Google 5.0 for iOS released, integrates Google Maps, adds iPhone 6-friendly design
Google has unveiled Google 5.0 for iOS, a new release of its search tool for iPhone and iPad.
Version 5, which incorporates functionality from Google Now, has been rebuilt from the ground up to add a number of new features, plus show off a new look and feel that’s been designed around the new iPhone 6 product family.
Countdown to Armageddon -- Google Earth API will be dead in 1 year!
In the grand scheme of things, we aren't far removed from a time when most people thought the Earth was flat. Yes, we went from thinking a boat could sail off of the edge of the world, to landing a spacecraft on a comet -- crazy, right?
When Google Earth was first released, it was a mind-boggling program. It allowed users to easily navigate a virtual Earth; a high-tech globe, if you will. While people take it for granted, the search-giant's offering remains wonderful. Unfortunately for developers, Google is killing the Earth API.
Apple customers can now pay online using PayPal
If you're looking for a new way to hand your money over to Apple, you're in luck. It's been a long time coming, but Apple now accepts PayPal payment in both the US and the UK online stores. Accepting this method of online payment is something that customers have wanted for some time, but Apple has previously been reluctant to embrace PayPal.
In fact, PayPal was only recently given the cold shoulder by Apple. The company was ignored when Apple Pay was introduced earlier in the year. It seems that relations between the two companies have improved -- there is money to be made, after all.
YouTube embraces animated GIFs with new beta sharing feature
YouTube is a great source of entertainment, but don't you wish that sometimes people would just cut to the chase? There are plenty of videos of epic length, often comprising a massive build up to a short punchline. Why not cut the crap and get to the point?
One way to do this when re-sharing YouTube videos is to convert the interesting portion into an animated GIF, saving viewers time and bandwidth. YouTube itself is getting in on the web's rekindled interest in animated GIFs. A new beta program has been opened up that lets YouTube users transform lengthy videos into snapper clips of up to six seconds in length.
Razer announces studio-grade Seirēn Digital Microphone -- the question is, why?
A company's brand is something very important. Quite frankly, once a brand is blemished or diluted, it can be very hard to recover. If a restaurant has a food-poisoning incident, foodies are not quick to forget. Dilution though, is a bigger issue, as brands often lose focus on their DNA. What do I mean by this? A good example is Polaroid. The brand used to be synonymous with photography, but now, after a series of business calamities, the name brand is essentially rented out to the highest bidder. The result is you see low-end televisions and tablets with the name Polaroid, and the brand is diluted and cheapened.
True, there is nothing wrong with a company looking to expand its offerings, as long as it stays true to the brand image. Today, PC-gaming hardware manufacturer Razer announces a slight diversion from its typical brand focus, with a new studio-grade microphone, called the Seirēn. Can it be used for gaming? Sure, I suppose so, but it is not designed for it. Instead the focus is on music recording and audio streaming. The question for me is, why?
Google's new design language will add functionality across devices
Google wants to get all of the platforms updated to Material Design -- the new design language first previewed at Google I/O this year.
Android Wear has been waiting for the Lollipop update for quite some time, after Nexus, Google Play Edition and some OEM (original equipment manufacturers) gained early updates to the new OS update.
HiPER Calc Scientific is a powerful free calculator
Windows Calculator has improved a great deal in recent years. It still opens in a very basic "standard" view, but you also get Scientific, Programmer and Statistics modes, along with unit conversions, date calculations and more.
The free HiPER Calc Scientific seems a little basic by comparison, as it’s "just" a regular scientific calculator. But it’s compact, portable, and has more than enough functions and features to make it interesting.
Raspberry Pi to blast off into space
Two Raspberry Pi computers are going to be sent into space as part of a competition to get children inspired by coding and space exploration.
The Astro Pi project will take place from the middle of January and will see the devices sent to the International Space Station (ISS), containing code written by primary and secondary school children.
Best Windows 8 apps this week
One-hundred and nine in a series. Welcome to this week's overview of the best apps and games released for Windows 8 in the last seven days.
Microsoft sent out invites yesterday for an event in January where it will talk about the next chapter of the Windows 10 operating system. Check out Wayne's post for information on the event.
Close annoying web popups with Overlay Blocker (Chrome)
It happens all the time. You’re browsing a website, engrossed in the content, when suddenly an overlay appears and blocks your view. Annoying, even when it’s displaying useful information.
Usually clicking the "x" close button will get rid of the popup, and you can carry on as you were. But if there is no "x", or it’s been carefully hidden, then you might need a little help.
Google working hard to improve its Cardboard VR headset
Google Cardboard, when compared to big virtual reality names like the Oculus Rift and Sony’s Project Morpheus, might seem like a bad joke. The tech giant, however, is prepared to show the world it’s serious about its cardboard-based headset.
The company has launched a new web page for the low-cost VR, one which collects the best apps for download as well as showcases new SDKs for Android and Unity devs to play around with.
Seagate's 8TB Archive HDD ships in January, and I want one!
I am a huge, huge fan of SSDs. They're blazing-fast, resistant to external shocks and, let's not forget, they are also energy-efficient. What's not to love about that? They're, quite frankly, the only storage solutions I want to use in my laptops, and the only type of storage solutions I can wholeheartedly recommend. (You can probably tell just how excited I am about SSDs, right?)
But, there are two (some might say major) downsides to SSDs, which go hand in hand: cost and capacity. To get a decently-sized SSD, one has to spend considerably more than for a HDD of the same capacity. In fact, the difference is huge. For instance, a 1 TB Seagate Barracuda HDD goes for around $50 on Amazon, while an SSD of the same capacity from Samsung (840 EVO family) costs around $420, on the same site. Also, SSDs don't usually go above the 1 TB mark, which makes them a poor choice for large file storage. That's where a HDD shines. And what better HDD to use for, let's say, long-term storage of movie collections than the soon-to-ship 8 TB Seagate Archive?
Knowledge-based marketing system delivers streamlined social interaction
Social marketing has become an increasingly popular option for companies, but delivering it often involves using a number of different tools to handle publishing, monitoring of campaigns and more.
To streamline the process brand and audience specialist Parllay has announced some new integrated, knowledge-based tools. Parllay Studio is a complete content marketing and trend Intelligence platform powered by a semantic knowledge engine.
Expanding on 'New Questions in Mobile'
Benedict Evans recently wrote an insightful piece exploring new questions for the mobile industry. Among the five questions he brought up, I believe that the evolution of interaction models and messaging will end up being the most important.
I don't have anything to add there as think Benedict's analysis here was excellent. However, I do think that three of his questions could benefit from deeper analysis. I also think that he may have missed a crucial question brought on by the scale of the mobile industry.
Xbox One finally outsells PlayStation 4 -- Sony unlikely to be losing any sleep over the news
Since Microsoft and Sony’s next generation consoles launched in late 2013, PlayStation 4 has been outselling the Xbox One very, very comfortably. In fact, just a month ago I reported that the PS4 had sold double that of its rival in the first year.
However, in November Microsoft’s console finally managed to claim the top spot, helped in no small part by a price cut and some decent software launches coming into the holiday season.
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