Android - page 37

Kicking Google Maps to the curb last year in favor of its own homegrown solution caused quite a stir last year for Apple. Most of the rage over Apple Maps has died down, but Google’s former CEO, Eric Schmidt, sees no reason why things can’t be repaired.

In fact, Schmidt admitted today that Google would love to work with Apple to set Google Maps as the primary navigation tool on iOS. With tensions between the two companies still being tight, we’d say there’s not a slim chance in hell of that happening, but Schmidt thinks it could.

Even though there are rumors that Facebook and Apple might be working to bring Facebook Home to iOS, it’s hard to believe Apple would give up so much control of iOS to Facebook.

For those craving for some Facebook Home action on iOS, there’s a new Facebook app update that will bring the most buzzed-about features of Facebook Home to your iPhone: “Chat Heads.”

Microsoft is designing a new smartwatch that could allow it to compete with upcoming devices from the likes of Apple, Google, and Samsung, The Wall Street Journal reports. The company has already asked suppliers in Asia to ship components for the device, which will reportedly boast a “touch-enabled” display.

Steam! That’s what Steve Jobs would have had rocket from his ears when he heard about Facebook Home. We’ll explain why on our newest CultCast, but also covet aloud the one feature we hope Apple borrows for iOS. Plus, inside Leander Kahney’s Jony Ive book; Ron Johnson father of the Apple Store takes a boot to the rear; and we wrap with an all new Faves ‘N Raves, the segment where we pitch our favorite tech and apps then vote on which one’s best!

Stream or download new and past episodes of The CultCast on your Mac or iDevice by subscribing now on iTunes, or hit play below and let the good times roll.

Click on through for the show notes.

Nuff said.

Source: Twitter

Yeah, that’s a bit of sarcasm up there in the hed; there’s obviously no lack of choice regarding Bluetooth speakers. This year’s CES exploded with Bluetooth, and it doesn’t seem a day goes by that a manufacturer doesn’t release another model.

iHome is more about, well, more; so instead of releasing one, they’ve released four.

I’m sitting here bobbin’ my head to these fresh playlists, straight outta Liberty City, Chinatown, Vice City, and other locations in Rockstar’s flagship series of games, Grand Theft Auto.

I’m not playing the games through, either. All the songs are set up in Spotify and iTunes by Rockstar itself, from the radio stations in the GTA series, including Grand Theft Auto IV, Episodes from Liberty City, San Andreas, Vice City and more.

Looks like this whiteout winter may finally be waning. Time to soak up a little sunshine; so grab your bike, backpack, rod, oars, harness and a Pocket Ranger official State Park Guide app for Android or iOS and get yourself outside. Why a Pocket Ranger app? Because it’s stuffed full of info about anything and everything related to state parks in your area — for free.

Samsung just announced a mega-sized phone. It’s freaking big. Like, it’s almost as big as the iPad mini, kind of. It’s called the Samsung Galaxy Mega 6.3, and it’s got a ridiculously huge 6.3-inch display.

If the Galaxy Note II was a puny “phablet” with its 5.5-inch display, then we have no idea what to nickname this gargantuan “phone.” Just look at how monstrous it is next to the iPhone 5! Have fun taking calls on that in public.

Source: Reddit

No one wants to own a Blackberry. That’s the takeaway from a new poll which asks people which device they’d never be caught dead using. There aren’t many people who wouldn’t be caught dead buying an iPhone, though.

Piper Jaffray has once again asked the teenage blight upon our fair nation to stop popping pimples and sexting for a second to tell them what gadgets they want to buy next year. And, duh, it’s the iPhone.

Thanks to those leaked screenshots that appeared on Tuesday, we’re pretty confident that Google Babel is no longer just a rumor, but a real product that’s patiently waiting to get its grand unveiling. And according to sources that are familiar with Google’s plans, it’s worth getting excited about.

They claim Babel aims to be “everything we have ever asked for in a unified messenger service,” with cross-platform syncing and a “first class iOS experience.”

To stay on top of its prediction game, analyst firm Piper Jaffray’s just finished its 25th bi-annual teen survey to find out what all the cool kids are doing with tech and what do they want next.

