Microsoft is slated to unveil its next iteration of Office today, and The Wall Street Journal’s Shira Ovide is prepping the announcement with some comparison data about the productivity suite and its direct cloud-based rival Google Apps.
According to the WSJ’s video above, Dominion Enterprises held a $2 million annual contract with Microsoft, but it recently decided to switch to Google Apps. The company now pays $200,000 for Google’s services.
Despite the loss, the Office sodtware remains a hugely successful product for Microsoft. It is one of the company’s most profitable goods, and it continues to maintain a stronghold in the desktop productivity market. Google Apps, on the other hand, is still in its infancy, but it is rapidly gaining steam and attention.
Today’s announcement from Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer will surely set the pace for the company’s future against the ever-growing Google Apps.
O.K., Facebook is a direct competitor to Google+, but its most recent Android app update deserves a mention.
The app’s interface now lets users snap and upload photos with a device’s front-facing camera. The UI lacked a lens toggle before— despite the recently added shortcut on for photo uploading on the homescreen.
What else is new in version 1.9.7?:
– New messaging features let you switch between conversations, include friends of friends, share bigger photos, and see who’s available
– Various bug fixes
– Made a security improvement
– Faster app login and navigation
Oh, and Facebook for Android 1.9.7 requires Android 2.2 and up. Check it out on the Google Play Store.
Of course, that is Google’s own statistic. The folks in Mountain View took to the official Google Translate blog to explain how its, well, Google Translate tool now offers example sentences for those newly created words. The examples are aggregated from “fresh new stories around the web,” wrote Google Associate Product Manager Etienne Deguine.
To use the feature, type into the left-hand text box of Google Translate, and then click on the example sentence icon on the bottom right (screenshot above).
Nielsen released smartphone purchasing data yesterday that depicted Apple grabbing more than a third of the total smartphone market in the most recently surveyed month. Android was over 50 percent. That is almost 85 percent of the market together, which is a striking number (and over 90 percent in the last three months). But, you would not know it when looking at Nielsen’s graph:
RIM at 9 percent seems to have almost the same share as Apple. Windows Mobile, Windows 7, Symbian, and Palm only come up with 5.8-percent of the market, but together they have a much larger piece of the pie than Apple. Well, we did a little Photoshopping and put their portions into proportion (Again, the disparity is growing with iOS and Android now over 90 percent):
NBC just unveiled two Adobe-powered mobile apps for its 2012 London Olympics coverage.
The NBC Olympics Live Companion app will act as a second display for stats and other details so users have a full bevy of data to compliment their television-watching experience. Meanwhile, the NBC Olympics Live Extra app will pipe live-streaming video to on-the-go users. It can handle multiple camera angles, social features, and the ability to seamlessly switch between both Olympics apps.
The free apps will launch today on both Apple’s App Store for iOS devices and the Google Play Store for Android smartphone and tablets. They will also support “TV Everywhere” authentication with cable providers for unlimited access to all the premium content. Users simply need to login to their pay-TV subscription to tap into 3,500 hours of Olympic events.
“To make it as easy as possible, you only need to go through the sign-in once and won’t have to “re-authenticate” every time you want to watch a live event,” explained Adobe on its Digital Media Blog. “For the first time in Olympics history, mobile apps will give you the opportunity to view live broadcasts of all Olympic events in the palm of your hand.”
NBC Olympics is also using Adobe technologies to serve ads, measure and monetize content, and provide digital analytics in both apps.
IMDb, the unofficial resume for everyone and everything Hollywood, just announced its iOS and Android apps have experienced more than 40 million total downloads. The Android counterpart for tablets and smartphones claimed half of those downloads, and IMDb is celebrating with today’s launch of “highly anticipated discovery, personalization and social features.”
The app’s latest version now includes:
– Sharing – check in on Facebook & Twitter to share what you’re watching
– Recommendations – discover other titles you might be interested in
– Mobile IMDb message boards – join in the discussion on your Android phone or tablet
– Filming locations & soundtracks – learn even more about the movies you love
– Similar titles – discover new movies and TV shows
Metacritic – now see both the IMDb user rating of a title as well as how the film critics scored it
– Amazon login – log in using your Amazon account
The IMDb Movies & TV app is a free app at the Google Play store. It rates 4.5-stars as of press time.
