Most people seem to agree that this is a reasonable thing to do, and I really appreciate that. For my next question, I want to know: “do you bring your phone or tablet into the shower with you?”
To clarify, I don’t mean using your phone or tablet while taking a bath — I’m specifically talking about while you’re showering.
Modern smartphones and tablets typically feature IP68 water and dust resistance, so you can definitely bring most devices into the shower without fear of breaking them, but is anyone actually doing this?
I’ve taken my smartphone for a dip once just for fun to finish an episode of Fashion Photo Ruviewbecause I already started it and didn’t want it to end.
However, I know MobileSyrup‘s Patrick O’Rouke and Bradley Bennett both regularly watch content and listen to music with devices in the shower. I think it’s a bit weird, but to each their own.
Do you guys ever bring your phone or tablet into the shower with you? Let us know in the comments below, and if the consensus is overwhelming, “yes,” I’ll try bringing the next phone I review into the shower with me to watch an episode of You.
Every week, MobileSyrup outlines some of the most notable movies and TV shows that recently hit Canadian streaming platforms.
Our ‘Streaming in Canada’ column typically focuses on new content from Amazon Prime Video Canada, Crave and Netflix Canada, but other services like Apple TV+ and Disney+ will be mentioned when relevant.
We’ll also highlight shows or movies that are made in Canada, involve notable Canadian cast or crew and/or are filmed in Canada.
Finally, with the COVID-19 pandemic causing many movies to hit digital platforms much sooner than planned, we’ll make note of any major films — as well as other notable streaming service news — that fall into this category when applicable.
Amazon Prime Video
I Know What You Did Last Summer [Amazon Original]
After covering up a fatal accident, a group of friends is stalked by a brutal killer.
Based on Lois Duncan’s 1973 novel of the same name, I Know What You Did Last Summer was created by Sara Goodman (Preacher) and stars Madison Iseman (Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle), Brianne Tju (MTV’s Scream), Bill Heck (Locke & Key), Ezekiel Goodman (Rat Bastard) and Ashley Moore (Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping).
Amazon Prime Video Canada release date: October 15th, 2021 (first four episodes, new episodes every week) Genre: Teen horror Runtime: Eight episodes (around 45 minutes each)
Another 12 drag queens compete for the title of “Canada’s Next Drag Superstar.”
Brooke Lynn Hytes, Brad Goreski, Amanda Brugel and Traci Melchor are the regular judges, while one celebrity guest judge will join each week.
Apple TV+ Canada release date: October 14th, 2021 (first episode, new episodes every Thursday at 9pm ET) Genre: Reality Runtime: 10 episodes (about one hour each)
In the third season of HBO’s critically-acclaimed drama, Logan Roy wages a bitter familial civil war against his rebellious son Kendall.
Succession was created by Jesse Armstrong (Fresh Meat) and features an ensemble cast that includes Brian Cox (Manhunter), Jeremy Strong (Masters of Sex), Hiam Abbass (Ramy) and Kieran Culkin (Igby Goes Down).
Crave release date: October 17th, 2021 (first episode, new episodes every Sunday at 9pm ET) Genre: Comedy-drama Runtime: Nine episodes (about one hour each)
Stream Succession here. Note that a $19.98/month Crave + Movies + HBO subscription is required.
Spiral: From the Book of Saw
A group of cops pursues a Jigsaw copycat killer, only to get entangled in his sinister games.
Spiral was directed by Darren Lynn Bousman (Saw franchise) and stars Chris Rock (Everybody Hates Chris), Max Minghella (The Handmaid’s Tale), Marisol Nichols (24) and Samuel L. Jackson (Pulp Fiction).
Original Canadian release date: May 14th, 2021 (theatres)
Crave release date: October 15th, 2021 Genre: Horror Runtime: 1 hour, 33 minutes
Stream Spiral here. Note that a $15.98/month Crave + Starz subscription is required.
A standard Crave subscription is priced at $9.99/month, with Starz costing another $5.99/month and HBO an additional $9.99/month.
The full list of movies and shows hitting Crave this month can be found here.
Disney+
Just Beyond [Disney+ Original]
This horror-comedy anthology series features various stories inspired by R.L. Stine’s eponymous Boom! Studios graphic novels.
