9to5 Staff

VoIP startup Vonage is determined to continue challenging Skype and other VoIP incumbents, so today it issued new Android and iOS clients, replacing the previous iPhone offerings Time to Call and Vonage Mobile application for Facebook. Dubbed “Vonage Mobile,” the new program boasts up to 30 percent lower international per-minute calling rates compared to its rival Skype. This is based on per-minute rates to the top 50 countries called. Additionally, Vonage Mobile for Android offers as much as 70 percent lower rates compared to major wireless carriers.

Calling and texting other Vonage Mobile users or Vonage’s VoIP home or business customers is free, and outgoing calls are placed using the user’s existing cell phone number. You do not need to be a Vonage phone service customer to use the app. Calling credits are available for in-app purchase in increments of $4.99 and $9.99. Vonage Mobile is a free download for Android devices on Android Market in over a hundred countries. If you are interested in iOS version, check out a post at our parent site 9to5Mac.com.

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Google has expanded capabilities of its Google+ social platform with new features that help prevent spammers from posting comments to posts, retrieve direct post URLs more easily, and share document forms on Google+.

As noted by Google’s Product Vice President Bradley Horowitz, “Our spam and abuse teams rock.” He was referring to changes to the comment moderation system on Google+. No longer do users have to put up with spammers flooding public posts with annoying click-bait links.

From now, users can delete or report a comment on a post by clicking the gray flag icon next to the comment. They can also immediately block the poster. As Google noted, blocking someone “is a big deal,” so make sure the poster is a spammer and not a known person from one of your circles.

Details on additional features are available  after the break.

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Just as the Android team launched an official Android Developers page on Google+ last week, the Internet giant today announced a similar page for developers writing add-ons for the Google+ social platform. The Google+ Developers page is now alive and kickin’, ready to spread the message and keep developers in the loop with everything related to the Google+ platform.

Chris Chabol, the lead of the Google+Developer Relations team, noted in a blog post that the team plans to host regular hangouts every Wednesday at 11:30 a.m to 12:15 p.m PDT to talk about the +Platform. This helpful web resource will also allow people to share tips and tricks with the community. The platform team will also share announcements pertaining to Google+ developer events, platform updates, conferences and hackathons, as well as photos and videos of the events.

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Software giant Microsoft will release in the second quarter a high-profile productivity tool for Android-toting business professionals. Accompanying Microsoft’s CRM Dynamics 2012 platform update is a preview guide that specifically mentions Android support, as noted by ZDnet. The document also includes a screenshot depicting Dynamics CRM mobile client for iPad (as seen on the right). In addition to native clients for Android devices and iPads/iPhones running iOS 5.x, Dynamics CRM will also be available on devices powered by Microsoft’s Windows Phone software.

As opposed to a web client that comes with significant limitations, the mobile client comes with all the bells and whistles so it should be Godsend for road warriors. Many businesses rely upon Dynamics CRM to manage their interactions with customers, clients, and sales prospects. Dynamics CRM mobile client will be priced at $30 a month per seat versus rival Salesforce’s mobile client which starts at $65 a month per seat.

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In line with the previous unaudited earnings release, Taiwanese handset maker HTC just posted fourth-quarter results. The big news: A substantial 26 percent drop in profits on sales of NT$101.42 billion ($3.5 billion), which is a 2.5-percent decline versus the year-ago quarter. The stock also tanked 5 percent in Asian trading. Following in Samsung’s footsteps, HTC did not divulge unit sales. Speaking to analysts on an earnings call, HTC CFO Winston Yung blamed Samsung and Apple for the shrinking business:

Our weakness in first-quarter guidance comes from facing competition in the U.S. from iPhone and Samsung.

No matter how you spin it, the results mark HTC’s fall from grace. According to the latest NPD data, Android and iPhone together accounted for over 90 percent of smartphone sales in the United States. HTC devices are nowhere to be seen on the top five best-selling devices in the United States. The company previously said it would “rationalize” its 2012 smartphone portfolio to a handful of so-called “hero” devices with better 4G LTE features, such as the HTC Zeta that is believed to run a 2.5GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon quad-core chip. From the company’s annual 2012 statement:

To expand its brand preference and value, HTC will work at a global level to build emotional connections with consumers, putting more of its marketing resources behind fewer products and driving value in those product brands.

Looking forward, HTC will also focus on further driving down operating costs and “enhance the efficiency of marketing campaigns,” such as its Beats partnership with Dr. Dre. More tidbits are after the break.

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Pictured above: The Samsung Galaxy S II profile

Samsung’s Galaxy S III smartphone will be 1.49mm slimmer than its predecessor the highly successful Galaxy S II will, a new rumor has it. According to industry sources who spoke to ETNews.com (via BGR), the new flagship phone by Samsung will be just 7mm thick versus the previous model’s 8.49mm profile.

