Author: seo

TIDAL finally announced the long-awaited Siri integration. Starting now, subscribers to the music streaming service can ask Apple’s personal assistant to play songs, playlists, albums, and more on the platform. Here’s what you need to know about this update.

According to the company’s Twitter account, ”TIDAL meets Siri.” In addition, the music streaming service also replied to a few users complaining over the past months about the lack of integration with Apple’s personal assistant.

In these last months, TIDAL has also integrated another important feature for Apple Watch users by bringing offline playback on Apple’s smartwatch. On the other hand, the music streaming service still lacks integration with the HomePod and HomePod mini.

As of now, apart from Apple Music, only Deezer and Pandora offer true integration with the HomePod. Unfortunately, Spotify and TIDAL still have to integrate its service to Apple’s speakers.

Ever since Apple released iOS 14.5 last year, it’s possible to use a default music streaming service to play your favorite songs. With TIDAL finally offering Siri integration, this became easier than ever. Just follow the steps below:

1. Make sure you’re running iOS 14.5 or later on your iPhone or iPad;
2. Ask Siri to play an artist/song/album;
3. Look for a new pop-up to choose which service you’d like to use;
4. Tap Yes to allow Siri to access data to TIDAL (or another app);
5. Your music should start playing.

What do you think about this integration with Siri? Which feature are you still waiting to see TIDAL adding? Share your thoughts in the comment section below.

Fans finally have more details about the newest starter set for D&D. Titled Dungeons & Dragons: Dragons of Stormwreck Isle. Wizards of the Coast provided scant details on Thursday, during the D&D Direct streaming presentation. The title and pricing were originally unveiled by parent company Hasbro in February.

Note that when that product was unveiled by Hasbro is was listed with an incorrect price. While the press release is still live, Polygon has confirmed that the new boxed product will be priced at $19.99.

Images show that it comes with an introductory rulebook, an adventure book for Dungeon Masters, a set of blue plastic dice, and some pre-generated character sheets. But it’s the pricing that’s most confusing here.

The original 5th edition Dungeons & Dragons Starter Set came with pretty much the same amount of stuff. It was released in 2014 and has a list price of $19.99. It’s currently going for just $13.29 on Amazon. Meanwhile, the excellent Dungeons & Dragons Essentials Kit is exactly that — essential for getting started with the game — with rules for sidekicks, a double-sided paper map, dice, and 81 cards for tracking magic items, conditions, and more. When that launched in September of 2019 it was priced at $24.99. You can find it now on Amazon for just $19.92.

Update: Polygon has updated our story to reflect the new — and correct — pricing on the boxed set.

Both Apple chairman Art Levinson and health lead Sumbul Desai are among the speaker line-up for Life Itself, a conference which aims ‘to inspire and foster changes in healthcare, while celebrating leaders whose work helps us all to be healthier and happier humans.’

The conference is co-hosted by CNN chief medical correspondent Sanjay Gupta and TEDMED creator Marc Hodosh, and is open to ‘a limited number’ of guests …

The website is something of a tease, providing an extensive biography for each speaker, but only the vaguest of topics. For Levison, for example, the complete description of the topic of his talk is:

Is ageing a disease?

While his biography is rather more extensive.

In September 2013, Arthur Levinson was named chief executive officer of Calico, a company focused on health, aging, and well-being.

Levinson joined Genentech in 1980 as a senior scientist, became head of R&D in 1993, and served as chief executive officer of Genentech from 1995 to 2009. Levinson serves as the chairman of the board of Apple, and previously served as a director of Google from 2004 to 2009.

Levinson has authored or co-authored more than 80 scientific articles and has been named an inventor on 11 United States patents. He was inducted into the Biotech Hall of Fame at the 2003 Biotech Meeting of chief executive officers. BusinessWeek named Levinson one of the “Best Managers of the Year” in 2004 and 2005, and Institutional Investor named him “America’s Best CEO” in the biotech category four years in a row (2004-2007).

In 2006, Princeton University awarded Levinson the James Madison Medal for a distinguished career in scientific research and in biotechnology. In 2008, Levinson was elected as a Fellow to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. In 2011 Levinson received the American Association for Cancer Research Margaret Foti Award for Leadership and Extraordinary Achievements in Cancer Research, and in 2012 he received the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Double Helix Medal.

In 2014 he received the Alumnus Summa Laude Dignatus Award from the University of Washington and was honored as a recipient of the National Medal of Technology and Innovation by President Obama. The Franklin Institute named Levinson as the recipient of the 2020 Bower Award for Business Leadership, which recognizes individuals who have demonstrated outstanding leadership in an American business or industry while adhering to the highest ethical standards.

Levinson received his Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Washington, earned a doctorate in biochemical sciences from Princeton University, and did his postdoctoral work with Mike Bishop and Harold Varmus at UCSF.

With Dr Desai, we don’t even get a topic title, just her biography.

Sumbul Desai, MD serves as Vice President of Health at Apple, overseeing health initiatives including clinical product development, medical research, and innovative clinical partnerships. She also leads the regulatory and quality teams at Apple.

Apple is also working with the best in the medical field, including Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, the American Heart Association, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Johns Hopkins University, to conduct landmark health studies and advance discovery with the ResearchKit and CareKit platforms. Apple recently launched its Health Sharing and Walking Steadiness features, adding to the many consumer health tools available on Apple Watch and iPhone including ECG, Irregular Heart Rhythm, Cycle Tracking and Hearing Health.

Dr. Desai recently served as Vice Chair of Strategy and Innovation in the Department of Medicine at Stanford Medicine, as well as Associate Chief Medical Officer at Stanford Healthcare. She also serves as Clinical Associate Professor in the Department of Medicine at Stanford School of Medicine.

Desai was hired by Apple back in 2017, when she was Stanford’s digital health leader. A couple of months ago, she talked about the three questions the company asks when designing new health features for its products:

• How are they grounded in science?
• How are they technically feasible?
• How do we deliver them in a thoughtful and meaningful design that will be impactful to a user?

I’m sure both talks will be well worth hearing.

As it slowly becomes safer to move your weekly game of Dungeons & Dragons away from the computer and back to the table, virtual tools like Roll20 will continue to be an option. But it’s also time for DMs to start thinking about physical maps and miniatures once again. Luckily, in an announcement at today’s D&D Direct event, Wizards of the Coast has you covered.

Image: Wizards of the Coast

Feast your eyes on Campaign Cases. These two kits give you everything you need to lay out two-dimensional maps and environments. The Creatures Case includes 64 customizable tokens in three sizes (and four colors) with a nice mix of what look like one, two, and three inch tokens to represent D&D’s small, medium, and large creatures. The case comes with 159 illustrated and reusable cling stickers in sizes to match and cover a wide range of creatures from kobolds to umber hulks to dragons.

Image: Wizards of the Coast

The Terrain Case has 30 interlocking tiles, along with a larger foldable map that looks to be about 22 by 18 inches or so. The double-sided tiles and map show a grassy terrain on one side and an snowy terrain on the reverse. The Terrain Case comes with the same type of reusable cling stickers as the Creature Case, representing things like campfires, trees, and gigantic bird nests. The announcement didn’t mention if the map and tiles would be dry erase friendly.

Both cases come in a ready-to-travel keepsake box with compartments for the various components and a handle on top. No pricing was mentioned during the presentation, but Campaign Cases will release on July 19. Preorders kick off today.