Google introduced driving directions on Google Maps for many African countries in 2010, but now it is unveiling walking directions.
“Not everyone drives or always needs to drive, so today we’re bringing walking directions for 44 African countries,” announced GIS Specialist Jacqueline Rajuai and Google Business Product Manager Jarda Bengl on the official Google Lat Long blog.
Walking directions are currently in beta, so Google strongly recommends caution, but walking directions are also editable. Any corrections can occur through the community-mapping tool Google Map Maker.
“We are always grateful to our active African online cartographers who have helped make our African maps what they are today,” Rajuai and Bengl added.
Google is expanding its “Search as You Type” feature under Google Commerce Search to U.S.-based AdWords advertisers today as a free, stand-alone service.
“It’s easy to implement and helps increase sales and conversion rates on merchant websites. The Search as You Type pilot is available to US-based AdWords advertisers for free, up to 25 million searches annually, after which licensing fees would apply,” announced Google Shopping Product Management Director Jennifer Dulski on the official Google Commerce blog.
Google’s famous predictive suggestions, auto complete, and related product results are integrated into Search as You Type to bulk a merchant’s existing website search functionality. Today’s announcement supports Google’s recent attempts at enhancing its online retail and search experiences.
“When shoppers type a search query into a merchant’s site, Search as You Type shows them product suggestions and photos, making it faster and easier for people to spot the product they’re looking for and click through to make a purchase,” Dulski explained.
Sustrans, a British charity promoting sustainable transport, just announced that it partnered with Google to bring cycling routes to United Kingdom-based Google Maps users.
Greener-minded Americans are quite familiar with the biking icon and its bevy of alternative transit routes, but now U.K. fans of the popular mapping app can plan their cycling trips, navigate bike lanes, and time routes on both smartphones and computers. For those unfamiliar, Google Maps offers worldwide mapping technology, directions and local business information to mobile and desktop users by way of satellite and street-level imagery and user-contributed content.
“We know how popular cycling is in London and the rest of the UK, especially ahead of a busy summer, which is why we are thrilled to bring cycling directions to Google Maps. Thanks to Sustrans, we now have thousands of miles of trails and routes, as well as bike lanes and recommended streets for cities across the country,” said Google UK Geospatial Technologist Ed Parsons.
“We’ll continue to add new trail information and urge commuters to swap their car for a bike as they can now find a convenient route that makes use of dedicated bike tracks and avoid hills whenever possible, Parsons added.
The new feature goes live today, and Sustrans is celebrating the launch with its own video, called “Lucy’s Cycling Treasure Hunt” (above).
Amazon just announced a new gaming experience for developers and the Kindle Fire: GameCircle.
According to the Amazon Mobile App Distribution blog, GameCircle is a “new set of services designed to make it easier for you to create more engaging gaming experiences and grow your business on Kindle Fire,” by making “achievements, leaderboards and sync APIs accessible, simple and quick for you to integrate, and will give gamers a more seamless and entertaining in-game experience.”
Amazon offers a growing suite of developer services. Its new GameCircle is geared specifically for game developers too, which is great news for the Kindle Fire since it is facing a firestorm of Android-based content competition from the new Nexus 7. Game Circle also helps players to better experience their games through three key features —achievements, leaderboards, and sync—that will surely continue to entice folks to the dominating Android-based eReader.
Achievements allow players to “track all earned trophies, treasures, badges, awards, and more without leaving the gaming experience,” while leaderboards give an “in-game view of score comparison information and percentile ranking, allowing players to quickly and easily check standings against top players or competitors, without ever leaving your game.”
Sync autosaves players’ in-game progress to the cloud for immediate pick-up exactly where they ended when switching devices or restoring a deleted game. Losing progress, scores or achievements is not a problem with GameCircle, because as all data is safely stored in the cloud.
UPDATE: OUYA met its $950,000 goal. The project is now at $1,252,480…and it still has 29 days left to go.
OUYA, an Android-powered gaming console for the television, just posted its hefty funding goal on Kickstarter, and it already raised over $500,000 in 13 hours.
The Los Angeles, Calif.-based folks behind OUYA had one main premise in mind when undertaking this revolutionary project: “Let’s make the games less expensive to make, and less expensive to buy.”
