Chrome 52‘s rollout to all platforms is near complete, bringing Material Design to the Mac and a number of features for Chrome OS. Version 53 is now in the beta channel with a number of user facing features specifically for Android.
Quietly announced at last year’s I/O, Google is launching a pilot of its Hands Free payment system in the South Bay area of San Francisco. In the past, Square also experimented with a similar type of payment model that required limited user interaction. While Square’s attempt ultimately failed, Google’s scale and previous work with Android Pay might help.
Samsung has been aggressively pushing its mobile payment service that launched last August. With today’s addition of Wells Fargo, Samsung Pay now supports credit and debit cards from 70 banks and credit unions in the United States.
As part of their so called “Samsung Galaxy Ecosystem,” Samsung Pay is expanding to Australia, Singapore, and Brazil over the coming year. The mobile payment service launched in the US last September to a crowded field of Apple and Android Pay.
Google has today pushed some minor — although notable — updates to the Play Store Developer Program Policies, including some brand new policies and provisions and clarified wording for others.
Most notable (possibly added due to recent events) is a new “Sensitive Events” policy. According to the new guidelines, Google doesn’t “allow content which may be deemed as capitalizing on or lacking reasonable sensitivity towards a natural disaster, atrocity, conflict, death, or other tragic event.” Somewhat related, the new policies also clarify wording in the deceptive behavior section to more clearly lay out the expectations for apps being unique and, well, not deceptive.
The Mountain View company has also made some changes to payments policies. Language has been clarified in the payment section, and Google has also added a new provision which states that “in-app virtual currencies must only be used within the app where they were first purchased.” Among other minor changes, Google has also specified that apps should not go messing with or improperly access developer APIs.
To read the new Developer Program policies, head over to Google’s website.
Samsung has begun sending out an email to Samsung Wallet users notifying them that the service will no longer be available as of June 30th (via SamMobile). The email says that coupons clipped with Samsung Wallet will no longer be available after the termination date, but that all “tickets & reservations” will still be available by visiting partner applications…
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Google is currently recruiting Wallet users with payouts and you can now throw deals in the mix as well. The company recently announced its new “Buy with Google” promotion, which offers discounts from a group of retailers including: B and H, Beautylish, CheapTicket, EAT24, Expedia, Fancy, JackThreads, LivingSocial, Newegg, Pose, Rue La La, Vinted USA, Sidecar Ride and Wish.
AT&T on Tuesday announced that it will be introducing a longer Next 24 monthly installment program on November 9th alongside its Next 12 and Next 18 plans for financing an Android smartphone. AT&T customers on Next 24 will pay $0 down and make 30 equal monthly payments between $10 – $50 depending on the device purchased.
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Google started accepting PayPal payments for Google Play app purchases earlier this year in 12 countries, including the US, France and Germany. Today, the company has expanded this payment option to Australia, Greece, New Zealand, Portugal, Singapore and Sweden.
After reports last year that Google Wallet’s co-founding engineer Rob von Behren had left the company to join competitor Square, Google today confirmed it has now lost another important employee related to its mobile payment efforts.
Google provided the following statement to VentureBeat, confirming that Osama Bedier, who was up until today chief of the company’s Google Wallet business, will be leaving the company “this year to pursue other opportunities.” Bedier joined Google back in 2011 after leaving eBay.
“We can confirm that Osama Bedier has decided to leave Google this year to pursue other opportunities,” said spokesman Nate Tyler. “He’s achieved a lot during his time here and we wish him all the best in his next endeavor. “
Google made a point of noting that it remains committed to making payments easier for users despite Bedier’s departure:
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