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Google has a creative way of advertising its products and its latest effort is quite a doozy. On May 30th at 10:45pm (local time) the company will air a live music performance by Sam Smith from London’s Roundhouse venue that will broadcast across a full ad break on the UK’s Channel 4. So what’s with the quickie concert? It’s an advertising platform for Mountain View’s digital music service.

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Google this afternoon released a small update to its Text-To-Speech app on Android. The update bumps the app to version 3.1, and while it may not be the biggest update, it certainly packs some useful changes for a handful of users. The update adds support for selecting and speaking text in Polish, Dutch, and Russian. It also improves its already existing support for some English dialects spoken in India.

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Those who expressed concern about Google’s acquisition of Nest may have have been right: the company has told the Securities and Exchange Commission that it may choose to serve ads on “refrigerators, car dashboards, thermostats, glasses, and watches, to name just a few possibilities.”

The WSJ reports that Google made the statement in support of its contention that it shouldn’t have to break out ad revenue from mobile devices … 
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Just a short while after releasing an update to Chrome OS, Google is now pushing out an update to the Chrome browser on Android. Although minor, the update does include a few improvements. The update bumps the app to version 35.0.1916.122, as well.

With this update, the app now has an undo tab close button, which allows you to undo closing a tab, should you have done it by accident. The app also now supports fullscreen video with subtitles and HTML5-based controls. Google also notes that Chrome now has support for some multi-window devices, as well as support for casting “some” videos with Chromecast. It’s unclear, however, what devices and videos this update adds support for. Nevertheless, casting videos with Chromecast is a great addition. Most of these features have been in beta for about a month now.

• Undo Tab Close
• Fullscreen video with Subtitles and HTML5 controls
• Support for some multi-window devices
• Support for casting some videos with Chromecast
• Other bug fixes

The update to Chrome for Android is available on the Play Store now, although it appears to be a staged rollout and may take a little while to hit your device. 

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Earlier this afternoon Google announced that it was making several improvements to the billing capabilities of the Play Store, and now the company has updated the entire Play Store app to go along with it. Pushing the version number to 4.8.19, the update adds a few interface tweaks to the app, in addition to the billing capabilities previously announced.

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Following confirmation during an interview with Marissa Mayer at the TechCrunch Disrupt event this week, a version of Yahoo’s popular News Digest app is now available to Android users. Yahoo made the announcement on its blog today where it also noted that new international and Canadian editions of the app have arrived.

Mayer noted in the interview this week that News Digest was one of the company’s mobile apps that its most proud of. The app, which offers users a daily dose of news in a concise format, has been experiencing impressive engagement among users on iOS since launching last year.

Here’s a breakdown of what you’ll get where in terms of the new editions in each country:
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Anyone who has followed Google over the past few years knows that it has had more than its fair share of privacy issues. The company’s had run ins with the UK government, US government, and others about privacy concerns, in addition to facing criticism over Google Glass. Microsoft has also mocked Google for its privacy issues as part of its “Scroogled” ad campaign. Now, a German activist group that calls themselves Peng Collective has launched a new website that parodies Google, its privacy issues, and apparent need to know everything about everyone.

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Today, Google opened Google Play merchant registration for eight new territories. Developers residing in Greece, Luxembourg, Romania, Saudi Arabia, Slovakia, Turkey, Ukraine and Vietnam can now apply for a merchant account with Google Play, which will allow them to collect money for paid apps in local their local currency.

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If you’ve been flirting with the idea of buying a gigantic phone or a small tablet with a vanilla Android experience but your cash flow is low, look no further than the Sony Z Ultra Google Play edition. Typically priced at $650, Mountain View has knocked $200 off the phone-tablet hybrid’s asking price. In addition to a shrunken premium, Google Play is offering free ground shipping with a standard warehouse departure time of 1-2 business days.

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Yesterday, Google’s newly acquired thermostat system made an appearance on a Play Store support page. This led many to believe that the search giant would soon offer its smart climate controller at its online marketplace, alongside its other in-house products. Today, the company has made things official and the Nest Thermostat is now available from Google Play for $250 with an estimated 1-2 day warehouse departure.

