Google to power global business operations with renewable energy in 2017

This article originally appeared on our sister site, Charged

A while back, Google announced that it wanted to power its entire business with clean energy. It looks like the company is very close to realizing this ambitious goal, as it plans to reach 100% renewable energy for its global operations in 2017, which includes both data centers as well as its offices.

Urs Hölzle, Google's senior vice president for technical infrastructure, made the announcement on the company's official blog. He also stated that Google will achieve its goal by directly buying enough wind and solar electricity on a yearly basis to account for every unit of electricity the company consumes.

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Google will do this for two reasons. The first is that the tech giant wants to reduce its carbon footprint and do its share in helping fight climate change, while the second reason is simply that it makes business sense.

According to The Verge, Google consumed almost as much power last year as the entire city of San Francisco. In hopes of keeping the electricity costs down, the company is turning towards renewable energy.

Over the last six years, the cost of wind and solar came down 60 percent and 80 percent, respectively, proving that renewables are increasingly becoming the lowest cost option. Electricity costs are one of the largest components of our operating expenses at our data centers, and having a long-term stable cost of renewable power provides protection against price swings in energy. — Urs Hölzle, Google's senior vice president for technical infrastructure

Google also said that powering its entire business with clean energy is only the first step in its mission. The tech giant wants to focus on regional renewable energy purchases in places where its data centers are located.

It also wants to broaden the variety of energy sources it buys in order to enable renewable energy production throughout the day. As Urs Hölzle puts it, "The wind doesn't blow 24 hours a day."

What are your thoughts on this topic? Do you think it's important for large companies to go green?

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Zuckerberg offers sneak peek at potential features coming to Facebook

Mark Zuckerberg gave us a glimpse of what the social giant could be bringing to Facebook next year, and it's very cool indeed.

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Just yesterday, Zuckerberg took to Facebook Live to show off some cool features that the team has been working on: some cool features that we could see on Facebook in the future, which include location requesting, GIFs as comments, and more.

Facebook's Oculus Touch controllers are well-received by critics, some even calling them "the best virtual reality controllers so far." Well, it seems Facebook is already hard at work making the Oculus Touch even better. Zuckerberg showed a demo device – a modified version of the current Oculus Touch – which physically changes its temperature depending on your virtual interaction. For instance, if you are hovering over a fire in your virtual reality like Zuckerberg was, the controllers will get physically warm.

There are also some big changes that might be coming to the social network itself. Zuckerberg demoed a new feature in Messenger, where you can request someone's precise location. He explained that this "builds on the safety check work" that the company has done. Personally, I think it's a fantastic idea, and takes the current emergency check-in process one step further. After all, social media is playing an increasingly bigger role in emergency situations.

Next up: more GIFs. If you love using GIFs in Messenger, you are going to love this – in the near future, you may be able to use GIFs as comments. Thanks to Giphy and Riffsy, users will be able to find the right GIF just like in Messenger and post it as a comment. Now, this is something that I've been waiting for a very long time.

Thanks to Giphy and Riffsy, users will be able to find the right GIF just like in Messenger and post it as a comment. Now, this is something that I've been waiting for a very long time.

The last of the demoed features is an AI-based shared albums feature. Essentially, the machine recognizes what you want (i.e. photos from the wedding) and gathers all the relevant photos and videos and creates an album for everyone to see.

Although these are not confirmed features, it is highly likely that we will see at least some of them next year – we will make sure to keep you updated!

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Rumor: Samsung to release Pearl Black Galaxy S7 Edge on December 9

The Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge was originally released in four colors: Black Onyx, Gold Platinum, White Pearl, and Silver Titanium. Since then, the South Korean giant has also released its flagship smartphone in Pink Gold and Blue Coral color options.

According to SamMobile, Samsung will launch the Pearl Black version of the high-end smartphone in South Korea on Friday, December 9. Despite the different name, this is the same glossy black S7 Edge we saw in-the-wild photos of recently.

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In addition to the new color, the device will also offer more storage — 128 GB — to make sure you have enough room for all your images, videos, apps, and similar content. All other specifications will, obviously, remain the same as on the original version of the phone.

