014, which have been made available first on their Indian store.

Both Kaspersky Internet Security 2014 and Anti-Virus 2014 use the security firm’s own Zeta Shield antivirus technology, which it claims is more effective at stopping targeted attacks on your PC. Kaspersky has also improved its Automatic Exploit Prevention, that checks programs for strange behavior associated with exploits while keeping a close eye on programs that are often exploited like Java.

Another new feature of Kaspersky Internet Security 2014 and Anti-Virus 2014 is the Trusted Applications Mode. This is a dynamic whitelist of apps that Kaspersky deems safe, and in Trusted Applications mode you will only be able to use these programs, in theory guaranteeing that you are safe.

Soon we will publish our comparison of this year’s security software, but for now you can still see which anti-virus suite was best last year.

[Source: Kaspersky]

Microsoft releases Windows 8.1 Enterprise Preview

Windows 8.1 should be out in September for all users, and Microsoft has released a preview of Windows 8.1 Enterprise today. It’s a complete version of the system designed for corporations and large companies. As we now know, it also has lots of new features, including the new start button and Internet Explorer 11.

Read our hands on preview with Windows 8.1.

Windows Enterprise 8.1 Enterprise Preview is available in the these languages: Arabic, Chinese (simplified and Taiwan), English, French, German, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese (Brazilian), Russian, Spanish, Swedish and Turkish.

To download the preview, you have to log in to your Microsoft account, and once installed it will be valid until January 14, when you’ll have to upgrade to the official release (due in September).

Read more about Windows 8.1.

Facebook bringing video ads to News Feed for $2.5 million each

We reported back in May that Facebook would be bringing auto-playing video ads to the News Feed but that still hasn’t happened. With the end of summer quickly approaching, rumors of video ads are heating up again. Today, Bloomberg reports that the social network is working to sell each video ad for a rumored $2.5 million. This corroborates rumors that Facebook would be making an estimated $4 million per day from video ads.

The video ads are also rumored to run for a mere 15 seconds. If that number sounds familiar to you, that’s because Instagram, which was purchased by Facebook, has a 15 second recording limit. It would make sense if Facebook brought the video ads to Instagram as well as users will be used to seeing 15 second videos anyway.

Twitter began the short video recording phenomenon with Vine, but it has yet to monetize the service. Twitter’s own apps and websites show “Sponsored Tweets,” which are paid advertisements. If Facebook’s video ads are successful, Twitter will likely adopt the advertising model as well.

With 15 second video ads, Facebook is hoping to move advertising money from traditional TV ads to the internet. Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg said, ““Every night, 88 million to 100 million people are actively using Facebook during prime-time TV hours in the United States alone,” during the company’s earnings call last week.

Still, Facebook needs to be careful about frustrating users with the new video ads. CEO Mark Zuckerberg reportedly already pushed back the roll out of video ads twice, fearing it would upset users. To make ads as unobtrusive as possible, a maximum of three ads will be shown a day.

Source: Bloomberg

Transit released on Android, provides highly detailed public transportation info

Transit was previously only on iOS devices, but released on Android today.

The app currently provides public transit information for 43 cities. In the United States, Transit offers real-time schedules for the majority of supported cities. Some transit services don’t provide real-time schedules so Transit can’t gather information from them.

The app does cover major cities in the United States like New York, San Francisco, and Chicago, but also covers Austin, Honolulu, and Miami.

Transit’s real-time lists of public transit in major cities is impressive and almost suffocating. San Francisco has a lot of options when traveling and Transit is able to pull info from all surrounding public transportation services.

If you’re visiting one of the 43 supported cities, Transit is a good app to bring with you.

Interested in the perfect public transportation app? So are we.

Download Transit on Android or iOS

Doodles arrive on Viber for Android, iOS coming soon

You can now send Doodles on Viber for Android, and the feature is coming soon to iOS. Doodles have been very popular on Snapchat, and sending drawings or ‘improved‘ photos’ to your friends in Viber chat will no doubt go down well.

Like LINE, with Viber you can text, call and send images for free with your phone or from the desktop app. Viber claims to have over 200 million users already (which LINE also claims).

The full list of improvements to Viber is as follows:

Send doodles or paint over a photo and share it with your friends!

Now you can know when your friends have seen your messages

Support for the Viber Desktop application on Windows and Mac

Fun new emoticons

Massive performance improvements

Bug fixes

Localized to: Croatian, Norwegian, Romanian, Slovak and Ukrainian

Download Viber for Android, iOS, Windows and Mac.

iOS 7 beta 4 released for developers

After the delay cause by the attack on the Developer Program website, Apple has finally released iOS 7 Beta 4 for iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. Intended for developers to test and create apps, iOS 7 beta 4 is free to download.

This beta is available as an over the air update to all devices running iOS 7 beta 3. Beta 4 brings some graphical improvements, bug fixes and some improvements to the interface.

The unlock button is clearer and bigger – the ‘slide to unlock’ text is now accompanied by an arrow.

The dialer has been revised, as has search, below.

The notifications center allows you to swipe between today, all and missed notifications. Some apps that didn’t work in the last beta now now seem to function.

iOS 7 beta 4 is compatible with the iPhone 4, 4S, 5, 5th generation iPod touch as well as the iPad 2, retina and mini.