It’s Atari Breakout’s 37th anniversary. And what does Google do to commemorate it?

Make an HTML5 game, of course. Google search on “atari breakout” or just go here. And kiss the next 2 hours goodbye.

The question as to why on someone’s green earth did Google buy the phone division of Motorola is still at large, but the hype and anticipation for the end result has been in no shortage. Rumors of everything from 56 core processor to anti-unicorn lasers have been flying around time and time again, but still, we are all clueless.

Now, my friends, enjoy some supposed images of the said X device. My thoughts? What is with that indented bezel? There better be some Apple like sales pitch behind that, or else they could stick it where Apple is heading. Your thoughts?

Most of the privacy advocates think Google Glasses invade privacy. I agree with them to some extent, but public picture taking or video recording is not illegal at least in the USA and India. It comes to just moral sense or commonsense of the camera holder. Keeping it aside, I think the following industries,  would definitely be not happy.

1. Film Industry – with the online piracy already taking toll on some of the film producers and distributors, Google Glass may help the movie pirates easily to record. Sometimes some of the movies streamed on the Internet even before they hit silver screen, and this could expedite that process even faster. You could argue that there are spy goggles already available and movies are being pirated using micro-camcorders, smartphone cameras, pen cameras etc. While they are true, you may have to hold them properly for better recording. But with Google Glasses, you don’t have to because your nose and ears will provide stability for that as long as you are not moving or shaking your head.
   You should expect ban of these from entering theaters. Yes, it may help some of amateur and short film makers, but major industry be not happy.
2. Bars, Clubs and Restaurants – This may not be common but definitely bars/clubs/restaurants have to add a clause to their terms and conditions, otherwise two drunkards one with Google Glass and one without could argue and show.
   There is a bar in Seattle already banned Google Glasses.
3. 911 operators and Traffic Cops – Too many distracted people walking, driving already and this may increase that. West Virginia already banned Google Glasses for drivers.

The main privacy concern I have is if a Google Glass wearing person is standing behind me while I am withdrawing money from a bank ATM machine, his/her God given eyes may not quickly notice the key strokes that enter in the PIN field, but his/her 720p Google God given Glasses would definitely. Even if (s )he may not be intentionally looking, it will definitely worry me.

The industries that benefit from Google Glasses:

1. Attorneys – Civil, Criminal and Traffic cases because of these. No I am not talking about stolen Google Glasses, I am talking about the fights and causalities that may happen because of this.
2. YouTube and other Video Streaming Sites – These sites would get more and more videos at a faster rate.
3. Online Movie and videos indexing sites – yes they say they are not hosting these, but they happily index those and launch many lunatic ads powered by Google AdSense and others. Yes some of the ads are video or audio content living on the sides of the screen without controls to disable or mute them.

Yes, there are definitely uses for Google Glasses and wearable computers, but they are not for mainstream like smart phones.

Disclaimer: Before Simmons questions about my first hand experience with Google God given Glasses, here is my disclaimer.

No Simmons, I am not an attorney, not a 911 operator, not a cop, not a bar/club/restaurant owner, neither a civil rights person. And I own neither a streaming nor movie indexing site. And you are right, I don’t own a Google Glass and haven’t seen one in physical. And I might have written more about Google Glass than anyone from Google itself. And yes my English is not as good as yours, but my computing and engineering skills are better than yours. If you think that is debatable, so be it.

I hope my disclaimer satisfies you,  grammar Nazi of MobilityDigest.com.

Mistakes happen. That is a universal certainty and I’m really not one for conspiracy theories so I’ll just count this as a human mistake. The mistakes aren’t just a matter of copy and pasting the wrong info though. This Wirefly smartphone OS comparison chart has errors that deal with each OS signature feature. Who doesn’t know that Android has a notification center? Sure it is referred to as the notification shade but still everyone knows it’s the same thing. Just like everyone knows that FaceTime is Apple’s integrated video chat service. Windows Phone 8 has NFC and has had it since day one. I have a hard time seeing such major errors not being noticed but like I said I’m not a big fan of conspiracy theories.

Source: Wirefly

You are right we are finding fault with Google for the sake of it. You are right. It is well known fact that Google keeps its products in beta state forever unless they pull the plugs. Yeah, yeah I know, Microsoft does pull plugs on its widely used products and Apple does that and everyone in the industry does that. And among Microsoft, Apple and Google, Google keeps its products in beta mode forever. And now they are into the practice of introducing incompatible stuff. Isn’t it one of the reasons why Microsoft was pulled over and issued pink slip for its dominant position in the industry?

I can give you a sample list of widely used products by small timers unplugged by Google making the consumers of those technologies stranded in a desert looking for water:

• Hotpot
• Google Checkout
• Aardvark
• Google Answers
• Google Base
• Google Docs (not integrated into Google Drive)
• Google Browser Sync
• Google Buzz
• Google Directory
• Google Dictionary
• Google Desktop
• Gears
• Wave
• Google Trends#Google Music Trends
• Writely
• Video Player
• Voice Search
• Google Apps Standard Edition
• Google Sync
• Google Reader – pulled out shortly
• iGoogle – pulled out shortly
• CalDav – pulled out shortly (Remember Microsoft is a small timer when it comes to Windows Phone platform and Google is doing its share to damage it by pulling out CalDav when Microsoft agreed to adopt CalDav. Yeah I know they have whitelisted users and Microsoft is one of them that could still use it, but given the fact that Google deprecates frequently how long this would work. Even though Google dropped Google Sync and stopped supporting EAS it is clearly showing who is trying to abuse their monopoly power).
• and so on

Now when it comes to abuse its monopoly position on the Internet Search (of course ad based) and almost monopoly on mobile platform (Android), they started introducing incompatible stuff

1. WebP (I thought only Microsoft only does bad with naming, but Google leads this with stink).
2. V8 (it reminds me of vegetable juice)
3. and so on

Yeah, I know Microsoft also introduced a lot of incompatible stuff and pulled plugs on a lot of widely used stuff and left the users stranded, but I think Microsoft had been pulled for this by various financially challenged nations to milk. I think Google dollars are working better than Microsoft dollars, I don’t say bribing, but lobbying successfully. If it were not Eric Schmidt’s internal connections with political parties, I think Google would have been chasing the monopoly case by now like Microsoft did in 90s and IBM in 80s for the abuse of power in the ad based searching, and almost monopoly hand in mobile platform.

