YouTube

Google has announced the winners of the 2013 Players’ Choice awards for top Google Play apps and games. The awards are given based on user popularity, unlike the apps featured last week in the Play Store for a similar award,  which were chosen by Google themselves. There were six categories spanning apps and games. The winners of each respective category are listed below, as chosen by the Android community.

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YouTube’s Reward 2013 is a mashup year in review of all the hottest videos that took the world by storm. So, YouTube did the only thing that made sense and invited a whole bunch of YouTube stars to appear in one giant mashup of the most popular moments since January 1st.

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Samsung is back on YouTube with Santa, the Galaxy Gear, Mrs Claus and a whole lot of screaming elves. So what’s the “next big thing?” Why the Galaxy gear of course.

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This “new” Verizon video includes Edward Norton and a whole lot of silly situations someone can get into during a 48 hour period. The video, which actually went live at the tail end of November is making the rounds this morning after a teaser earlier in November hinted at something relating to 48 hours.

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Samsung’s new YouTube video courtesy of their Taiwan channel is teasing something elegant, fast, simple and something just for us. There’s plenty of rumors we could fan with this one as the boys from Android Central point out upon their discovery of the video.

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Imagine my shock and surprise as yet another anti-Chromebook advertisement hits the YouTubes courtesy of Microsoft. The latest in the company’s anti-everything-Google campaign attacks the notion that a Chromebook has “everything you need” as a laptop.

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Google has updated its Google Wallet application for the iPhone with a few notable enhancements. First, like it has added to its other apps on iOS as of late, Google now allows single sign-on for Wallet. This means that if you are signed in via Google to YouTube, Gmail, Adsense, or other compatible Google apps, you can be automatically logged in to the Wallet app. More interestingly, you can now use your iPhone’s camera to capture the data from your debit card or credit card to connect it to the app. Google added that feature to the Android app last month. Google Wallet recently launched a physical card program for Wallet. The update is free in the App Store.

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Chrome OS users take note, a brand new camera app is on its way offering a host of new features. The announcement came via Google’s “Happiness Evangelist” Francois Beaufort who suggested that while the current Chrome OS camera is good, the team can do better.

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We’ve been hearing rumors of a subscription music service from YouTube for awhile now, but according to a new report from AllThingsD, we are still a little ways off from seeing it launch. The blog reports, citing “people familiar with the company’s plans”, that the music service will not launch this year, but rather sometime in Q1 2014. Reportedly, YouTube has already secured the licenses with music labels, which is not an easy task nowadays, but is not satisfied with the actual service. Reports of the subscription service began appearing back in October, with the project supposedly nearing its final stages then.

There are still a lot of questions surrounding the service, as well. Such as, how it will differentiate itself from Google’s All Access service and how it handle user content, like lip syncs and mashups. Last week, an update to the YouTube for Android app revealed code that hinted at a “Music Pass” service that supported offline playback and was entirely ad free for “millions of songs”.

Since there’s no pinpoint launch date within Q1, it could be that we see the service launch relatively early in the quarter, which would mean we are not too far away from seeing it.

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Oh Microsoft, when will you ever learn? The latest in the company’s Surface line of “attack” ads forgets about Apple and turns its attention onto Samsung’s Galaxy Tab. The ad highlights  video output, a full size USB port and the ability to charge “while getting stuff done” on the Surface.  Then it turns its attention on the Galaxy Tab’s lone microUSB port which must be used both for hooking up to a monitor, transferring documents and for charging. Ooooo slick burn Microsoft!

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Amazon’s never shied away from quietly mocking Apple’s iPad and that’s why this new Kindle Fire HDX and its distinctly British voice has us laughing. Calling it the “magical new iPad Air” in proper British tongue, this new commercial discovered via YouTube is offset with the American accented intro of the 8.9″ Kindle Fire HDX.

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Today a new version of the YouTube app for Android started rolling out on Google Play. The update includes revamped search results with videos, playlists and channels grouped together, new tabs on channel pages, and other fixes and enhancements. The update might not be all that exciting, but new code in the app discovered by AndroidPolice points to some big new features potentially coming to the app in the future.

Several references to “Music Pass” in the app’s code have many speculating that YouTube could be gearing up to launch its rumored subscription based music focused streaming service. Back in October, Billboard reported that YouTube was developing a streaming service that would allow users to stream music videos along with regular audio tracks.

