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Good news for parents: Microsoft’s Bing now lets you see how a school ranks nationally in the US

Jul17
by on July 17, 2014 at 4:00 am
Posted In: Around the Web, bing, Product Updates

If a school’s national ranking is one of the key criteria you have in mind when selecting a school for your kids, Microsoft’s Bing is making it easier for you. The search engine now shows school ratings, rankings and academic indicators directly in Snapshot. This means that when you search for a particular school in the US — from elementary to high school to higher education — you get to see how they fare nationally, within the state and what their STEM rating might be. It even shows the rating of the community around the school and famous alumnus. Microsoft has been…

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PayPal is rewarding loyal customers with better offers and priority in the customer service queue

Jul17
by on July 17, 2014 at 3:13 am
Posted In: Around the Web, Insider, payments

PayPal wants to keep customers coming back to its payments platform — and so it’s rewarding those who use it the most with a new program called ‘PayPal Select’ that is launching this week in the US. The program will give loyal PayPal customers access to what the company says are the “best offers” from leading online retailers, and first dibs in the customer service queue whenever they have questions. Additional benefits will be revealed “over time” as the program matures. You will only know if you’re a qualifying customer when PayPal emails you with a welcome to the program,…

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LG announces the G3 Beat, a 5-inch, mid-range version of its flagship G3 smartphone

Jul17
by on July 17, 2014 at 2:56 am
Posted In: Around the Web, Asia, lg, Mobile

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LG has announced the G3 Beat, a new, mid-range version of its flagship G3 smartphone. With a screen size of five inches, the G3 Beat is slightly smaller than its 5.5-inch older sibling, but LG claims the device “retains the best features and functions of the G3″ while catering to consumers who are shopping with a smaller budget. The new device runs Android KitKat but is more modestly powered than the G3. At the heart of the G3 Beat is a 1.2 GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, while it includes 1GB RAM, 8GB of on-device memory — both of which are half the power…

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Microsoft announces Xbox One sales more than doubled in June following price drop to $399

Jul16
by on July 16, 2014 at 11:03 pm
Posted In: Around the Web, Insider

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The Xbox One has had it tough since launch. While Microsoft lead the console wars with the Xbox 360, the PlayStation 4 has been outselling the Xbox One. But good news out of Redmond, the June sales of the console have more than doubled the May numbers. According to Xbox Wire, an internal Xbox blog, the uptick in sales numbers probably has something to do with the new Kinect-free $399 version of the console and games that were announced at E3. That uptick in sales is based on sold-through numbers during the retail calendar. What Xbox Wire doesn’t reveal is actual numbers…

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Home-automation company Insteon to add Cortana speech recognition support to apps

Jul16
by on July 16, 2014 at 10:39 pm
Posted In: Apps, Around the Web, Insider

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More and more companies want us talking to our devices. Apple has Siri, Google has Google Now, Glass and Android Wear, and Microsoft has the Xbox Kinect and its newest Halo-inspired feature, Cortana. Now connected home (or internet of things) company Insteon is adding Cortana support to its Windows phone apps in the next couple of months. With the upcoming update, Windows Phone users can control their lights, thermostats, and other Insteon connected devices with their voice. For example, you can tell your Windows Phone, “Insteon, turn off all the lights.” This eliminates the need to launch an app just to control connected items…

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