The HTC Vive. Steven Tweedie / Business Insider

Good morning! Here is the tech news you need to know this Tuesday.

1. Google officially unveiled the latest version of its mobile operating system. Android 8.0 is called "Oreo," and it will begin rolling out to Google's own Pixel and Nexus devices in the coming days and weeks, with more devices to follow.

2. Google is reportedly planning to launch a new Pixel-branded Chromebook laptop later this year. The device should be announced alongside the new Pixel phones, as well as a new, smaller version of the Home smart speaker.

3. A group of hackers claimed to have entered Sony's PlayStation Network (PSN). The group, named "OurMine," was able to briefly overtake the company's PlayStation-related Twitter accounts, and claimed to have stolen information from PSN users.

4. Microsoft announced that its voice-recognition technology has become better than humans at transcribing conversations. The company achieved a 6.3% error rate back in September, and has now come down below 5.1% — the error rate of a group of people.

5. Tesla has become the fourth-largest automaker by value in the world. With its $58.8 billion (£45.6 billion) valuation, it sits above both General Motors and Ford in the United States, while only Toyota, Volkswagen, and Daimler are bigger internationally.

6. HTC is permanently cutting the price of its virtual reality (VR) headset, the Vive, to $599 in the US and £599 in the UK. The move is a strategic one, and comes after Facebook's decision to bring down the price of its own VR headset, the Oculus Rift, to $499 (£387).

7. Spotify executives have reportedly met with US regulators to discuss its upcoming direct listing. It's bypassing a typical IPO and the SEC is looking into the unusual plan.

8. Facebook will launch a dedicated "Safety Check" tab in its app over the coming weeks. It will show a continuous stream of bad events happening in the world — from terrorist attacks to extreme weather situations — and show whether your friends are marked as safe.

9. Intel updated its Core lineup of processors to the 8th generation. The new chips are still based on the architecture of Kaby Lake, the 7th generation, but boast a 40% speed improvement over the previous models.

10. WhatsApp is reportedly rolling out a new feature to its Snapchat-like "Status." Much like on Facebook, the new update will allow users to create status updates with text on a coloured background, choose between different fonts, and even add links.

You may have missed it while watching the solar eclipse, but Google released a new version of the Android operating system on Monday. Code-named "Oreo," the latest version replaces Android Nougat, which Google released last year. Given that there are more than 2 billion active Android devices today, the update could have a big effect on how much of the world interacts with their smartphones and tablets.

Eventually, anyway. As we can see in this chart from Statista, which is based on data from Android Developers Dashboard, Android users don't tend to jump to the newest version of the operating system right away, and older versions can linger on and on. That's unlike Apple's iOS, which underlies the iPhone and iPad, where the vast majority of users are typically running the latest version.

Google has been working on a fix for this, but the blame lies mostly with smartphone makers and wireless carriers. Before users can install new versions of Android on their gadgets, the updates typically have to be approved by the device manufacturers and carriers first. And that process can drag on and on.

Mike Nudelman/Business Insider

Get the latest Google stock price here.

California Senate

A California senator is hoping to create a new law to end sexual harassment in the venture capital world. 

Senator Hannah-Beth Jackson (D-Santa Barbara) is introducing a bill this week that would explicitly prohibit sexual harassment by venture capitalists as an amendment to a current civil rights law. 

The bill, SB 224, comes in response to accounts from women tech entrepreneurs who have described how they were sexually harassed while seeking funding from venture capitalists. 

The proposed bill would amend the Unruh Act, a civil rights law in California that protects against sexual harassment in business relationships. The current law lists doctors, landlords, teachers and others as liable for sexual harassment. This bill would amend the law to clarify that consequences exist for investors too, and provide protections for entrepreneurs who are harassed.

"If we want to see the venture capital industry change and an end to sexual harassment of women in technology, we need strong legal protections. No matter how well intentioned, decency pledges and promises are not enough." said Senator Jackson in a statement.

Jackson was referring to a public plea made by LinkedIn founder and Greylock partner, Reid Hoffman, that asked firms to sign a Decency Pledge, a promise to treat the relationship between a VC and an entrepreneur like a manager and employee.

