So GMail has rolled out a brand new feature known as Google Buzz and it intends to integrate a whole bunch of features right into your inbox. Surprisingly enough, when I logged into GMail, I was greeted with the following page.
If you haven’t been invited yet, you can directly opt to try out Buzz by going to Google Buzz.
GMail has always been awesome with rolling out better and newer features and integrating them right into the inbox. First it was just email, and then came chat, video chat, and with Labs features enabled, we could do much more with our plain old GMail inbox.
GMail Buzz intends to take it to the next level with the integration of other Google services such as Reader, Picasa etc. as well as other social networking services such as Twitter, Flickr all in one place – your inbox. And it is indeed very simple to get started, as seen below I integrated my twitter account.
All this means just one thing; Google is trying to bank on its GMail services to get back into the social networking arena [after Orkut having lost the match to twitter/ facebook etc]. Sharing links, content etc is all going to be integrated in your inbox.
It is also available on your mobile phone. For more details visit this link [ Google Mobile Blog post: Introducing Buzz for Mobile ]
The 30 odd minutes or so that I got to play around with the Google Nexus One of a friend were one of the fastest 30 minutes on earth. I spent those most precious 30 minutes having a proper run-through the UI, the phones hardware and software and most importantly comparing it with the market leader and benchmark -iPhone 3GS. In this post, we’ll just keep it to what we thought of the Google Nexus One as a phone which stands up for itself.
Screen: Awesome and bright OLED capacitive touchscreen flaunting a 800X480 resolution. The size of the screen is 3.5″ which is a bit smaller than the Droid’s 3.7″. But the OLED means brighter pictures and lesser power consuming – hence longer battery life.
Although the overall design is essentially HTC, the aesthetics of the hardware are appealing. Very curvy and smoothened edges and the back feels non-plasticky, which is always a plus point.
For all the people who have craving for an Android Phone, but still holding back due to unwilligness to shell out megabucks on the Motorola Milestone or the new Google Nexus One, here’s some good news. Unlike HTC’s smaller screen HTC Tatoo, or T-mobile Pulse, LG’s newly launched LG InTouch GW620 is just right for your pocket. Similar to other smartphones of the Android genre, it has a 3 inch touchscreen with QWERTY keyboard.
The customised Android interface sports a social-networking app called Linkbook, which integrates Facebook and Twitter accounts. The Android build is an earlier one [possibly Android 1.5 or 1.6] and hence, does not support Flash [but well, you can root it]. Other goodies included are the 3.5mm jack, Wi-Fi, 5MP camera and Micro-SD slot to increase the storage space and most importantly, an HSDPA internet.
The pricing revealed are quite attractive too. The phone comes for free with T-mobile 24 month contract at £20 a month -unlimited data. But the best deal is with Virgin Media -18 month contract at £18 a month -unlimited text and data.
Certainly a good buy for entry-level smartphone buyers. No news on the specifications of the phone such as screen type -capacitive or resistive and Android Marketplace support.
Chinese manufacturers Lenovo revealed their Android based Mobile – The LePhone at the current CES at Las Vegas. It is the first smartphone from the manufacturer and it definitely is dressed to impress. An AMOLED 3.7″ screen with 800X480 touchscreen and merely 12mm thick and 60mm wide. The LePhone also comes loaded with Bluetooth, WiFi and GPS support.
On the pro side, this phone has some awesome features of its own which is completely different from the Android 2.0 version it houses. The UI is absolutely different, and on-screen widgets and a very Palm Pre Web-OS-esque card view task manager. The applications menu is definitely inspired by the Apple iPhone, although the icons are all circular.
The homescreen brings forward an array of options for contacting your contacts – via. a mobile call, email, IM or text in a pretty flower design.
The accessory that houses the keyboard is a dock for charging and is ideal for making conference calls. It has dual cameras ideal for video chats, and the rear one is a 3mp.
It also has a Snapdragon Processor similar to the Google Nexus One.
On the down side, this phone does not support Android’s marketplace.
No news about the international date of launch in the US,UK or anywhere else. Currently, Lenovo plans to launch it first in China.
Have a look at the Crunchgear CES hands on video after the jump and get ready to be impressed. And also a bonus video courtesy Mobileburn. Also lots of LePhone glamour photos for your viewing pleasure.
Stan Schroeder from Mashable raised an interesting question of the frequency of visitors now to the main homepage of Google, i.e. Google.com ( etc. depending upon your geographical location). It is true that with browsers which have in-built search functionality in the address bars viz. Chrome and Opera, the middle layer of the Google homepage has been largely eliminated. Add to that, other browsers like Firefox, IE and Safari include a search bar. It’s pretty safe to state that the entire spectrum has been covered. So, is anyone really using Google homepage and why?