Some other clues from the code include references to “offline playback”, “no ads on millions of songs”, and the ability to play music in the background. We can only speculate that the no ads would be for some type of premium service, much like on Google Play Music, but it’s clear YouTube has at the very least offline streaming and background audio features in the works. It will be interesting to see how Google positions the YouTube service against its own Play Music streaming service. 
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YouTube has been getting a lot of backlash since introducing its new Google+ powered comment system earlier this month. Despite some very vocal users not exactly liking the change, Google provided an update on the new comment system last night and confirmed it’s here to stay. In a post on its YouTube Creators Blog, the company explains that it’s working to combat spam in comments and will soon introduce new bulk moderation tools for creators.

Since we launched the new comments experience on YouTube two weeks ago, we’ve received a lot of feedback from creators on the increase in comment spam. While the new system dealt with many spam issues that had plagued YouTube comments in the past, it also introduced new opportunities for abuse and shortly after the launch, we saw some users taking advantage of them.

To combat the users “taking advantage” of the new system, YouTube is implementing the following updates to help with spam: 
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We haven’t yet seen too many apps that can stream content to Chromecast dongles, but all that is likely to change over the next month or two as Google has scheduled a Chromecast ‘hackathon’ at its Mountain View HQ next month, reports Engadget.

Google has invited several developers including CyanogenMod / AirCast dev Koushik Dutta and Thomas Kjeldsen to a hackathon on December 7th and 8th in Mountain View. An opportunity to test drive the “upcoming release” of the Cast SDK is promised, plus an opportunity to talk with Google engineers about what it can do … 
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We’ve already had a look at LG’s official video showing off the G Flex “self-healing” technology but this time around we’re getting a true hands-on. Recognizing that LG’s official video happened in the most optimal conditions using the very best in camera angles…this new video video courtesy of YouTube star Marques Brownlee shows off “self-healing” in the real world.

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The Moto G news train continues this morning with the very first commercial already hitting YouTube showing off the customizable backs, display, processor, and Android 4.3 with “guaranteed upgrade.” In total, the sixty-second spot doesn’t show us a whole lot we don’t already know and only mentions “exceptional price” without mentioning the actual dollar amount.

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YouTube announced an interesting new feature for creators today that will allow them to promote their channel across YouTube free of charge. Normally Google charges companies to place those ads that are often displayed at the beginning of YouTube videos, but for YouTube creators, Google will now display video ads for free through a new tool called ‘Fan Finder’.

YouTube is asking creators to submit a channel introduction video ad to Fan Finder, much like the example video ad from Rainn Wilson’s Soulpancake channel in the instructional video below. Once you’ve submitted the ad, Google will automatically turn it into a TrueView video ad and display it across YouTube for users it thinks might enjoy your content. Like normal YouTube ads, users will be able to skip the channel ads after 5 seconds:

We’ll turn your video into a TrueView video ad, which gives viewers the option to skip after 5 seconds. We’ll show your ad for free across YouTube to connect you with brand new fans. Fan Finder takes into account the interactions that viewers have with millions of YouTube channels in order reach the people who are most likely to engage with your channel.

You can learn more about using the new Fan Finder tool here and check out Google’s instructional video for the new ads below:
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Google today has released Chrome 32 beta for Windows, Mac, and PC. The update includes several new features. Arguably the biggest, however, is the ability to track down which tab is the one playing a video and/or making sound. This feature was rumored way back in February, but only now is it making its way to the Chrome beta channel. In Chrome 32, tabs that are playing sound will now show a small speaker icon. Chrome has been doing this for YouTube videos since August, but it will now work with any site. Tabs that are using a webcam or microphone will also now display icons, as will tabs that are being cast to a TV with a Chromecast.

Also new in Chrome 32 beta is a new design for Windows 8 Metro, the automatic blocking of malware files, and a plethora of stability and performance improvements.

• Tab indicators for sound, webcam and casting
• A different look for Win8 Metro mode
• Automatically blocking malware files
• A number of new apps/extension APIs
• Lots of under the hood changes for stability and performance

You can download Chrome beta to give these features a try. The update should be released in the main channel early next year.

Back in May Google rolled out new contextual quick action buttons in Gmail that appeared next to messages in your inbox allowing users to, for example, quickly RSVP to an invitation or check-in to flights. Today Google announced on its Gmail blog that it’s rolling out even more quick action buttons in Gmail. One of the new buttons will allow users to rate and review restaurants and save Google Offers with a single click:

For example, you can rate and review restaurants you ordered from on Seamless and even modify OpenTable reservations—all without opening an email. And for the deal lovers out there, you can conveniently save a promotion from Google Offers with one click, making it easy to find and buy it when you’re ready.

Another new quick action button will allow YouTube and Vimeo uploaders to click a “View video” button next to emails in their inbox to jump right to viewing their finished uploads (pictured below). The same button will also appear for Dropbox, Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides. 
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