TechDroider: Editorial

The Top 4 TV Deals Besides Netflix

The Top 4 TV Deals Besides Netflix
Featuring thousands of shows and movies on its site, Netflix has taken the streaming world by storm since its founding in 1997, with nearly 7.5 million customers joining its customer base in the first quarter of 2018 alone.

However, while other TV streaming sites and bundles haven’t quite reached an iconic ‘Netflix and chill’ status, there are still some TV viewers that find themselves dissatisfied with what the popular streaming site alone can offer. Thus, many people have started looking into alternative options for streaming their favorite TV shows and movies online.

Luckily for them – and for you if you have similarly found the perks of Netflix alone to be underwhelming – there are other options.

Why Are Viewers Turning to Alternative TV Deals?

Although still able to boast its success as the #1 streaming platform worldwide, services and TV deals beyond Netflix have been gaining popularity in recent years as well.

This may be due to the increasing cost for most Netflix membership plans, which has made deals like Verizon triple play – which bundles gigabit connection, TV, and phone services – a relatively budget-friendly option to turn to.

Some people are also just ready to find some new content that hasn’t yet been added to world’s favorite streaming platform. While Netflix still has an impressive offering of media for viewing, for those with more specific tastes, or who are otherwise up for trying out the two to four-week trials offered by some popular alternative streaming networks, TV viewers have no shortage of television options.

In addition to Verizon’s Fios triple play deal, listed below are four other top contenders gaining popularity as Netflix alternatives.

Top Alternatives for TV Deals


1. Amazon Prime Video

Amazon Prime Video is just one of the perks Amazon Prime members can gain access to when signing up for their prime membership account. However, the video service – now #2 to Netflix for streaming – can also be bought alone, without the prime membership, at a cost of $8.99 per month.

Amazon Prime Video features TV shows from dozens of channels, movies, as well as original content such as the popular shows “Man in the High Castle” and “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”.

2. Hulu

Hulu is another top TV and movie streaming platform, as a viewing option very similar to Netflix. Starting at $7.99 per month for its lowest-cost subscription (with an upgraded commercial-free plan available for $11.99) the pricing is similar to its top competitors.

One perk of this streaming platform is its feature of offering episodes of shows currently on air, typically allowing access to new episodes one day after airing on their respective networks. Hulu also now offers a Live TV package (at a pricier $39.99 per month), which allows users to live stream 50+ top live and on-demand channels, such as ESPN and popular news channels.

3. Acorn TV

For TV viewers in the United States who can’t get enough of the most popular British dramas and comedies, Acorn TV is an increasingly popular American streaming service providing viewer access to a myriad of TV shows from the UK as well as other countries.

At $4.99 a month, it can be an economical, commercial-free, on-demand TV deal for those still reeling over the end of Downton Abbey and who are looking for a new engaging British show to incite the same excitement.

Acorn TV is available to be streamed on several platforms, including Roku devices, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, or simply your iPad or computer.

4. YouTube TV

Available at $35 a month, YouTube TV is a recent premium streaming service offered by YouTube featuring cable network streaming, live broadcast television, as well as shows from other popular entertainment, news, and sports networks. In other words, it’s basically a cable replacement, which might better explain the cost.

YouTube TV can be viewed on Google Chromecast, Android and iOS devices, tablets, and an Apple TV.

How To Effectively Boost Your Business With Technology

There are many available resources out there these days that have a purpose of making your life easier, and many apps and resources that are developed specifically for convenience and communication. The ways that businesses communicate with their customers has changed drastically over the last five to ten years. Using some of these resources to help develop your businessand gain a larger customer base could have incredibly impacting results if approached in the right way. Below are some ideas and inspiration for quick and easy ways to boost your business.

Social Media

The advancements and accessibility of social media in just the last five years has had an astounding impact on the way consumers gain information. Apps such as Facebook and Snapchat have now become mainstream sources for news updates. Twitter and Instagram enable photos and stories to be shared publicly to the masses. Bearing this in mind, a well thought out and impressive social media campaign could be what is missing from a serious boost in your business. Depending on what you are offering to your customers, by pinpointing your target market, you can quickly begin to connect with your customers remotely.

