Apple and Samsung Strike a new deal, Tik Tok continues to grow, Google Assistant gets an update and TweetDeck finally lets us schedule tweets with videos and multiple images

Apple and Samsung Strike a new deal

It’s not news that Apple and Samsung have been going head to head over the years, battling it out to be the top dogs in the tech world. The two companies have been involved in many lengthy battles concerning specific patents, resulting in repercussions for both of the brands.

But times are changing: it looks as though the two tech giants have changed their ways and decided that it’s time to work together. The two companies have announced a new service integration plan – Apple and Samsung have partnered to offer iTunes Movies and TV Shows, as well as AirPlay to a select few smart televisions. According to the recent announcement Samsung will “offer iTunes Movies and TV Shows and Apple AirPlay 2 support on 2019 Samsung Smart TV models beginning this spring.”

But don’t worry, those of us without the newest TVs can still enjoy this, as those with smart TV’s will be able to use these features via a firmware update. The iTunes Movies and TV shows app will debut on Samsung Smart TV’s in over 100 countries, and AirPlay 2 will also be available on Samsung Smart TVs in 190 countries.

Samsung customers will be able to access their iTunes libraries and browse the iTunes store to rent and buy from a selection of movies and TV episodes. With the added support of AirPlay 2, Samsung customers will also be able to stream videos, photos, music, podcasts and more from apple devices, directly to their Samsung Smart TV’s, including QLED 4K and 8K TV’s!

Tik Tok continues to grow

Tik Tok is huge around the world, even in developing markets. The tech app has two lite versions of the app and they have been blowing up since August, and they have been downloaded over 12 million times in the last 5 months.

Tik Tok is the Chinese app taking the world by storm; it allows users to create and share short music videos and has become one of the most popular apps on the market, particularly in the US. To target emerging markets, TikTok launched two lite versions: one for its Asian markets and one for India, Brazil and Russia.

The first app launched in Thailand in August and has been made available across Southeast Asia, with Vietnam, Malaysia and the Philippines the countries where the app is most popular. It has over 5 million downloads currently, whilst the version launched in India, Brazil and Russia has 7 million in 2 months. This version has also been installed across: Egypt, Algeria, Tunisia, Russia, Ecuador, South Africa, Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Kenya, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Nigeria, Angola and Ghana.

In total the app has been downloaded over 887 million times. The app company is growing fast and looks as though it will soon be catching up with the top Western social networking apps, and these companies seem aware of this fact; both Facebook and Snapchat have been working on recreating Tik Tok’s features on their own apps.

Google Assistant gets an update

Google Assistant – Google’s latest virtual assistant for mobile and smart phone devices – got a new upgrade, which brings in Google Maps and more smart features.

The news was shared this week at CES 2019 in Las Vegas. At present, users of Google Home Speakers can ask their Google Assistant to give them directions to specific locations and it will appear on the smart display. With the new update, Google Assistant will be able to offer recommendations for places and inform about transport schedules. As well as this, the update will help users checking into their flights and retrieving boarding passes without having to put in any verbal or manual confirmation codes, starting with coverage on all United Airlines flights.

TweetDeck finally lets us schedule tweets with videos and multiple images

This week, Twitter announced updates to TweetDeck’s scheduling capabilities, which will allow users to schedule Tweets both with videos and multiple images directly through the app. Since Twitter acquired the platform in 2011 it has not seen much change or improvement, and it was even removed from Windows over two years ago.

But times are changing and so is TweetDeck. Twitter saw an opportunity to please the masses and thusly provided. Previously, users would have had to use a third party platform to schedule tweets with videos and multiple images, but not anymore. They have now removed the hassle of jumping from platform to platform in order to schedule content – making everyone’s lives easier, keeping the people happy and getting the platform back to a more current state.