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Why didn’t Wired’s 2012 prediction that game consoles were going to die because of mobile come true? originally appeared on Quora: the place to gain and share knowledge, empowering people to learn from others and better understand the world.

This author fell into a common trap for people making predictions about technology markets (actually growth patterns in general). There is a natural tendency to extrapolate linear, unbounded growth. People are able to add an inflection point and adapt their thinking to exponential growth when they see it, like Moore’s Law or the expansion of the internet. But, for some reason, people don’t do well putting a second inflection point in the curve, and they almost never predict leveling off.

In 2012, smartphones were growing at an astronomical rate, and gaming was a prime application for them, along with a lot of other highly useful applications, like mobile messaging, VoIP calling, web browsing, and social media.

This led a lot of people to think all of the above would shift to almost completely mobile, and alternative platforms would die.

But, there are a few problems with that, and for gaming, they are pronounced:

• From an HCI (human-computer interaction) perspective, it just isn’t possible for a standard smartphone to provide the user interfaces needed to control and visually process higher end games.
• High-end games are very resource intensive applications. The power needed to run one would murder the battery of a phone to the point of impracticality, even if a user could properly interact with it. You could certainly have accessories to at least partly address that (like a big supplementary battery pack), but once you go that route you quickly lose the mobility advantage. The same is true of the GPU systems high-end games need.
• From a business perspective, mobile gaming revenues were not climbing at the same rate as mobile adoption. When there isn’t money to be made, the companies with the best IP don’t have the incentive to push harder into it. While it was a strategic area for all the gaming companies, and most were bullish on it, the way the mobile app marketplaces evolved, with freemium and very low prices being the norm, simply didn’t support gaming companies the way the console game marketplace did.
• Mobile was clearly growing the overall gaming market, and claiming the lion’s share of that gain. Mobile consoles, like the PSP and NDS, were bound to get crushed, but many people using their phones for games were new to it or were coming from casual games, which are a non-factor on consoles. As such, the growth of mobile gaming was not much at the expense of console.

The bottom line: consoles (or gaming PCs) are still necessary for high end games, and mobile only took a small share of that. There are some people who can’t afford both, and some who have given up high end games for more casual ones, but for the most part people who want to play the Battlefields and FIFAs of the world aren’t able to replace that with their phones. Now, real VR consoles on the other hand…

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Every February, the cellular generation industry gathers in Barcelona, Spain for the Mobile World Congress (MWC), an alternate display that lets in groups to reveal off new mobiles products, CEOs and other idea leaders to share their vision of the cell future, and otherwise enjoy the bright Mediterranean sunshine.

This yr’s MWC officially begins on Monday, February 26 and runs thru March 1, but a number of companies could be unofficially kicking off with press meetings on Sunday, February 25.

Here are 4 things to assume from this year’s occasion:

Samsung will launch its flagship Galaxy S9 and S9+
MWC is, typically, Samsung’s display, with the largest and maximum predicted product launches coming from the South Korean company, and 2018 is no unique.

After skipping MWC in 2017 because of the exploding Note 7, the enterprise is expected to expose the Galaxy S9 and S9+, with a purpose to with any luck, no longer combust (the Galaxy S8 and Note eight did not — an amazing omen) but additionally serve as a direct competitor to the iPhone X. While the telephone will appear much like the S8, the S9 models can have critically fancier cameras, have a fingerprint scanner at the back, and — bucking the fashion — will nevertheless have audio jacks.

The kick-off of Samsung’s part of the display — and the brand new S9s — will take area on Sunday, February 25, at 5 pm GMT and may be watched through live stream.

The stop of the audio jack drawers nearer.
Though the brand new Samsung S9s have stubbornly kept the headphone jack in its design, experts agree that Bluetooth headphones are the way of the destiny, and it’s miles expected that the of the headphone jack will be driven a step in addition at MWC. Sony’s Xperia XZ2 and Nokia 8, which can be both going to launch on the event, are rumored not to have headphone jacks, that is already gone from handsets from Huawei, Google, HTC, and Motorola, amongst others.

Ajit Pai, the Chairman of the FCC, could be one of the keynote audio systems.
This 12 months’ keynote speeches are basically made of the heads of diverse telecommunication corporations, although a few non-cellular tech CEOs can also be talking. These encompass Dr. Jim Young Kim, the president of the World Bank; Formula 1 Driver Fernando Alonso (reputedly speak at the Fourth Industrial Revolution); and Ajit Pai, the chairman of the FCC this is overseeing the dismantling of net neutrality. According to the respective software, he can be talking about “tech and society” and “destiny offerings company.” Perhaps he has an alternative to internet neutrality? Or more likely: he’ll make an argument for why the ending of net neutrality is really the proper decision.