Trending Topics

Whether you run a café, a car dealership or a cab service, you can tailor a social media platform to work for you. Using a hashtag can be incredibly powerful and can be used to get a subject ‘trending’. For example, if you are offering a one-time only deal, by sharing an image on Twitter, Facebook,and Instagram with relevant info and a hashtag including a keyword that you want to start trending, you can start to spread the message of your business. Using available features to give live updates can be useful if you are running events, as live videos have become a regular feature of our newsfeeds. Email marketing is another practical and manageable way to boost business as 91% of customers check their email on a daily basis. Using email to inform customers of trends and offers can again bring in business with the touch of a button.

Customer Loyalty

Of course, this is an obvious point, but spending time devising a strategy as to how best connect and communicate with customers can have long-lasting results. By implementing specific offers and deals to loyal customers, you can encourage these customers to return to your business; loyalty and points cards are a good way to do this. It can be as advanced or uncomplicated as you want; coffee shops often have loyalty cards that require ten stamps for a free drink, for example. Other shops and businesses may offer more advanced loyalty cards to collect points which a customer can then track online. By making your customers feel valued, you can ensure happy customers not only return, but spread the message. Sometimes the downfall of a business can be to not pay attention to their current customers in the quest to find new ones. This can potentially affect and impact those who have been loyal to you, so don’t forget the old just to find the new.

3 Advances in Bio-metrics and Smartphone Security

The term “biometrics” is one of those words that many of us are familiar with, but we might not be able to define it if we were on a quiz show. To help you win that top prize on Jeopardy someday, biometrics are body measurements. Thanks to some pretty amazing advancements in technology, we now use different types of biometrics as security features in our devices like smartphones. As Study notes, biometric security measures the unique characteristics that we have in our bodies; in turn, these biological traits will verify who we are and give us access to our portable devices. 

Or, as Android Central states, instead of having to remember the bunch of letters, numbers and characters that make up a traditional password, in the land of biometric security, we are the password. Here are three of biometric's coolest applications:

Iris Recognition

Iris recognition works by measuring and scanning a smartphone owner’s iris pattern. Each one of us has a different pattern of color our irises, so smartphones that are equipped with this form of biometric security can scan the user’s eye to verify his or her identity. For example, if you own a Samsung Galaxy S8, to use the iris scanner to authenticate yourself, you will lift the phone to eye level at arm’s length, and wait for the innovative scanner to capture the iris data from your peepers. The Galaxy S8 is able to do this process pretty quickly and unlock your

phone. The technology also works from a longer distance and will not get fussy and stop working if your eyes are not perfectly centered with the phone.

Fingerprint Scanners

Another cool type of biometric security involves fingerprint scanners. As you have probably been told from the time you were a kid, your fingerprints are unique, so they are a reliable way to allow — or not allow — someone into a smartphone. Fingerprint scanners work by measuring the arches, loops and whorls on the finger. If the sensor detects your unique print, it will let you get into your phone.

As M2Sys.com notes, while fingerprint scanners used to be used only by the government, the military and law enforcement, they have become increasingly popular over the past five years and are now found in a number of smartphones, including the Touch ID feature that is found on many recent-model iPhones.

Facial Recognition
As the name implies, this type of biometric security uses your face to gain access to your smartphone. Apple announced Face ID not too long ago, and it has gotten a lot of attention as people wonder if it is possible to “fool” this form of security with a photo or other methods. 

As Wired notes, a team from the website tried hard to crack the Face ID system in a number of ways without any success. The new Apple iPhone X, which features Face ID, uses more than a 2D facial check; it will use a grid of 30,000 infrared dots projected onto a face, along with an infrared camera reading the distortion of the grid to create a 3D image of your face.

As the years go by, it will be interesting to see what other advances will be made in biometric security and its application to smartphones. It is nice to know that we no longer have to recall complicated passwords to access our trusty devices and rely instead on certain unique parts of our bodies.

Why We Need to Understand Aging

Young people today are understood like no other generation before. Their likes, dislikes, reading habits, political affiliation, routes, check-ins, friends, and shopping habits are categorized and stored by the big Internet giants like Google, Facebook, and more. Young people’s habits are known, the data has been stored, and they can be studied. It is not young people that we need to understand, it is the seniors of our population. Aging is an inevitability that we all face, and there are multi-billion industries that work towards prolonging youth and defying aging at every turn.