OUYA’s controller, console, and interface will come in one package that doubles as a dev kit. There is no need for developers to buy a license or SDK, and they already familiar with the platform, so gaming production should be a breeze. Developers will even have access to OUYA’s open design, so they can make plenty of games that take full advantage of the television. OUYA only requested that developers make some of the gameplay free either through a demo with a full-game upgrade, in-game items or powers, or subscriptions.
OUYA noted it could even change AAA game development: “Forget about licensing fees, retail fees, and publishing fees.”
Motorola announced its much-rumored Atrix HD today exclusively for AT&T’s LTE network.
The smartphone, previously codenamed “Dinara” among the blogosphere, sports a Kevlar backing and 8.4mm-thick body, while the specs include a 1780mAh battery, 1 GB of RAM, 8 GB of internal storage, and a 4.5-inch, 720p HD display with Motorola’s ColorBoost. It also boasts a rear-facing 8-megapixel camera that shoots 1080p, 30 fps video, and it even comes quipped with an HDMI-out port.
This $99.99 device, on a two-year contract, sports Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich right out of the gate. Oh, and it arrives July 15 in Modern White and Titanium flavors.
It has been a couple of weeks since Google dropped its Asus-built Nexus 7, but the Jelly Bean-powered tablet is just now becoming available at a slew of third-party online retailers.
The 7-inch Android slate first debuted on the Google Play store, where the 16 GB version retails for $249, with a $25 credit. Folks can only pre-order at the moment, because shipping is still another two to three weeks out, but they can now place their orders for the Nexus 7 just about anywhere. GameStop, Staples, B&H, Adorama, Abt, and Canada’s FutureShop are just a few of the latest places to offer the world’s first Android 4.1 Jelly Bean tablet. Canada’s Best Buy reportedly started selling the Nexus 7 as well, but United States listings are currently not live on the retailer’s website.
Interestingly, Staples offers the Nexus 7 with free shipping. It also promises delivery between July 12 and July 17, if pre-ordered by July 10. B&H, Best Buy and Future Shop peg expected availability around mid-August, while Adorama does not even have the tablet in stock. Abt is vague about shipping with estimated delivery between “3-5 Business Days,” but the website also noted, “Estimated Arrival dates are based on in-stock items only.” GameStop features similar wording, too.
Last spring, as part 2012’s 24 Hour Film Race presented by HTC One, Director Frank Hannah shot a four-minute film with the manufacturer’s popular Android-powered smartphone.
The challenge occurred from May 18 to May 19, where over 750 teams around the world were given the following criteria:
Create an original short films (4 minutes max) in just 24 hours based on a theme (one), action (listening to music), and prop (the number one).
Hannah interpreted and completed the challenge, and then HTC honored his work by recently posting the short film on YouTube (above). A second video even documents the behind-the-scenes footage (below). Check ’em out!
So, someone stole your AT&T Android smartphone—now what? Well, AT&T plans to début a new system July 10 for blocking any stolen device.
According to The Verge, which cited a trusted source, the system will block access to voice, data, and SMS should a smartphone or tablet be swiped. The account will remain “intact,” as the publication noted, to avoid the “inconvenience of a full SIM block”:
The company sent a message [above] to customer service representatives on Wednesday advising them of the change. According to the guidance, AT&T will compile a “blocklist” of stolen devices and service will be automatically suspended “if any attempt is made to use a device that is stored in the blocklist.” The only way to add a device to the list will be by contacting a customer service representative directly, and users with remote data wipe apps will be required to activate them before suspending their device, to “prevent access to their personal information.”
AT&T will not have a directory of blocked phones, but a customer who requests a block may also remove it later. Therefore, the company will likely keep a record of blocked devices corresponding with customers.
A recent report suggests the Galaxy Note successor will début with a slightly larger display at a popular consumer electronics show in Europe next month.
According to Maeil Business Newspaper, the Galaxy Note 2 will boast a 5.5-inch display, which is .2-inches larger than the original model, and it will run Android 4.1 Jelly Bean. A quad-core Exynos processor will give the phablet a performance boost, and its rear-facing camera will see an upgrade from 8-megapixels to 12- or 13-megapixels.