Hoffman proposed the idea after dozens of female tech entrepreneurs came forward in recent weeks with accounts of being sexually harassed while seeking funding for their ideas and startups. Prominent investors like Dave McClure of 500 startups and Justin Caldbeck of Binary Capital have resigned in the wake of such allegations.

But self regulation like a decency pledge isn't the same as ensuring VCs are covered under the Unruh Act.

"We need to be clear there are consequences for this type of behavior," said Jackson. "The idea is to take a very strong position, and make it very clear that this is the kind of intersection between power and opportunity where we are not going to tolerate sexual harassment."

So far, Jackson says the response to the bill has been overwhelmingly positive. Because the current legislation sessions ends soon, in September, she plans to move the bill forward when the legislation reconvenes in January, and expects to have a vote on it by the end of that month. 

Dan Blanchette and his son, Sam, 6, watching the final phases of a total solar eclipse in Salem, Oregon.Don Ryan/APThere's nothing like a rare astronomical event to bring Americans together.

Eclipse-chasers came out in droves on Monday to witness a total solar eclipse — when the moon crosses between the Earth and the sun and blocks out the sun's light — at gatherings across the country.

Total solar eclipses happen about every one to three years, but Monday's event was special. It was the first time since 1918 that the path of totality, where day briefly turns to night, cut diagonally across the entire US.

We rounded up the best photos of people watching the eclipse from Portland, Oregon, to Charleston, South Carolina. We will continue to update this post throughout the day.

Donald Trump did wear eclipse glasses, but couldn't resist sneaking a look with his naked eyes. Mark Wilson/Getty Images

Eye doctors are going to be busy tomorrow.

If you checked out the solar eclipse and weren't wearing certified protective glasses (or even if you were), you might be wondering if your vision is okay.

Looking at the sun without adequate protection allows sunlight, including ultraviolet and near-infrared radiation, to penetrate the retina. That can burn parts of the eye and create a toxic reaction that causes damage, which can lead to a condition eye doctors refer to as photic or solar retinopathy.

If you watched the eclipse in an unsafe way, damage may not be immediately apparent, since you can't feel burns on your retina. Some people might start to notice changes to their vision within a few hours, though it's most likely that vision changes would become apparent by the next day, according to the American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO).

Symptoms of solar retinopathy include poor vision, changes to vision including blurry or discolored spots, pain, and especially a loss of vision in the center of the eye. A number of solar retinopathy patients report being unable to read because of the changes, which can be temporary or permanent.

People watch the solar eclipse on the campus of Southern Illinois University on August 21, 2017. Scott Olson/Getty

Some people Business Insider spoke with said their eyes felt strange immediately after viewing the eclipse even though they did wear protective glasses. If your glasses were properly certified and didn't let in any light that was less bright than the sun, the discomfort may just be a temporary effect. It could be caused by the rapidly changing levels of light exposure you encountered while repeatedly covering and uncovering your eyes to look at the crescent sun. The fact that your eyes felt weird after watching the eclipse doesn't necessarily mean there's any permanent damage.

People who watched the eclipse for even a brief period of time without protection, however, are susceptible to damage. President Trump briefly demonstrated what you were not supposed to do, and tech entrepreneur Elon Musk may have done the same, tweeting that he watched with "sunglasses."

Sunglasses don't provide adequate protection and could potentially increase the risk for eye damage, since the pupil opens up more widely to let light in, according to Dr. Tongalp Tezel, an expert on retinas at Columbia University Medical Center.

If you are experiencing vision changes or eye pain, even if you wore proper eye protection, call an eye doctor to schedule an appointment.

A good proportion of cases do resolve themselves over time, potentially within a day or even over a couple of weeks, according to an editorial in the journal JAMA Ophthalmology. But if vision hasn't come back within six months, it's not likely to — and there is, unfortunately, no present treatment for solar retinopathy.

A doctor can examine your eye and see changes to the retina, which can take on the appearance of the crescent-shaped sun responsible for the damage. Without medical confirmation, it's hard to know whether something is really wrong and to know whether it can be addressed.

