Google Play: Google aims to build a digital entertainment hub - latimes.com
Google launches a content hub to bring together music, books and apps. Whether it can “compete head to head with iTunes” (as stated the authors) is a far fetched, long term consideration given the lack of traction achieved by Google Music to date.
Self-styled ‘hobbyist’ data analyst Chris Sauve has a great post up on his blog PXLDOT that illustrates this point well. He recently ran the numbers on Android platform fragmentation and wanted to continue the discussion with some stats about iOS. The findings are dramatic and do a lot to explain the frustration that developers have with Android.
One of the most descriptive charts is this one, which dramatically demonstrates just how fast iOS adoption rates are when compared to Android. Look at the vertical shape of the iOS 5.x curve when compared to Gingerbread, Android’s latest version besides the brand new Ice Cream Sandwich, which doesn’t even register on this scale.
(via Developers Love iOS for A Lot of Reasons, This is One.)
Pool Worldwide created a first person shooter on top of Google Maps street view (called Google Shoot View) - a tad violent, but looks well done. Obviously, Google has shut them down.
Pool Worldwide created a first person shooter on top of Google Maps street view (called Google Shoot View) - a tad violent, but looks well done. Obviously, Google has shut them down.
Google's Management Doesn't Use Google+ | the understatement
If the public uses it, and early reports indicate some are starting to, this doesn’t particularly matter. That said, it’s not a great look. I’m sure that once docs integration gets a bit closer, we might see some increase - but who knows.
"Look at Google’s financial results. They reported $8.5 billion in net income this year, and $6.5 billion last year. That’s for all of Google. They’re offering $12.5 billion for Motorola. So Google just spent almost two years of its profits to buy a second-rate phone maker that itself is unprofitable, almost went bankrupt, and is arguably only the third-best maker of Android devices, behind HTC and Samsung."
- Gruber also lays it to Dan Lyons, but also illustrates the position Google was in, and how Motorola had the upper hand allowing them to go beyond simply selling their patent portfolio, but selling the whole business and a high margin. via Daring Fireball
"This all raises the question: over the past two years, would you have gained more knowledge by reading Lyons, or by having your head up your own ass?
Tough call.
"
- MG Siegler absolutely dismantles Dan Lyons here. You wonder why Lyons wouldn’t give this a little more thought given the provocative nature of his comments and the spotlight on this topic. Definitely worth a read.
Google+ Project: It’s Social, It’s Bold, It’s Fun, And It Looks Good
Google+, Google’s big social investment, revealed (in limited amounts) by MG Siegler at TechCrunch. Look forward to seeing this in action.
PostRank acquired by Google | StartupNorth
Congrats to the whole PostRank team. Exciting to see a local startup see an out like this.
A well done ad by Google. I don’t remember seeing anything done by Google that makes such a good connection between emotion and use-case. via John Gruber
Edit: Not everyone seems to love it, though. The other side of the coin is that Google is asking to store all kinds of personal family data on their servers so they can know more about you. The question then becomes, what are they selling? See that here.
A well done ad by Google. I don’t remember seeing anything done by Google that makes such a good connection between emotion and use-case. via John Gruber
Edit: Not everyone seems to love it, though. The other side of the coin is that Google is asking to store all kinds of personal family data on their servers so they can know more about you. The question then becomes, what are they selling? See that here.
Google Launching "Chrome Web Store"
Google is launching an app store for web applications, the Chrome Web Store, the company announced at Google I/O, its developer conference.” As great as the App Store is, there is a lot to be seen in web apps - both for desktop and mobile computing. As the bar gets continually raised and aggregators like this start showing up, I think we’ll starting becoming much more aware of the great web applications that are out there.
Hey, Google, Apple Just Got Into The Search Business!
The tech industry is so interesting to watch right now - it’s been escalating to this point for years. Strangely, I was just thinking how neat it is to watch these three major companies - Google, Apple and Microsoft - shift and position themselves and one of the first thoughts that came to mind was, imagine if the United States had three viable political parties. That would be interesting too (for a change)… the mind wonders.
“What’s at stake? Nothing less than the future. Microsoft wants computing to continue to be tied to the desktop — three screens and a cloud, as Ballmer is fond of saying. For Apple, it’s all about closed information appliances with lots of third-party apps, computers anybody can use. And for Google, all roads lead to the internet, and the internet is synonymous with Google.”
via Gizmodo.
Apple’s Spat With Google Is Getting Personal - NYTimes.com
An interesting look at the tensions between the two companies, and some consideration for the broader industry implications. Not surprising in any way, but a shame in some; I am nearly exclusive to the offerings of both.
