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France gives Google 15 days to expand right-to-be-forgotten worldwide or face sanctions

Avatar for Ben Lovejoy Jun 12 2015 - 4:34 am PT
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Google has so far been meeting the controversial ‘right to be forgotten‘ ruling in Europe by removing links only from the local site for each country – google.com remaining unaffected. A French court ruled last November that removing links from google.fr was insufficient, and ordered Google to remove the links worldwide.

Google ignored the ruling, and Reuters now reports that the French data protection regulator CNIL has given the company 15 days to comply before imposing sanctions … 
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Be together, not the same: Google’s phone picker helps you find the right phone for you

Avatar for Tom Maxwell Jun 11 2015 - 2:46 pm PT
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Around the time of the launch of the Nexus 6 and Nexus 9, Google revamped its marketing for Android with the new tagline “Be together. Not the same,” uploading to YouTube a handful of heart-tugging videos featuring a slew of different animal pairs playing together and being friends. These ads were meant as a real-world analogous to how Google sees its Android operating system today, in 2015: one operating system that can power a bevy of different devices in different environments and use-cases. Not just phones with different screen sizes but also watches, TVs, and cars, to name the primary ones. With so much choice, Google has launched a new website which, based on user input, helps narrow down which phones might be right for different people.


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Google Hangouts gets improved ‘full-view’ screen sharing

Avatar for Jordan Kahn Jun 11 2015 - 1:32 pm PT
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Google announced today that it’s rolling out an improved experience for sharing your screen with others through its Google Hangouts chat app. Now, when you decide to share your screen with someone else in Hangouts, you’ll get a new “full-view” experience that Google says brings the following two notable improvements:

  • The screen shared content will use as much visible area of the screen as possible. The thumbnail photos of meeting attendees will overlay the content at the bottom of the screen by default.
  • A new button will be added to the control bar at the top to allow participants to hide the thumbnail photos of meeting attendees as desired.

The updated experience will be available to anyone that shares their screen using the ‘Present to everyone’ mode in Hangouts as well as when a Hangout member pins a person currently screen sharing.

9to5Toys Lunch Break: LG G Pad tablet $65, Chromecast free movie rentals, Transcend flash storage, more

Avatar for Stephen Hall Jun 11 2015 - 12:34 pm PT
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Keep up with the best gear and deals on the web by signing up for the 9to5Toys Newsletter. Also, be sure to check us out on: Twitter, RSS Feed, Facebook, Google+ and Safari push notifications.

Today’s can’t miss deals:

LG G Pad 16GB Wi-Fi 7-inch Quad-Core Android Tablet (refurb): $65 shipped (Reg. $150)

Chromecast free movie rental offer includes American Sniper, Interstellar, and more hits

Amazon Gold Box: Transcend Micro/SD Cards, USB sticks & SSDs: $18 for 64GB, $288 for 1TB SSD

Samsung Galaxy Tab 4 SM-T230 7″ White 8 GB: $120 shipped (Reg. $150) | eBay

LG is offering buy one get one free on its attractive leather covers for LG G4 | LG

Father’s Day: Tommy Hilfiger, Nordstrom, more up to 50% off, DEWALT tools & gift cards from 20% off, more

More new gear from today:

Daily Deals: Samsung 40″ 4K Smart TV $550, Toshiba 1TB External HDD $50, more

More deals still alive:

‘Pay what you want’ Mobile-First Developer’s Bundle ($1,740 value, currently $6)

New products & more:

Sony’s new RX100 IV prosumer digital camera is loaded with features

Holus uses 3D holograms to bring images from phones and tablets to life

Google Docs ‘Slides’ app updated with Chromecast and AirPlay support

Avatar for Stephen Hall Jun 11 2015 - 10:41 am PT
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Google announced today that it updated its Slides app, available for Android and iOS, to both support Google Cast and AirPlay. The update comes following the announcement of the Remote Display API that Google showed off at its I/O developers conference at the end of June, which allows developers to present more intricate applications and games on a remote screen.
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Chrome for Android 44 beta experimental New Tab page renders large icons instead of thumbnails

Avatar for Tom Maxwell Jun 11 2015 - 10:25 am PT
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We learned back in March of an experimental feature the Chromium team was testing in its canary channel that replaces the thumbnails of your most frequently visited sites on the New Tab page with simpler large icons (the site’s respective favicon) for each site. The thinking goes that the screenshot Chrome takes of the sites you frequent don’t always look great, and sometimes the browser’s cache of screenshots doesn’t refresh for a while, so large icons prove to be a much cleaner solution.

