The Wall Street Journal is now reporting that the rumored $1.1 billion cash acquisition deal for social blogging site Tumblr has been approved by Yahoo’s board of directors. The Tumblr acquisition was rumored last week, with a price tag reportedly north of $1 billion, which appears to be accurate if the WSJ’s sources are correct.

Tumblr would continue to be run as a separate business and independent property, the WSJ’s sources said, and we could see an official announcement as soon as Monday from one or both of the companies. Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayor become interested in the site only a couple months ago, but sees the Tumblr purchase as a way to big inroads into social media and boost revenue growth, according to one of the anonymous people who spoke to the WSJ. Yahoo already has an event scheduled for Monday in NYC, and the WSJ has learned it will deal with Flickr, something which we’ve also heard separately. The Tumblr deal might not have been on the docket initially, but if it’s all approved it’s highly likely we’ll see it mentioned tomorrow, too.

Recently, we’ve seen suggestions that there’s a vacuum developing at the top of Yahoo’s executive ladder, and there have been rumors recently of key people departing from the mobile team. It’s interesting that a lot of these departures are fairly recent, and could go some way to explaining why Tumblr may have been willing to accept the $1.1 billion offer when sources have told TechCrunch that the amount was seen as “too low” by some within the company. Our sources also suggested that Tumblr may be looking at a fast-depleting cash pile, which again gives it good reason to sell.

Some users on Twitter are threatening to depart Tumblr if the Yahoo deal goes through, as Ingrid reported on Saturday. Overall, as she noted, visitor growth to the site appears to be flat or declining slightly in 2013, so combined, those two facts might not bode well for Tumblr’s future user acquisition. But Instagram also faced an outcry of vocal users claiming they were going to shut down their accounts and depart the service for good when Facebook bought that company. In fact, users, engagement and reach for brands using Instagram have all gone up considerably since the acquisition.

Yahoo has been snapping up companies at a rapid pace this year, with what seems like new acquisitions every week over the past few months. One of the more high-profile purchases was the Summly buy, which brought the news summary startup into the Yahoo fold for a reported price of around $30 million. The company’s 17-year old founder arguably made more headlines than the company itself, and many debated the merits of the acquisition.

More recently, the companies on Yahoo’s shopping list have been more under the radar, and in general the pattern looks like a strategic hiring spree, rather than a bunch of additions to Yahoo’s product portfolio. Tumblr would likely buck this trend, as it has a massive built-in audience, a full-featured, mature product and targets a relatively young demographic that so far isn’t all that well-represented at Yahoo. There’s a certain amount of “cool” that’s attached to Tumblr, and Yahoo is desperate for exactly that.

The deal size is raising some eyebrows, since, as Fortune’s Dan Primack tweeted, Yahoo had only $1.2 billion cash on hand as of its most recent quarterly earnings, which makes an all-cash offer for Tumblr a lot more of a stretch than it would be for someone like Apple, or even Facebook, which acquired Instagram for $1 billion in a mix of both cash and stock. Yahoo’s purchase of Tumblr, if the terms are correct, is a strong indicator of just how badly it wants to expand into media-based social networking.

As of 3/31 Yahoo had just under $1.2b of actual cash on hand. And deal is $1.1b cash? Time to liquify that $1.8b of "short-term investments"—
  (@danprimack) May 19, 2013

We’ve contacted both Yahoo and Tumblr for comment, and so far have only received a boilerplate “We don’t comment on rumors or speculation” from Yahoo. If Tumblr gets back to us, we’ll update this piece.

Editor’s note: Keith Teare is the founder of just.me and a partner at Archimedes Labs. He is also the co-founder of TechCrunch. Follow him on Twitter @kteare.

Because of Google I/O, this was a momentous week for those of us who are watching the rapid transition that is taking place from desktop computing to mobile, and particularly for those focused on mobile-social as I am because of my job at just.me. Here is my take on what we just witnessed.

Standalone Hangouts. Google announced at its I/O event that Hangouts was to be launched as a separate app from Google Plus, taking personal conversations out from the G+ app and putting them into their own space.

Facebook Home problems. AT&T was reported to have decided to discontinue distribution of the HTC First – the Facebook Home Android phone – due to lack of sales. This comes on the back of publicity pointing to a large number of one-star reviews for the software on the Google Play store.

What is at stake?

There are many common themes and questions that underpin the launch and evolution of Hangouts as a separate app and previously led to the decision to launch the Facebook Home product. These products represent two very similar answers to a common question. The primary question is who will users look to to enable their social communications needs on mobile devices?

To set the context for an analysis let’s acknowledge the elephant in the room that is partially driving these decisions.

Mobile Messaging is rapidly becoming the primary way users engage socially on mobile. Figures released this week imply more than 41 billion messages a day are now being delivered via various “Over the Top”  (OTT) messaging apps.

Phones were created as social tools. Smartphones are especially good at being social, integrating text, voice, video and images in an endless number of apps that can serve a user’s needs, and all without the need for a web-based social network.

Users are able to communicate with anybody in their address book anywhere in the world with almost any content mix at any time. This has been compelling to users and has driven the growth of apps like iMessage, WhatsApp, LINE, WeChat, KakaoTalk and some other smaller competitors. Almost 750 million users out of a smartphone population of 1.2 billion are already using these apps.

If you are Google, Facebook or almost any other major provider of social communications platforms originally developed for the web, this move to mobile messaging represents a considerable challenge.

Similar challenges exist from media-sharing apps. As users flock to Vine, Snapchat and, previously, Instagram, the social platforms are challenged to continue to be the primary provider of these services to the growing army of smartphone users.

The other core feature of Facebook and Google+, publishing to an audience for all or many to see, are increasingly becoming activities only a few engage in on mobile — and certainly less often than was the case on the web.

What Is A Platform Provider To Do?

If we look out a few years there is really only one product approach available.

That is to build single apps that embrace and extend the current features of the messaging market leaders — hoping to win users over from WhatsApp, LINE, KakaoTalk and WeChat — while also integrating the features of media sharing, private memory collection and publishing into single unified experiences.

Google and Facebook both seem to be pursuing this approach.

Breaking out Hangouts and going after the messaging audience with enhanced features makes sense. But Google also showed Google Now and Voice Search as possible points of integration for all of its mobile-social features. It’s early days here, but Android clearly wants to find a point of integration for all the users’ needs.

Facebook, with Home, revealed its integrated approach, while under the hood it has Messenger, Camera, Pages and the full Facebook app. Poor as Home’s reception has been, Facebook will certainly continue to deepen and refine its integration efforts and its attempt to be the primary UI a user needs on a smartphone.

Vulnerabilities And Strengths Of Mobile-First Companies

WhatsApp and its clones can be thought of as mobile-first companies. Their apps sit on top of the smartphone, particularly the mobile address book, and just help a user chat to their friends, family or colleagues.  Their success is their simplicity and the singular purpose they have addressed.

Insofar as they are vulnerable, it is due to being very narrowly focused on brief “in the moment” conversations in the form of a chat or instant messaging UI. They have added the ability to include media in those conversations, and some voice-calling abilities. But their goal is really momentary interactions with individuals or groups. Their requirement to have both sides of the conversation install the app is another liability.

