News tagged ‘Google’

Apple has joined the Digital Due Process coalition, which is focused on pressing Congress to update the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA).

ECPA was passed by Congress in 1986, before the World Wide Web was even invented and when cell phones were still a rarity. Yet to this day, ECPA is the primary law governing how and when law enforcement can access personal information and private communications stored by communications providers like Google, Facebook, your cell phone company or your ISP.

The aim of the Digital Due Process group is to "simplify, clarify, and unify the ECPA  standards, providing stronger privacy protections for communications and associated data in response to changes in technology and new services and usage patterns, while preserving the legal tools necessary for government agencies to enforce the laws, respond to emergency circumstances and protect the public." Digital Due Process highlights email, mobile location, cloud computing and social networking as new technologies that need to be included in the law. Other coalition members include Amazon, Intel, AT&T, Google and many more.

Research firm Gartner has published sales forecasts for the tablet market, stating that a lack of momentum from competitors will allow iPad to be absolute leader during the holiday shopping season. Looking further ahead, Gartner predicts that Apple will maintain more than 50 percent share of this market segment through 2014 even as Research in Motion’s QNX and Microsoft's Windows 8 platforms are expected to build up some momentum. Research vice president at Gartner Carolina Milanesi explains:

“This is because Apple delivers a superior and unified user experience across its hardware, software and services. Unless competitors can respond with a similar approach, challenges to Apple’s position will be minimal. Apple had the foresight to create this market and in doing that planned for it as far as component supplies such as memory and screen”.

Gartner has lowered its estimates for sales of Android tablets in 2011 by 28% over second quarter’s projections, noting very weak adoption due to its interface issues, high prices and limited app availability.

The company expects that Android will see growth as Google releases its next-generation Android’s "Ice Cream Sandwich" and addresses fragmentation across the Android ecosystem. However, according to Gartner's sales forecasts, Android tablets will not catch up the iPad by the end of projection period of 2015.

MuscleNerd has announced via Twitter that jailbreak utility RedSn0w 0.9.9b1 is released with major update and numerous new features:

Major improvements and features added to redsn0w 0.9.9b1! See update #9 at http://is.gd/6eek4Y Feedback: @redsn0w_testers

Indeed the list of new features is quite high. There are two main ones:

• There is no need to download firmware any more. There is no need to push Browse IPWS button any more (but you still can).
• Developers added lots of functionality to work with SHSH keys (extract, submit, download, verify, stitch etc)

However this new version does not bring features like untethered jailbreak for iOS 4.3.5 or iOS 5.

Due to some possible bugs we still recommend to use the old RedSn0w 0.9.8b7b, but the new 0.9.9b1 is worth seeing and playing with.

Here are links to our RedSn0w 0.9.8b7b iOS 4.3.5 jailbreak tutorials:

• Mac OS: iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, iPad 1, iPod Touch 3G, iPod Touch 4G
• Windows: iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, iPad 1, iPod Touch 3G, iPod Touch 4G

You can download RedSn0w 0.9.9b1 here:

Here is the full list of features from DevTeam:

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According to London-based research company Brand Finance, Apple takes the second position after Google in brand value rating. The 33% increase allowed Apple to overtake Microsoft, Wal-Mart, GE and IBM for the first time. The research firm attributes Apple’s high rating to loyal consumer base, successful marketing activities and innovative design.

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Hewlett-Packard, the ailing computer maker, announced a new iOS app Printer Control with printing and remote control capabilities. Apart from typical set of functions such as automatic printer setup and discovery, troubleshooting cartridge identification, printer status notification this iOS app allows using your iOS device as a scanner and includes scan to Google Docs, scan to email and scan to Facebook capabilities.
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A blog-publishing service Bloogger has become quite popular after Google bought it in 2003. However, the search company neglected the app for iOS until today, when this service debuted for iPhone as a free download app on the App Store. Google states at the Blogger blog that this app allows users to write a blog post and save or publish it from their iOS devices.