What we need to do, however, is understand aging. We need to understand the sociological impact for the betterment of our society. We need to understand how to take care of our aging population. We need to know more about aging, because we are living longer than ever, and we are living beyond their savings. What do we do with our aging population?

We need to understand aging so that we can prepare our society and our infrastructure for the future if every young person today is looking at a life of a century or more. With the amount of money and research going in to stopping or even reversing aging through stem cell research and beyond, it’s possible that we will live longer than that. As such, we need to make changes to our society. We need people who are qualified and have doctorates in the process of aging. We need people with gerontology PhDs such as these at https://gradschool.cuchicago.edu/academics/doctoral/edd-phd-gerontology-leadership/.

We need specialists who will help direct businesses, city planners, and politicians towards building a future that takes into account our unprecedented lifespan. We have millions of seniors who will outlive their savings and need to rely on Medicaid. This isn’t just a problem for the seniors of today, but every person alive and every person who will be born.

We need everyone to be aware of this issue, and everyone needs to have an understanding of gerontology. It isn’t just a degree that will help you take care of our senior population, it’s a degree that will help direct our society to a more sustainable future.

Our parents and grandparents are going to need more help as they age. We need people who will be there to help us learn how to take care of them and their advanced medical and social issues. We also need people to help us find them housing, support, and more. We need people who have studied gerontology to take care of our seniors, and we need them to produce studies that will help create cities and technologies that address our aging population.

Studying gerontology isn’t just about taking care of our elders, it’s about making the future a place we can all live. Advancements have changed the face of our earth entirely, and we need to be innovative and forward thinking if we are going to have a bright and happy future.

5 Tips you need to know about internet security

5 Tips you need to know about internet security
As you all know, Internet security plays a vital role in keeping our devices safe from online threats of any kind. Which, as we all noticed by now, are becoming more and more frequent. Not to mention very dangerous. By the way things look, hackers won't stop too soon from affecting our lives and the way our gadgets perform. If we don't know how to protect ourselves and our PCs, tablets or smartphone against malicious software, we risk losing all the important data stored on them.

Individual users and companies, no matter if big or small, should pay extra attention to Internet security. After all, this makes the difference between a well-protected computer and one risking major damage. The Internet is a very dangerous place nowadays. If we don't know how to stay safe when using it, we'll leave the door open to all sorts of dangers.

All of this might sound scary, but there's a silver lining to it. We can stay protected from harm if we follow a list of simple rules. In today's post we're going to discuss 5 tips you need to know about Internet security. Read all about them and you won't have to worry about a thing anymore! Off we go.

Use a different password for your social media accounts

The temptation to use the same password for our Twitter, Facebook and other accounts can be quite big for many of us. The important thing here is to resist it every time it comes up. Otherwise hackers will find a quick way to figure it out and login to your social media profiles via this password. Using different and complex passwords is the best thing you can do. Password managers come in very handy in situations like these. LastPass and KeePass are only two of the best options you can look for online and try out for a while.

Another good idea here is to see if the accounts you're registered to have multi-factor authentication. If they do, use that and you'll feel way more secure than if they didn't.

Make sure the sites you visit use HTTPS

Hackers love it when we access Internet pages that start with HTTP. The latter is already obsolete because it's been proven to do a lot of damage from a security viewpoint. Websites containing the HTTPS we mentioned combine the HTTP - or Hypertext Transfer Protocol - with something called a Secure Socket Layer (SSL)/Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocol.
In other words: you're offered strong encryption whenever a session between the browser you're using and a web server happens. This helps a lot when you're buying something online, for instance.

Be extra careful when using public Wi-Fi

Do you like to work from the park or a coffee shop? Then you'll most likely use their free Wi-Fi. This is going to make hackers very happy. Why? Because every time you open a website in your favorite place, you'll give them access to your device's most important data.
To avoid this from affecting you, too, we have a tip for you: before using public Wi-Fi, go to your computer. From there, disable the option called file sharing. Also, make sure you're connected to a VPN before opening a site that requires a password from you.

Choose strong Internet security solutions

Compared to your usual antivirus package, Internet security suites come with better protection for your computer. Especially against phishing, ransomware and other modern-day online threats. You can find out more about it and how to select the best option for you from here.