Human beings have broader needs that are currently served by other single-use apps. Evernote for private memories, email for longer more enduring interactions, social networks like Facebook, Google+ and Twitter for public statements of all kinds and Path or Instagram for photo sharing. This is a little like the era of Windows before Outlook when apps tended to do only one thing and users used many apps.

Can Web Companies Beat Mobile-First Companies?

These recent moves by Facebook and Google represent early moves by the web-era companies to react to the successes of the mobile-first messengers. They certainly do not represent end points in any way, impressive as they are. And there is plenty of time for the mobile messaging apps to respond by offering a broader range of social features. 

There are already clues to the future – provided by users. The continuing use of email on mobile (trillions of messages in 2013) indicates that  users are not entirely catered for by the chat-centric conversational UI. The growth of Vine and Snapchat (single-feature based as they are) indicate not all media-sharing needs are catered for by these apps. There is a lot still to play for.

If we look five years out, it is likely that the iOS and Android core will support a far more integrated set of messaging tools that cater for many of the needs we use single-use apps for today.

Message saving for private use, shared messaging to individuals or groups, media sharing, video and voice messaging (both synchronous and asynchronous), Timelines to look back and recall what we did in the past. These will all be features of the operating system.

As mobile moves from its Windows 3.1 — single-use apps — era to its more integrated future, apps that used to stand alone will have their features sucked into the operating system. Google and Apple have an advantage here of course as they own the operating system.

The Future Is Being Fought Over Now

In that sense the current product focus – decisions about what features to separate into single apps, and how to integrate those into a unified UI all represent the first moves in defining who wins.

Facebook has Messenger, Camera, Pages and its primary app with Home as an integration point.

Google has Talk, Contacts, Mail, Plus, Hangouts perhaps with Now as a point of integration.

Apple is a little behind but has iMessage, FaceTime, Photostream, Mail and Contacts. iOS itself may be the point of integration.

WhatsApp, LINE, KakaoTalk, WeChat and the others will need to move beyond the chat-centric user interface into a broader set of asynchronous messaging features, and a new set of social features, probably with Timeline support, in order to stay ahead of the curve.

The End Of Social Networks And The Start Of A New Era?

The ground has been set for a fascinating next few years as the web-based social platforms seek to own mobile-social messaging and the mobile messaging apps seek to extend into more fully integrated social features.

As of this moment the mobile-first apps have the lead measured by number of users and levels of engagement. To keep it they will need to continue to innovate.

The human race is already social, and the smartphone has everything needed to enable them to act on their social needs. As the growth of OTT messaging and media sharing shows, a user’s social needs are being met with no need for a social network.

In this mobile-social world the only question is, whose software will we all use to enable human social activities? That is what this week was all about.

Google and other tech companies have come under fire for exploiting a common tax loophole to book revenues through their Irish subsidiaries, but today The Sunday Times is reporting that a former Google UK executive has evidence of further tax avoidance by his one-time employer. Barney Jones worked for Google between 2002 and 2006 and says that during his time at the company, Google relied almost exclusively on its UK sales staff to secure advertising deals in London, effectively closing deals there rather than in Dublin, where it booked the revenues. Google VP Matt Brittin had previously testified to the Commons Public Accounts Committee (PAC) that "nobody" at Google’s UK office was selling Google advertising, last week revising his...

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Every week, we share a number of downloads for all platforms to help you get things done. Here were the top downloads from this week.

SafeIP Hides Your IP Address for Private Browsing, Blocked Media

Windows: If you want access to streaming media restricted by your location, web sites that display differently depending on where you are, or just a little privacy, SafeIP can help. The utility lets you select where your IP address will appear to be located, and can even rotate them regularly if privacy is your goal. More »

DIY Pizza Pie Teaches You How to Make Perfect Pizza at Home

iPad: Making pizza isn't rocket science, but making good pizza can be tricky. Thankfully, DIY Pizza Pie is a guide to making the perfect pizza from scratch. The app shows you how to make dough, pick great toppings, choose the right cheese, and avoid some of the most common pitfalls at-home pizza chefs encounter.More »

Supercharge Your iPhone Home Screen with Velox and These Add-Ons

iOS (Jailbroken): Velox is a new tweak for jailbroken iPhone's that completely changes how you view notifications and apps. It's one of those rare apps that overhauls iOS in a way that truly changes the way you use your iPhone. The app itself is great, but you can also tap into it with a handful of useful add-ons that add to the experience. More »

Cydia Substrate Brings Winterboard, Other Tweaks to Android

Android (rooted): Today, the developers behind Cydia and Mobile Substrate announced that Cydia Substrate will be coming to Android. You read that right: Cydia on Android. In fact, Winterboard is already available.More »

Proven Finds Great Jobs in Your Area, Lets You Apply On Your Phone

Android/iOS/Web: Proven is a job search engine and mobile app that makes finding the perfect gig for you super easy. The app guides you to great jobs in your area, and lets you apply for them via the web or right on your smartphone while you're stuck commuting to your current terrible job. More »

Amazon Cloud Drive Photos Syncs Your iPhone's Camera Roll

iPhone: Apple's Photo Stream, which automatically backs up and syncs your last 1000 photos for up to 30 days, is a boon for iPhone photographers, but Amazon just rolled out an app that tops it with lots of free storage.More »

Subtitles Automatically Downloads Subtitles for Movies on Your Mac

OS X: We've shown you how to download subtitles for movie files on your computer through services like Opensubtitles or Subscene, but Subtitles for Mac makes the process as simple as dragging and dropping a video file. More »

Firefox Gets a Health Report, New 'Do Not Track' Options, and More

Windows/Mac/Linux: The lastest version of Firefox, Firefox 21, isavailable for download now. What will you find in this new release? A few major new features, including three "Do Not Track" options, a tune-up tool called Firefox Health Report, and performance-boosting startup suggestions. More »

TouchPal Wave Types Sentences the Way Other Keyboards Type Words

Android: TouchPal Wave is the latest beta for the TouchPal Keyboard (which we've mentioned before). Wave combines gesture typing and predictive text to let you type out entire sentences in the time you would spend typing words with other keyboards, all with fewer errors. More »

iTunes Updates to 11.03, Brings a Better MiniPlayer

Today, Apple released an update to iTunes that brings much needed improvements to the MiniPlayer, including a playback bar with a scrubbing playhead. More »

Marina Litvinenko, widow of Alexander Litvinenko (a British citizen who was assassinated in London by two former KGB agents who poisoned him with radioactive polonium) has accused the British government, Secretary of State William Hague, and PM David Cameron of sabotaging the coroner's inquest into her husband's death. Hague and Cameron intervened in the coroner's hearing to seal key evidence that implicated the Russian government in Litvinenko's killing.

Sir Robert Owen, who is leading the inquest and who has seen the material, characterised it as "documents that examined whether UK officials could have done more to prevent his murder." 's widow says that this is part of "a secret political deal with the Kremlin." This comes against a charm offensive by the UK government to increase Russian investment in Britain.

The former Labour government severed all contacts with Russia's FSB spy agency in 2007 after concluding it had played a leading role in Litvinenko's assassination. Putin is the agency's former chief.