Above you can see an example of the current desktop New Tab page on the left and the new suggested page on the right. Now, though, the change can be enabled in Chrome 44 beta for Android…


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Leaked images claim to show a redesigned Hangouts app for Android

Avatar for Chance Miller Jun 10 2015 - 4:15 pm PT
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Update: It looks like there’s going to be an Android Wear app too.

Android Police today has shared a handful of images of what are believed show the 4.0 update that is coming to soon to Google’s Hangouts app on Android. The images show a refreshed interface that Google seemingly hopes will silence the complaints regarding the app’s current interface and design.


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Google being sued over video compression technology used in H.264 and VP8 standards

Avatar for Tom Maxwell Jun 10 2015 - 2:40 pm PT
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No, we’re not talking about Pied Piper here: Google is being sued by Max Sound Corporation over patented technology which allows for “far more economically efficient transport of digital content due to greatly optimized data capacity.”

The District Court of Mannheim in Germany has scheduled a December 8th hearing for the video streaming patent case against Google and YouTube, which was filed this past December. The whole case will be heard that day and a decision is expected to be brought down a few weeks later.


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9to5Toys Lunch Break: Galaxy Tab 4 (7-inch) $120, BOGO LG G4 leather covers, Lexar 128GB microSD $73, more

Avatar for Stephen Hall Jun 10 2015 - 12:43 pm PT
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Keep up with the best gear and deals on the web by signing up for the 9to5Toys Newsletter. Also, be sure to check us out on: Twitter, RSS Feed, Facebook, Google+ and Safari push notifications.

Today’s can’t miss deals:

Samsung Galaxy Tab 4 SM-T230 7″ White 8 GB: $120 shipped (Reg. $150) | eBay

LG is offering buy one get one free on its attractive leather covers for LG G4 | LG

Lexar High-Performance MicroSDXC (Up to 95MB/s Read) w/USB 3.0 Reader Flash Memory Card $72.99 (Orig. $159.99)

Daily Deals: Onkyo 5.2-Ch Network A/V Receiver $185, Lexar High-Performance MicroSDXC $73, more

Crucial M500 960GB 2.5-inch Internal Solid-State Drive: $290 + $4 shipping (Reg. $340+)

‘Pay what you want’ Mobile-First Developer’s Bundle ($1,740 value, currently $6)

Father’s Day: Tommy Hilfiger, Nordstrom, more up to 50% off, DEWALT tools & gift cards from 20% off, more

More new gear from today:

Sony Bluetooth speakers: SRSX3 in white $80 (Reg. $128), SRSX5 in black $95 (Reg. $150)

Games/Apps: Captain Toad Treasure Tracker $33 Prime shipped, Slayin for iOS goes FREE, more freebies

More deals still alive:

Apple begins selling iPad mini 3 on its refurbished online store

New products & more:

June Oven has better specs than MacBook & was designed by former Apple engineers

Google’s new location-aware voice search would have been great to debut at I/O

Avatar for Stephen Hall Jun 10 2015 - 8:55 am PT
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Quietly, Google introduced some new location-aware search functions in voice search over the last couple of weeks. The feature lets you perform several searches based on your location, with Google looking at its Maps data to figure out what you’re talking about. For example, you can voice search “how tall is this?” and looking at your location, Google can tell you the height of the building that you’re looking at.
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Larry Page named top CEO of 2015 with a 97% approval rating

Avatar for Chance Miller Jun 9 2015 - 10:14 pm PT
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Career website Glassdoor today has released its annual breakdown of the top 50 CEOs, as voted on by employees. This year, Google CEO Larry Page was voted as the chief executive officer of the year with a 97 percent employee approval rating. Last year, Page was 10th on the list, with LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner taking the top spot. Weiner this year fell to 12th overall with an approval rating of 93 percent.


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Google announces new ‘iOS Account Wipe’ feature for Google Apps admins

Avatar for Chance Miller Jun 9 2015 - 5:11 pm PT
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Google announced in a blog post this evening a new feature called iOS Account Wipe. This feature allows Google Apps admins to easily delete an employee’s corporate account and data from their iPhone or iPad without affecting their personal data, such as photos or music.

Prior to today, Google offered a Remote Wipe functionality, but it erased the entire device, including the employee’s personal data. Remote Wipe will still be available, however, and will simply live alongside iOS Account Wipe.

Google also revealed that it is launching enhanced functionality for Android Mobile Application Management:

These new features can help admins get their employees up and running on Android for Work faster (with auto-install into an employee’s Work Profile) and stay productive (by preventing employees from uninstalling certain apps)—while at the same time keeping data protected (with widget control).
More details are available in the announcement post on the Google Apps Updates blog.