Just Beyond was created by Seth Grahame-Smith (Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter) and features an ensemble cast that includes McKenna Grace (I, Tonya), Gabriel Bateman (Annabelle), Lexi Underwood (Little Fires Everywhere) and Izabela Vidovic (The Fosters).
Disney+ Canada release date: October 13th, 2021 Genre: Horror-comedy Runtime: Eight episodes (24 to 32 minutes each)
During the Edo period of Japan, a human ronin teams up with an orc to save an elf orphan.
A spin-off of the 2017 Will Smith film Bright, Samurai Soul was directed by Kyōhei Ishiguro (Your Lie in April) and features Mississauga, Ontario’s own Simu Liu (Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings) in the English dub and Yuki Nomura (Yakuza video game series) in the Japanese voiceover.
The Movies That Made Us (Season 3) [Netflix Original]
With Halloween and Christmas fast approaching, Netflix is offering a behind-the-scenes look at the making of several themed movies, including Halloween (1978), Aliens, Friday the 13th, The Nightmare Before Christmas and Elf.
Netflix Canada release date: October 12th, 2021 Genre: Documentary Runtime: Eight episodes (44 to 54 minutes each)
After marrying Love and raising a baby with her in a new home, Joe’s efforts to live a normal domestic life are thwarted when the family reverts to its sinister dark habits.
Based on Caroline Kepnes’ novel of the same name, You was created by Sera Gamble (Supernatural) and Greg Berlanti (The CW’s “Arrowverse”) and stars Penn Badgley (Gossip Girl), Victoria Pedretti (The Haunting of Hill House), Toronto-raised Scott Speedman (Felicity) and Michaela McManus (Law & Order: Special Victims Unit).
Apple says its new Watch Series 7 can recharge up to 33 percent faster than the Series 6, going from zero to 80 percent in just 45 minutes.
That’s great and all, but you’ll need a few things to make it actually work.
The first (and the easiest) thing is a new USB-C charging cable for the Apple Watch. Thankfully, Apple includes one of these new cables in the box with the Watch Series 7. However, if you need another one, you can get one from the Apple Store for $39.
The other thing you’ll need is a USB-C power brick capable of putting out the right amount of power. Previously, it wasn’t clear how much power the Watch Series 7 needed, but a new support document from Apple (spotted by MacRumors) clears it up.
In short, you’ll need a USB-C power brick that supports at least 5W over USB Power Delivery (USB PD) or greater. Although Apple doesn’t include a power brick in the Watch Series 7 box, it likely won’t be too hard to come by something that puts out at least 5W — for example, the Pixel charger sitting on my desk can output 15W or 18W of power.
As a refresher for those who didn’t read our article about iPhone 13 charging, you can calculate the watt output of a charging bring by multiplying the volts and amps listed in the fine print on the charging brick (assuming the brick doesn’t just list the wattage outright).
It’s also worth noting that if you want to stick with just Apple accessories, the minimum option is Apple’s 18W USB-C charging brick. I couldn’t find the 18W one on the Apple Canada website, but the next step up (20W) is available for $25.
Along with the 18W and 20W options, Apple’s support page says that its 29W, 30W, 61W, 87W or 96W adapters will all fast-charge the Watch Series 7. The 5W requirement stands for third-party chargers.
All that said, there’s probably a decent chance you already have a 5W USB-C charging brick you can use for the new Apple Watch. If not, you can either fork out at least $25 for the Apple brick or grab one of the countless options on Amazon ranging between $10 and $35 in price.
At the virtual DC FanDome event, Montreal-based developer Ludia unveiled its next project: a mobile game called DC Heroes & Villains.
As its name suggests, the game features DC superheroes like Batman and Superman teaming up with villains like Lex Luthor and Harley Quinn to fight a common threat: Trigon. DC fans will know that Trigon is the father of Raven, a member of the Teen Titans. Therefore, it’s safe to assume that Raven, as well as some of her fellow Titans, will make an appearance.
Otherwise, it’s unclear what kind of game DC Heroes & Villains will be, outside of confirmation that it will come to both Android and iOS.
For now, Ludia says players can go to the game’s official website to pre-register, although it’s currently down at the time of writing. We’ll update this story once it’s up and running and more details become available.
