Samsung’s Galaxy Nexus is the first smartphone at Verizon to get Android 4.1 Jelly Bean, announced the leading 4G LTE carrier today, with the software upgrade rolling out over Wi-Fi now.
Those interested in getting the latest, buttery-smooth version of Android can go to System Updates under the “About Phone” Setting’s menu. As noted, a Wi-Fi network is required to complete the download. The update comes to Verizon more than three months after Jelly Bean was released on the GSM version of the Galaxy Nexus.
“The interface on Jelly Bean is also the most responsive Android OS to date,” said Verizon in its announcement. “Customers can interact with messages, photos, emails and event details from the notification screen, allowing them to directly access important information without navigating their phone.
YouTube recently launched a beta feature, called “Video Questions Editor Beta,” which Dutch tech website WebSonic.nl first discovered, that allows publishers to add an interactive quiz to their videos.
This is an opt-in beta for a simple Video Questions Editor on YouTube. Through this editor you can setup multiple questions to be displayed on top of your video during playback that a viewer can answer.
Users can go the edit page of a video and select the “Questions” tab atop to input questions. A summary of viewer interactions will appear on the analytics page under the Annotations section.
Google just announced a partnership with Peres Center for Peace in honor of today’s 30th annual International Day of Peace.
Peres Center for Peace promotes peace between Jewish and Arab citizens of Israel and neighboring Arab countries. Google and the non-profit organization are hosting a series of Hangouts on Google+ to “enable dialogue between Israeli Arab and Jewish students.”
“Hanging Out for Peace” is a six-month project that will involve nearly 150 Israeli university students, women and men, with an equal number of Arabs and Jews. Students will be divided into mixed Jewish and Arab ‘circles’, matched with other students who study the same subject at university.
The circles will meet via Hangouts on Google+, led by instructors from the Peres Center, and will undertake online and offline projects related to the circle’s area of academic focus. After a series of Hangouts, the students will meet face to face, present the projects they’ve developed to the larger group of participants and discuss issues that arose during their work together.
Google Wallet is sponsoring a concert sweepstakes at Irving Plaza in Manhattan for American indie rock band FUN.
The mobile payment service is offering potential concertgoers a chance to win tickets to the show with VIP after-party access. The sweepstakes will give three grand prizewinners two VIP tickets for Oct. 30.
The experience includes a private area upstairs during the concert, complimentary food and beverages, entrance to the official after party, and a meet-and-greet with FUN. But, that’s not all: 40 runner-ups will also win two general admission tickets.
Walmart apparently sent a memo to store managers on Sept. 19. announcing plans to stop selling Amazon’s line of Kindle products.
“We have recently made the business decision to not carry Amazon tablets and eReaders beyond our existing inventory and purchase commitments,” said Walmart in the memo. “This includes all Amazon Kindle models current and recently announced.”
Reuters, which cited the memo and an unidentified source “familiar with situation,” first reported the news:
In the memo, Wal-Mart said the decision was consistent with its overall merchandising strategy. While Wal-Mart dwarfs other retailers in overall sales, it trails Amazon and others online and has been stepping up efforts to increase its presence there. Consumers who buy Kindle tablets such as the new Kindle Fire HD can shop on the devices for more than just digital books, pushing Amazon into further competition with stores.
The publication did not provide additional details, but Walmart.com currently reflects the reported change. When searching for “Kindle” on the national retailer’s website, no Kindle-related products appear in the queue. It is unclear if Walmart’s website ever offered the tablets, however.
Google UK Marketing Director Dan Cobley briefly spoke with Bloomberg TV today on Apple’s decision to remove Google Maps from iOS 6, but the most intriguing part about his statement concerned how people could continue to use Google Maps after updating.
Cobley noted folks on iOS 6 can still “use Google Maps by downloading them or going to the Google Maps website.” This is an interesting comment, however, as there is no Google Maps-related app from Google available in the App Store aside from the Google Earth app. It features 3D layers, including roads, borders, places, photos and more, but it is not an adequate Google Maps replacement. There is also no existing option to download a map from Google Maps in mobile Safari.
