Windows 11 doubled its usage share in the last two months

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In a blog post published a few days ago, Panos Panay, Chief Product Officer of Windows and Devices at Microsoft, talked about the future of Windows 11 and also announced that upgrades of the new OS have been taken up by users at twice the rate of Windows 10 upgrades.

Of course, as is to be expected by any sort of such announcement from Microsoft, there were no figures to back up this claim, but what is clear is that Windows 11 is rapidly increasing its usage share.

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Microsoft releases Windows 11 Build 22543 with some improved UI visuals

Windows 11 laptop

Windows Insiders in the Dev Channel usually get new builds on a Wednesday. This week they’ve had to wait an extra day, but it’s definitely worth it with this latest flight.

Build 22543 comes with quite a few improvements, including updated visuals for some UI areas.

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The apps section of the Microsoft Store is still a dumpster fire

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In a new blog post in which he discussed a number of things, including the (near) future of Windows 11, Panos Panay, Chief Product Officer, Windows + Devices talked about how the new operating system is driving 3x more traffic to the newly redesigned Microsoft Store.

"We’re energized by the feedback from both our customers and partners about the new Microsoft Store" he said. But hmm... Perhaps he needs to step out from his bubble and see what Windows customers are really saying about it.

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Microsoft reveals what's next for Windows 11

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Let’s be honest here. Windows 11 has the makings of being a good operating system, but it’s not there yet. Some of the features that Microsoft touted in its original presentation -- such as native support for Android apps -- aren’t even available yet.

However, Microsoft today addresses what’s coming next for the new OS and you won’t have long to wait to try out the new features and functionality.

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YouTube's TikTok rival is more popular than you might think

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TikTok’s massive success caught the major social networks napping. While they might not have anticipated the meteoric rise of the platform, they weren’t slow in rushing to produce their own takes on the popular short-form, video-sharing app.

While rivals Byte, Triller, and Clash all have their fans, it’s Instagram’s Reels, and YouTube’s Shorts that have the best chance of dethroning TikTok. You might scoff at the idea of that happening, but YouTube has just announced the all-time views for Shorts so far, and they are massive.

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Children can now code their own versions of Animal Crossing or The Legend of Zelda

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Open-ended role-playing games like The Legend of Zelda and Animal Crossing are hugely popular with younger children, and codeSpark Academy, the learn-to-code app for children, has just added a new set of design tools to help them make their own such games.

codeSpark Academy says the tools in its "Adventure Game" addition require less hand-eye coordination than other creative modes. It also lets users add features like speech bubbles for characters, to enhance storytelling.

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Microsoft releases Windows 11 Build 22538 with Voice Access updates and lots of fixes

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It’s Wednesday and that can only mean one thing for Windows Insiders in the Dev Channel -- a new Windows 11 build from Microsoft!

Build 22538 fixes a number of problems, including one that caused explorer.exe to crash for some Insiders when they pressed the hardware volume buttons. The build also includes some updates to the Voice Access feature introduced in Build 22518.

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Microsoft set to acquire Activision Blizzard for $68.7 billion

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Microsoft today announced plans to acquire game developer giant Activision Blizzard for $68.7 billion. It is a move designed to expand the company's gaming business across PC, console, mobile and the cloud, as well as to give it a solid start in the metaverse.

This deal will make Microsoft the third largest gaming company (by revenue), behind Tencent and Sony.

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iStorage diskAshur M2: An ultra-secure hardware encrypted portable SSD [Review]

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Storing files in the cloud has a lot of benefits, not least making them easily accessible from anywhere. It isn’t necessarily the most secure option, however.

If you have private data that you can’t afford to fall into the wrong hands, you should definitely consider a PIN authenticated hardware encrypted portable USB SSD like iStorage’s excellent diskAshur M2.

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Anyone who masters the principles of machine learning is mastering a big part of our tech future and opening up incredible new directions in careers that include fraud detection, optimizing search results, serving real-time ads, credit-scoring, building accurate and sophisticated pricing models -- and way, way more.

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Microsoft releases Windows 11 Build 22533 with redesigned flyout

Windows 11 laptop

With the holidays a distant memory, Microsoft is back to its regular Wednesday release schedule with a new Windows 11 build for Insiders on the Dev Channel.

Build 22533  updates the flyout design for the hardware indicators for brightness, volume, camera privacy, camera on/off and airplane mode, so it now follows Windows 11’s design principles.

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Facebook tracks you across the web and Mozilla wants your help in finding out how

Everyone knows that Facebook collects data on people online and then uses this to tailor content and advertising. Exactly how it does this remains something of a mystery, however.

Mozilla has partnered with non-profit newsroom The Markup for what it’s calling the 'Facebook Pixel Hunt' to find out how Meta tracks people across the web through its pixel-powered ad network, and what it does with this collected data.

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