Confirming Samsung’s plans to postpone the expected MWC introduction, the publication is claiming the Galaxy S III will arrive in May, sporting an 8-megapixel back camera and a two-megapixel camera on the front. Other features mentioned in the article include Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich and Samsung’s trademark Super AMOLED Plus display…

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The United States government traditionally prefers BlackBerries for their security features and it is known for barring its employees from sending classified messages using smartphones that do not meet security certifications. That is changing, though, as Uncle Sam is putting forth a test program that will see some U.S. officials, including troops, use smartphones running a modified version of Google’s Android software rather than a commercial one.

This modified Android version will be installed on commercially available phones sporting hardware that meets certain security criteria. According to “people involved in the project” who spoke to CNN, the forked Android version with added security features will let U.S. troops and government workers handle classified government documents over cellular networks. These secure devices will be first deployed to U.S. Army that has been testing touchscreen smartphones and tablets for nearly two years. Later, secure Android phones will arrive to certain federal agencies that will use them to send and receive government cables, the report noted.

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[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cItHOl5LRWg]

YouTube really is becoming the de facto No. 1 destination for premium entertainment and what better proof than Madonna, who is a 53-year-old American singer-songwriter, actress and entrepreneur choosing to debut her latest music video titled “Give Me All Your Luvin'” on YouTube. The song features Nicki Minaj and M.I.A. and it was released today to radio and as a digital download, while marking Madonna’s new three-album deal with Interscope Records. The music video that was filmed in December 2011 and directed by MegaForce can be seen above and on Madonna’s YouTube channel. You can pre-order the song through iTunes for $1.99 and check out Madonna’s Google+ profile for latest news. Go past the fold for a nice teaser on Madonna’s halftime show performance during Sunday’s big game.

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European regulators want Google to stop introduction of a new privacy policy that consolidates user information from the search giant’s many services until it investigates possible privacy concerns. The new privacy policy is due to come into effect on March 1. According to Reuters, the Article 29 Working Party, an independent body that brings together data protection authorities from each of the European Union’s 27 countries, and the EU’s executive European Commission, wrote in a letter to Google CEO Larry Page:

Given the wide range of services you offer, and the popularity of these services, changes in your privacy policy may affect many citizens in most or all of the EU member states. We wish to check the possible consequences for the protection of the personal data of these citizens in a coordinated way. In light of the above, we call for a pause in the interests of ensuring that there can be no misunderstanding about Google’s commitments to information rights of their users and EU citizens, until we have completed our analysis.

Google’s woes with the European Union also include the planned acquisition of handset maker Motorola Mobility, pending an antitrust review by the European Commission and another probe over an alleged misuse of its market position.

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We are unsure whether the above spy shot leaked by Ubergizmo is authentic, but we are aware of some promising rumors involving a Galaxy smartphone with a flexible display. Be advised this could simply be an early prototype that might not see the light of day. Moreover, Samsung and Corning teamed for a joint venture in Korea focused on supplying Samsung Mobile Display with the latter’s new Lotus Glass technology said to be more resilient than other glass substrates.

Nevertheless, Samsung did confirm plans to market phones and tablets with flexible displays later this year. Also indicative, the South Korean conglomerate delayed a planned late-February introduction of the Galaxy S III until later this year, allegedly until iPhone demand cools off. Another reasonable explanation for the delay:

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ChangeWave Research published an interesting survey today proving that people are really loving their Kindle Fire tablet, with more than half of the respondents (54 percent) being “Very Satisfied” with Amazon’s Android-driven tablet versus 74 percent for Apple’s iPad and 49 percent for other tablets. Whilst Amazon is believed to be selling the $199 tablet at a loss, content spending among the Fire owner benefits the online retailer over time.

Specifically, post-purchase spending at Amazon.com is up, with nearly one-third of respondents (29 percent) claiming they will spend more at Amazon in the next 90 days versus just 19 percent for non-Kindle owners. ChangeWave Research, a service of 451 Research, included a look at the reaction of Kindle Fire owners to their gizmo. Price was the determining factor for a whopping 59 percent of owners, followed by its color screen at 31 percent, ease of use at 27 percent and selection of e-reading material at 20 percent…

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[vodpod id=Video.16032192&w=425&h=350&fv=videoGUID%3D%7B5D778932-8D5E-495F-84C6-CA9ECF2911AB%7D%26amp%3Bplayerid%3D4001%26amp%3BplyMediaEnabled%3D1%26amp%3BconfigURL%3Dhttp%3A%2F%2Fwsj.vo.llnwd.net%2Fo28%2Fplayers%2F%26amp%3BautoStart%3Dfalse]

YouTube boss Salar Kamangar sat down yesterday with AllThingsD’s John Paczkowski at the “D: Dive Into Media” conference to talk content, the future of video entertainment and the big picture. He stressed the apps cable companies are building for Google TV let them control the entire experience, from the interface to delivery methods to monetizing mechanism.