Remove suspicious emails

If you're at work and you notice unsolicited emails, chances are they contain dangerous attachments. Once you open them and click the suspicious links inside, you'll expose your PC to online threats. Better stay as far away as possible from going through any of that. Your company's IT department needs to be notified asap. They'll know how to deal with this kind of problem.
Dealing with online threats isn't so hard nowadays. There are many ways to prevent you from falling prey to hackers. If you want to keep your beloved devices as safe as possible, take a look at the 5 tips you need to know about Internet security!

Is Hacking Roblox a new trend?

Is Hacking Roblox a new trend?
It's safe to say Roblox is THE MOST played multi-platform game of it's time. With a following of over 178 million players it's not surprising whatsoever, but with a community as large as this, it's not incorrect to say there won't be issues! Sure, you've got your mini-games and it's quite easy to establish friendships with other players, but if you're not keeping up with the community you're missing out on many wonderful opportunities.

For those not granted the gift of financial freedom it's quite hard to "keep up". Builders club is nothing more than an expensive reoccurring payment that enables you to have privileges most users should be entitled to without paying a premium, and decent looking items are nothing more than outrageously priced add-ons the game should have from the gecko. To tell you the truth, it seems Roblox's primary concern isn't about treating the community, it's about reaching a bottom line. Unfortunately, this seems to be a trend in most modern games, and it's almost unavoidable unless you're leveraging methods for obtaining currencies in-game. Sure, some things are simply unethical to do, for example - Stealing items or Robux from other players. But what if you didn't have to? What if you could generate Robux in-game without any intervention whatsoever?

Well, it's absolutely possible with a roblox hack. Simply navigate to the website, enter your username associated with your Roblox account, select the amount of Roblox you'd like to generate and BOOM BAM, that's it. No other intervention is required.

Keep in mind, when using hacks to boost your Robux you could encounter temporary bans. This is all due to account flags Roblox places on it's account holders when server sided changes have been made on multiple occasions, specifically larger server sided changes. So when using LazyAssGamer's Robux hack, be sure not to use it frequently. And above all, enjoy!

“StealthGenie” Spyware App in U.S

“StealthGenie” Spyware App in U.S
This is the age everyone is inquisitive for the other. Spy apps may have been planned so that parents can keep an eye on their kids, but that's not where it ends. These tricky apps can be used by any relative, friend, suspicious colleague or even, illegal minds. Spyware is also largely used by businesses spying on their opponents. So, if you found that someone seems to know a bit too much about your life, so probably they could be spying on you at the moment. But not every software is the same just like https://mspytracker.com/

Spying apps are common, easy to install and one can easily track the other person via application but sometimes things go wrong and you could be fined for stalking. For example, the US federal court has supposedlyindicted Danish white man for selling up of applications that remotely watch and access your iPhones, iPods, tablets and Android devices also.

This hearing has been made with full court bench in the Southern U.S. State of Virginia, finding the Danish Man Hammad Akbar with an amount of $500,000 for selling this spyware, which apparently is used by Defense Department to notify the illegally anticipated viruses and managed to block them remotely.

“StealthGenie” an app that remotely monitors your applications, especially the one including your voice calls, phone calls and as well as your texts, nothing in your phone stays as secret if this app is installed on your phone, as this seems to be hidden while it's creeping out all your applications while pretending to be close in front of the user.The app is designed in a way that if you download it in someone else’s phone, then the app reports you back about their chats, location and where they have traveled throughout the day. The app is not available now for downloading.

According to the Victim, the app “StealthGenie” can perform some advanced functions as it can even intercept the incoming and outgoing calls and can record the voice data and transfer it to the remote sections. These devices can be used to leak out the official Telephonic conference that usually proceeds in between the elite officials of the country.

By the time, theinstallation has been done; the purchaser is liable for temporary usage. Even, there are no signs of external access seems to be provoked, well these apps have now been a vital source of collecting information and valuable data without the induction of any visible activities.

It is advised by the State Department to make an eye on the mishaps in form of applications because it has a higher density to capture a strong negative market, which can never be an easy job to wipe out!