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9to5Toys Lunch Break: LG G Watch $50, Huawei SnapTo (unlocked) $130, Learn to make apps for $6, more

Avatar for Stephen Hall Jun 9 2015 - 11:52 am PT
0 Comments

Keep up with the best gear and deals on the web by signing up for the 9to5Toys Newsletter. Also, be sure to check us out on: Twitter, RSS Feed, Facebook, Google+ and Safari push notifications.

Today’s can’t miss deals:

LG G Watch Android Wear smartwatch refurb: $50 shipped (Reg. $200) | eBay

Huawei SnapTo 4G LTE 8GB flash (unlocked): $130 shipped (Reg. $180) | Best Buy

‘Pay what you want’ Mobile-First Developer’s Bundle ($1,740 value, currently $6)

Father’s Day: Tommy Hilfiger, Nordstrom, more up to 50% off, DEWALT tools & gift cards from 20% off, more

Review: Mohu Channels tries to bring your TV services together, Leaf antenna goes on sale

More new gear from today:

Brother Wireless Multifunction Laser Printers from $85 shipped

 Headphones: Harman SOHOi on-ears $150, Sennheiser HD439 over-ears $40, JBL S500 over-ears $68, more

More deals still alive:

Canon refurbished cameras w/ 1-yr warranty: T5i DSLR w/ 18-55mm Lens Kit $450, PowerShot SX510 HS $130, more

New products & more:

Gibson’s new Trainer Bluetooth headphones designed by Usain Bolt are available for pre-order today

Google Play Books passes the 1 billion install mark on the Play Store

Avatar for Stephen Hall Jun 9 2015 - 10:09 am PT
0 Comments

Update: Facebook’s Messenger has also now passed 1 billion.

Google Play Books, an app that comes pre-installed with stock Android, has now become the ninth app to pass the 1 billion install mark. It’s not exactly an amazing achievement considering it ships with most Android phones, but it’s a huge number nonetheless.

Notably, only two non-Google apps, Facebook and WhatsApp, have ever passed this milestone. As you might expect, some of the more popular Google-made apps like Google Maps and Gmail passed 1 billion at various times over the last couple of years.

Side-by-side: How Apple’s new Transit directions compare to those in Google Maps

Avatar for Stephen Hall Jun 9 2015 - 8:54 am PT
10 Comments

Yesterday, at WWDC 2015, Apple introduced transit directions to its native Maps application for the first time. It’s a feature that has long been in the works, and it’s still not actually coming to consumer devices until later this year. But those who have access to the iOS 9 beta can try out the feature in select cities, including New York City, San Francisco, and others.

Transit directions aren’t new, though, and you probably know that Google has offered them in its own official Maps app for many years. But since Apple split off from using the Google-powered Maps app with iOS 6, the company has been struggling to match Google’s offerings. Here, we take a look at Google’s transit directions in comparison to Apple’s new offering…
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9to5Toys Last Call: Galaxy Note 3 (unlocked) $255, Chromebooks $30 off, Father’s Day deals, more

Avatar for Stephen Hall Jun 8 2015 - 3:06 pm PT
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Keep up with the best gear and deals on the web by signing up for the 9to5Toys Newsletter. Also, be sure to check us out on: Twitter, RSS Feed, Facebook, Google+ and Safari push notifications.

Today’s can’t miss deals:

Samsung Galaxy Note 3 32GB (unlocked): $255 shipped (Reg. $500)

Save up to $30 on select Chromebooks from the Google Store

Father’s Day: Tommy Hilfiger, Nordstrom, more up to 50% off, DEWALT tools & gift cards from 20% off, more

Gibson’s new Trainer Bluetooth headphones designed by Usain Bolt are available for pre-order today

Review: Mohu Channels tries to bring your TV services together, Leaf antenna goes on sale

More new gear from today:

Canon refurbished cameras w/ 1-yr warranty: T5i DSLR w/ 18-55mm Lens Kit $450, PowerShot SX510 HS $130, more

More deals still alive:

Fitbit Charge Wireless Activity and Sleep Wristband for $100 (Reg. $130)

New products & more:

Bose updates its best-sounding Soundlink Mini II portable Bluetooth speaker

LG’s G4 gets an iFixit teardown, beats all of this year’s flagships in repairability