As for YouTube, a global video delivery platform used by over 800 million people, it has the eyeballs and the audience. What it lacks is the minutes, as compared to traditional broadcast. The executive confirmed plans to “channelize” YouTube with more interactive and niche content than available on any other platform.

The website is already moving from individual kitten clips to groups of videos (channels), he said. Moreover, in the near future, YouTube wants to become a platform to enable “game-fying” of video content with six dimensions of entertainment…

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[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQro3kvKCtk]

As we reported yesterday, Samsung is plotting an aggressive advertising push to promote the 5.3-inch Galaxy Note with its first-ever Super Bowl commercial scheduled to air during the fourth quarter of the big game on Sunday, Feb. 5. Today, the company released a teaser clip of the advert, include above. The 45-second video tweaks the original line waiters’ formula a bit. Adding ambiguous music background (Tainted Love by Soft Cell), the commercial depicts exhausted people standing in line, looking terribly bored.

They are annoyed, too, as apparently a new iPhone they have been waiting for “looks the same,” lacks 4G, has “sketchy” battery and so forth. Then, the advert eludes that the Galaxy Note guy is coming to the rescue. Before we get to see him, the advert wraps up with the “The next big thing is already here… Again” tagline. To our Apple fans, it is a subtle hint at Apple’s iPhone 4 promotional video that closes: “This will change everything – all over again.”

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Contrary to the latest rumors, Samsung will not tap the upcoming Mobile World Congress that takes place from Feb. 27 to March 1 in Barcelona, Spain to unveil a successor to the popular Galaxy S II smartphone. Instead, in an Apple-like fashion, the Galaxy S III will be introduced to the world at a dedicated event scheduled for the “first half of the year,” the company told Techradar.

According to the official statement attributed to a Samsung spokesperson:

Samsung is looking forward to introducing and demonstrating exciting new mobile products at Mobile World Congress 2012. The successor to the GALAXY S II smartphone will be unveiled at a separate Samsung-hosted event in the first half of the year, closer to commercial availability of the product. Samsung stays committed to providing the best possible mobile experiences for customers around the world.

All told, Samsung is confident that a dedicated event rather than a trade show announcement would better convey the Galaxy S III message. According to PocketNow, the handset should feature Samsung-built Exynos 4412 chip sporting four Cortex-A9 processing cores by fabless semiconductor maker ARM Holdings, each clocked at 1.5GHz. Boasting a 50 percent faster graphics performance compared to its predecessor, the Exynos 4210 is a new piece of silicon that will be manufactured on Samsung’s 32-nanometer fabbing technology. The closest competitor to the Exynos 4412 is a 2.5GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon quad-core chip that should debut in the HTC Zeta smartphone.

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Valve Software’s official Steam client for Android devices has been available in beta since last week. Today, the stable 1.0 version was released on Android Market. You will need a Steam account to use the app that lets you chat and participate in the Steam community from your phone or tablet, get heads-ups on discounts, browse profiles, access latest news and more. Note that the program does not enable mobile purchasing of Steam games nor does it facilitate gaming on the go.

Steam is a digital rights-managed distribution system for cross-platform delivery of games, but it also provides support for features such as multiplayer, automatic updates and in-game voice and video chat. The Android version of mobile Steam client arrived on the heels of last week’s release of a companion Steam app for Apple’s iPhone and iPod touch.

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Samsung confirmed plans to launch its Galaxy Note phone in the United States come Feb. 5 with an aggressive marketing push. The South Korean conglomerate will spare no expense promoting the 5.3-inch device that features a stylus, as it will take advantage of the nation’s most valuable ad space during the Super Bowl XLVI finals. To our overseas readers, Super Bowl is the largest sporting event in the United States.

The 90-second Galaxy Note Super Bowl commercial will air during the fourth quarter of the big game on Sunday, Feb. 5. Pre-orders for the Note begin the same day, Samsung confirmed. As we learned yesterday, the Note will also be available at AT&T and Best Buy Stores beginning Feb. 19, with pre-orders at those outlets also starting Feb. 5.