“Samsung will unveil the Galaxy Note 2 during the IFA 2012, a consumer electronics show held in Berlin, Germany in late-August,” reported South Korea-based Maeil, while quoting a source “familiar with the matter.”
The Google Play store abruptly removed the Galaxy Nexus earlier this week for unknown reasons, but Google just confirmed that it pulled the device from the Android marketplace due to Judge Lucy Koh’s recent decision to not lift the injunction against the smartphone.
The device will continue sales on Google Play next week, according to ABC News, with Jelly Bean preloaded as the operating system to solve the contending issues within the dispute:
Google confirmed to ABC News that the Galaxy Nexus had been pulled from its Google Play store as a result of the judge’s decision, but said it would begin selling the device again next week running the latest version of Android — Android 4.1, known as Jelly Bean. The updated version of Android would address the issues in dispute, Google said.
The Galaxy Nexus is currently listed on Google Play as “coming soon,” and visitors have the option to receive an email notification for when the smartphone becomes available.
Update: As The Verge reports, this afternoon the Court of Appeals has suspended the ban on the Galaxy Nexus until a formal response is given from Apple. From there, the Court will decide if the ban should go in effect or not.
The August issue of Vanity Fair fully dissects “How Microsoft Lost Its Mojo,” but it also gives an interesting glimpse at how the once-reigning tech company foolishly underestimated Google.
The actual article is not online, but BetaBeat obtained a physical copy and found a little nugget buried inside that describes chief executive Steve Ballmer going on a rampage in 2004. After allegedly throwing a chair, the CEO had this to scream say about an engineer who left Microsoft for Google:
“Fucking Eric Schmidt is a fucking pussy!” Ballmer yelled, according to the court document. “I’m going to fucking bury that guy! I have done it before and I will do it again. I’m going to fucking kill Google.”
Ballmer is notorious for his emotional antics and miscalculated quotes about the competition. The video atop is a perfect demonstration of Ballmer going, well, crazy. Meanwhile, the video below shows the executive laughing about the iPhone in 2007, while dismissing its ability to handle business-oriented tasks due to its lack of a tangible keyboard.
Google wanted to stop YouTube-MP3.org last month from ripping audio embedded in YouTube’s videos, but the conversion website’s 21-year-old owner is not ready to roll over and admit defeat.
YouTube-MP3.org received a letter from the Mountain View, Calif.-based Company last month that threatened to take legal action. Google’s video-sharing platform is free and provides content that is embeddable or accessible through its API, while YouTube-MP3.org is also free and pulls audio from YouTube videos. The website then converts those files into downloadable MP3s. Apparently, despite the API that gives developers access to many features, pirating any sound directly violates YouTube’s Terms of Service agreement.
The June 8 “cease and desist” letter from YouTube’s Associate Product Counsel Harris Cohen addressed the website’s Germany-based owner, Philip Matesanz. Cohen cited the platform’s terms for API in the legal notice, and he noted separating, isolating, or modifying “the audio or video components of any YouTube audiovisual content made available through the YouTube API” is strictly prohibited. Cohen warned of “legal consequences” for YouTube-Mp3.org, and he gave the website a week to comply. However, Google immediately blocked the website’s servers from accessing YouTube.
Matesanz took to his website yesterday, conveniently on the United States’ Independence Day, to give a “Situation Update” on the, well, situation:
After numerous reports questioning the legality of this service I have decided to get case studies from two highly reputable lawyers in Germany to prove the difference. I have asked them to create English reports about the legal situation of this service and the accusations Google has made. They agree that there are no copyrights of a third party violated by providing this service and it has to be considered legal. It might be surprising to some but they also agree that all claims Google has brought up so far are not justified: There is no TOS violation. They even question if Google can take action against so called “YouTube Converters/Recorders” since they seem to be protected by federal law. Google would have to make massive changes to their public broadcasting service to demand that such services shut down e.g. no more embedded videos, restrict access to registered users who have agreed to the TOS[..]. There are also doubts about the legitimacy of the section Google is accusing me to violate: Section 6.1K is designed to abandon a fundamental right all German citizens have. According to federal law you have the unquestionable right to create a private copy of certain media; including YouTube. Google’s attempt to abrogate the rights of the public in their TOS has to be considered as illegal and is in a strong contrast to their public self-representation.