Mrs Litvinenko added: "This is a very sad day, a tragedy for British justice which has until now been respected around the world, and a frightening precedent for all of those who have been trying so hard to expose the crimes committed by a conspiracy of organised criminals who operate inside the Kremlin."

In his ruling (pdf), Owen said the inquest scheduled to take place later this year might now result in an "incomplete, misleading and unfair" verdict.

The coroner said he would consider inviting Theresa May, the home secretary, to hold a public inquiry instead. The inquiry could hear the sensitive evidence buried by Hague in secret sessions.

Alexander Litvinenko widow accuses William Hague of sabotaging inquest

Over the past months we’ve discovered ‘pirates’ in the most unusual places, from the FBI, through major record labels and the U.S. Government to the Vatican.

Inspired by these revelations the Canadian Pirate Party decided to take a look at the downloading habits of their local Government and police, against a backdrop of vigorous recent debate surrounding online piracy in Canada, and the copyright troll phenomenon in particular.

With help from the pirating anti-piracy group Canipre several movie studios are gearing up to sue thousands of Internet subscribers. Interestingly, the Pirate Party’s findings suggest that even the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) and the Government’s Industry Canada could become potential targets.

“This discovery shows that copyrighted materials have, in fact, been downloaded via the RCMP and Industry Canada networks,” states Pirate Party leader Travis McCrea.

McCrea notes, however, that like most copyright trolls, their evidence is far from rock solid and can’t be linked to individual downloaders.

“However, we cannot be sure who is responsible for downloading the material, or even if it was downloaded by employees, contractors, or a person who was using an open wireless connection. This is why this type of intellectual property enforcement doesn’t work – there is no method of reliably telling who actually engaged in the infringement of copyrighted materials.”

Below are a few “hits” that were found with data provided by BitTorrent tracking outfit Scaneye, starting with the police IP-addresses. The pirated titles are not unusual and the list mostly includes popular TV-shows and movies.

Royal Canadian Mounted Police Pirates

Industry Canada IP-addresses have also been caught pirating movies TV-shows and games, including episodes of The Voice, Duck Dynasty and The Ultimate Fighter.

The IP-addresses that were found are pulled from peer lists which increases the possibility of false positives, which is exactly how many copyright trolls are believed to gather evidence.

Industry Canada Pirates

In the months to come thousands of Internet subscribers may be dragged to court, with movie studios demanding thousands of dollars in compensation. The Pirate Party Canada speaks out fiercely against these trolling actions.

They point out that despite the crackdowns on individual citizens, the police and the Government can seemingly continue to pirate without repercussions.

The fact that the makers of Game of Thrones and other frequently pirated titles don’t seem to mind, makes it all the more confusing according to the Pirate Party.

“Between the difficulty of targeting individual pirates, the double standard of targeting individuals more harshly than organizations, and the fact that many content creators don’t see piracy as detrimental to their business, it’s clear that something is wrong with the way intellectual property rights are currently enforced,” the Party comments.

“If the goal of copyright enforcers – and the creators they represent – is to increase profits and protect creator rights, shouldn’t there be a better way to accomplish this than by harassing individuals who may or may not bear any responsibility for copyright infringement happening on their IP address?”

For the many future troll victims in Canada, we hope that the judges handling these cases will ask the same questions.

Source: Canadian Police and Government Caught Pirating Movies and TV-Shows

Tuesday morning, TorrentFreak received an email from a UK music industry source which clearly indicated that the labels. led by the BPI, still view website censorship as the way forward in the continuing piracy battle.

In the past sites such as The Pirate Bay, KickAssTorrents (KAT), H33T and Fenopy have been blocked by court action, but the list this time is particularly ambitious.

A total of 25 sites are listed including some of the world’s largest torrents sites – 1337x, Bitsnoop, ExtraTorrent, isoHunt, Monova, TorrentCrazy, TorrentDownloads, TorrentHound, TorrentReactor and Torrentz. In fact, if the current action comes to fruition, only one of the current top 10 torrent sites will remain unblocked in the UK.

However, in the torrent scene news travels very quickly indeed and if there is one thing users hate more than a badly-seeded torrent, it’s censorship, and the signs are that the proposed blocks will be met head on with potent circumvention tools.

PirateProxy.net is the world’s largest Pirate Bay proxy site whose growth has been nothing short of phenomenal. From a standing start in the second quarter of 2012 the site has achieved amazing things. According to Alexa, PirateProxy is the UK’s 137th most popular site, just ahead of its Netherlands ranking of 145th. To give an idea of scale, PirateProxy’s traffic can be compared with that currently achieved by Kim Dotcom’s Mega.co.nz.

“Once I read that TF article, I started configuring and testing new proxies sites for Torrentz, Isohunt and Extratorrent,” the admin of PirateProxy told TorrentFreak.

“I have already created proxy sites for other blocked torrent sites such as KAT, Fenopy and H33T. Katproxy.com has become really popular in the UK recently too and i’m hoping to add these proxy sites to a new section on proxybay.info.”

As noted in our previous article, the world’s second most popular Pirate Bay proxy is PirateReverse.info. An admin there say they’re also well prepared.

“At the moment we’re looking to proxy all the torrent sites that were mentioned and we’ve already acquired such domains,” TorrentFreak was informed. “We’re always willing to invest in the proxies we provide to make them as fast and accessible as possible, and we’re planning some hardware upgrades shortly.”

However, in addition to the torrent sites the BPI list also contains other domains related to file-hosting searches (FilesTube, Filecrop) and MP3 sites (Grooveshark, MP3Skull, BeeMP3 etc). Early signs suggest that these aren’t the main priority of proxy providers since they are more difficult to set up.

“It would be particularly difficult to proxy the file sharing sites however, because of all the protection they use to stop people hot-linking the downloads, same goes for Grooveshark and the MP3 services,” PirateReverse explain.

“We will be looking into it, but for the moment the torrent sites are our priority. They will all be listed on torrentproxies.com when available, which we’re working to make the number one hub for torrent site proxies.”

PirateProxy’s admin says that any non-torrent site proxies will be driven by demand.

“I set up Proxybay.info a while back to collect good working proxies for The Pirate Bay. I am planning on doing a re-design that will allow proxies of other sites to be included as well. Currently, I am only planning on unblocking popular torrent sites, however, I may move onto other types of sites if there is enough demand.”

While both sets of proxy admins work separately, they share the belief that censorship is not only ineffective but also counterproductive.

“The current censorship regime in the UK just shows how technology is always a few steps ahead of government. They will catch up eventually, but by that time, we will find other ways to circumvent these blocks,” says PirateProxy’s admin.

“We think the way to combat piracy is to offer simple to access and good value alternatives. At the moment it is genuinely easier to torrent a movie or album than to buy it DRM free and keep forever online. Censorship will never work in this case,” says PirateReverse.

“However, our concerns lie that in the future we, the proxy operators, may be targeted. It is easier for us to move around into different IP spaces but it will be a tiresome and expensive game of whack-a-mole. In the long-term though, we think it will prove that censorship doesn’t work. Perhaps we will see the ISPs put up more of a fight – it costs them money to implement the blocks.”