Warner Bros. Games Montreal has unveiled a new look at Gotham Knights, its upcoming Batman video game, at the virtual DC FanDome event.
Specifically, the Canadian developer focused on the Court of Owls, the mysterious criminal organization that make up some of the game’s villains. The trailer features commentary from Court of Owls creators Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo (the writer-artist team behind the popular “New 52” Batman comics), DC Comics publisher and chief creative officer Jim Lee and WB Games Montreal creative director Patrick Redding.
The four creators discuss the origins of Court of Owls and how they’ll make an impact in Gotham Knights, particularly through different enemy types that the player will have to face off against. The trailer also shows more gameplay footage of playable characters Nightwing, Robin, Batgirl and Red Hood.
The game stars the “Bat Family” because Bruce Wayne — as well as Commissioner Gordon — are seemingly dead at the start of the game. This leads the four surviving Batman allies to team up to protect Gotham, allowing the game to support both single-player and two-player drop-in/drop-out co-op.
Gotham Knights will release sometime in 2022 on PlayStation 4/5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S and PC.
Amazon-owned Twitch, a popular streaming service, has confirmed that passwords weren’t exposed in the recent data breach that saw the platform’s source code leaked online.
In an update posted on October 15th, Twitch explained that it is “confident” that attackers didn’t access the systems that store Twitch login credentials. It also confirmed that attackers didn’t access full credit card numbers or bank information.
On October 6th, a massive trove of Twitch data was made available for download online. The data included Twitch source code, creator payout information, an unreleased competitor to Steam (a popular platform for buying PC games) and more.
Twitch later confirmed the leak, and in the latest update, provided some more information about the data exposed by the security breach:
“The exposed data primarily contained documents from Twitch’s source code repository, as well as a subset of creator payout data. We’ve undergone a thorough review of the information included in the files exposed and are confident that it only affected a small fraction of users and the customer impact is minimal. We are contacting those who have been impacted directly.”
Twitch previously blamed the breach on an error in a “server configuration change” and said it had reset all stream keys “out of an abundance of caution.”
The Verge notes that sources have spoken out about Twitch, accusing the company of poor security practices. Further, the sources claimed that Twitch experienced a security problem in 2017 but didn’t report it.
Warner Bros. has released the first story trailer for its Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League game at the virtual DC FanDome event.
Developed by Rocksteady, the studio behind the Batman: Arkham trilogy, Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League follows the titular team of supervillains as it’s assigned to, as the title suggests, take out the Brainiac-controlled Justice League.
The game was first revealed in a cinematic trailer at last year’s DC FanDome with a 2022 release window, although no gameplay was revealed. The new trailer similarly doesn’t feature gameplay, so it’s unclear exactly how it will play. Rocksteady has previously confirmed it will support one to four players via co-op.
That said, we did get three minutes of in-game footage in the new “Ticking” trailer. In the footage, we see more of Harley Quinn, Deadshot, Captain Boomerang and King Shark from the first trailer, as well as first looks at Amanda Waller, the Suicide Squad’s boss, as well as Justice League members like The Flash, Superman, Green Lantern and Wonder Woman.
Interestingly, we only get a look at the Batmobile instead of Batman himself, which is especially notable considering Kill the Justice League is set in the Batman: Arkham universe. It’s unclear what role Batman may play or whether he’ll be voiced by veteran actor Kevin Conroy as he was in the Arkham trilogy.
Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League will launch on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S and PC sometime in 2022.
Pixel 6 and 6 Pro leaks have been relatively scarce compared to previous Google phones, but as the search giant’s October 19th event approaches, the leaks have increased substantially.
First, leaker Evan Blass (@evleaks) posted a lengthy thread of high-res images and renders of both phones on Twitter. The images include renders of the Pixel 6 and 6 Pro in all three colours, renders of some cases for the phones and lifestyle shots with people holding the phones. We haven’t seen some of the pictures before, but if you’ve been following the Pixel 6 series closely since Google’s semi-reveal earlier this year, there shouldn’t be any surprises in this leak.