Apple will not be the bodily gift but will make its presence acknowledged in other approaches.
As the top cell smartphone corporation inside the global, Apple doesn’t actually need the MWC, and as an alternative makes all of its huge product reveals and bulletins at its very own conference within the fall.

It does, however, generally tend to upstage Samsung and MWC in other ways, like whilst the Samsung Galaxy S6 turned into launched with a substantially improved digicam — and Apple launched the #shotoniPhone marketing campaign for the then-upcoming iPhone 6, revamping its entire website and launching print and digital commercials. Trolling fulfillment.

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CUTTACK: A day after rumors of an Odia query paper leak rattled the Board of Secondary Education, the body on Saturday issued advisories to all center superintendents to make sure a complete ban on mobile telephones inner matriculation examination centers.
The board has directed that except center superintendents no other person will be allowed to carry cell phones inside the examination centers. District training officials (DEO) have been asked to make sure that the order is carried out in letter and spirit.
This is not the primary time that the board has instructed center superintendents to put into effect a ban on cellular phones interior examination centers, however, on the primary day of the matriculation examination on Friday, it turned into noticed that the order was now not accompanied properly.
“Our officials visited distinct examination centers and determined that the instructions had been no longer strictly followed. The DEOs and center superintendents must make sure that no person incorporates a mobile phone, even if it’s miles switched off, inside the exam center,” stated board president Jahan Ara Begum.
Strict motion can be initiated against the center superintendents if any violation of the order is located at their center, delivered Begum. Only the center superintendent is authorized to carry his cell phone in order that she or he can tell the board if any exigency arises at the center.
Sources at the board officials said the unique squads fashioned to check malpractice were directed to conduct checks to make sure that a cell telephone ban order is strictly applied. At least 95 squads have been fashioned to maintain a watch on cheating in exam centers.
On Friday, almost an hour after the commencement of the matriculation examination, pics of the Odia query paper went viral on social media main to the unfolding of the hearsay that the query paper has been leaked.

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“The viral photograph clips of the Odia query paper on social media truly pondered that our mobile cellphone ban order became no longer enforced strictly at examination centers. But now we are able to show no leniency on the problem,” said a senior board authentic.
The board has also said that instructors coming to the examination centers to bodily become aware of their students will no longer be allowed inside the campus and they must become aware of students at the doorway gate itself.
The board additionally stated media people will no longer be allowed in the exam halls. “The media people can cowl the event from outdoor the primary gate however they can’t input examination halls as college students are disturbed with the aid of their presence,” said a board reputable.
At least five.Ninety lakh students are appearing for the matriculation exam at 2,818 centers across the nation. The tests commenced on February 23 and will conclude on March eight.

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FRANKFURT: Two phrases – synthetic intelligence – promise to upstage familiar generation industry topics like 5G, the Internet of Things and virtual fact at subsequent week’s Mobile World Congress, Europe’s largest annual era industry accumulating.
Telecom operators are seeking to artificial intelligence as an ability money-spinner to fight stagnating mobile provider sales as once-rewarding functions like textual content messaging have become commoditized and client boom wanes as nearly every person who can find the money for a telephone and a records plan already has one.
Artificial intelligence, or AI, makes use of computer systems to perform tasks commonly requiring human intelligence, along with making decisions, recognizing textual content, speech, and pics, or translating foreign languages.
Several huge-call telecom carriers are launching very own-logo domestic virtual assistants that are two-manner audio system inclusive of those utilized by Amazon’s Alexa or Google’s Home.
France’s Orange has Django; Germany’s Deutsche Telekom Magenta and Spain’s Telefonica Aura, marketplace research company Ovum said.
Device makers also spot an advertising and marketing opportunity for their cutting-edge glass-and-metallic telephones by way of together with AI capabilities inner to assist cameras to take smarter snapshots or to assume the pastimes of their users.
But the industry wishes to show it could do more with AI than play buzzword bingo, Ben Wood, a client electronics analyst at CCS Insight, said.
“Although we are highly obsessed with the generation itself, we’re increasingly more involved in the manner wherein it is being marketed,” he said.
Barcelona will characteristic a chain of bulletins by mobile operators which need to reinvent themselves as digital ‘structures’ – offering apps which includes video messaging; song streaming or cellular video on call for on pinnacle of their traditional voice- and records-driven offerings.
Turkcell, as an example, ambitions to provide its Lifecell platform, which incorporates various apps for messaging, amusement, track, TV, and e-commerce, to foreign companions at the occasion.
The industry also desires to do a great deal extra with the statistics it collects from its customers with a view to giving community operators insights into spending styles. Processing new streams of facts from networks of commercial or avenue sensors also holds promise.
Yet this puts them in opposition to the likes of U.S. Tech giants Amazon, Google or Facebook which have confirmed adept at recruiting users and exploiting their statistics to sell products, services or advertising.
Four-eyes telephones and actual 5G
Asian smartphone makers will release an array of new phones this weekend, however many are worldwide versions of models already on sale in China, which with 1.Four billion subscribers are, by means of far, the arena’s biggest cellular market.
The massive smartphone launch on Sunday nighttime by Samsung of its new flagship cellphone, the Galaxy S9, in advance of the conference may have a focal point on dual digicam features, Wood stated.
Cameras, the extra the merrier, is all of the rages, with some smartphone fashions boasting four to 5 built-in cameras, stated.

