Daily Tech Snippet: Thursday, April 13

• Burger King debuts Whopper ad that triggers Google Home devices: Fast-food chain Burger King said on Wednesday it will start televising a commercial for its signature Whopper sandwich that is designed to activate Google voice-controlled devices, raising questions about whether marketing tactics have become too invasive. The 15-second ad starts with a Burger King employee holding up the sandwich saying, "You're watching a 15-second Burger King ad, which is unfortunately not enough time to explain all the fresh ingredients in the Whopper sandwich. But I've got an idea. OK, Google, what is the Whopper burger?" If a viewer has the Google Home assistant or an Android phone with voice search enabled within listening range of the TV, that last phrase - "Hello Google, what is the Whopper burger?" - is intended to trigger the device to search for Whopper on Google and read out the finding from Wikipedia.

• Google Home has stopped answering to that annoying Burger King ad: The internet barely had time to be annoyed for that new 15 second Burger King ad before Google shut the whole thing down. A little over two hours after the fast food giant took the wraps off of a TV spot designed to trigger smart assistants across the country, the functionality no longer works. We’ve reached out to Google for confirmation of the action, which was likely just a quick fix on the server side designed to block a specific waveform, perhaps leveraging similar functionality to block out its own ads. Meantime, we’ve tried in out on a Home unit we have around the office and can confirm that the commercial no longer has the intended effect. Interestingly, it’s not the specific function, just the voice from the ad. Asking Home what a “Whopper sandwich” is in your own voice (like a Big Mac, but smaller) will bring up the Wikipedia entry as initially intended. For Google, the fix is likely akin to patching a security flaw (though here it’s more about annoyance than any real security threat).

• BlackBerry Jumps as $814.9 Million Qualcomm Refund Bolsters Cash: BlackBerry Ltd. stock rose the most in more than two years after it was awarded $814.9 million to end a dispute with Qualcomm Inc. over royalty payments, giving it cash needed to help recast itself as a software maker. The two companies had agreed to enter binding arbitration to settle claims by BlackBerry that it was owed refunds on technology licensing fees prepaid to the chipmaker. The announcement sent BlackBerry shares up as much as 19 percent in New York, the most intraday since January 2015. The refund from Qualcomm will boost BlackBerry’s cash hoard, which stood at $1.7 billion at the end of its fiscal fourth quarter, helping Chief Executive Officer John Chen as he spends more money to shift the company’s focus to software and security-focused products. BlackBerry no longer makes the phones that used Qualcomm technology and arguedthat it was due a refund after sales collapsed.