Some people were seen criticizing the decision. According to them, StealthGenie case is strange because the actions have been taken against the creator of the app, instead of being taken against the consumers of the app first. Forbes also raised an issue thatStealthGenie is different from the only company out there that gives the services used to track someone or stalk their every move. MobileSpy, MSpy, FlexiSPY, and MobiStealth were the other common names mentioned by Forbes for spyware.

Source: Teckrr.com

Best Affordable Android Phones

Are you looking for cheap Android phones? There are many manufacturers that offer Android phones that won’t burn a hole in your pocket. Gone are the days when cheap phones meant compromising on quality, durability, and performance. Nowadays, there are many famous brands that offer a line of cheap phones with good performance and features same as expensive phones. This write-up is your guide to the best cheap phones.

Read further to know the best large screen phones.

Alcatel Pixi 4

One of the best ultra-cheap phone is Alcatel Pixi 4. It features a 5 inches touch screen display with 480 x 854 resolution. The phone runs on Android Marshmallow that allows you to play unlimited games and watch movies without any lag. The performance of the phone is great thanks to its Quad-core 1 GHz processor and 1 GB RAM. Pixi 4 has plenty of storage space of 8 GB that enables you to save many apps, media files, and games. You can take bright and crisp pictures with its rear 5-megapixel camera.

  • Pros
    • Expandable storage
    • Marshmallow operating system
    • Affordable
    • Great camera
  • Cons
    • No HD display

Motorola Moto G5

Next on the list is Motorola’s Android phone Moto G5. The phone has a 5 inches display with 1080 x 1920 pixels at PPI of 441 pixels per inch. It is powered by Octa-core 1.4GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 430 processor. The G5 is available with a 3GB RAM that offers smooth performance. You can watch your favorite movies and videos non-stop as it offers a 2800 mAh battery. It can easily last throughout the day. It has the Android 7.0 that allows you to have access to the latest games and apps. You can download plenty of apps and games as it has 16 GB of internal memory. You can expand the storage space up to 128 GB through micro SD card.

With Moto G5 you can take great selfies as it has a great 5-megapixel front camera. The rear camera of 13-megapixel allows you to take capture bright and sharp pictures.

  • Pros
    • Partial metal body
    • Vibrant HD display
    • Great phone at best price
    • Good camera
  • Cons
    • No NFC

Huawei Honor 5C

Another great Android phone is the Honor 5C that you can get without breaking your bank. Honor 5C features a 5.2 inches full HD screen with 1080 x 1920 pixels. It has 2 processors, 2.0 GHz Quad-core processor and a 1.7 GHz Quad-core processor that handles all the applications. This makes Honor 5C perfect for multitasking without lagging. The Honor 5C runs on Android Marshmallow that provides a powerful user experience. This phone has 13-megapixel powerful camera that captures crisp pictures. The front camera can take some amazing selfies thanks to its 8-megapixel camera. It is perfect for those who prefer a phone with sleek design and small body weight.

  • Pros
    • Great value
    • Strong screen
    • Ultra smooth performance
  • Cons
    • Part metal frame is not so good
    • Poor low-light photos

In the end, when buying the best budget phone, you must keep in mind your requirements. All these phones offer great performance and a battery that can last through the day. Which phone do you like the most? Let us know in the comments below.


Improve Your Customer Service with Session Replay Tools

Improve Your Customer Service with Session Replay Tools
Want to improve your customer satisfaction rates? Use session replay tools for a faster, smarter way to solve all your digital client issues.


Partnering Session Replay Tools with a Faster Connection Leads to More Satisfied Customers

Imagine you’re working at a customer service help desk for a website. A customer calls in, saying they are having an issue with a transaction. You try to access their session, but you can’t because you don’t have instant access. Not only that, your company’s Internet speed has suddenly dropped considerably as the number of content downloads has greatly increased. Overall, the customer gets a negative experience, most likely gives up on the transaction, and you feel frustrated because you couldn’t do anything to help that customer.

However, there are now session replay tools being introduced for companies that allow instant replay of session, and allow for more real-time customer support. These tools are essential for businesses that want to improve their customer service experience because of their speed, ease of use, and ability to identify where behind the delays reside. As you will see, they are a great investment for many businesses, and their usefulness will only increase in the future.