Next up, leaker ‘Snoopy’ (@_snoopytech_) posted a Pixel 6 series ad on Twitter (via 9to5Google). The roughly 30-second ad focuses on the new Tensor chip and shows off several features powered by it. Those with a keen eye will spot some of the new Android 12 clock and weather widgets, what appears to be a redesigned ‘Now Playing’ widget and a ‘Magic Eraser’ feature.
In the ad, Magic Eraser appears as a suggestion chip in Google Photos — the user taps the chip, and it highlights a person in the background of a selfie and then removes that person from the image.
Further, the leaked ad shows off ‘Live Translate’ in a conversation between two people, in Google’s Messages app and in pictures, although the latter appears to be existing Google Lens functionality. The impressive part comes after, where the ad claims that there’s “no internet required” for the feature.
Finally, the ad shows off the new ‘Security Hub,’ which Google bills as a helpful way to protect your “digital life.”
All in all, the ad makes the Pixel 6 series look rather impressive. We’ll likely learn more about all these features on October 19th and real-life tests from reviewers soon after will show how well the features actually work.
Back in February, Toronto-based Dbrand launched ‘Darkplates,’ an accessory for the PlayStation 5 that let owners replace the default white faceplates that ship with the console with matte black ones.
In typical Dbrand fashion, the company cheekily baited Sony to “sue us” on the website for the Darkplates — a decision that seems to have come back to bite the company.
Although Sony didn’t sue, it did threaten legal action and sent a cease and desist letter (which Dbrand has published here).
Sony’s letter raises several issues with the Darkplates, including with how they “replicate” Sony’s design — the Darkplates feature Dbrand’s take on the PlayStation 5’s ‘microtexture,’ which feature thousands of tiny circles, squares, ‘X’ symbols and triangles (the same symbols on the PlayStation controller’s buttons).
In the letter, Sony also asked Dbrand to “promptly and permanently cease and take down all marketing and promotion for and cease all sales worldwide of faceplates featuring the product configuration of [Sony’s] PS5 faceplates or any similar product configuration, including without limitation all faceplates currently for sale at dbrand.com.”
In a lengthy Reddit post full of swear words, jokes, and some clever ‘whataboutism’ pointing fingers at Netflix’s Squid Game, Dbrand wrote that it “elected to submit to the terrorists’ demands… for now,” (emphasis theirs). The Darkplates website now features a list of coverage from media outlets and that’s it — you can’t buy them anymore.
Dbrand also notes in the Reddit post that it received the cease and desist letter months ago, but only made a change after Sony’s lawyers informed the company that a patent had been issued in Canada that reportedly covers the shape of the PS5’s faceplates.
The Verge points out that Sony has threatened legal action against other companies that sold PS5 faceplates. Further, both The Verge and Dbrand heavily imply that Sony may launch its own PS5 faceplate accessories given how easy it is to remove the faceplates and how hard Sony’s fighting third-party options.
Whether that actually happens, Dbrand seems to sum it up best: “Darkplates are dead. Thanks, Sony.”
According to a screenshot of a text message sent to iPhone in Canada, Fido is offering some customers 5GB of data for 15 months. The pictured text message from Fido reads as follows (sans a few emojis):
“Hi David, it’s Fido. You deserve more data. Here’s an extra 5 GB every month for 15 months. Seriously! No added costs, no new contracts, no strings attached. All because you’re a great customer.
“Visit fido.ly/my-account and sign in to get your FREE gigs before November 1st, 2021. Hurry! You don’t want to miss this.”
The URL included in the message goes to Fido’s MyAccount sign-in page.
All in all, it seems like a solid offer. It’d be nice if the 5GB bonus was permanent, but hey, I’ll take free extra data for 15 months too. Unfortunately, the deal is extremely ‘your mileage may vary’ — if you got one of these messages from Fido, you should head to the MyAccount portal to claim your data.
If you’re with Fido but haven’t received a message like this, you might be out of luck. Still, it could be worth checking the MyAccount portal just in case the offer is there too.
It’s also worth noting that Rogers and Fido seem to give out bonus data fairly often. In September, Rogers reportedly offered some customers 5GB of bonus data. Both it and Fido had similar offers about a year prior. In other words, if you didn’t luck out in this round of bonus data, give it a few months — maybe you’ll be in the next one.