PirateProxy’s admin says that there is a message to be sent – and hopefully plenty of determination to send it.

“Looking at the bigger picture, I hope these proxy sites can send a message that censorship on the Internet is pointless and counter-productive. I will continue to run these proxy sites until these sites are unblocked and accessible everywhere,” he concludes.

Source: Fighting Censorship, Proxies Gear Up to Unblock More Torrent Sites

Welcome back to Android Gaming Weekly, our weekly recap to focus on new releases. We still plan to cover upcoming releases and games we’re playing, but this column is dedicated to new games you can install and start playing right now. Check out our top picks and let us know if you have any suggestions for next week in the comments below.

Sonic The Hedgehog

Description: The Sonic game which started it all is now optimized for mobile devices! Race at lightning speeds across seven classic zones as Sonic the Hedgehog. Run and spin through loop-de-loops as you collect rings and defeat enemies on your mission to save the world from the evil Dr. Eggman. This re-mastered mobile version of the SEGA Genesis classic features the full “Sonic The Hedgehog” game, plus exclusive features.

You Don’t Know Jack

Description: Download the Spike TV Video Game Awards’ “Social Game of the Year” to your Android phone or tablet. You Don’t Know Jack is the #1 game in the world that contains both fart noises and trivia about Shakespeare. This free-to-play mobile version includes hundreds of full episodes of everybody’s favorite quiz show trivia game, with new, topical episodes added every week!

Carmageddon

Description: Carmageddon is the original freeform driving sensation, where pedestrians (and cows!) equal points, and your opponents are a bunch of crazies in a twisted mix of automotive killing machines. The game features anarchic drive-wherever-you-like gameplay and over-the-top surreal comedy violence. It’s the racing game where racing is for wimps.

Daddy Was A Thief

Description: Bank staff is usually friendly and polite. This time something went wrong! Gain as much money as you can! Hurry! Everyone try to catch you, but you are clever, aren’t you? Find combo speed boosts, shortcuts and grab power-ups to survive.

Zombie Derby

Description: Do you have the drive to survive? Americans have two favourite things; cars and guns. And no stinking zombie apocalypse is going to change that. Take control of your car to see how far you can get and how many zombies you can kill – and if you can actually escape with your brains intact. Four cars are available to get you to the final fort, each capable of holding progressively more loot. Ranging from the simple Redneck pick-up and the classy Hunter and to the tough Sledge and frankly-silly Harvester, you’ll enjoy throwing these bodged-up jalopies at the lines of the undead.

Can Knockdown 3

Description: Challenge your aim, hone your precision, and push your puzzle-solving skills to the next level in this insanely addictive game. This installment takes the critically acclaimed Can Knockdown series to all new heights- the physics-based carnival gameplay you know and love- and adds unique puzzles, adrenaline-charged challenges, and even more explosive action!

Cross Craze

Description: CrossCraze is a classic crossword puzzle game where you place letters on a board to form interlocking words. Play against the computer or with a friend. Frustrated by the time-wasting and cheating found on online game apps such as Scrabble, Words With Friends and Wordfeud? CrossCraze lets you choose a computer opponent to match your own skill level. It will never cheat, never take more than a moment to move and never abandon a game before the end. How refreshing!

Toy Defense 2

Description: Toy Defense 2 is the long-awaited sequel to the multi-million-download hit Toy Defense! Set in WW2, this action/strategy game is packed with more levels, amazing new features, a big selection of fighting units for each world, and more intense action than ever. Take part in various missions in a range of theaters of war, from the picturesque beaches and forests of Normandy to the deserts of northern Africa. The most epic battles of WW2 await you!

Dark Avenger

Description: Enter the dungeon and hack-n-slash your way towards immortality! The highly anticipated dungeon crawler arrives on mobile! Evil has awoken from its slumber. Our heroes must rise and send the forces of darkness back to the depths of hell. Choose from three heroic classes: Templar, Archer, or Mage. Equipped with enhanced, intuitive controls, you will experience the game like never before!

Attack of the Wall St. Titan

Description: A giant robot, built to destroy and subjugate the masses. Reprogrammed by an anonymous hacktivist to turn on your evil corporate creators, you are the Wall Street Titan. Occupy Wall Street with a giant robot fist! Selected by Indie Game Magazine as one of the best mobile arcade games of 2012!

COMING SOON

A game and a couple of tools highlight this abbreviated list of picks

The combination of Google I/O going on in San Francisco and BlackBerry Live in Orlando this week has our team a little sparse, but we think there are a few great picks to be seen this week regardless. Whether its just four apps or ten, we do our best every weekend to bring you apps that each of the Android Central writers have been using regularly the previous week.

Stick around after the break and see how this week's picks stack up against the rest.

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I’ve spent the last two weeks wandering around London, Paris, and Istanbul (not Constantinople.) As an experiment, I left my trusty MacBook Pro behind and brought only the $199 Chromebook on which I type this. And to my considerable surprise it has served admirably. So admirably, in fact, that I believe ChromeOS is only one or two iterations away from being the right choice for many-if not most–homes.

I was skeptical to begin with: after all, I thought, Chrome is acceptable when you’re online, but I’ll be spending much of my travel time offline, which probably makes it a non-starter, right? — So I devoted most of my Chromebook’s (bizarrely spacious) 320GB hard drive to an install of Ubuntu. Which I then never used even once.

I suppose I would have if some kind of critical work emergency had come up: after all, I’m (mostly) a software developer by trade, and ChromeOS isn’t much of a developer platform. But that didn’t happen. Good thing, too, because Linux-on-the-desktop seems as ugly and frustrating as ever for someone, even a deeply techie someone, who just wants to get things done.

ChromeOS, though, is both very pretty and almost painless. Its biggest problem is that out of the box it naively insists that you’ll be online all the time–even though it can be perfectly serviceable while disconnected. You may not have known that nowadays both GMail and (most) Google Docs can work just fine offlne.

And if you didn’t, well, Google sure isn’t about to proactively tell you. You actually have to make a point of seeking out, installing, and then activating Offline Gmail and Offline Google Docs from the Chrome Web Store. Why ChromeOS doesn’t prompt you with this option as part of the onboarding process is truly beyond me. Similarly, why on Earth are “Gmail’ and “Offline Gmail” two separate apps? Google may be full of incredibly smart people, but they can also be insanely myopic when it comes to end users.

Once those were up and running, though, my Chromebook was a charm to use under almost all circumstances. Offline, I could write documents, check old email, and even play a few free games from the Chrome Web Store, although most Chrome games still seem to require an initial server connection to start up. And online, of course, the world was my oyster.

Did I have access to all the features of, say, Word or Excel? Hell, no. (You still can’t create a Google Docs spreadsheet when offline, either.) Was it an all-guns-blazing gaming experience? Again, no, although Chrome’s rapidly evolving Native Client ought to keep matters improving here. What I could do, though, was email, play a few games, surf the Net, communicate (via GChat or Google Hangouts, which worked excellently), and write documents — which unless I’m much mistaken is pretty much everything that most people use their computers for at home.

