Posts tagged with "google"

Back to the “iWallet”, Apple Allegedly Considering A BOKU Acquisition

According to a rumor published by TechCrunch, Google and Apple are keeping an eye on mobile payments startup BOKU, which allows users to complete online transactions by simply entering their phone number and confirming the purchase with a text from their phone. A simple and unobtrusive system that could really eliminate the need of credit cards and banks online: charges will be added to your wireless monthly bill. Boku has closed deals with carriers worldwide, including AT&T in the U.S.

Apple seems to be really committed to turning the iPhone into a digital wallet-like device you can use to buy stuff on the go and / or online, as we speculated in rumors surfaced earlier this year. Yesterday, Cult of Mac reported Apple not only wants to develop an “iWallet” based on NFC technology – they’re aiming at remote Mac controlling as well. Read more

Apple Grabs 26% Of U.S. Smartphone Market, Google Leads With 44%

According to Canalys’ latest report, Apple grabbed 26% of the U.S. smartphone market (still considered the biggest and most relevant in the world) but Google, thanks to its multitude of devices running Android, is still leading with nearly 44%.

The numbers, which refer to Q3 2010, also show that Apple really took the lead from RIM, stuck at 24%. Nokia is still leading the worldwide share with a resonant 33%, and Google’s share is expected to increase as more devices running Froyo and the future Android Gingerbread ship.

In the meantime, Apple somehow managed to obtain a 50% worldwide profit share with the iPhone. Not bad.

On iPhone, Android And People’s Perception

I was watching Chuck last night, and just like every episode recently aired I noticed there were many iPads and iPhones around. I don’t know if this is a trend amongst producers or Apple paying for product placement, but the thing is - Apple products are everywhere in today’s TV shows. I’m referring to “TV shows” as it’s the only kind of content coming from television networks I regularly consume nowadays.

So while I was watching and yet another iPhone showed up, my girlfriend - who is not exactly a “tech savvy” type - said: “Look, another iPhone 4”. The same happens every single time in the other shows we follow.

I also noticed, though, that there are other kinds of gadgets showing up every once in a while, namely non-Apple cellphones. They’re usually Motorola, HTC, Samsung Galaxy devices (I also spotted a Nexus One on Chuck) running, as you may guess, Android. I know those are Android devices, and when I see them I usually whisper “look, that’s an Android phone”. But I know those are Android devices, because I’m a geek who’s interested in technology and reads dozens of tech blogs every day. Do regular people notice these products at all? Read more

Gmail Mobile: Snappier on iOS 4, Still Featuring Fuzzy Graphics

If you use Gmail as your default email client and you happen to use it on your iPhone browser as well (because quite frankly, it’s just better than Mail.app) you may have noticed that Google rolled out a few changes in the past weeks.
The Google Mobile team made Gmail snappier with a much smoother scrolling on iOS 4 and managed to fix that weird issue with scrollbars continuously moving when scrolling the page. Gmail mobile has fixed scrollbars now. Yay. Read more

Chromium for Mac Gets Spiffy Google Instant Integration

I love Google Instant: since Google launched its new real-time updating version of the search engine last month, I’ve been using it regularly and, yeah, I like it. A lot. I know many people are out there would like to revert back to the old “type and press enter” system but hey - this is where we’re going. Sorry if you don’t like it.

For as much as I love Google Instant, when I’m in my browser I don’t really fancy manually opening Google.com every time I need to fire up a new query. My searches start from the new Omnibar instead (Google’s definition of the address bar) because the Cmd + L shortcut is just too useful and fast. For this reason, I’ve been looking forward to the Google team baking Google Instant right into the browser and finally, we Mac users can have it: the Chromium trunk channel for Mac was updated earlier today to include support for Instant right out of the box. Read more

On Rules and Android “Openness”

Short version: every ecosystem needs rules. Otherwise, it’s a mess.

Long version: I wanted to briefly inform you about my take on Android’s purported “openness” and the need of rules and control on a mobile platform. Openness is good: everyone wants to be able to have a choice, choices make us feel in control of almost every situation. With computers, choices mean we can decide how to operate a machine. With mobile devices, choices have (sadly) come down to choosing whether or not you want to browse with Flash or find any kind of application in a marketplace. Read more

Google Goggles Now Available in Google iPhone App

Finally, I’ve been waiting for this: with a post on the official company blog Google has just announced that the Google Mobile iPhone app has been updated to include support for Google Goggles, the free service that allows you to search by taking pictures. An iPhone version of the popular Android-only service was first announced in June.

The app isn’t available yet in the US Store (I guess it’s still propagating). Check out the video below.

Update: the app is now live in the App Store. Update #2: I took a quick test, the app works great. Check out my screenshots below.

Read more