Therefore, it is currently unclear what Cobley meant by “downloading them.” SearchEngineLand asked Google today when iOS would get a new Google Maps app, though, and if it would feature turn-by-turn navigation. Google replied:
We believe Google Maps are the most comprehensive, accurate and easy-to-use maps in the world. Our goal is to make Google Maps available to everyone who wants to use it, regardless of device, browser, or operating system.
Google’s Director of Android User Experience, who was recently dubbed one of the top 50 designers shaping the future by Fast Company, admitted on his Google+ page yesterday that Android functions at only a fraction of what he has envisioned for the mobile operating system.
It’s true, we still have a lot of work to do. Personally I feel like I’ve gotten only about a third of the way to where I want to be with regards to consistency, responsiveness, and polish. Better get back to work!
Duarte’s UI influence spans from Android 3.0 Honeycomb to Android 4.1 Jelly Bean.
American Airlines just revealed it will give 17,000 Samsung Galaxy Notes to flight attendants while onboard its aircrafts to record a passenger’s meal preferences, access passenger particulars, and identify passengers for special assistance or high-value purposes.
“This is a huge step towards a new, modern American Airlines, as our tablet program is the first of its kind in the airline industry, where our flight attendants will have the most up-to-date customer information in the palms of their hands, allowing them to better serve our customers from boarding to deplaning,” said American Airline Vice President of Flight Service Lauri Curtis in a press release. “By giving a device to all of our active flight attendants we are better enabling our people to deliver an exceptional customer experience.”
Today’s phablet news comes on the heels of the Samsung’s announcement regarding a United States launch for the Galaxy Note II by mid-Novemeber.
Get the full press release below, or watch the video above, for more information.
We gave a complete hands-on last week of the Galaxy Note II’s global version, while also promising more information on the United States variant when it becomes available, and now Samsung has revealed the phablet will launch stateside with five major carriers “by mid-November.”
The Galaxy Note II marks the U.S. debut of Samsung’s Exynos 1.6 GHz quad-core processor, which is optimized for LTE networks; and it is the first Samsung smartphone to launch with Android 4.1 Jelly Bean. It notably weighs less than the original Galaxy Note, features a narrower bezel, and it ships in Marble White or Titanium Gray flavors. The carriers are expected to announce additional details on pricing and availability.
Hardware specs include:
2GB of internal RAM
16 GB of onboard file storage with additional support up to 64GB via a microSD card
5.5-inch HD Super AMOLED touchscreen; larger and thinner than predecessor with 16:9 aspect ratio
3,100 mAh battery, which is 24 percent larger than the original Galaxy Note
Redesigned S Pen with rubberized tip and textured grip
Software features include:
Easy Clip feature—allows users to outline and crop content to save, share or paste
Air View—allows users to hover the S Pen over content to preview without having to open or wait for screen transitions
Quick Command—the S Pen activates applications and services most often used
Idea Sketch—allows users to add illustrations by handwriting keywords on the S Note
Photo Notes—allows users to create handwritten notes on the back of digital photos
Popup Note—lets users open an S Note as a pop-up window to jot a note during a call, email, video, etc.
Popup Video—extends the concept of “Popup Play”; allows users to float video with the touch of a button
Popup Browser—launches a new browser window when a user clicks on a link embedded in an email
Additional sharing features found in Samsung Galaxy S III including S Beam, Share Shot, Burst Shot, Best Shot, AllShare Cast, etc.
Accessories include:
Protective Flip Cover
Pen with Eraser
Those who love Android (better yet—those who are dying for Jelly Bean), styluses and big ‘ole screens will surely want the Samsung Galaxy Note II, as it is a fast, crisp all-in-one device with flashy features and powerful hardware. Check out 9to5Google’s review —or the press release below— for more details.
With fall on the horizon, the Google Maps team researched the summer’s most popular activities by analyzing global search patterns on maps.google.com. The team then charted the resulting data into visual representations, otherwise known as an infographic, which is available in full below.
