As you’ve likely heard, Google recently acquired Sparrow, the popular email app for both the Mac and iPhone. Along with the acquisition, Google made it clear that no further updates or changes would be pushed to the Mac and iPhone, and that the Sparrow team will be merging with the Gmail team.
People never like change, though, and the Google-Sparrow acquisition is no exception. Within just days of the announcement, a petition to keep Sparrow alive has popped up on the web.
An interesting report comes from All Things D today, detailing a argument from Google against Apple. Unsurprisingly, the discussion revolves around patents, particularly standard essential patents (SEP). Basically, Google is suggesting that when technologies become popular enough, even if they are proprietary, they should become public standards, available to everyone.
All public companies are required to file congressional lobbying disclosure reports, which were released today for the second quarter of 2012. Interestingly enough, Google has once again outspent Apple by a margin of nearly 10 to 1.
As revealed by the reports, Google spent just shy of $4 million, coming in at $3,920,000, while Apple spent only $470,000 in Q2.
Tongue firmly in cheek, my buddy Rob Beschizza over at Boing Boing explains the best way for fans of Sparrow to prepare their Macs for all future enhancements and developments that may result from today’s announcement of a Google acquisition.
You might want to wait on actually following these instructions until Sparrow Google Plus integration comes down the pipeline.
Source: BoingBoing
Popular third-party email client Sparrow has announced that it has been acquired by Google. The iPhone and Mac app will remain unchanged, but all development of new features has been discontinued. Sparrow has promised to continue supporting its user base as it transitions into becoming part of the Google family.
Google will merge the talented team at Sparrow with the Gmail team.
If you have a tendency to drop your expensive gadgets, and you’re looking for something a little more robust than the iPad, you should probably check out Google’s new Nexus 7. According to this drop test from warranty provider SquareTrade, Google’s $199 slate handles drops and water damage better than the new iPad.
Apple has been granted what has been described as “the mother of all software patents,” which covers a whole host of features that Apple pioneered with the iPhone. Not only is this huge for Apple in its fight against copycats, but it could have a significant affect on almost every single device that rivals the iPhone or the iPad.
If you’ve recently typed “weather” into Google search on your mobile phone, you may have noticed Google’s neat little interactive weather visualizations. The new weather visualizations give you a look at the current forecast, precipitation, wind direction/speeds, as well as an hourly and ten-day forecast. And now, these same cool visualizations are available in search on tablets.
Did you know that people on the internet still make unboxing videos? I didn’t. I thought that fad came to a halt back in 2009, but apparently I was wrong. YouTube was hit with a tidal wave of new unboxing videos as people finally got their hands on Google’s new iPad competitor, the Nexus 7. Not only is it not as good as the iPad, but it’s a super huge pain in the ass open. Just check out the video and chuckle as poor Android fans have to result to using collar stays and butcher knives to get at their precious new tablet.
Source: YouTube
Thanks: Vincent
We’re nearly halfway through July, and while the vast majority of us are enjoying the summer weather (unless you live in the U.K. where it continues to rain), retailers are already preparing for Christmas. U.K. retailer Currys and PC World just published its of predictions for the top ten gifts this holiday, and at number four it lists an “Apple mystery device” with pricing to be confirmed.
Could this mystery device be the upcoming iPad mini?
Google has released a major update to its Google+ iOS app that brings full support to the iPad’s Retina display. Borrowing from the Android version, Google+ on the iPad relies heavily on images and sports a very clean, minimal interface. The iPhone version of Google+ was updated weeks ago with a similarly clean UI, probably due to the fact that Google acquired Kevin Rose’s talent at the app development firm Milk.
In today’s update, the location-based Google+ Events feature has been integrated into the universal app. You can attach photos directly from your device’s Camera Roll and add them to your posts. You can also start and join hangouts in-app and stream them to your TV using AirPlay.
Back in February it was discovered that Google was bypassing Apple’s privacy settings in Mobile Safari on iOS. The search giant was making ad revenue from Safari users’ web activity by ‘tricking’ the default iOS browser to allow multiple tracking cookies.
6 months later, and Google is about to pay the “largest penalty ever levied on a single company” by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC). Google will pay $22.5 million to settle the charges issued by the FTC, and the code in question has already been disabled by Google in Safari on iOS.