The survey found that Apple is the most desired tech brand by teens, but Google has made some improvement compared to last year. Yet while analysts are still busy predicting the demise of Apple, 48% of teens in the survey say they own an iPhone, and 62% say they plan to buy one next.

Topeka Capital analyst Brian White received some criticism last week when he revealed in a note to investors that he expects Apple’s much-anticipated television set to come with a “mini iTV” tablet and an “iRing.” But rather than going into hiding until the whole thing is forgotten about, White has revealed his predictions for the iPhone 5S.

The device will be available with “at least” two screen sizes, White claims, giving those who might switch to Android for a larger display a reason to stick with the iPhone.

WhatsApp has denied that it is holding sales talks with Google following reports that the company is on the verge of a $1 billion buyout. One source claimed last week that the hugely popular cross-platform messaging service has been in talks with Google for the last 4-5 weeks, but WhatsApp’s business development lead, Neeraj Arora, denies any discussions.

The App Store and Google Play continued to drive mobile app downloads during the first quarter of 2013, while BlackBerry World and the Windows Phone Store remain “distant challengers.”

That’s according to the latest figures from Canalys, which say a whopping 13.4 billion apps were downloaded across these four stores over the last three months, raking in $2.2 billion in app sales, in-app purchases, and subscriptions.

Remember Lodsys, the patent troll that began suing a bunch of indie iOS developers back in 2011 over their use of in-app purchases? Well, it’s back to do more trolling. The company has targeted another ten mobile game makers in its latest complaints, which it has been quietly filing in an East Texas court throughout 2013.

The studios named include Gameloft, Walt Disney, BackFlip Studios, and Gamevil.

Cult of Mac Deals is ffering you a great deal on a service that makes backing up easy. With SOS Online Backup you can backup 100 GB of your files for three years – and you can do it in a secure online backup application so you can share, access, and maintain all of your important files right in one place. This award winning automatic backup web application that will have you covered on up to five PCs, Macs, Android devices, iPhones, and iPads.

With this deal you can free up 100GB of space on your gadgets for just $29. That’s a savings of 88%!

Real Racing 3 is set to get its first update since hitting the App Store back in February, and it’s going to be a big one. In addition to adding two new cars, users will see more than 100 new events, a new game mode, and iCloud save syncing. EA has published a teaser trailer ahead of the update’s release, which shows off the new cars.

Google has confirmed that it will drop WebKit for its own rendering engine called Blink in “around 10 weeks.” The company has already begun testing Blink in Chrome Canary builds — the beta version of its popular browser — but it will rollout the change to stable Chrome builds with version 28 for both desktops and Android devices.

There seem to be two ways to make a Wi-Fi-enabled camera. The first is to build an actual camera and add a Wi-Fi radio. The second is to make an iPod Touch with a decent 5MP camera module inside. Depending on your requirements, either one can be great.

But there now appears to be a third way. Samsung has taken a camera, added an Android phone, and then taken away the phone part of that phone. Behold! The Wi-Fi Galaxy Camera.

Today Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg unveiled “Home,” his company’s new experience on Android devices. Rumors leading up to today’s event said that Facebook has been working on its own Android device in conjunction with HTC, and that has turned out to be true.

Zuckerberg started by explaining how modern smartphones are built around different apps that communicate with people, and that Facebook wants to switch that paradigm and focus on people first. Home allows you to quickly interact with your Facebook account anywhere from your device, including the lockscreen.

Rovio has today announced that it will be bringing the hugely popular Facebook game Angry Birds Friends to Android and iOS. The game is very similar to the rest of the titles in the Angry Birds series, only it has a strong focus on social gaming rather than playing alone.

Madfinger Games announced a massive update to its flagship First Person Shooter (FPS) game on iOS and Android today. There are new maps, weapons, and game content, each of which was created directly from player feedback, including the new “friends” feature.

Rookie players now have a new Special Tutorial mode, while veterans will be glad to see new booster packs for speed, armor, damage, accuracy, and invisibility, along with several game optimizations, bug fixes, and new gamepad support.

Android may have a larger share of the smartphone market than iOS, but Apple’s Safari browser is still king of the mobile web. According to the latest market share data from Net Applications, Safari accounted for 61.79% of the mobile web traffic throughout March.