Avatar for Stephen Hall Jun 8 2015 - 10:13 am PT
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This year’s Android flagships have really gotten the beating from iFixit. The group gave the HTC One M9 a 2/10 and the Samsung Galaxy S6 a slightly-better 4/10, just as two examples. But the LG G4, which many believe to be the best Android handset introduced this year as of yet, seems to have an advantage in terms of repairability as well. At least partially due to the fact that it’s one of the only handsets left that has a removable back, iFixit has graced LG’s flagship with a repairability score of 8/10.
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Nest’s plans for a Dropcam successor possibly outed by new FCC documents

Avatar for Stephen Hall Jun 8 2015 - 9:09 am PT
3 Comments

Nest sent out press invitations last week to an event on June 17th, and we speculated that it might mean that the company is ready to announce its first Dropcam successor since being acquired by Google in June of 2014. Now, thanks to an FCC filing that we’ve uncovered (published to the FCC website on May 28th), it seems more likely that the company is getting ready to announce the next generation of its security camera…
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UK tax authorities adopting Google Apps, offshore data storage and all

Avatar for Ben Lovejoy Jun 8 2015 - 4:55 am PT
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The UK tax body, Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC), has completed a successful trial of Google Apps and will be rolling out the service to more of its staff throughout the year, reports The Register.

HMRC has 70,000 staff, and as such will be Whitehall’s first mass deployment of Google’s cloud services […]

David Fitton, head of public sector sales for Google UK, wrote on Linkedin: “The acceptance by HMRC that they can store official information offshore in Google data-centres represents a major change and endorsement of Google’s approach to managing sensitive information.”

HMRC said that it had “carefully considered the protection of customer information” when making the decision … 
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9to5Toys Lunch Break: 22,400mAh power bank $29, 480GB Pro SSD $200, Galaxy Tab Pro $200, more

Avatar for Stephen Hall Jun 5 2015 - 12:55 pm PT
0 Comments

Keep up with the best gear and deals on the web by signing up for the 9to5Toys Newsletter. Also, be sure to check us out on: Twitter, RSS Feed, Facebook, Google+ and Safari push notifications.

Today’s can’t miss deals:

EC Technology 22,400mAh Ultra High Capacity Power Bank $29 Prime shipped (Reg. $39)

SanDisk Extreme Pro 480GB 2.5-inch Internal Solid-State Drive $200 shipped (Reg. $230+), more

Samsung Galaxy Tab Pro 8.4″ 16GB Black tablet: $200 shipped (Reg. $300) | Best Buy

Samsung Galaxy S6 smartphone 32GB (unlocked) GSM: $580 shipped (Reg. $800) | eBay

Motorola Nexus 6 from $499 shipped for 32 GB and $549 shipped for 64 GB (Reg. $649, $699) | Amazon

Get $50 in Google Play credit when you buy a Nexus 9 from $399 | Google Store

Samsung Galaxy Note 4 32GB (unlocked): $400 shipped (Reg. $700) | eBay

Bose updates its best-sounding Soundlink Mini II portable Bluetooth speaker with (almost) everything we asked for

More new gear from today:

Amazon Gold Box – up to 68% off iconic actors/directors collections: Clint Eastwood 22-Disc Blu-ray set $47, more

More deals still alive:

Klipsch Quintet 5-Channel Home Theater System: $160 shipped (orig. $550)

New products & more:

Microdia plans a microSD card with 512GB of storage space, release in July

Google admits it hasn’t always been clear to European users & businesses regarding its policies

Avatar for Chance Miller Jun 5 2015 - 12:43 pm PT
2 Comments
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Google has been facing legal heat in Europe for several users over how it handles and collects user data as well as its monopoly-like actions, but today the company finally admitted that it has made some mistakes. Google’s European chief executive Matt Brittin stated today to Politico that Google has failed to make its intentions well-known in Europe.


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Momentum extension keeps you on task with reminders & motivation on Chrome’s ‘New Tab’ page

Avatar for Tom Maxwell Jun 5 2015 - 6:14 am PT
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The Internet can be a double-edged sword – a window to the world’s knowledge at one end, and at the other a window to the world’s favorite cat pictures. And since on the web all sites are treated equally (save for the “deep” web, I guess) if we don’t have a strong, lasting motivation to get work done it can prove all too easy to get distracted browsing places that aren’t a valuable use of our time. While that lasting motivation must come from within, there are certain tricks and tools you can try that may just give you the boost you need to power through that next email or essay. The one I’d like to share with you today is an extension for Chrome called Momentum.

Momentum quite simply replaces the default New Tab page of Chrome with a “personal dashboard,” as the developer calls it, like the one you see above. For reference, here’s the New Tab page:
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