"I always, always say if you notice something strange about your vision, see the eye doctor," Adriane Santa Croce, an ophthalmic sonographer at Scheie Eye Institute in Philadelphia, told Business Insider. She added that "the concerns about vision following the eclipse may uncover unrelated eye problems that people may not have addressed otherwise," including changes in vision related to diabetes, cataracts, macular degeneration, or glaucoma.

Interestingly, Santa Croce noted that this eclipse should provide doctors with a better understanding of how light can damage the eye, since some imaging technology used now didn't exist the last time many people watched an eclipse.

Regardless of how your eyes feel after the eclipse, the AAO recommends regular comprehensive vision exams, since a number of health conditions can be first spotted in the eye.

If for any reason — eclipse or not — you notice any pain or vision changes tomorrow, call a doctor to be safe.

Google

Along with new Pixel smartphones, Google is apparently cooking up a smaller Google Home smart speaker device powered by artificial intelligence (AI), according to Android Police.

Few details exist about a smaller model of the Google Home, but there's a high likelihood that it'll simply be a smaller version of the original Google Home.

It sounds like it could be similar to Amazon's $50 Echo Dot, which is also essentially a smaller and cheaper version of the original Echo, which usually costs $180 (it's going for $100 on Amazon at the time of writing). 

With that in mind, a smaller and cheaper Google Home would let you add more Google Home devices throughout your home without thinning your wallet quite as much as multiple $130 Google Homes. Alternatively, a cheaper Google Home could make a great entry device for anyone who wants to try out a smart speaker.

It's pure speculation, but the new mini Google Home could have similar abilities as the regular Google Home, which is powered by Google's own artificial intelligent assistant called Google Assistant. That means you could ask the mini Google Home for answers to basic questions, control music playback, make phone calls, manage your calendar, and control your smart home.

It's unclear if the mini Google Home will have any additional features over the regular model, like the Echo Dot has over the original Echo. For reference, Amazon's diminutive Echo Dot has a few features that the original Echo doesn't, like the ability to connect to a separate speaker via Bluetooth or auxiliary cable. Still, the mini Google Home in an unreleased, unconfirmed device, and rumors about it should be taken with a grain of salt. 

At the Formlabs Digital Factory event in June, Carl Bass used the phrase Infinite Computing in his keynote. I’d heard it before, but I liked it in this context and it finally sparked a set of thoughts which felt worthy of a rant.

For 50 years, computer scientists have been talking about AI. However, in the past few years, a remarkable acceleration of a subset of AI (or a superset, depending on your point of view) now called machine learning has taken over as the hot new thing.

Since I started investing in 1994, I’ve been dealing with the annual cycle of the hot new thing. Suddenly, a phrase is everywhere, as everyone is talking about, labeling, and investing in it.

Here are a few from the 1990s: Internet, World Wide Web, Browser, Ecommerce (with both a capital E and a little e). Or, some from the 2000s: Web Services, SOAs, Web 2.0, User-Generated Data, Social Networking, SoLoMo, and the Cloud. More recently, we’ve enjoyed Apps, Big Data, Internet of Things, Smart Factory, Blockchain, Quantum Computing, and Everything on Demand.

Nerds like to label things, but we prefer TLAs. And if you really want to see what the next year’s buzzwords are going to be, go to CES (or stay home and read the millions of web pages written about it.)

AI (Artificial Intelligence) and ML (Machine Learning) particularly annoy me, in the same way Big Data does. In a decade, what we are currently calling Big Data will be Microscopic Data. I expect AI will still be around as it is just too generally appealing to ever run its course as a phrase, but ML will have evolved into something that includes the word “sentient.”

In the mean time, I like the phrase Infinite Computing. It’s aspirational in a delightful way. It’s illogical, in an asymptotic way. Like Cloud Computing, it’s something a marketing team could get 100% behind. But, importantly, it describes a context that has the potential for significant changes in the way things work.

Since the year I was born (1965), we’ve been operating under Moore’s Law. While there are endless discussions about the constraints and limitations of Moore’s Law, most of the sci-fi that I read assumes an endless exponential growth curve associated with computing power, regardless of how you index it.

In that context, ponder Infinite Computing. It’s not the same as saying “free computing” as everything has a cost. Instead, it’s unconstrained.

What happens then?

Also published on Medium.