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Earlier this year, Google acquired smart thermostat maker Nest for the huge sum of $3.2 billion. This led to speculation that the two companies would work together, with Google using its online retail outlet to boost sales of product. Since the acquisition, however, nothing has come to fruition between the companies, with both continuing business as normal. It looks like, however, that Google may soon start to sell the Nest thermostat via the online Play Store.

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Google announced today on its Chrome blog that Major League Baseball is adding support for its $35 Chromecast streaming stick through the MLB At Bat app for Android and iOS. That means that users with the app and an MLB.TV Premium subscription will be able to stream live and on-demand video content from the app (or from a browser tab in Chrome through MLB’s site) to a Chromecast connected TV. You’ll also be able to use the phone or tablet you’re streaming from as a second-screen experience to “check scores, stats and news” while watching the game on the bigger screen:

MLB.TV is the latest live streaming service to come to Chromecast, so now MLB.TV Premium subscribers can invite their friends over to watch live, out-of-market games. While casting a game to the big screen, use your phone or tablet to check scores, stats and news from around the league. You can even choose between home or away broadcasts to steer clear of the opposing team’s announcers when your guys are on the road.

The updated apps are rolling out today for the MLB At Bat app for Android and iOS on Google Play and the App Store, but the Chromecast feature will require an MLB.TV Premium subscription to get started. Those cost $129.99/year or $24.99/month in comparison to the regular $19.99/season or $2.99 month At Bat subscription and offers “every 2014 Regular Season out-of-market game LIVE or on-demand in HD” across platforms. 

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Want to do something nice for mom on Mother’s Day, but flowers make her sneeze and candy goes against her strict diet? Then perhaps a few books and magazines from Google Play’s Mother’s Day sale will bring a smile to mom’s face on her special day.

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In December, Google announced a new feature that further integrated Android apps into its Search products by showing links directly to apps in search results. For instance, if you searched for a movie to see, you had the option of opening the results in the IMDB app if you already had it installed on your phone. Basically, if you had an app installed all you had to do was click “Open in app” on the search results page and you’d go right to the relevant app. If a search included relevant apps from inside Google Play, you’d be able to quickly go to the Play Store and download it.

Today, Google has announced that it is further expanding this feature to support even more apps. Starting today, you have the ability to directly from search results into the following apps:

500px, AOL, BigOven, Bleacher Report, Booking.com, Eventbrite, Glassdoor, Goodreads, Huffington Post, Merriam-Webster, Pinterest, Realtor.com, Seeking Alpha, TalkAndroid, TheFreeDictionary, The Journal, TripAdvisor, Tumblr, Urbanspoon, Wattpad, Yellow Pages, Zagat, Zappos and Zillow.

The feature is being updated over the air, meaning that no app update is required and you should start to see changes in these search results very soon.

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Hot on the heels of adding an activity feed to the web version of the Play Store, Google is now quietly rolling out a new “People” section to the Play Store app on Android. While the activity feed on the mobile app simply shows you what you’ve recently reviewed, rated, and purchased, the People section shows you what other users have recently been into.

The People feed is integrated heavily with Google+ and allows you to quickly follow users and view the their full profile. The feed shows what others have reviewed, +1’d, or shared. It includes apps, music, movies, and anything else available on the Play Store.

The People feed is rolling out now to the Play Store app. The interface is accessible via the sidebar and should appear on its own.

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Following an update to Google Keep earlier this afternoon, Google is now rolling out an update to its Play Newsstand app, which was released earlier this year as a replacement for Currents. The update makes some design tweaks, as well as enhances how you can organize your sources.

First off, the My News and My Magazine categories have been merged into a new My Library section. There is also a new Read Now category bar at the top of the interface that autohides and allows you to easily swipe between categories. Finally, the action bar now changes colors depending on what section you are in (News/Business/Sports/etc).

The update is rolling out now, although it is a staged update and may take a while to hit your device. Keep an eye on the Play Store.

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