ChromeOS still needs better, and simpler, offline support; and I’d like to see more diversity of available hardware; but once those two things are addressed, which shouldn’t take long, I would happily recommend a Chromebook to my parents the next time they upgrade. In fact I’d happily recommend one to anyone who wants a small second laptop for travel, or who doesn’t need to do serious work on their home computer.

Long ago Neal Stephenson, when comparing operating systems to vehicles, described MacOS as a hermetically sealed day-glo VW Beetle; MS Windows as a clunky two-tone station wagon; and Linux as the product of a horde of dreadlocked hippies who spent their time building M1 battle tanks and giving them away for free. Which sounds great at first, but who actually wants to drive a tank?

Well, if I may extend that a little, ChromeOS is like a sleek, shiny Airstream trailer built around that same M1 engine. There are many things it can’t do, and a bunch more at which it’s very clumsy, but within its bailiwick, casual exploring, it’s both very attractive and awfully comfortable.

I don’t think Stephenson’s original analogies quite hold any more, though. Nowadays OS X is more like a Porsche…and Windows is a gas-guzzling pickup truck, or a cube van that makes disturbing noises whenever it corners. Still suitable for work, but not particularly great for either road trips or sub/urban living — and nowadays looking nervously over its metaphorical shoulder at the flotilla of drones and self-driving cars on the horizon.

Image credit: Dan McCullough, Flickr.

Google broadcast the I/O 2013 keynote live on YouTube today, giving a detailed peek into the latest updates to their various technologies across Android, Chrome, and the web as a whole. The I/O conference consists of a lot more than announcements, however, with displays showing off all kinds of technologies Google and third parties employ to make the web and mobile devices better.

We registered on Tuesday to ensure we didn't run into any delays when getting to the keynote the next morning. Registration was super simple. You just checked yourself in with a QR code or confirmation number on a Chromebook and proceeded to the appropriate table to pick up your NFC-enabled badge. If you had an NFC-enabled Android phone, you could just tap it to the badge to get a variety of information. It also included personal data for I/O conference workers to confirm your identity.

Whitson and I had a surprise visit from Pash at our hotel, who brought along his Google Glass. It's very interesting to watch someone use it because they're having a very specific experience, seeing something only they can see. It looks like they're rubbing their glasses but they're actually navigating an interface. When Glass talks to you, it uses the bones in your head to amplify the sound so it tickles a little when making noise.

We woke up at 6:00 AM to get ready for the keynote and headed to the Moscone Center around 7:00 AM. From there we got to hang out in a press room and eat pastries while we waited for Google to escort us to the keynote room. After that, we waited outside the doors for a bit then went into the press area up front. It was a great view, and we were surrounding by some of the most enthusiastic developers I've ever met. People came from all over the world. It was really neat to see different development teams from so many different cultures.

Despite Google's advanced technology, they still can't get Wi-Fi to work well in the Moscone main room. I was able to get a hotspot running on my Nexus 4, but Whitson and I couldn't use it at the same time. He needed to relay instructions to the other writers so he used the connection and I made due with the Wi-Fi when it worked. It gave me a chance to enjoy the keynote a bit more and take lots of pictures.

Google announced a lot of little things during the keynote, but Google Maps provided some of the best imagery.

Larry Page came out to talk in front of one of the most stunning images.

For the first time, he answered questions live during the keynote. Naturally, Robert Scoble was first in line.

Two young people made it to the front of the question line. Google seems to be sponsoring a lot of young, intelligent developers. It's great and almost intimidating how smart kids are now.

Also, this Jon Hamm look-alike.

After the three-and-a-half hour keynote, we were all very hungry. Fortunately Google had lots of good food and excellent cupcakes.

Beyond the keynote (and lunch) there were lots of awesome booths and displays. Everywhere you looked, you could find plenty of Android guys—including these flying ones.

A big roundtable let people try out and learn about Google Glass.

I'm not entirely sure what this Chromebook Pixel display was supposed to do, but it was interesting to watch.

The Chrome display had all sorts of Chrome web app demos and developer resources.

Then there was the photosphere, which displayed—you guessed it—photospheres!

Inside you could watch different photospheres from various locations around the world.

We were told to expect some Google TV updates but didn't really find any. It just seems a few new TVs are running the latest version we already knew about. No surprises here.

Although mostly just for display, this Google Voice Search Phonebooth was pretty awesome.

There were tons of other cool booths. This one was really fun to look at.

There were so many other things to see at I/O—too many to show them all. This Google Maps hiking bot was pretty amazing, though. They let people strap it on and see what it's like to map out a hiking trail for Google Maps.

Lastly, this motion-tracking flying game was a lot of fun and reminded me of Pilotwings.

Beyond the booths were tons of sessions on the future of Android, Chrome, and the web. While not as outwardly exciting as the sorts of announcements that come out of I/O each year, some very cool technologies are coming that will make mobile devices and web apps significantly better. By 2014, the web, especially, should change for the better in some pretty amazing ways. If nothing really excited you at I/O's keynote today, stay tuned—some really great stuff is coming not necessarily from Google but the developers they help to create great things.

For more photos of I/O, check out the full Flickr collection.

A group of cybersecurity experts has come out in opposition to a White House-backed proposal that would dramatically expand the FBI's wiretapping capabilities for internet communication services.

In a new research paper, the group argues against new regulations under what's being called CALEA II, an extension to the 1994 Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act, which mandated law enforcement backdoor access for telephone networks. The new regulation would do something similar for internet communications, threatening heavy fines on companies that do not comply with wiretapping orders. That means that all apps would need to be built or rebuilt to be wiretap-ready, just in case they need to accomodate a law enforcement...

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The new activity recognition features introduced in the latest Google Play services update are just two days old, but SmarterApps has already released an AutomateIt update in the Play Store that takes advantage of the new functionality. The latest version touts the ability to make your phone smart enough to automate different tasks depending on if you're walking, running, biking, or driving.

The new sync adapter brought in via Wednesday's Google Play services update introduces a location reporting API, a task that previously was performed within apps themselves locally. Apps can now request location data from the new, more efficient fused location provider that's a part of Google Play Services, rather than having to work through Android's built-in location APIs that call on GPS / Wi-Fi / network location.

• [I/O 2013] New APIs For Location, Single Sign-On, And Google Cloud Messaging
• AutomateIt (A Tasker-Like App) Gets Weather-Based Triggers: Make Your Smartphone Alert You When It's Going To Rain
• [Review] AutomateIt Allows Your Phone To Take Care Of Itself
• Utter! Claims To Be The First Non-IME App To Utilize Offline Voice Recognition In Jelly Bean

AutomateIt Becomes First App To Introduce New Activity Recognition Features was written by the awesome team at Android Police.

A sudden burst of piping hot (or freezing cold) water is a showering human's worst nightmare. But what's the cause? And how can you prevent it? The DIY experts at Stack Exchange provide a few tips.

When the shower is running and someone flushes a toilet, why does the shower get cold (or sometimes hot) in some houses, but not others? More importantly, would fixing that require replacing the water heater, or re-doing the piping in the entire house? Or is there some cheap/easy way to fix it?

See the original question.

