Weekly Download #108: Samsung just invented the future of phones

Hey , it’s Sunday, December 14.

Chip wars are driving up phone prices, Samsung's tri-folding marvel arrives in 2026, and your Android can replace that expensive webcam right now. Plus: BLUETTI giveaway ends December 20th!

Buckle up - this one's packed.

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🤑 GIVEAWAY

If you haven't entered already, there’s still plenty of time to enter our BLUETTI giveaway. And if you have already entered, you can gain more entries by completing additional actions on the checklist. Click the button below for more details. The giveaway is running now through December 20th. Good luck! Enter here.

📝 How-To

🎥 Turn Your Android Into a Pro Webcam (No Apps Required!)

Skip the $150 webcam purchase—your phone's camera already destroys your laptop's built-in lens.

What You Need

✅ Android 14+ phone (Pixel/Motorola work perfectly; Samsung/OnePlus need workarounds)
✅ Any USB cable (yep, your charging cable works)
✅ 5 minutes and a place to prop your phone

The Setup (Seriously This Easy)

🔌 Step 1: Plug phone into computer → tap the USB notification
📱 Step 2: Select "Webcam" from the menu
💻 Step 3: Open Zoom/Teams/Meet → choose "Android Webcam" in video settings
🎬 Step 4: Profit! (Seriously, you're done)

Quick Controls

Pull down notifications → tap "Webcam" to switch cameras or adjust zoom

⚡ Instant Fixes

• Phone not showing up? → Check you're on Android 14+ and using a data cable
• Laggy video? → Use a USB 3.0 port (the blue ones) and close phone apps
• Looking up your nose? → Get a phone mount and position at eye level

Pro Move: Clean your phone's camera lens before important calls—pocket lint looks terrible in HD!📩 Newsletters Worth Reading

 📧  Newsletters Worth Reading

tl;dr sec.
Join >90,000 security professionals getting the best tools, talks, and resources right in their inbox for free. [LINK]

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Learn how to grow and monetize your newsletter. Trusted by 50,000+ founders, CEOs, and creators. [LINK]

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Scoops and insights on the media and tech industries, hitting inboxes six days a week [LINK]

 📚 Tech Terms Worth Knowing

Shadowban
(noun)

Definition: Silently reducing someone’s visibility on an online platform without notifying them directly.

Usage: "Alex thought nobody was replying to his posts, but it turned out he’d been shadowbanned."

📰 The Big One

The Great Chip Squeeze: Why Your Next Phone Costs More

Why it matters: Chip news is now driving gadget prices, AI progress, and even foreign policy.

The big picture:

• Washington just flipped its stance and will let Nvidia’s powerful H200 AI chips be sold into China again, with the U.S. government skimming a cut of the revenue.​

• At the same time, China is tightening exports of key rare-earth materials and pushing state-backed data centers to use homegrown AI chips instead of Nvidia, AMD, or Intel.​

• Intel and Tata’s new India alliance aims to build a third major chip hub and reduce dependence on China and Taiwan.​

Zoom in: prices and devices

• The AI boom is sucking up high-end memory and manufacturing capacity, causing a global shortage of DRAM and flash and driving component prices sharply higher.​

• Phone makers are already warning they may hike prices up to roughly 20–30% in some markets next year if memory costs stay elevated.​

• Expect premium laptops, GPUs, and flagship phones to get pricier, release in tighter quantities, or both, as fabs prioritize AI data center parts over consumer gear.​

Between the lines:

• Looser U.S. export rules could accelerate China’s AI capabilities, while China’s materials controls and “buy local” chip mandates give its domestic players a protected home market.​

• India’s play with Intel is less about this year’s iPhone price and more about building a long-term “non-China, non-Taiwan” backup for the world’s chip supply.​

Bottom line: For the average consumer, all this high-stakes chip diplomacy mostly shows up as more expensive gadgets, longer waits for in-demand hardware, and a future where where those devices are increasingly shaped by which country controls the fabs and materials. [LINK]

⚡ Fast Five

1.) People use Gemini more than ChatGPT
ChatGPT usage has dipped around 3% in recent months [LINK]

2.) Amazon issues urgent scam warnings—what shoppers must know
Tis the season. [LINK]

3.) AI system monitors employee mental health in real time
This seems like a massive invasion of one’s privacy [LINK]

4.) Apple patches two zero-day flaws exploited in attacks
Update your iPhone, like, right now [LINK].

5.) Samsung AI mode cuts washing machine energy use by 30%
Finally, AI does something useful [LINK]

PARTNER MESSAGE

A Framework for Smarter Voice AI Decisions

Deploying Voice AI doesn’t have to rely on guesswork.

This guide introduces the BELL Framework — a structured approach used by enterprises to reduce risk, validate logic, optimize latency, and ensure reliable performance across every call flow.

Learn how a lifecycle approach helps teams deploy faster, improve accuracy, and maintain predictable operations at scale.

Read the Full Guide

💾 Extra Bytes

Samsung unveils Galaxy Z TriFold: The first tri-folding smartphone [LINK]

Your phone is spilling your secrets to Uncle Sam, study reveals [LINK]

OpenAI fires back at Google with GPT-5.2 [LINK]

ChatGPT gets Adobe’s photoshop powers [LINK]

Australian government bans social media for teens under-16 [LINK]

Google’s first AI glasses are coming in 2026 [LINK]

3 out of 10 US teens use AI chatbots every day [LINK]

📱 Gear of the Week

Galaxy Z TriFold

Samsung just dropped the announcement on its latest foldable innovation: the Galaxy Z TriFold. And yes, it's exactly what the name suggests – a phone that folds in three.

The Z TriFold is Samsung's most ambitious foldable yet. Unfold it completely and you're looking at a 10-inch display – the largest Galaxy smartphone screen Samsung has ever made. For context, that's essentially a tablet in your pocket.

Here's what impressed us about the specs:

• Dual inward-folding panels that collapse down to a portable phone size

• Just 3.9mm thick when fully unfolded (seriously thin for a triple-folding device)

• Titanium hinge housing and Armor aluminum frame for durability

• Snapdragon 8 Elite for Galaxy processor

• 200MP flagship camera system – sharp detail across the massive display

• Samsung's biggest battery ever in a foldable

• Built-in Samsung DeX for desktop-like productivity

When Can You Get One?

The Galaxy Z TriFold is coming to the U.S. in Q1 2026. Pricing hasn't been announced yet, but expect it to be a lot [LINK].

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⚙️ Tools

Google Workspace Studio: Build Gemini agents that automate everyday Gmail and Docs tasks [LINK].

Taskade: Create dashboards, client portals, and automation workflows instantly [LINK]

Meco: The best newsletter reader tool on this planet [LINK]

MindStudio: Build AI agents the easy way, free plan 👉 [LINK]

Thanks for reading!

Alright! Thanks for getting all the way to the end. Until next week…….

-Kevin

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