As of now, we do not know if the device will only be available in South Korea, or if Samsung will release it in other markets as well. We'll know more regarding this after the official announcement of the new device on Friday, if it even happens, of course. Fingers crossed.

So, what do you think of the new Galaxy S7 Edge color option? Do you like how it looks? Let us know in the comment section below.

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Chrome 55 for Android allows downloads for offline use and more

According to a post on the official Chrome Releases blog that tracks release updates from the Chrome team, Chrome 55 for Android has been released and will be available on Google Play over the next few days. The latest version v55.0.2883.84 contains several performance, memory, and stability fixes, apart from a few new features.

The new Chrome for Android update allows you to easily download music, videos, and even full web pages for viewing offline. You can view these downloads within Chrome, as well as share those.

The browser also introduces a spell checker and the misspelled words will be highlighted in the text fields on web pages. Per the blog post, there are also improvements to the contextual search UI.

What do you think of the new features? Tell us in the comments!

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HTC 10 Android 7.0 kernel code available for unlocked devices

HTC recently started rolling out the Android 7.0 Nougat update to unlocked devices over-the-air, as well as making the full update available for direct download from HTC.com. Now, HTC has released the kernel source code for developers.

The 219 MB file is available for unlocked devices only and can be downloaded now from HTCdev.com. For those who are unaware, the kernel is the core software program that manages the system resources like system memory, CPU resources, networking etc. It's not the same as the Android 7.0 Nougat ROM rolling out to the HTC 10, only what it's built from.

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If you're a developer looking to get involved, you can download the HTC kernel 3.18.31 at the link and if you want to know more about kernels, check out our explanation video here.

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Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes goes rogue with new characters from Rogue One

In case you've been living under a space rock, you're probably aware that Rogue One: A Star Wars Story is less than 10 days away.

To celebrate the launch of the new movie, EA is releasing an update to Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes that brings the new Rogue One Heroes Pack. As you may have guessed, the new bundle features many of the new characters from Rogue One, including K-2SO and more.

The Rogue One Heroes Pack will be available, for free, exclusively to Android users beginning 12:01 PT on Wednesday, December 7 through December 16. As an added bonus, K-2SO will be available for free only on Android. Players will also be able to upgrade the ex-Imperial droid to 7 stars within the game.

Excited? Me too.

The update is rolling out now in the Play Store, so head to the link below for the update.

Get it from Google Play

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Boot Loops Cereal | Podcast 090

While Josh is out, for the third (and potentially final) time, to acquire Snapchat Spectacles, the rest of the gang gets together to talk about the week's Android news. This episode, we have Jonathan Feist, Joe Hindy, and David Imel to talk about the potential of Google Assistant coming to the Nexus devices, the arrival of even MORE Pokemon in Pokemon Go, and the woes of Cyanogen and their recent dramas. Check the timecodes below if you want to jump to a specific topic!

The Android Authority Podcast – discussing topics in Android every single week.

Rough Timecodes:
After Josh rants about Snapchat Spectacles, our check-in includes another crazy story from David Imel
01:00 – Spectacles Debacle
30:00 – Pokemon Go Updates
42:00 – Android Nougat 7.1 for Nexus
47:00 – Nexus 5X recalls and refunds by LG
60:00 – Cyanogen craziness

Links to Podcast

RSS Feed
iTunes
Stitcher
SoundCloud
Direct Download

Relevant Links

Android 7.1 on the Nexus
Pokemon Go updates
Nexus 5X refunds
Cyanogen saga

Follow our Hosts

Joshua Vergara Twitter | Google+	Joseph Hindy Twitter | Google+
Andrew Grush Twitter | Google+	Jonathan Feist Twitter | Google+
Nirave Gondhia Twitter | Google+	John Dye Twitter | Facebook
Lanh Nguyen Twitter | YouTube	David Imel Twitter | Instagram
December 2016 giveaways
SoundGuys – Powerbeats3 giveaway TabTimes – iPad Pro 9.7 giveaway	VRSource – Oculus Rift and Oculus Touch giveaway Charged – DJI Mavic Pro drone giveaway

Recorded on December 1, 2016 – Hosted by Jonathan Feist and produced by Joshua Vergara.

"RIP Josh."

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