Before we approach the official end of summer on September 21, our Google Maps team thought it’d be fun to see how those of us in the Northern Hemisphere have spent the dog days. To do this, we reviewed the summer search activity on maps.google.com in several countries between the end of May and the beginning of September. Within each country, a look at some of the top-rising searches and the often-searched landmarks on Google Maps gives us a sense of how people around the world spent their summers.
A few of the highlights: North Americans mostly searched for local beaches, Europeans preferred community swimming pools, and United Kingdom dwellers looked for indoor activities. The overall patterns indicated, however, that the most popular destination searches were outdoor-based.
Check out the full-sized infographic below, or go to the Google blog for more specifics.
The folks in Mountain View want businesses, schools and people around the world to go Google, and they are continually recruiting by encouraging current Google Apps users to share their “gone Google” stories.
Design Within Reach CEO John Edelman is the latest unofficial spokesperson to tell the story about how he and his national retail operation, which sells modern design for homes and offices, moved to Google Apps, with the help of Google Apps reseller Cloud Sherpas, for ease of communication.
Before Google Apps, it wasn’t easy to share important materials like store promotion schedules, store layouts, or PR updates quickly and efficiently. Instead, we relied heavily on email for communication. In retail, things change all the time and emailing about employee schedules, promotional timelines or new merchandise availability meant that the information was quickly out of date and risked employees having inaccurate information. Google Apps changed all that. Now, our marketing team is able to track in-store promotions via shared calendars. Employees can track inventory through Google Docs, so when we have a floor sale and someone wants 4 red chairs and we only have one, we can easily hop onto Google Docs and find the chairs at another location. The customer is happy – and we’re happy because we’ve made a sale and cleared the floor.
Google just inked a deal with Twentieth Century Fox to bulk its YouTube and Google Play catalog by over 600 more film and television titles for renting and buying.
A few of the more notable TV shows include “Family Guy” and “Modern Family,” while a snippet of the blockbuster movie additions range from “Prometheus” to “Black Swan.”
Today you can buy Fox’s new release Prometheus in HD, available three weeks ahead of the Blu-ray, DVD and video-on-demand release. And over the next few weeks you’ll be able to rent or buy your favorite Fox movies like X-Men, Ice Age andBlack Swan, and TV shows like “Glee,” “Modern Family,” “New Girl” and many more.
The new titles will first roll out in the United States with “other countries” eyeing availability soon. Pricing is unclear at this time, but “Prometheus” in HD is now live and set at $14.99 for buying.
The Internet giant’s mergers and acquisitions team has steadily bulked the walls of Google’s headquarters for the last two years. It gobbled up 79 firms last year alone, including companies for patent-related purposes, and this year it added 11 more to the pile. Sure, the numbers from 2011 and then 2012 may seem a little unbalanced, but not when someone calculates the $12 billion price tag of this year’s Motorola Mobility purchase.
Google, originally a basic search engine that founded exactly 14 years ago this month, is now more of a Renaissance, er, man. It conquers search, maps, video, email, advertising, mobile OS, and it dabbles in photography, business reviews, fiber TV and Internet, social networking, travel management, voice-control features, heads-up displays, self-driving cars, facial-recognition systems, etc. The list goes on. Look at the chart above for a more sweeping look at the goliath Google has become.
From 2001 to present day, Google has purchased and integrated over 110 companies. When founder Larry Page took over as CEO in April, 2011, he killed off a number of small initiatives and refocused the company around 7 core product divisions. All the companies in this graphic have been organized into by those groups, but don’t necessarily reflect their placement upon initial acquisition. Mouseover the infographic (above) to magnify the acquisition details, and refer to the key for additional information. Source: Google Corp Dev and Wikipedia.
Oh, Kickstarter. It is a primary place where tech lovers’ dreams have an opportunity to become reality; it not only promotes some of the most innovative ideas, but it also makes those of us in the real world more anxious for a gadget-filled tomorrow. Enter LIFX.
LIFX’s, well, life on Kickstarter is only nearing the 48-hour mark, but the reinvented light bulb already surpassed its set goal and hit $402,707 (as of press time) worth of pledges. In a nutshell: LIFX is a “Wi-Fi-enabled, multi-color, energy efficient LED light bulb that you control with your iPhone or Android.”
