NewsBytes Briefing: Clubhouse hits million downloads on Android, and more
What's the story
Despite Big Tech doing its best to clone Clubhouse into their existing platforms, evidently nothing beats the original. Android users flocked to the newly launched app of the audio-only social media platform and downloaded it a million times. Clubhouse achieved the feat in less than a week. To put this into perspective, it took around a year to amass 10 million downloads on iOS.
Reason
Meanwhile, Jack Ma can't catch a break from government crackdown
However, not everyone is having a good time. Chinese billionaire Jack Ma continues to be hounded by the Communist Party. After suspending the IPO of Ma's fintech company Ant Group and levying anti-competition fines on Alibaba Group, the government crackdown has now forced the billionaire to step down as the president of Hupan University, an elite business school he had co-founded six years ago.
Fast and non-invasive
New COVID-19 test achieves the convenience and speed of breathalyzer
In an unrelated good news, Singapore has developed a new test that could prove to be a viable alternative to the RT-PCR test used for rapidly detecting COVID-19 infections. Developed by Breathonix, the experimental apparatus works like a standard breathalyzer test, but claims to offer a detection sensitivity of 93 percent. The sheer speed and convenience of the test makes it extremely attractive.
Moving prism
Google's new patent could solve under-display camera quality issues
In other significant consumer technology innovations, Google has filed a patent for an implementation of under-display camera that solves the problem of poor selfie quality plaguing existing solutions. Google's patent uses a movable prism to maintain true transparency for better photo quality, while also projecting the image from a hidden display to transform the transparent camera window into a seamless part of the screen.
Lossless audio
Journalists try their hand at design to inspire Apple
From innovation, let's move to the lack thereof. While Apple Music has finally made the switch to lossless audio, none of its wireless earphones are capable of actually delivering lossless audio, well, wirelessly. The good folk at 9to5Mac therefore took matters into their own hands and created beautiful renders of the iPod Max and AirPods Max, which are concept designs of their own making.