Tester101 answers:

Why You Get Burned

One of the most common plumbing configurations is a trunk and branch system. This is where a larger diameter pipe runs from one end of the building to the other, and smaller diameter pipes branch off to supply rooms or individual fixtures. If any of the branches demand water (you flush the toilet), there is less water available to all the other branches. Since the toilet only uses cold water, there is less cold water available to your shower when the toilet is filling. This causes the water in the shower to be warmer, because there is less cold water mixing with the hot water. There are a few ways to reduce or eliminate this burning feeling. Probably the cheapest is to reduce the amount of water going to the toilet.

Reducing Toilet Water

You can reduce how quickly the toilet uses water by simply closing the supply valve slightly. This means the toilet will take longer to fill, but will reduce the temperature fluctuation in the shower. Adjusting the supply valve can also have negative side effects, such as increased fill times and noise. You can also reduce the overall amount of water the toilet needs by either buying a low flow toilet, or placing a brick, jug of water, or other object in the tank. However, this method will reduce the amount of water available for each flush, so you may encounter difficulty clearing solids from the bowl.

Smarter Mixing

Installing a new mixing valve in the shower can reduce or eliminate the temperature fluctuations. Thermostatic mixing valves automatically balance the amount of hot and cold water being mixed, which will prevent drastic fluctuations in shower temperature. If the cold water flow is reduced (due to a toilet flush), the valve automatically adjusts the amount of hot water being mixed. This keeps the shower temperature more consistent, even when other fixtures are using water.

Increasing Available Water

Increasing the amount of water available in the system can alleviate the problem, but will likely require a major change to the plumbing. If you have a trunk and branch system, increasing the trunk pipe diameter and/or the branch pipe diameter (if the branch feeds the entire room) will increase the amount of water available to the fixtures.

Distributing Water Evenly

A more drastic solution would be to install a manifold with home runs. This would likely require a major plumbing renovation, with almost all of the plumbing changed. In this type of system, there is a central load balancing manifold. Then for each fixture in the house, a dedicated pipe is run between the fixture and the manifold.

Supply and Demand

In the end, it's all about supply and demand. If the demand is greater than the supply, you end up with a burnt butt. The only way to avoid uncomfortable showers is to reduce demand or increase supply.

Matthew PK answers:

The shower temperature changes when you flush (or use water) because the pressure in that supply line has changed. This means less supply to the mixing valve in the same setting. Modern thermostatic mixing valves are designed to keep the total pressure constant. This means that a reduction in cold water pressure (from a flush) is detected and the mixing valve responds by reducing corresponding flow in the hot water. So, the solution to shifting shower temperatures is to install a thermostatic mixing valve.

Tester101 comments:

The shower would get cold if somebody used hot water for something (almost certainly not a toilet flush), instead of cold. It could be caused by an over-enthusiastic thermostatic mixing valve, which reduced the hot water flow too much. Using up all the water in the hot water tank would also lead to a cold shower. And yes, you do have to install a thermostatic mixing valve at each shower/tub. They are used to replace the plain old standard mixing valve.

bcworkz comments:

I believe Matthew is suggesting that upgrading your shower valves is the best solution. I agree. A different water heater will do nothing. Changing the piping so the pressure change is minimal will help but not eliminate the problem. A thermostatic mixing valve is the best solution, but note it still takes a brief time for it to adjust to a sudden change in pressure, so a brief cold period will still be noticed.

Find more answers or leave your own at the original post. See more questions like this at Home Improvement, the DIY site at Stack Exchange. And of course, feel free to ask a question yourself.

Image via Mark Sayer (Shutterstock).

Google's long-rumored Play Music All Access service is already out the door, while Apple's iRadio is still bogged down in licensing talks. According to music industry sources, all the haggling could prevent Apple from debuting the service at the Worldwide Developers Conference next month.

Sony/ATV, the largest music publisher, has rejected Apple's terms according to published reports. What's more, The Verge has learned this week that BMG Rights Management, the fourth largest music publisher, is also holding out. Insiders say that there's still plenty of "market momentum" behind iRadio and some of the industry's largest players — including Universal Music Group, which was the first to license songs for the service — want to see it...

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Writes Trevor Timm at the Freedom of the Press Foundation blog: "The law certainly wouldn't help the AP, and national security journalists, the only reporters that get subpoenaed by the federal government, would be at *more* risk of being forced to give up their sources in some situations, not less."

A U.K. judge has sentenced four members of hacking collective LulzSec, an offshoot of hacking group Anonymous, for their role in taking down various corporate and government websites between February and September 2011, ZDNet reported. Judge Deborah Taylor sentenced 26-year old Ryan Ackroyd, 20-year old Jake Davis, 18-year old Mustafa al-Bassam and 21-year old Ryan Cleary in a London courtroom on Thursday.

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No show notes this time. Just listen and enjoy. Namaste.

On the second day of Google's I/O Developers conference, the company announced the availability of more "glassware" applications for its heavily hyped wearable computing device. Google Glass applications including CNN, Elle, Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook and Evernote are available now to early Glass adopters, The New York Times reported. The applications join Path and The New York Times' own app, which were previously the only other third-party apps available for the device. Each application will bring something unique to Google Glass. The CNN application, for example, allows users to be notified with news alerts for a specific topic, while the Evernote app will let users send notes, such as a grocery list, to Glass for reference later on.

Since early last year Kim Dotcom and the rest of the “Mega Conspiracy” have been accused by the U.S. Government of running a criminal operation.

Despite the severity of the charges, Megaupload’s legal team does not have insight into all of the relevant documents relied on by the U.S. Government when it came to that conclusion.

Through the New Zealand courts Dotcom and his fellow defendants have requested access to the withheld information. To mount a proper defense they want to see the extent to which the U.S. authorities can back up their criminal charges.

On two earlier occasions, including once in the High Court, Dotcom’s legal team were granted full access to the U.S. evidence. However, in March these rulings were overturned by the Court of Appeal, which concluded that the United States could move forward with a summary case.

After the defeat Dotcom and his legal team quickly filed for an appeal at the Supreme Court, which was granted a few hours ago. This means that Megaupload has another shot at getting insight into crucial evidence.

“I am looking forward to the NZ Supreme Court review in our case and getting the discovery needed for a fair extradition hearing,” Dotcom commented on the news.

If the Supreme Court sides with Kim Dotcom and his associates, the evidence disclosed would be hugely helpful in ongoing legal battles on multiple continents. This includes the pending extradition battle in New Zealand.

Meanwhile, Megaupload’s lawyers haven’t been sitting still. In the United States they have a request pending to dismiss the case against the company, and last week two of their top lawyers released a white paper accusing the Obama administration of taking instructions from Hollywood.

Over in Europe, Germany was also added to the mix, with Megaupload lawyer Robert Amsterdam asking the Government there to intervene. Amsterdam argues that the human rights of Dotcom, a German citizen, have been violated by the U.S., and he wants the authorities to raise this issue in Washington.

Kim Dotcom’s extradition hearing in New Zealand is currently scheduled to take place in August this year, but that date could be further delayed now the Supreme Court has taken up the case.