Just watch the video above for the full effect. A few of the more notable integrated uses include changing indoor light color to match any mood, visualizing music, security measures for while away, or even just enabling couch potatoes. Those who pledge at least $69 will get a handy-dandy LIFX “smartbulb” to try, with an estimated delivery pegged around March 2013.
Home-automation technology is a huge hit among startups, such as former Apple Senior Vice President Tony Fadell’s popular Nest Learning Thermostat, and even carriers are trying to get on board by developing services that streamline life and home processes.
AT&T, for instance, produced a consumer home automation and security suite of services that began trials earlier this summer. The services, which exist under the “AT&T Digital Life” naming umbrella, control home functions and implement security features. With Nest and others creating a buzz in the mobile home-automation space, expect to see LIFX flying off retailers’ shelves this time next year.
While confirming the Nik Software acquisition on his personal Google+ account, Senior Vice President of Engineering Vic Gundotra just revealed a few interesting Google+ statistics.
The Google executive announced 400 million people have now “upgraded to Google+,” with 100 million of them being “monthly active users” on desktop and mobile. These rounded numbers directly refer to Google+ and do not seem to encompass users actively exercising other Google products.
Google typically avoids dishing out specifics on Google+, like active user base estimates, but it has previously cited the budding network as the social core to its umbrella of products and claimed it boasted more than 170 million users (of which 60 percent allegedly sign in daily).
We are pleased to announce that Google has acquired Nik Software. For nearly 17 years, we’ve been guided by our motto, “photography first”, as we worked to build world class digital image editing tools. We’ve always aspired to share our passion for photography with everyone, and with Google’s support we hope to be able to help many millions more people create awesome pictures.
We’re incredibly grateful for all of your support and hope you’ll join us on the next phase of our journey as part of Google.
All our best!
The Nik Software Team
Snapseed, which is akin to iOS app Instagram in terms of jazzy vintage filters, is just one of many desktop and mobile photography apps that Nik Software develops. Snapseed launched on Apple’s iPad in June 2011, winning “iPad App of the Year” soon after, and then it landed on the iPhone in August 2011 and Mac OS just four months later. The app also boasts a Windows counterpart.
Today’s announced buyout could notably help Google’s budding social network, Google+, better combat direct rival Facebook, which recently acquired Instagram and its 100+ million users.
Googler Amit Singhal told guests at a Churchill Club event in Silicon Valley on Thursday that he thought the cofounders of Google were “smoking something” when they first approached him.
Larry Page and Sergey Brin allegedly attempted to recruit Singhal in 2000 by telling him the company would be worth “$500 million at least,” adding they had “the entire Internet sitting on our disks.”
BusinessInsider, which first reported the story, elaborated:
Except they didn’t, really. Their plan for a new search engine was simple: They didn’t have to search every word, they only needed “a snippet from the beginning [of each page] to do search,” he recounts.
They were running short on funds, so they had to build their own, more affordable computers to store the data. Today, Google builds more servers than many of the world’s commercial server makers. If it sold servers, it would rank around No. 5 in world market share.
The Tetris for Android app, normally $2.99, is free today on the Amazon Appstore as part of the online retailer’s “Free app of the day” series. Today’s free app —an iconic tile-matching puzzle video game originally released in 1984 via a range of platforms— is available to Android users in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, and Spain.
We first reported in July about an upcoming movie called “The Internship,” starring Hollywood actors Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson as two 40-something Google interns attempting to find success.
BetaBeat (via AllThingsD) noted today that the film posted casting calls recently for extras and a stand-in for Wilson. According to Casting Networks, the stand-in gig calls for a 25- to 45-year-old Wilson look-a-like in the San Francisco area, and whoever lands the gig, whether SAG or non-union, will get $160.
OnLocationVacation further reported that the flick is filming at Stanford University today, while the final weeks of shooting wrap up in San Francisco.
According to IMDb, as seen in the image atop, Vaughn wrote the movie’s screenplay. Director Shawn Levy is also signed-on, while Vaughn, Wilson, and Rose Byrne take up the top three roles. Oh, and 21 Laps Entertainment, Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation, and Wild West Picture Show Productions are just a few of the production houses on board.