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According to Reuters, this morning Apple sued Samsung in Japan and requested the court to block sales of Samsung tablets and phones in the country:

"Apple has filed a suit with the Tokyo District Court seeking the suspension of sales of Galaxy S and its sequel S II smartphones and the Galaxy Tab 7 in Japan, according to sources close to the matter. The first hearing was held on Wednesday, the source said".

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Recently 9to5Mac and AppleInsider have published new evidences showing Apple’s work on a "Find My Friends" service that was originally discovered in iOS 4.3. "Find My Friends" is a location-based friend-finding service like Loopt and Google Latitude. The strings (embedded above) seem to confirm those suspicions:

It includes references to standard social networking functions, like a list of people a user is "following," as well as "pending" and "accepted" follower requests. The code also mentions user statuses, updates, blocking of users and removing followers.

"Find My Friends" will allow you to find your friends who near you in real time by leveraging your mobile phone's GPS signal and using constant updates. This service will also allow you to "follow" or be followed by others.

As it is known, iOS 5 will copy some Android features. Apart from notification system and  system-wide speech-to-text functionality, it was revealed that Apple will also implement Android-like activation of voice recognition Assistant feature.The Google’s promotional video above shows iPhone application for voice-powered search in Google.

As you can see in this video, with the app, you just have to move the iPhone up to your face, speak and in a few seconds Google will show you the page with search results. Apple plans to provide the same functionality to the iOS 5 users for its voice Assistant feature. According to code strings in the iOS 5 SDK, a user will need to put the iPhone to their ear, start speaking and the search results will be shown.

This activation method is much quicker than method in Voice Control. Currently users have to hold down the home button for several seconds to activate the service. Activation method in Assistant will not just rely on the iPhone’s proximity sensor detecting the distance from your ear, but will also rely on data from phone’s motion sensors for accuracy.

Google and Apple, two main parties on the smartphone market, are continuously fighting for consumers especially those who have not yet decided which OS they want to have in their next smartphone. According to Nielsen survey in July 2011, these ‘undecideds’ will be the customers which manufacturers will be hoping to win over. It is interesting that late adopters are least sure among likely smartphone upgraders about their next phone platform.

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The latest developer version of Google’s browser Chrome includes several new improvements. Now the software supports Apple’s multitouch gesturing in OS X Lion. This improvement allow you to flick your finger right or left with Magic Mouse or (two fingers with Trackpad) to go back or forth in your history. However, such gestures as double-tap or pinch can’t be used to smoothly zoom in and out, like in Safari on Lion. With another enhancement you can be assured that accidental hitting of the Command + Q combination will not quit Chrome since to quit the browser you need to hold down the combination for a brief time.

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Today co-founder and CEO of Google Larry Page officially said that their company has acquired one of the largest smartphone manufacturer – Motorola, specifically Motorola Mobility. The company was sold for $12.5 billion, which is 63% more than the closing price of the company on Friday, August 12. This deal has yet to be approved by several official authorities in USA and European Union, as well as Motorola Mobility’s shareholders. All transition processes is expected to finish in the end of 2011 or beginning of 2012.

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Since a raid on Russian payment processing company ChronoPay two month ago, there was not much work for malware defense system of OS X , but a new trojan horse did emerged earlier this month. According to F-Secure, the trojan called "OSX.QHost.WB.A" disguises itself as a Flash Player installer and adds records to a file on the computer’s host to redirect users trying to visit some of Google sites. The server in Netherlands shows a fake webpage that is very similar to the real Google site.

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Google has released an update for its Google+ application for iOS devices, including iPod touch and iPad, which previously were unavailable in this app. Also this update includes improvements in huddle settings, aggregated circle add notifications and usual improvements in performance and stability.

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It is well known that iPad is a fine gaming device. And it looks like Apple is going to improve iPad’s entertainment capabilities as it is a new trend nowadays. Some well-known publishers pay most attention to gaming aspect of the iPad as consumers gradually lose interest in gaming on traditional consoles. Console’s long upgrade cycle, expensive software and hardware for them and allure of touch gaming devices are main contributing factors to the decline of the console business.  Recently The Electronic Arts CEO John Riccitiello said IndustryGamers:

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