One of the major reasons for people still using the Google homepage is that fossilised browser that it still breathing. Yes, IE6. There are no search bars, and the only option to search is Google. Of course, users here would be able to install Google Toolbars and stuff. According to W3counter statistics, as of Sep 2009, IE6 still maintains the fourth position in browser usage share with 13.28%, behind IE7, Firefox and IE8. It is difficult to segment the share of people out of this percentage who use search solely through Google’s homepage. There were no Google toolbar statistics to help us out.
Let us keep this straight and simple. iGoogle is the preferred homepage for all of us Googlers. Yes, that is indeed a word. We love our Google Search right above all our Google fodder, from Mail, News, Docs, even Twitter Gadgets and Flash Games Time Wasters; the list of Gadgets is endless. And all of this has been served in a stylised Theme package.
The new addition to this list of stylised themes is the Comics package – for the Superman or Iron Man fan in you. For the Batman Lovers or the Wonder Woman worshippers, don’t worry. There’s room for you too. Google even changed their homepage logo to a DC Character ensemble on the 23rd July, dedicated to the ongoing Comic Con in San Diego, California. A list of my favorite ones are given below. Just click on the links to explore the themes and hope you enjoy them. Cheers! [Click on the Link to go to the Theme Page]
The announcement of a new operating System from Google called the Google ChromeOS came as no surprise to me as an OS from Google had been long expected. The rumors had been doing the rounds – remember the gOS which was mistaken for the Google OS. Well, it never really took off. Wonder if any single PC right now is running the gOS. And then, Google launched the mobile OS – Android. And for a long time, people believed that it was the Google OS which people expected. And now, in the recent announcement [ Read: Introducing the Google Chrome OS ], GOOG has made it official, that come next year[ a vague dateline of second half, next year] Google’s new OS – Chrome will be released for users. And yes, it will be opensource, free, lightweight and is initially going to be targeted at netbooks.
So what does this mean to me and you? What does it mean to Microsoft/Windows XP-Vista-7 users, Apple/MacOSX users and Linux users? Is all the buzz and hoopla worth it? Let’s deal with them one by one.
a) Google Chrome OS is Chrome extended :
It has worked for the browser- which is clean, clutter free, simple, fast, instant start-up, reliable and lightweight. Going by the name, ChromeOS is aimed at replicating all of these features. From what we get from Google’s release post, it is indicated that the user interface will be kept extremely simple, and most of the user experience will take place on the web.Now that raises certain eyebrows and questions about the user experience in an offline environment. We have yet to see any demos and exact feel of how the OS is going to look like, so its a bit early to comment further on this.
Yes, 5 years after all the magic and spells and labs and offering us 7 gigs of inbox space, GMail has finally shed its beta skin and entered the non-beta zone. GMail’s blog post [Read: Gmail leaves beta, launches "Back to Beta" Labs feature] announces the arrival of the new GMail, although its been hightime since the last 3 years for GMail to come out of the beta-image. The little GMail icon on the left of your Inbox page showed the beta text, but its no longer there.
So, does that really mean anything for you? Not exactly! Since, GMail has been quite frankly, the most stable email service provider for me, and the most functional as well. In terms of sheer inbox size, they are at the top. In terms of different innovations, Labs has taken care of it. The blog post [ linked above] enlists the different changes that GMail has brought into itself since its introduction to us 5 years ago. From being an invite-only service to opening up for sign-ups, to chat, group-chat, and video-chat, the list is endless.
So, have a look at the list.
And well, if you are still fussy about the damn beta-image and can’t still get enough of it, a new labs called “Back to Beta” will restore the Beta-image back to your inbox. Although you know, its no more Beta at heart. Its only the shell !! This Labs feature is available in the Labs list, and follows similar procedure for activation.
Happy GMailin’ folks!
Chinese manufacturers Lenovo revealed their Android based Mobile – The LePhone at the current CES at Las Vegas. It is the first smartphone from the manufacturer and it definitely is dressed to impress. An AMOLED 3.7″ screen with 800X480 touchscreen and merely 12mm thick and 60mm wide. The LePhone also comes loaded with Bluetooth, WiFi and GPS support.
The announcement of a new operating System from Google called the Google ChromeOS came as no surprise to me as an OS from Google had been long expected. The rumors had been doing the rounds – remember the gOS which was mistaken for the Google OS. Well, it never really took off. Wonder if any single PC right now is running the gOS. And then, Google launched the mobile OS – Android. And for a long time, people believed that it was the Google OS which people expected. And now, in the recent announcement [ Read: 
Yes, 5 years after all the magic and spells and labs and offering us 7 gigs of inbox space, GMail has finally shed its beta skin and entered the non-beta zone. GMail’s blog post [Read: 