How Session Replay Tools Work

Session replay tools mean that within just a few seconds of an action taking place on your website, the data is stored for analysis. If a customer calls and reports a problem, there’s no need to create a new trail in order to understand how they got to the page that is giving them trouble, and you will be able to connect quickly with someone in a different department of your company to find the best way to solve the problem for the customer. The easier it is for you to solve the customer’s problems, the more satisfied they will be, and the more profitable your company will be.

Speed Up your Service


As mentioned earlier, a lot of the service you need to provide to your customers happens over an open Internet line. This slows down response times, makes it harder for immediate tracking, and just slow down business productivity in general. If your business 
invests in a leased line, it would give your company a devoted Internet connection which only they would use. This, in turn, would mean faster response speeds when using session replay tools to provide customer service, and would always ensure that your business gets instant updates about all website-related activity. A leased line can be a very worthwhile investment for your company.

If your business is stuck because of customer service, it’s time to find a way out. Put these session replay tools to action: with the stored data that can be used for a variety of specific analysis, your company can quickly get a handle on what is preventing visitors from converting into customers or clients. Being able to track the customer experience as it happens gives staff members a chance to understand the website issues from the customer’s perspective. When you employ these resources, you can reduce the time it takes to help customers, cut down the number of customers who need assistance, and find the root of any issues slowing you down. The faster you can improve the digital customer experience, the sooner you will see an improvement in your end results.

Four Tips On How To Make The Perfect Company Brochure

Four Tips On How To Make The Perfect Company Brochure
Brochures are a great medium to get information about your product or services out into the wider community to persuade potential buyers to part with their hard-earned cash. From designing the layout, to generating engaging copy – there are many elements required. Sounds like a lot to take in, right?

Here are four quick and simple tips, to help you create successful brochures for your organization. The tips below can be used across a number of markets, so whether you sell toiletries, condos or gardening supplies, there will be something you can take away.

1. Remember the all-important acronym – AIDA


AIDA is one of those business marketing buzzwords that you’ll love to hate, but it’s actually useful to think about. AIDA stands for: Attention, Interest, Desire and Action. This means your brochure needs to be colorful enough to grab attention; filled with engaging content to be interesting; contain desirable products that your customer needs; and numerous ways for them to buy – or act. Once you’ve got these four points nailed down, your brochure will be much more effective.

2. Punchy headlines generate more sales

The average attention span of any reader is around 5-seconds. They’ll spend this time by glancing at the front of your brochure and flicking through a few pages. If they don’t see something that they like straight away then you have lost them.

That’s why punchy headlines are a must. They draw the reader in – engaging them straight away. ‘Revolutionary Bar Stools’ might well be a bit of an overstatement, but it reads much better than ‘Bar Stools Available in Lots of Different Colors’. Capture their imagination straight away and they’ll be more inclined to read.

3. Ensure your brochure looks professional

If there is one quick way to ruin the reputation of your business, it’s a shoddy-looking brochure. With a free professional style brochure creator, you will not produce anything sub-par. With this software, you ensure that your final product looks, feels and appears to meet the expectations your customers are hoping for.

The paper you use is almost as important as how it looks. If your brochure feels cheap, customers might associate your products to be cheap as well. Thick glossy paper is generally a good call when creating a brochure, as it’s a durable, yet professional looking material. This means that your final product will last longer, which means more people will potentially read it.

4. Selling should be your main priority


Ever heard the phrase ‘sell, don’t tell’? Well, if you haven’t, it essentially means that your brochure should focus on selling an item, as opposed to just describing what the item is. Take the two short descriptions:
  • Our green chair comes with two arm-rests and is foldable.
  • Our chairs, with a neutral green finish, fit perfectly in any garden environment, and can be folded neatly away in the cold winter months.
The first simply describes the product and what it does, while the second not only describes, but sells the advantages of the chairs – it’s crucially important when developing a brochure to always have sales at the forefront of your mind.


Why Xiaomi and Motorola Should Enter the Offline Market in India

Why Xiaomi and Motorola Should Enter the Offline Market in India
It is already a known fact to everyone that the Indian smartphone market is completely dominated by Chinese smartphone vendors such as Xiaomi, Gionee, Coolpad, Lenovo, Vivo, and Oppo. While Samsung is still dominating the market, analysts claim that it will be dethroned by Xiaomi in the next few days. 