Despite months of speculation, many doubted Google would ever bring its terrific Chrome browser to iOS. But the search giant has put an end to the rumors by finally releasing it, and it’s kicking off this week’s must-have apps roundup. We also have a new weather app for those who like to keep it simple, arguably the best Google Analytics client for iOS, and more.
Following yesterday’s report from Bloomberg that revealed Apple plans to release the long-awaited iPad mini this September, a new report from The Wall Street Journal has this morning added even further credence to those claims.
According to “people familiar with the matter,” Apple’s suppliers are preparing for mass production of a new iPad with a display smaller than 8 inches, which is expected to begin in September.
The brand-spanking new Google Nexus 7 is arguably the biggest non-Apple tablet announcement since Amazon debuted the Kindle Fire. With a starting price of $200, the Nexus 7 isn’t really intended to be an iPad killer, although Google wouldn’t mind cutting out a piece of Apple’s pie.
The guys at iFixit recently tore down the Google Nexus 7, and their findings revealed that a one millimeter difference in thickness makes Google’s tablet infinitely more repairable than Apple’s iPad.
Following Apple’s Google’s leap into 3D mapping technologies, Amazon has acquired a 3D mapping startup of its own. The online retail giant today sealed a deal to purchase UpNext in a move that could signal the company’s intentions to bring 3D maps to its Kindle Fire slate without any assistance from Google.
Until Tim Cook climbs onto the roof of Apple’s Cupertino headquarters and shouts, “we will never build an iPad mini” at the top of his voice, the rumors will continue to circulate. The latest comes from “various analysts” who claim the upcoming iPad mini will feature a 7.85-inch IGZO display from Sharp, and will start at just $249.
Although it sometimes doesn’t understand everything you say, it’s hard not to like Siri. After all, the voice-controlled assistant has made it easier then ever to perform all kinds of tasks on a smartphone using only the natural language that we use on a daily basis. But as we are well aware, Siri isn’t perfect.
Especially when it comes to answering your questions. In fact, Apple analyst Gene Munster believes she’s still two years behind Google after she only managed to answer 68% of the 800 questions he asked in a quiet room.
Google finally released its hugely popular Chrome web browser for iOS yesterday, and just as we had expected, it’s the best third-party browser so far. In fact, in many ways, it’s also better than Apple’s built-in mobile Safari browser. And you can now use Chrome as your default browser on your jailbroken iPhones, iPads, and iPod touches, thanks to the BrowserChooser tweak.
Gizmodo reported today that their new MacBook Air was crashing something fierce. They turned to their own forums and the Apple Support forums and found that many other users of the MacBook Air also had the crashing issue. Both parties saw improvements when they stopped using Google’s star web browser, Chrome, but no one could be sure.
They even checked on the MacRumors forums, finding the same issue. Then, they heard from Google.
If you’re a New York Times subscriber, you’ll be pleased to know that you can now enjoy full access your favorite content via Flipboard, one of the best news readers available on iOS. Even those who don’t subscribe still get a little treat: free access to the publication’s “Top News” section.
Whew, what a day. Day 1 of Google I/O was full of sky diving, rappelling, biking, oh yea… and cool gadgets and software!
With iOS 6, Apple is finally ditching Google as a maps partner and releasing their own custom maps solution, built upon partnerships with companies like TomTom and using their own technology acquired from companies like C3.
How costly would it be for Apple to compete with Google Maps head-on, though, by building their own mapping system from the ground-up without any outside deals? More than you might think: in fact, Apple might have to increases its global workforce by 50%.
At Google’s own answer to WWDC, the annual I/O conference, the search giant just announced its own answer to Siri: a radically overhauled version of Google Voice Search.
Before his tragic and untimely death last October, Steve Jobs’s chronic health issues were such a constant concern for investors that they arguably kept the stock price of the company artificially low for years, as Wall Street worried that the company would tank without its charismatic leader at the helm.
Obviously, that hasn’t happened. In fact, since Jobs’s death, Apple’s share price has soared to new highs. As sad as it is to say, in some ways, Jobs’s death finally liberated the stock from the hyperbolic threat of his death, and allowed investors to finally appraise the company as it actually is: the best on Earth, even without Steve, because he made it that way.
But Wall Street never learns. Since Google CEO Larry Page called in sick to last week’s annual meeting, investors are panicking.