ICYMI: February 23, 2016

Good morning! 

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The biggest story of yesterday and why you should care today:  Mark Zuckerberg is everywhere at Mobile World Congress, popping up at Samsung's presentation before his own keynote, and his message at his address to attendees was simple. Facebook is intent on building out network infrastructure in the developing world. The company's Telecom Infra project is focusing on the vital, if unflashy, telecom particulars of extending network infrastructure. CNet notes that cheaper, strong infrastructure benefits companies all over the globe:

Lowering the cost of infrastructure to deploy networks in both rural and urban areas won't just benefit developing countries. British mobile network EE is working with the project to spread speedy 4G Internet to the far reaches of the Scottish Highlands.

This project is much different in scope that the Facebook Free Basics initiative, which offers an app connecting people to a number of websites for health information, job hunting and Wikipedia. Although much was made of Free Basics getting shut out of the booming Indian mobile market by regulators, it's been rolled out with partner carriers in 37 other countries. 

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As a runner-up for a big story: Samsung is partnering with natural language  startup Voicebox; the deal lets Samsung use Voicebox's Natural Language Understanding (NLU) technology for Samsung’s intelligent personal assistant, S Voice. Samsung is playing catch-up to Amazon's Alexa, Apple's Siri and Microsoft's Cortana. The bonus for Voicebox is their continuing colonization of new markets for their speech recognition technology.

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The most useful tech news: Here's what you need to do if you want to boot up Windows 10 a little faster. If you value your privacy, delete your Microsoft Edge browsing history regularly. Find all the wifi networks in your area and see which ones are the strongest, courtesy of NetSpot for Windows.

There are six compelling reasons why you should take advantage of the landscape orientation on your iPhone, among them an expanded keyboard, a scientific calculator and a tricked-out Outlook window.

Speaking of email, Lifehacker has a tutorial on how to find and safely delete all those old messages you've been saving in Gmail. Sure, you have 15 GB of storage -- but do Bush administration-era offers for Old Navy Performance Fleece really need to chew up that space?

And MakeUseOf has a nice run-down of seven different storage services where you can chuck your digital photos so they're not taking up RAM that can better used for, oh, podcasts or apps or ebooks. Writer Mark O'Neill says the clear winner is Google Photos; for a rundown of how to make that service work seamlessly for you, revisit how Yasmin Evjen uses it in "What I use to do what I do."

Finally, InboxVudu is shutting down, so start searching for the next tool you'll use to organize your email inbox.

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The most amusing tech news: A teenager in the United Kingdom created a 'bot that successfully appealed $3 million dollars in parking tickets since August 2015. Creator Josh Browder reasoned:

Since laws are publicly available, bots can automate some of the simple tasks that human lawyers have had to do for centuries. Browder's isn't even the first lawyer bot. The startup Acadmx's bot creates perfectly formatted legal briefs. The company Lex Machina does data mining on judges' records and makes predictions on what they will do in the future.

Beyond parking tickets, Browder's bot can also help with delayed or canceled flights and payment-protection insurance (PPI) claims. Although the bot can only help file claims on simple legal issues — it can't physically argue a case in front of a judge — it can save users a lot of money.

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What we published yesterday: 

MWC16 - Evidence that the Windows Phone Hibernation Continues — "Dormant and hibernating ecosystems need slow feeding to last through the lean months and the Windows Phone 1%, or whatever the percentage is at these days, is getting that trickle of nourishment in the form of brand new Windows 10 Mobile handsets being unveiled over at MWC16."

Save Your Skype Qik Messages Now — "In what can be considered a good news-bad news situation -- depending on whether you really like Skype or enjoyed using the video messaging service Qik -- Microsoft has added video messaging to Skype and the Skype app."

MWC16 - New Windows 10 Devices from HP, Alcatel, Lenovo and Huawei — "The devices are being brought to market by familiar Microsoft Partners such as Lenovo and HP but there is also new hardware from companies like Alcatel and Huawei."