Samsung's success primarily comes from the offline market, but the South Korean giant also has a vast presence in the online market. That said, Xiaomi is slowly entering the offline market in recent times but has a long way to go. 

On the other hand, we have Lenovo-owned Motorola, who has been an online-only brand since its comeback in 2014. And there's no scope for it to enter the offline market as well. Because Lenovo is doing a decent in the offline market with its K series of devices. 

However, it's important for both and Xiaomi and Motorola to enter the offline market, barring the success of Vivo and Oppo. Vivo, who is significantly earning a name in the offline market has shipped close to three million units in Q1 2017, which is close to Xiaomi's number. 

Motorola's Moto G series of phones are the trademarks for the budget segment and imagine if the company sells them in the offline market as well? Then the sale figures will surely be doubled. 

Both Oppo and Vivo are looking to invest Rs. 2200 crore in the offline marketing, which tells the entire story of their success in the segment. 

Xiaomi will be entering the market slowly and is opening an exclusive Mi Home store in Bangalore on May 11. However, the company should keep the prices same as the online market. If they don't maintain the price similarly, then Xiaomi won't get enough success in the segment, and it will turn out to be a huge dent. 

Top Tech Brands Are Trying to Connect with You

Top Tech Brands Are Trying to Connect with You

If you have been paying close attention to the tech market recently, you will have noticed that a lot of brands – particularly those who used to be conventional, like Samsung – are now engaging their users more and more. Enthusiast brands like OnePlus and Xiaomi have been doing this for a while, but traditional ones are now beginning to respond to users, take advantage of user-generated content and even run digital campaigns like never before.

The shift in marketing trends, according to the masters in business administration online department of Northeastern University, is caused by changes in behavior. We interact with each other differently these days, with social media being an essential part of our lives. Instead of formal reviews from various sources, we can now access peer reviews and tech videos easily.

To understand more about tech brands’ efforts in reaching out to their users, the Trends That Are Changing the Way Brands Market to Consumers by Northeastern University is the infographic to read.

Do you support Smartphone leaks?


As you all may know, the Galaxy S8 has been the most leaked device in recent history. But it's not the first time this happens. It has happened to Apple, HTC, LG and even to Google with its Pixel phones.

Supposedly, companies hate leaks and want to prevent them. Other times, they just leak things themselves to get the media's attention. But there's a thin line between this and sometimes these companies act hypocritical. Other times it's obviously them leaking this stuff.



I know sometimes it ruins the whole anticipation, but other times it's what excites readers about new products and makes them buy it after released. Like the GS8, which will break sales records when released, or even the iPhone 6 and 7 which had leaked so much that even clones were on sale before they were released! 

Some people look at us, the tech blogs, and think we are the evil guys here ruining companies' plans. But we are journalists, we have to report whatever pops up. Interestingly, I just read a poll on Samsung's fan club and they were asking what their readers thought about leaks. And the results were amazing. More than 60% of their readers support leaks.

So...what do you think guys? Are you in favor of leaks? Vote and leave a comment!



Johanna joins TechDroider


As you all know, Felipe left for his own project, motorola-fans.com and we wish him the most success. But it's also time for us to grow even more while still focusing on our readers and providing the latest news and rumors about your favorite brands.
-TD team.

Hi TechDroiders!

My name is Johanna and I'm from West Covina, California. I'm 28 and I've been a geek since the first iPhone was released. I really love Apple products but it's competitors are top notch. Samsung, LG, Sony are of great interest to me. 

I wrote tech news for my school newspaper and then I was invited to join this amazing site. I've been following this site for a year and love the fact that is always the first to post leaks. I love that. 

Being the first is always the most important thing to journalism so I will try to do that here. Hope you all enjoy my articles. Oh, and I love pop music, cats, a good bottle of wine and art museums.

I really hope you love my stuff.

Johanna

New chapter for Motorola Fans




Hellomoto indeed! The Motorola Fans Community now has its own portal dedicated to talking about the iconic brand.

The website is called motorola-fans.com and will talk about current and past Motorola devices, while also reporting on the latest news and posting fan-related stuff.

I joined TechDroider nine months ago, and it's thanks to TechDroider that I love writing. So this is not a departure from this site. While Motorola Fans is a project I poured my soul into, I will keep writing for TechDroider and this will be the main site for exclusive news, while the Fans portal focuses on news that aren't what people call "leaks" or original reporting. 

