Google

Apple, Google, Microsoft and hundreds of other businesses have joined together to urge the US Supreme Court to legalize same-sex marriage across the country.

The companies have filed what’s known as an amicus brief, a way for parties not directly involved in a case to make an argument for or against a particular decision by the court. The brief argues that there is a sound business case for consistency across the country, explained counsel Susan Baker…
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Just a day after offering deals on some of its most popular content, Google today has listed Jennifer Lawrence’s upcoming film ‘Serena’ on the Play Store. The film is not slated to hit theaters in the United States until March 27th, but eager Lawrence fans can rent it on the Play Store now for $9.99 in SD or $10.99 in HD.

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According to a new report from The Wall Street Journal, Google’s upcoming wireless service will only work with the Nexus 6 and no other devices. Citing people familiar with the matter, the report doesn’t delve into too many details regarding Google’s reasoning for why it’s limiting the service to the Nexus 6.

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Google today has revealed that it is launching its Google Compare service for car insurance in California. The feature was rumored back in January, but Google officially announced it today in a post on the Inside AdWords blog.

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Update: Everything seems to be returning to normal as of 12:30 ET.

According to a number of reports on Twitter, several Google services are having issues this morning. User tweets show that Hangouts, the Play Store, Gmail, Play Music, OAuth, and other services are having unusual performance issues. Some users are receiving authentication errors on their Android devices and unable to do anything that requires a Google log-in…

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Google has once again topped Fortune’s list of the “100 best companies to work for” taking the number one spot for the fourth year running.

Some of the perks of working at Google that helped it earn the top spot, according to Fortune, include recently enhanced parental leave benefits and $500 of “Baby Bonding Bucks”:
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In honor of Update Wednesday, Google this evening has started rolling out a new version of the Drive Android app. The update bumps the app to version 2.2 and focuses on improving navigation and usability throughout the interface.

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Verizon this evening has revealed that it is starting to rollout Android 5.0 Lollipop to its HTC One M8 variant. The update packs all of the features we’ve come to know and love with Android 5.0, as well as a few new tweaks and enhancements exclusive to the M8 on Verizon.

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Google this evening has updated its Android distribution data to reflect numbers collected during the past 7 days. Most notably, Android 5.0 saw an increase from 1.6 percent last month to 3.3 percent this time. Last month was the first time the latest version of the operating system gained enough usage to chart.

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During an interview at Mobile World Congress 2015 in Barcelona today, Google’s Android chief Sundar Pichai made a few interesting announcements, including confirming the company will launch its own wireless service as an MVNO in the coming months.
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Google SVP Sundar Pichai sat down with Bloomberg’s Brad Stone at the Mobile World Congress today in Barcelona, Spain, and as happens often, he had some pretty interesting things to say. Among other topics, the Chrome and Android lead at Google talked about the company’s goals for improving the world’s Internet connectivity through various projects (including the company’s MVNO plans), Google’s further mobile payment ambitions with Android Pay, how Android will tie into virtual reality, and more…
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TechCrunch:

…confirmed with Google, that David Besbris [above] has left his role as the head of the company’s social and identity product. He has been replaced by Bradley Horowitz, a longtime VP of product for Google+.

Google Plus seems to be in tumult and it sounds like it is being dismantled for its good parts including Photos and Hangouts. Perhaps the feed will turn into a more Twitter-like product. Who knows at this point—we’ll likely get a roadmap at Google I/O in May.

As for new lead Bradley Horowitz, he never really left Google+ through Vic Gundotra’s departure and will probably oversee the split of the units which are said to have already been reduced by half.

Google’s Sundar Pichai recently sat down with Forbes to talk about the Mountain View company’s ambitions in China, its relationship with Apple, and what its overall vision looks like. Some interesting quotes from Google’s Android and Chrome head have surfaced as a result, and among other comments, Pichai took a moment to respond to constant criticism from Apple that Google is in the business of monetizing its users. Pichai also touched on Google’s aspirations in China as well as the sponsored ad program it is testing in Google Play…

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Google paid developers a total of $7B in the past 12 months from a mix of app sales and in-app purchases, the company says, closing in on the record $10B payout recently announced by Apple.

Re/code also reports that Google is testing sponsored searches in the Play Store, enabling developers to pay to have their apps show up at the top of searches. Sponsored Play Store searches will work in exactly the same way as they do in the company’s main search engine: developers bidding for keywords, with sponsored apps appearing above organic search results, flagged with a small Ad tag …

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According to a new report out of The Wall Street Journal, Google’s YouTube unit posted a revenue of nearly $4 billion in 2014, but did not earn a profit of any kind. The $4 billion in revenue during 2014 is up from $3 billion in 2013. YouTube accounted for about 6 percent Google’s overall sales last year.

In an effort to remedy remaining unprofitable, YouTube is planning to launch a new ad-targeting system later this year, the WSJ says, though details remain unclear. …

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Google today has announced that it is introducing a way to automatically convert Adobe Flash-based ads to HTML5. Google says that eligible Flash ad campaigns, both existing and new, will automatically be converted to HTML5 when uploaded through AdWords, AdWords Editor, and a variety of third-party tools.

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