Source: Kim Dotcom Granted Supreme Court Appeal Over U.S. Evidence

Yahoo's homepage just got an upgrade courtesy of Twitter — a new partnership between the two companies will bring selected tweets to Yahoo's homepage as part of its news stream feature. Yahoo's newsfeed, which simply aggregates content from across the web under some broad categories like 'local' or 'entertainment,' will include relevant tweets alongside its standard list of articles, though it isn't clear exactly how tweets will be chosen to appear. Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer announced the update in a blog post today and says that the feature will start rolling out on the web for desktops and mobile devices over the next few days. Given the ever-increasing role that Twitter plays in breaking news across basically all categories, this is a...

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Amazon has just announced a new content deal with NBCUniversal, bringing a host of new television series to the video streaming platform.

Some of those titles include Covert Affairs, Defiance, Grimm, Hannibal, and Suits. And what’s more, the company is pulling content from NBCUniversal’s children series such as Curious George and Land Before Time, which will be available with Kindle FreeTime Unlimited.

With platforms like Hulu and Netflix growing rapidly, and moreover making strides to offer the biggest libraries of content that include original programming, Amazon too has been working tirelessly to build out its offerings. According to the company, Amazon now offers more than 40,000 movies and TV episodes to Prime members, which can be watched across a wide variety of platforms including iOS, Kindles, Roku, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Wii (U).

In terms of availability, Covert Affairs and Grimm will both be available today, while Hannibal will not be ready until later this year, and Defiance will be out early next year. Amazon is also bringing SyFy series such as Alphas, Eureka and Warehouse 13 to the platform, along with Smash, featuring Debra Messing.

Here’s what Brad Beale, director of digital video content acquisition for Amazon, had to say:

We listen carefully to our customers to find out which TV shows and movies they find the most entertaining. Our expanded agreement with NBCUniversal gives Prime members access to even more exclusive content that they can stream instantly, at no additional cost. Compelling shows like Covert Affairs, Defiance, Grimm, Hannibal and Suits are big wins for our customers and we look forward to adding more titles soon.

Alongside expanding its library offerings, Amazon is also boosting its original programming efforts. Most recently, the company released eight comedy pilots and six children’s series pilots to get feedback from customers. After they make their decision, they’ll buy out the remaining episodes of the series which people seem to love.

New apps need lovin’ too, right? Every day there are thousands of new entries on the Google Play store, but many go unnoticed and never receive the attention they deserve. We have shown in the past that this community can discover great apps and launch them to new heights. So, we’re bringing back our weekly column Fresh Meat that highlights new apps with less than 100k installs. Browse our new Android app picks below and let us know which ones you enjoy.

Saga

Pitch: Saga is the easy way to keep track of where you go and what you do with no need to check in. Live your life, and let Saga write your digital autobiography. Saga is the automatic lifelogging app for everyone. Download Saga and start building your lifelog today, with next to no manual input from you.

Contactive

Pitch: Contactive unites the functionality of your address book with the knowledge of the Internet. It collects information from your social media networks, publicly available sources, and Contactive’s Global Directory to show who’s calling before you even answer the call. Always have something to talk about. Get a cheat sheet of your contacts’ latest updates in the moment that matters.

Trek Episode Guide

Pitch: The Trek Episode Guide immerses Star Trek™ fans in an authentic LCARS style interface introduced in the Star Trek: The Next Generation™ television series, and provides a compendium of all Star Trek episodes and movies, with detailed plot descriptions and HD images (where available).

AppGratis

Pitch: Bringing you daily free apps plus discounts up to 90% off. AppGratis is free and finally on Android! Top rated worldwide, already loved by over 10+ million iOS users.

We Heart It

Pitch: Discover inspiration and images you love every day! We Heart It is the place to find the most beautiful images of everything you love, inspired by millions of people from around the world! Save a collection of quotes, view pictures that match your mood, find images for an art or fashion collage, and get updated on news through images of the latest styles, for free!

WeatherSignal

Pitch: WeatherSignal lets you use your cell phone as a mobile weather station. The app makes use of native phone sensors to display local atmospheric readings, which are then displayed on our live-updating weather map. By using WeatherSignal you are becoming a part of the most ambitious weather crowdsourcing project in the world – helping to record weather patterns on a more localised level than ever before.

Schemes

Pitch: Schemes is a simple tool that allows you to send scheduled messages via SMS, Facebook, Twitter or Email (Gmail only!). Whether you want to send that happy birthday text at midnight (or a minute before midnight if that’s your thing), Tweet about your favourite time of the day, make a Facebook status without your friends on the other side of the world missing it, or send that important business email right on the hour, Schemes will do it for you!

AudioBox

Pitch: Your media collection is now truly portable! Stream from anywhere, it doesn’t matter where your files are stored. Upload and stream from the cloud, directly from your desktop or from the most popular cloud services. Mix your favorite tracks in custom or smart playlists, even if they are stored on different cloud sources.

Paul

Pitch: PAUL learns your preferences and creates your personalized profile. PAUL will preload the videos and songs you want BEFORE you want them, so there are no delays when you want to view them. Plus, PAUL can do all the work over WiFi only, incurring no data charges.

Clutch

Pitch: Clutch combines everything you need to shop with your phone – wallet, daily deals, trending and hot products, shopping searches, personalized collections, price comparisons and gifting – with the ability to make purchases and deliver them anywhere, with a few taps. Clutch is the only mobile app where you can get the best deals, give the best gifts, and discover and share these finds with your friends and family in a single place.

The best cellphone hardware has been crippled by manufacturer and carrier bloatware and skins, and Google's Nexus lineup has been hamstrung by a lack of LTE and somewhat inadequate specifications. But we've just gotten a look at the big surprise of Google's I/O keynote, a Samsung Galaxy S4 running stock Android, and suddenly we have visions of a world in which we don't have to choose between features and design, between timely updates and cutting-edge specs.

We tracked down Android VP Hugo Barra as he traipsed around the Moscone Center, and grilled him about his S4 while snapping a few pictures along the way. Details are still somewhat scant — as is what's sure to be an interesting backstory — but Barra said simply that "it's pretty...

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Keep up to 1,000 of your own PDF and EPUB files in the cloud for free

Caught up in all of the hullabaloo around the keynote, Google Play Books received a notable update in the Play Store to not only bring new UI elements but also a new way to view your own documents. First up is the design, which follows many of Google's latest design principles with a new left edge slide-in navigation panel and high contrast blue and white design. The interface on Play Books has always been simple, but it can't get much cleaner than it is now. You can "Read Now" (remember you can "Listen Now" in Play Music), view "My Library" or go "Shop". Very simple.

The big back-end feature that was enabled by this update is user uploads, which lets you now upload from the web (at play.google.com/books/uploads) or directly from Google Drive any PDF or EPUB document of your choice. Those documents uploaded on the web are then available for sync and download on your phone or tablet to read at any time. Users can store up to 1,000 documents at once with the service, and uploaded documents have their page position, bookmarks and notes completely synced across devices.

Play Books may not be on of the fanciest or most talked-about Google apps today, but these are huge improvements in usability that make the entire Android platform (and Google ecosystem) more compelling.