The exhibition halls in Barcelona will be full of communicating of extremely-rapid cellular video, connected vehicles, factory automation, digital fitness and smarter cities.
Also, 5G, lengthy the challenge of arcane technical debates and an elusive search for concrete packages, is ultimately setting out to commercial enterprise. The first industrial 5G roll-outs begin this 12 months and next in the United States, Korea, and Japan, creating new sales streams for operators and overwhelmed-down device makers.
But 5G remains an abstraction for consumers, Forrester analyst Thomas Husson wrote in a weblog post beforehand of the display.
Early 5G devices are set to move on show subsequent week after telephone chip maker Qualcomm earlier this month introduced 5G-geared up chips with 18 network operators and 19 device makers, analysts stated.

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SRINAGAR: It is an in reality loose run for prisoners within the excessive-security significant jail prison right here in which nearly 300 unauthorized mobile telephones are operational with the inmates of the jail where radicalization of undertrials and petty criminals is posing a developing threat, in line with an authentic record.
The report has been shared with the Jammu and Kashmir Home Department from time to time however movement appeared to have not been taken to check this fashion.
These issues have come to light in the course of an inner probe being executed within the aftermath of getaway of dreaded Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terrorist Mohammed Naveed Jhatt, a Pakistani countrywide, who fled from police custody on February 6 after killing policemen.
According to a national intelligence file, which changed into submitted to the country home department, almost three hundred cellular telephones are operational inside the jail premises which has to turn out to be a den for the radicalization of youths lodged for petty crimes.
The then Director General of Prisons S K Mishra, who turned into shifted after the dramatic break out of Jhatt at busy SMHS sanatorium, had spoken back to the file, saying that the cellular jammer hooked up inside the jail by using Electronics Corporation of India Limited (ECIL) has not been functioning.
“The generation adopted via the ECIL appears to be out of date. The jammers are not capable of blocking any signals or mobile phones,” he stated, adding that the problem becomes suggested to the country home department through several communications however the prison authorities have “no longer obtained any reaction.”
On radicalization, the report stated “the sermons are given on Jihad… The simple tenets of faith are ignored and the emphasis is laid on radical aspects. Such religious sermons have a deep psychological impact on inmates and teenagers especially who expand inclination closer to joining militancy or getting recruited as overground employees (for militants),” the document stated.
There is not any segregation of prisoners and people arrested for expenses under terrorism or separatism are handled with a better diploma of admiring by using the inmates. “The inmates are allotted barracks based on their affiliation of (terror) agency,” the report said, adding the choice is taken by using old prisoners themselves.

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It said the jail, that’s anticipated to act as a correctional facility, is “as an alternative getting used as an area of religious indoctrination and militant recruitment”.
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“It is being determined that even petty crook who spend some time in jails are these days coming out as notably indoctrinated people with nonsecular motivation to support or maybe be a part of militant ranks.”
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Mehbooba”s birthday celebration has a lot of sympathizers in those jails, so expect they’re flushed out, conditions will continue to be the same. How can mobiles be even allowed inner a jail?
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Mishra, who’s at gift posted as chairman-cum-managing director of Jammu and Kashmir Police Housing organization, stated: “segregation of excessive profile militants is unachievable in central jail Srinagar because of very poor and antique shape”.
Anyone can go to any barrack and intermingle and pay attention to the sermons within the barracks, he had spoken back.

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