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The Flipboard for Windows Phone app has been updated today, bringing with it a new Topics feature that allows you to find new content in the news-meets-magazine app based on your interests.  The update, version 2.6.0.0 for those keeping score at home, allows you to define tags of subjects that you are interested in within the app.  You can then quickly and easily find new content based on those tags, i.e. topics.  There are over 34,000 topics within Flipboard so you shouldn’t have any problem finding that item of interest.

Flipboard for Windows Phone – Free – Download Now

Yesterday’s announcement of the new Lumia 640 and Lumia 640XL seems to have gone over well with many relieved to see a mid-range phone instead of a low-end Windows Phone come to the market.  I still contend there needs to be a flagship phone sooner rather than later but that’s a different discussion for a different glass of wine.

One interesting observation though:  Verizon was not mentioned at all as a US carrier who will have these new Lumia devices.  AT&T will carry both the Lumia 640 and Lumia 640XL while T-Mobile and MetroPCS will carry the Lumia 640.  It appears, at least for now, the Lumia 640XL will be exclusive to AT&T which, frankly, it should be given that AT&T has been a supporter of the platform.  So you will have the US #2 and #3 carriers with these new budget friendly devices but not the #1 carrier in Verizon.

Given the history of Verizon with Windows Phone however, this shouldn’t come as a complete shock to anyone.

The Netflix apps for both Windows and Windows Phone received a minor update yesterday that all users should update to if you haven’t done so already.  The update, version 4.1.0.16 for those keeping score at home, does not have any detailed release notes with it but it is widely suspected that this addresses a bug that was causing crashes on the streaming movie and television app.

Netflix for Windows Phone – Free – Download Now

Netflix for Windows – Free – Download Now

This week or next it is expect that we will see the next Windows 10 Preview build for PCs and Tablets drop to Windows Insiders.  While the release date is not exactly known, there are indications of what can be expected in the build.  While no major changes are coming to the Preview, you can expect to see the new Project Spartan web browser experience come to it in this release.

For those of you who haven’t heard, Project Spartan is a new universal app browser that is coming to all platforms in Windows 10.  That new browser, which was demonstrated yesterday at MWC in Barcelona, is significantly faster than the current Internet Explorer and brings other improvements like Cortana integration.  Everything I’ve seen and from those on the inside at Microsoft are saying it is impressive.  Personally, I cannot wait to see it.

The even better thing about Project Spartan is that it is a true Universal App based on the methodology and framework Microsoft laid out yesterday.  That means that we will see this new browser experience not only on PCs and Tablets, we will see it on Windows 10 for Phones.  That will also be in the next Preview build for Phones but don’t expect the next build for phones next week.  All indications are we have a mid-to-late March to wait for that release.