The new Google Messenger is real! It's not called Babel, or Google Talk, but "Hangouts." It also isn't the unified messenger we've all wanted - maybe it will be someday, but Hangouts is strictly a Google Talk replacement - there's no SMS or Google Voice integration.

What Hangouts does have going for it is that it is really pretty. It supports group messaging, pictures, video chat, and even has read receipts! Hangouts completely replaces Google Talk, so if you have a fondness for the past, say your goodbyes before you update. Let's take a look:

The Hangouts List

This is the "front page" of Hangouts.

• Tango Updated With Group Chat, Makes It Easy To Yell At Several People Simultaneously
• Facebook Messenger For Android Updated To 1.7, Brings Message Read Status And Tries To Call Itself A "Texting" Service
• Facebook Brings Messaging Improvements To Messenger And Main Facebook Apps, No It's Not The New Native App
• [Update: Hangouts Is Live! | I/O 2013] Google+ Gets A New Stream, And Hangouts (Read: Babel) Becomes Real, Unifies Messaging Across Android, iOS And The Web

Hanging Out With Google Hangouts - Google's New, Beautiful Messaging App That Doesn't Really Unify Anything was written by the awesome team at Android Police.

Google used this year’s developer conference to announce a ton of new features and services available now and coming soon for Android. There is a new Maps experience; Google Play has been updated; Google Now is set to include more information; Google game services will enhance your gaming experience across phones, tablets and platforms; Google Play Music All Access will completely change how music works on your Android device. And yet, there was no new version of Android announced. That’s no coincidence.

Google’s answer to fragmentation has been fully realized at Google I/O 2013. Google has developed around the vastly different configurations of Android, breaking down the various walls keeping Google from updating core apps and services that really shape your Android experience. If you were to break down the most important aspects of Android that dictate user experience, you could easily include everything Google updated today, without having to actually update Android. That means that not only will Nexus users experience Android the way Google wants you to, but HTC One, Samsung Galaxy S4, Sony Xperia Z and Oppo Find 5 users will as well.

Yes, the way text messages, certain aspects of notifications, the lock screen and home screen may be entirely different on various devices, but that’s not fragmentation — that’s choice. When every Android user, despite what phone or tablet they use, can enjoy the same Google Play store, the same Maps app, the same music services, the same Gmail experience and the same robust Google Search features, there’s no way you can say Android has a fragmentation problem. In the past there has been system compatibility problems, keeping some users on older versions of Android from accessing certain features, but that is getting better every day. And Google has set up a system that will get rid of that problem in the future.

In order to implement the changes to Android that Google wanted to today, they didn’t have to update Android. That, in itself, is the most important piece of news to come out of Google I/O 2013. To see how far Android has come in the last year, you don’t need to look further than that.

Google has formally demanded that Microsoft yank its new YouTube app for Windows Phone, which allows users to skip ads and download YouTube videos — both of which violate YouTube's terms of service. The Verge has the full text of Google's cease-and-desist letter, which is dated today.

ReadWrite reported on the Microsoft app's apparent rule-breaking last week.

Updated 10:24am PT on May 16: A Microsoft PR representative emailed us a statement in response to Google's letter:

YouTube is consistently one of the top apps downloaded by smartphone users on all platforms, but Google has refused to work with us to develop an app on par with the apps for other platforms. Since we updated the YouTube app to ensure our mutual customers a similar YouTube experience, ratings and feedback have been overwhelmingly positive. We’d be more than happy to include advertising but need Google to provide us access to the necessary APIs. In light of Larry Page’s comments today calling for more interoperability and less negativity, we look forward to solving this matter together for our mutual customers.

As our developer audience knows, Android is more than simply a phone or tablet. It’s a platform, an ecosystem, and an opportunity for developers around the world to build exciting services and apps that reach millions of people every day. The flexibility and openness of Android provides developers--and Google, through services like Google Now--the opportunity to build simple, beautiful experiences across multiple devices.

Here’s a quick look at what we announced today at Google I/O, our annual developer conference:

Developers, the heart of Google Play 
Just a year after launch, there are now more ways than ever for developers to monetize their apps in Google Play, and for users to discover and enjoy apps and entertainment. We’ve passed 48 billion app downloads, with more than 2.5 billion downloads in the last month alone. Today, we launched a range of new tools, including services for game developers. For users, this means that you’ll be able to challenge your friends on Google+ to real-time multiplayer competitions, or race against them to the top of the leaderboards. (Check out a few of our favorites: World of Goo, Super Stickman Golf 2, Beach Buggy Blitz, Eternity Warriors 2, and Osmos).

Our library is your library: Google Play Music All Access 
Google Play Music All Access is a new monthly music subscription service that lets you listen to millions of songs across your devices. You can create a radio station from any song or artist you love, browse recommendations from our expert music team or explore by genre. And when millions of songs just aren’t enough, Google Play Music lets you combine our collection with your own collection. You can store 20,000 songs for free in the cloud and listen to them alongside the All Access catalog. It’s $9.99 a month, and you can try it free for the first month. Or better yet, start your trial by June 30 and you’ll pay only $7.99 a month.

Google Play for Education: Android goes to school 
Imagine a world in which all classrooms and students are connected to the web. While such a vision will take the efforts of many, Google has contributed to this endeavor through Google Apps and Chromebooks. Today we are excited to expand Google’s education offering by combining the ease and portability of Nexus tablets with highly engaging educational content. Through this new program educators will be able to manage tablets and discover, purchase, and distribute content through Google Play for Education--whether they're in charge of one classroom or one thousand. We’re inviting developers to get started now to create world class educational apps for grades K-12. Schools interested in learning more can sign up here.

Samsung Galaxy S4 on Google Play 
Next month, we are adding a new Android device to the store to join our current lineup of Nexus phones and tablets. We’ve worked closely with Samsung to create a special Samsung Galaxy S4 exclusively for Google Play. It brings together cutting edge hardware from Samsung with Google’s latest software and services -- including the user experience that ships with our popular Nexus devices. Starting June 26, it will be available with no contract for $649, supporting both T-Mobile and AT&T, with LTE.


Hugo Barra VP, Product Management, Android

Posted by Thijs van As, Product Manager

Today we announced Hangouts, a big improvement to Google’s real-time communication services. Instead of different versions of chat, video chat and calling across Google products, Hangouts gives you one consistent way to connect with the people you care about.
What does this mean for your Gmail? You now have the option to switch from the current version of chat to Hangouts. Simply click “Try it out” next to your chat list to switch to Hangouts and give your chat an instant facelift (literally!). You’ll now see the profile photos in the order of your most recent conversations. With Hangouts, you’ll also be able to quickly send messages, have video calls with up to ten people at once, and share photos. You can start a conversation with just one friend or even a whole group.

Hangouts transition effortlessly between desktop and mobile -- in fact, Hangouts will be available in Gmail, Google+, Android phones and tablets, iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch and as a Windows, Mac or Linux desktop application using the Chrome extension. You can start a Hangout on your phone, and pick it up in Gmail right where you left off!
The new Hangouts experience in Gmail is rolling out as an optional switch starting today. Click the “Try it out” button when it appears next to your chat list to switch right away, or you can switch later. Learn more about the new Hangouts here.