TTFN

Ta Ta For Now and thanks for everything.

The Editors

Tostitos at the Super Bowl

They may not be getting a Super Bowl ad this year, but

Tostitos will be getting plenty of camera time.

The PepsiCo brand will go for the unofficial record for a live

stream of a tortilla chip bowl, set out in the brand’s cantina

at the game in Atlanta.

A live stream camera will focus on the bowl for 53 hours, from

1:29 pm ET on February 1 to 6:29 pm on Game Day, February 3.

"This might be the most exciting thing to hit the Super Bowl

marketing scene in a decade, maybe ever…or maybe not at

all," said Sheldon Boyea, senior director of marketing, Tostitos,

the Super Bowl’s official chip and dip sponsor.

Droll commentary aside, the brand offers hope of at least a

few moments of interest, courtesy of appearances by current

and former NFL stars, including Barry Sanders, Dak Prescott,

Matt Ryan, Baker Mayfield and Tony Gonzalez.

Apple Games

Apple is planning a subscription service for games, according

to five people familiar with the matter.

The service would function like Netflix for games, allowing

users who pay a subscription fee to access a bundled list of

titles. Apple ($AAPL) began privately discussing a subscription

service with game developers in the second half of 2018, said

the people, all of whom requested anonymity to discuss

unannounced plans.

It’s unclear how much the subscription will cost or what kind of

games Apple will offer. The service is still in the early stages of

development, and Apple could ultimately decide to abandon it.

The company has also discussed partnering with developers as

a publisher, according to two people familiar with the talks, which

could signal Apple’s ambition to assume distribution, marketing,

and other related costs for select games.

5G Smart Cars

The next generation of wireless data communications is

called 5G because it succeeds older protocols. Most of the

current discussion about 5G concerns your phone and other

mobile devices. Because 5G can bring up to 20 Gbps data

speeds to your devices, it enables a better experience.

What might get lost in the noise is that 5G is also going to

enable automakers, governments, and the aftermarket to put

smarter, more connected vehicles on the road through

Cellular Vehicle-to-Anything (C-V2X) communications.

“We announced our 9150 C-V2X chipset in September 2017,”

said Maged Zaki, director of technical marketing at Qualcomm.

“Since then, we have done about 20 trials globally, in the US,

Europe, China, Korea, and Japan. I worked with most of the

automakers on the trials, and Ford just announced that it will

release 5G C-V2X in cars starting in 2022. That’s a big win for

us. Also, we think we’ll get huge traction in China because

China is building new infrastructure that will use the technology.”

MSFT Does It Again

MSFT is planning to end support for the Windows phone

it once championed as a potential iPhone, BlackBerry and

Galaxy killer.

On Friday, the tech giant announced that anyone who still

uses its Windows 10 mobile platform — once called Windows

Phone — should switch over to an iPhone or an Android phone.

A change to the Windows 10 Mobile support page was first

spotted by Thurrott, a site that covers Microsoft.

Microsoft said that on Dec. 10, 2019, it will stop sending “new

security updates, non-security hotfixes, free assisted support

options, or technical content updates from Microsoft for free.”

In other words, there aren’t going to be any more updates, and

only a few phone models will even be supported until that final

Date.

“With the Windows 10 Mobile OS end of support, we recommend

that customers move to a supported Android or iOS device,”

Microsoft said. “Microsoft’s mission statement to empower every

person and every organization on the planet to achieve more,

compels us to support our Mobile apps on those platforms and

devices.”

Samsung S10

That new leak lines up with previous leaks. As you can

see on the photo, the new devices don’t have a notch.

They feature a hole-punch selfie camera instead. If you’re

looking for the fingerprint sensor, Samsung could choose

to embed it in the screen.

Just like in previous years, in addition to the main S10,

there will be a bigger version of the device — the S10+.

On this photo, you can see that the bigger version has

two selfie cameras instead of one.

But the S10E is a new addition to the lineup. Samsung is

launching a more affordable version of the S10 at the

same time as the S10. The S10E features two cameras

on the back instead of three for instance. I wouldn’t be

surprised if the S10E had an LCD display instead of an

AMOLED display as well.

Samsung plans to unveil the Galaxy S10 at an event in

San Francisco on February 20. We’ll have a team on the

ground to tell you more about the device.

Another LONG Weekend

Happy MLK Day to all!