Ok, I think I am done, now it is your turn.

Microsoft’s Xbox has won a preliminary ruling from an ITC judge that clears them of violating a Google Motorola patent dealing with ”sensor controlled user interface for portable communication device”. This is the last patent (out of 4) that Google Motorola has in their patent case against Microsoft.

It looks for now that the 12.5 billion that Google paid out mostly to secure Motorola’s patent portfolio continues to pay little dividend in return.

Source: Foss Patents

Image: BisNis-jar.com

Google is killing the beloved Google Reader and the internet is upset! Ramon and Marti discuss on Mobility Digest TV. Check out the video below!

Well when you’ve a Surface Pro or any other Windows 8 Laptop with multi touch screen with resolution equal to almost 2k. You could install Chrome browser and follow our awesome Doug Simmons instructions in response to this MobilityDigest Post, Microsoft Web Apps for free.

Simmons said “For all you awesome Chrome users (specifically, 23.4% of you), grab yourself this extension which when you open an email in gmail that has an attachment, next to the download and preview links you’ll have a Save to Drive thing that dumps the attachment right into your root folder on Google Drive.

And here’s one that claims to let you save to Google Drive, SkyDrive, DropBox and Box but I didn’t try it.

I’m sure IE has that sort of functionality built in though.

Oh, here’s another cool Chrome extension that lets you right click any image or the target of any link to save it to Google Drive. Handy for building up your .. stash to have with you anywhere you go if you know what I mean.”

And here is how to run Chrome Web Apps in Chrome browser without need of Chromebook.

My dear fellas unless you have tons money and your hands are itching for a 4k resolution laptop powered by a browser for HTML5 apps, you could technically use your awesome Surface Pro or any other Windows 8 laptop with close to 2k resolution and run Windows store apps, legacy Windows desktop apps, Chrome Apps, and with the help of BlueStacks, your beloved Android apps. Not only these, you could sync iPhone, iPad (with iTunes), Windows Phone and Android Phones. You also could easily integrate with iCloud, Google Drive, SktyDrive and other tons of Cloud storages easily.

The only benefit you get from a Pixel is 12 free sessions of GoGo Inflight Internet (useless unless you fly regularly), and 1 TB of 3 year could storage on Google Drive. I have shown you in different post, How to Expand Surface Storage, that you could get at least 100 GB of cloud storage with options for paid services for more.

Now if a company like BlueStacks provides a way to run millions of iOS fart apps on Windows 8 Tablets and Touch enabled laptops wouldn’t that be “that” tight feeling while standing behind a ballerina beauty who is drinking water stylishly and we are waiting for our turn to drink water from the fountain in New York Central Park on a hot summer day.

Simmons, thanks for the picture.

Now tell us what do you think about having separate Chromebook including Pixel.

Sources: Doug Simmons, diTii.com, BlueStacks

It’s history repeating itself all over again. Back in London almost a year ago the Samsung Galaxy S 3 was announced and it was met with great excitement. The excitement was well placed as the SGS3 has been a huge success for South Korean based Samsung. Here in the United Sates it was no different. The SGS3 sold incredibly well even though it was not quite the same device that launched first in Europe. Because of the LTE markets here in the US, Sammy choose to use the Snapdragon S4 processor instead of the Quad Core Exynos used overseas. Now it appears that it will once again be launched over here with a Snapdragon 600 Quad Core processor instead of the Exynos 5 Octa that will be launched in Europe.

Stay tuned and we will know for sure on March 14th in New York when Sammy will announce the Galaxy S IV. We are trying to get Ramon snuck in the back door, so hopefully we will be live there. Anyone know someone who might know someone friendly with the front door guy?

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They say impersonation is the sincerest form of flattery. Well I guess Apple could feel extremely flattered right now. Samsung continues to borrow heavily from Apple’s software and hardware design language. It has helped them rise to the top of the smartphone market and just when you think they have their own complete identity they launch Samsung Wallet. No not Google Wallet, Samsung Wallet.

Managing to stoke the ires of the Cupertino giant and ruffle the feathers of Google. Samsung Wallet is a clear attempt at pushing the Samsung brand while launching a feature that is meant to ease the transition for potential iOS converts. I have no problem with pushing your brand, that is what you’re supposed to do if you want to be successful. The problem I have here is that without much effort you can clearly see that the Korean tech giant fixed their eyes solely on Apple’s passbook. To complicate matters Samsung is clearly going in on the Wallet experience solo and separating itself from Google Wallet. It is simply the latest sign that Samsung views themselves as above the fray and Android brand. This is the type of behavior that Google has become wary of.

Like Apple’s Passbook, Samsung Wallet is able to deliver time and location based push notifications, notifying you when you are near a store or location that you can use a Wallet card. Always connected, membership cards and boarding passes can be updated in real-time.

Is this the year the digital wallet takes off? With Apple and now Samsung ready to push their own solutions 2013 might just be the year we get to use one of the most convenient digital solutions of 2012.

Source: The Next Web