“The Internship” is currently slated for a June 2013 premiere.
A new report from the Dow Jones Newswire today asserted that Mountain View, Calif.-based Google pressured Acer into abruptly canceling a launch event for the CloudMobile A800 smartphone because it runs the Aliyun mobile operating system.
Chinese Internet giant Alibaba developed the Linux-based OS—dubbed the aspiring “Android of China.” Acer intended to unveil a smartphone powered by the alternative OS today, but the Taiwan-based manufacturer called off its event after submitting to coercion from Google.
Alibaba specifically told the Dow Jones Newswire that Acer was “notified by Google that if the product runs Aliyun OS, Google will terminate its Android- related cooperation and other technology licensing with our partner…”
Google wants folks to know there is a slew of third-party Google Drive integrations available, so it began a blog series today to highlight the most notable apps:
Google Drive is a place where you can create, share and keep all your stuff — so you can live online and get things done in the cloud. Drive is also an open platform, which means you can use third-party applications to do things like send faxes,make floor plans, and create mockups directly from Drive.
There are lots of great third-party Drive apps and Drive integrations out there, so we thought we’d periodically highlight a few useful ones on this blog.
Google subsidiary Motorola Mobility unveiled its new line of Droid Razr smartphones just last week, and now the Droid Razr M is officially available at Verizon Wireless for $99 on a two-year contract.
We recently reviewed the device and dubbed it our “favorite little Droid.” It packs a Super Amoled Advanced 4.3-inch display with 40 percent more screen real estate and a 40 percent more powerful battery than the Apple iPhone 4S. It also notably features a Corning Gorilla Glass display, DuPont Kevlar fiber and a splash-guard coating on the outside, while the software on the inside comes equipped with Android 4.0.4 Ice Cream Sandwich (with an upgrade to Jelly Bean by “the holidays”) and access to Google Play. It also touts Chrome for Android, Google Maps, Voice Actions for Android, Google, YouTube, and an easy-to-use tutorial for interactive help with customization
Additional premium specs include 4G LTE and NFC capability, a 1.5 GHz dual-core processor, 1 GB RAM, 8-megapixel camera with LED flash and 1080p HD recording, front-facing camera for video chatting, mobile Hotspot and a microSDcard slot with support for up to 32 GB. The Droid Razr M comes in either “sleek black” or “stand out white.”
Google will launch its Google Fiber signup process tomorrow in qualified Kansas City neighborhoods, so folks can finally select their desired service plan, but the Internet giant has updated its TV offering today to help customers make a decision.
We just added a number of additional channels covering a variety of genres, including arts, family, faith, lifestyle and sports. Google Fiber TV service already includes almost two hundred channels, but we’ll continue to add more over time. And since our TV service runs on a gigabit network, we can offer access to all our HD channels for no extra charge.
The new channels include:
ABC Family, ABC News Now, Disney Channel, Disney Junior, Disney XD, ESPN, ESPN Buzzer Beater, ESPN Classic, ESPN Deportes, ESPN Goal Line, ESPN2, ESPNews, ESPNU, Longhorn Network, Ovation, SOAPnet, TBN, TBN Enlace, and Velocity
With that said, check the Google Fiber Blog tomorrow for the final announcement of qualifying neighborhoods. Kansas Citians in those “fiberhoods” will have the option to choose between Google’s Gigabit + TV plan, Gigabit Internet plan, and its Free Internet plan.
Afghanistan just banned Google’s YouTube over an American film posted on the video-sharing platform that insults the Prophet Mohammad, subsequently spurred riots in North Africa, and led to the killing of Libya’s U.S. ambassador.
Aimal Marjan, Afghanistan’s general director of Information Technology at the Ministry of Communications, who rebuffed additional questions as to whether the country blocked YouTube to avert more violence or as a safeguard from further insults, told Reuters:
“We have been told to shut down YouTube to the Afghan public until the video is taken down.”
The controversial film apparently portrays Mohammad as a womanizer and a religious hoax, so Afghan President Hamid Karzai promptly condemned it and then claimed freedom of speech does not permit the disrespect of Islam.
