Samsung once again ships the largest number of phones in the world

Samsung reportedly shipped 60.1 million smartphone units globally in the first quarter, representing 20.8% of the global market share – and first place. Meanwhile, Apple shipped 50.1 million units, or 17.3% market share. Both companies, however, saw a decline compared to the first quarter of 2023. Apple saw a decline of almost 10%, while Samsung’s was less than 1%.

Apple briefly pushed Samsung into 2023, but it was business as usual. IDC’s takeaway is that the smartphone world is getting stronger (what does that mean?), with an increase in more expensive phones, which is true for both Samsung and Apple.

Xiaomi rounded out the top five brands with 40.8 million units, Transsion with 28.5 million units and OPPO with 25.2 million units shipped. Have you never heard of Transsion? It is a global smartphone giant based in China, responsible for phone brands such as Tecno, Itel and Infinix.

—Mat Smith

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Sonic 3 gets another actor.

Keanu Reeves will play the dark and tortured Shadow the Hedgehog. The antihero, both great rival and ally of Sonic, will be created by Jim Carrey’s Dr. Robotnik after the events of Sonic 2. Wow.

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The social media app will go offline on April 29.

Meta will shut down Threads in Turkey on April 29 after an interim injunction from the Turkish Competition Authority (TCA) against automatic data sharing with Instagram. The TCA ruled that linking Threads and Instagram without user opt-in would “result in irreparable harm” and that Meta was “abusing its dominant position” in the industry with the practice. This is not the first regulatory battle between Meta and Turkey. In 2022, the country fined Meta $18.6 million for sharing data between its apps.

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Dismantling a hard drive in just eight seconds.

DiskMantler from Garner Products uses a mixture of shock, harmonics and vibration to shake a hard drive. The process loosens screws and other fasteners to free parts such as circuit boards, drive assemblies, actuators and rare earth magnets. The process would take between eight and 90 seconds for most hard drives and around two minutes for soldered helium drives. Only about a fifth of the planet’s e-waste is currently recycled, so anything that could improve that share would be welcome.

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