The commercial, which will also feature HD shots made on the Note, marks Samsung’s Super Bowl debut, as the company never bought a Super Bowl ad slot in its 71-year history. The advert is directed by Bobby Farrelly of the “There’s Something About Mary,” “Dumb and Dumber” and “Kingpin” fame. The announcement also marks a continuation of Samsung’s aggressive marketing push…

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European Union regulators today announced the launch of a formal investigation of Samsung over mobile patents to determine whether the South Korean conglomerate breached EU antitrust rules in its legal dealings with competitors. The investigation is focused on so-called FRAND patents, a common rule that stipulates a patent applying to the standard must be adopted on “fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory terms” (FRAND). According to the press release, EU regulators want to figure out whether Samsung “used certain of its standard essential patent rights to distort competition in European mobile device markets, in breach of EU antitrust rules.”

The Commission reminds that Samsung a decade ago promised to let rivals license its mobile patents under FRAND terms. The full-blown investigation comes in the light of the lawsuits Samsung filed against Apple at courts in Germany, France, the Netherlands and other countries around the world, asserting copyright infringement related to patents essential to wireless telecommunications standards.

The case is “a matter of priority,” the document reads. Patent blogger explained, “The European Commission can’t wait until Samsung finally wins a ruling based on such a patent and enforces it, potentially causing irreparable harm.” The full text of the European Commission Antitrust Commission announcement can be found below.

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Ever since the original iPhone redefined the smartphone and Android became popular, carriers in the United States were caught flat-footed and they have constantly been whining about an undesired network impact caused by data-hungry owners of iPhones and Android devices.

While U.S. carriers are to blame for their years-long reluctance to upgrade their infrastructure and prepare for the inevitable surge in traffic, wireless operators elsewhere have mostly been able to mitigate the issue. Nevertheless, with 700,000 Android devices being activated each day, and the rising popularity of Google’s platform in Japan, it was only a matter of time before Japanese carriers faced similar hurdles as their U.S. peers.

According to a Reuters report citing a local newspaper story by the business daily Nikkei, Japanese carrier NTT DoCoMo said a recent network outage is to blame for a heavy surge in traffic caused by some data-centric Android apps that move large chunks of bits through its cellular network. Specifically, the carrier made claims that VoIP apps disrupted the service and is now requesting that Google do something about it:

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A mockup of an 11.6-inch Galaxy Tab versus a 10.1-inch model, courtesy of TabTech.de

Samsung allegedly plans to announce a bigger, 11.6-inch Galaxy Tab tablet powered by Ice Cream Sandwich at the upcoming Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain. The show is scheduled to run Feb. 27 to March 1, 2012. According to German-language TabTech.de, the new Tab will not be just bigger; it should take advantage of Samsung’s 2GHz dual-core Exynos 5250 chip that was announced last November.

Given the 5250’s four times graphics performance compared to the Exynos 4210 silicon, the 11.6-inch Galaxy Tab might be the first tablet with an ultra high-resolution display. The Exynos 5250 is based on the Cortex A15 architecture from fables semiconductor design firm ARM Holdings and Samsung said it is capable of delivering 14,000 DMIPS. This could be the reason alone for a bigger Tab.

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South Korean conglomerate Samsung announced a new addition today to its Galaxy family lineup, the Galaxy S Advance smartphone. This 3G HSPA 14.4Mbps device packs in Bluetooth 3.0, a 4-inch Super AMOLED display, Android Gingerbread, a 5-megapixel camera on the back with 720p video capture and a 1.3-megapixel camera for videoconferencing on the front. It is powered by a dual-core Cortex-A9 1GHz chip with 768 MB RAM and 8GB/16GB internal storage and is pretty light, weighing just 120 grams (20 grams lighter than the iPhone 4S).

The Galaxy S Advance will be available in Russia starting February. Samsung promised to roll out the device in CIS, Europe, Africa, Middle East, Southeast and Southwest Asia, Latin America and China in the coming weeks. Additionally, Samsung also collaborated with headphones maker Jays in a deal akin to HTC’s partnership with Beats. The partnership will see the Galaxy maker push v-JAYs headphones in a time-limited promotion across 691 company-owned stores and third-party outlets in Korea during February.

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As 9to5Google reported last October, the search Goliath appears to be on a spending spree since 2011. Having reported holiday quarter earnings, the company filed its 10-K with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission yesterday. The document, available online at the agency’s website, specifies that Google spent $1.9 billion dollars acquiring 79 companies throughout last year.

The sum includes cash and stock and is nearly double the $1 billion they spent on 48 acquisitions in the previous year. For the entire 2011, the number of full-time employees at the company ballooned 33 percent to 32,467 Googlers. Just do not count on the company satisfying its appetite for acquisitions anytime soon, as the filing reads:

Acquisitions will also remain an important component of our strategy and use of capital, and we expect our current pace of acquisitions to continue.

So, has Google put its acquisition money to good use?

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