It's also a great new chapter for TechDroider, as the team recently expanded and we are able to cover more news.

I hope you enjoy the new website while also keep up with the latest TechDroider exclusive news.

Felipe
TechDroider

Motorola in 2016: Is it Moto, or is it Rola? Does it matter?


No one can deny this year started like crap for Motorola fans. In fact, the first half of 2016 might go down as the worst months we went through. However, the second half of the year makes it up for all those horrible feelings we had. In a series of editorials, I will cover everything 2016 brought and left behind for Motorola.

Last January at CES, Rick Osterloh said they were "facing out Motorola". Those three damn words caused a mess inside Motorola, Lenovo, the fans, and the tech sites. Lenovo did not have any statement to cover that and neither did Motorola. In fact, they quickly had to release two statements, but none of them were effective. The truth is that it was never meant to be an announcement. If Osterloh hadn't opened his mouth then the transition would have felt natural. It wouldn't have been different from what we saw last year (the Moto brand has been around since 2002), except for a couple Lenovo logos on boot animations and a little corner of the phone's packaging. The problem was that everything Motorola did in 2016 would be under the magnifying glass of the fans and many tech sites because of this.


The situation was a mess. Tech sites would milk the drama, regular customers would jump to social media to criticize Lenovo and mourn about the loss of their beloved brand, while the fans were stuck in the middle, without knowing if we could hold onto something or if we had to believe everything.

Knowing how big of a fan I am, Motorola immediately sent me the press statement before everyone else got it, but I was still very doubtful and sad. I wanted these sites to stop talking about it. In the following weeks I started doing lots of research about it. I read Motorola, Inc.'s separation papers (took 3 hours to read), I got to know the brand licensees, and I also spent hours trying to convince tech sites that Motorola wasn't dead.

My Motorola Fans social media communities were on fire too. Those communities increased like crazy throughout the year. Maybe we all needed to be together in one place, as one big family sharing this tough moment we were going through. (Follow us on Twitter and Facebook)



I also started bombarding Motorola and Lenovo employees with questions. Most answers were elusive. That was until David Roman, Lenovo's CMO, replied. His answer was short but helped me understand things. He talked about the strength of the Moto brand and how they never meant Motorola was going to be killed off. His reply meant a lot to me, because it came from a top position and it showed they really cared about this and wanted to clarify things.

Then we got to see this year's Moto portfolio. All the phones were solid, and they didn't differ much from last year's products in terms of branding. Plus, the products did show the full Motorola brand name in many parts.



I was quite upset with the visual identity from early 2016, though. I was never too keen on the approach to the new "Moto" logo and how the batwing logo was attached to the "(M)Moto" word earlier this year. It felt like people were forced to call it Moto, as if the Motorola logo was just a decoration item. These visuals didn't ease the fans' concerns at all, and it was even worse when we found out the Moto G4 and the Moto Z didn't come with the iconic batwing on power-on animations.



Then Jan Huckfeldt became Motorola's CMO and this was changed. Both Lenovo and Motorola logos are now shown everywhere, while the batwing takes a central role (no longer attached to the "Moto" word), allowing users to call it Motorola, Moto, Lenovo Moto or Lenorola. 




It was a clever way to strengthen brand image and make the fans happy once again. They understood that the Motorola logo can be -if it isn't already- like the Apple logo. Apple doesn't write "Apple" all over their products. They just place their logo everywhere. That's what Motorola is doing now.

The new visuals quickly evolved to get the batwing playful, colorful and fun. They listened to some fan complaints and some weeks later the batwing was brought back to boot animations! All these awesome changes helped me understand that my biggest concerns throughout the year weren't because of what was announced back in January. It was due to the way the brand was being shown, and after these changes and resurrection of some iconic brand items (Hellomoto), I know Moto is at a great place. 



With the new visuals, Lenovo listened to the fans and proved everyone wrong. They aren't killing Motorola Mobility or the Motorola brand. We already know Motorola Mobility is still here, but they are giving us the power to call it whatever we want, so it doesn't matter what was said or announced back then.  YOU have the power to choose how to call Moto from now on. I can certainly say that the second half of the year was one of the best times to be a fan since becoming a fan ten years ago.