Matesanz further disclosed to readers that YouTube-mp3.org is officially operated through PMD Technologie UG, which is a company registered in Germany, and he has tried to contact Google “multiple times,” but all of his attempts have failed. A recent call to Google’s main legal head was even blocked by an assistant, Matesanz wrote, who claimed Google would only communicate in written form but allegedly did not respond to three e-mails sent.
“I don’t have any marketing or public relations experts […] I am just an IT guy with no experience whatsoever,” Matesanz added, while referring to the case as a “David vs. Goliath situation.”
The computer science student-turned-Google arch nemesis is now attempting to level the playing field with a petition on Change.org, where he asks Google to permit third-party recording services to access YouTube. The petition has over 343,000 signatures.
Reuters interviewed the U.S. judge today who dismissed Apple’s patent court case against Motorola, and the details behind the jurist’s reasoning for tossing the lawsuit are as interesting as they are controversial.
Richard Posner sits on the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago and disputes whether software and related tech industries should even have patents for their products.
“It’s not clear that we really need patents in most industries,” said Posner, referring to the slew of features in smartphones that are legally protected. “You just have this proliferation of patents. It’s a problem.”
Posner, 73, argued the pharmaceutical industry better deserved protection for its intellectual property because of the, as Reuters coined it, “enormous investment it takes to create a successful drug.” He tossed Apple’s lawsuit against Google’s Motorola Mobility last month and denied an injunction against the sale of Motorola devices using Apple’s patented technology.
The judge attributed Apple’s scramble to attack competitors allegedly using its technology to a “constant struggle for survival.”
“As in any jungle, the animals will use all the means at their disposal, all their teeth and claws that are permitted by the ecosystem,” Posner contended.
“You can now share all of your favorite Chrome Web Store items with people in your Google+ circles by finding them in the Chrome Web Store and clicking the +1 button located in their store detail page,” wrote Software Engineer Hui Guo on the official Google Chrome blog.
Users can also review app, extension, and theme recommendations from friends in their Google+ circles by hitting up the ‘From your circles’ link under the left category menu on the Chrome Web store. If apps have been +1’d by people in a user’s circles, the indication will appear respectively on the Chrome Web Store to help folks pick an app. Those new to Google+ will notice suggestions from the Chrome team instead.
The video above is a quality demonstration of voice searches on Android Jelly Bean.
Jean-Louis Nguyen posted the video, titled “How to impress your friends (or annoy your iOS counterparts): 40+ voice searches thrown at Google on Jelly Bean,” on Google+ yesterday.
“I never make videos, but felt compelled to share the many new voice capabilities on +Android, some of which were not demoed on stage during Google #io12. You may be surprised by some answers, notably those provided by the Knowledge Graph,” Nguyen wrote.
“You’ll no longer need to feel clueless when you’re at the railway station, trying to figure out where to buy a coffee before you rush to catch your train from platform 11; nor will you feel embarrassed about asking for the lingerie section when you’re in the department store – because you’ll have all the answers in the palm of your hand,” wrote Razia Ahamed, Geo Indoor Partnerships Lead in the United Kingdom, on the official Google Lat Long blog.
Just open Google Maps on any Android smartphone, zoom in to the location, and desired indoor floor plans will appear. Enabled buildings will even show where a user is on a map when the My Location feature is turned on. Moreover, users can search for a location, even if it is on a different floor, and Google will provide directions.
iFixit is hardcore when it comes to breaking open our favorite electronics to see what’s inside, and the website did it again today with the refreshed Google-flagship, Asus-built Nexus 7 that unveiled at the Google I/O conference last week.
Teardown highlights:
— The 7-inch tablet offers GPS, NFC, and Wi-Fi antennas all manufactured between April 20 and May 25, 20011.
— The Nexus 7 boasts a 4326 mAh battery that lasts 9:49 hours, whereas the Kindle Fire has a 4400 mAh battery that lasts 7:42 hours. Meanwhile, the new iPad battery, which is “significantly larger” at 11,500 mAh, only lasts 9:52 hours for HSPA and 9:37 hours for LTE.
— The official Nexus page stated there is one “speaker” in the back, but iFixit spotted
— Hydis manufactures the 7-inch, 1,280-by-800 HD display designated by model HV070WX2.
