Thoughts from a Bafta nominated Podcaster, Blogger, Writer and Commentator.
Chromecast is a little HDMI dongle with built in Wifi connectivity to allow you TV to be part of your network and play videos and media from other devices on your home network. Of course you’ll need to buy into Google’s ecosystem with the Chrome browser or an Android device to make the connection, but for many people there’s enough value in being able to use a large screen TV that offsets the elements of privacy you give up to Google.
Samsung are working on a service that allows application ‘a’ to receive the keystrokes from application ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’, etc (reports The Verge) so that application ‘a’ can be more contextually aware and deliver better search results and improved experiences. Automatically. I can’t see an issue with that at all. I’m sure everyone will be more than happy that Android will allow data to flow to apps, to servers outside of the handset, and be analysed and recorded, with nothing more than a security pop up at install. Nobody would ever leverage that for evil…
Now that everyone on the planet knows that Flappy Bird was earning the author $50,000 a day (that’s set in stone, no matter what the numbers say), every developer is going to try and replicate that success. Not the big boys, but the bedroom coders and the hobbyists will think that ‘the next title’ will be the one to make it big. And they’ll carry on churning out countless ad-supported games that bring in maybe $100 in total for a ridiculously low per hour rate for the developer. In the meantime , Google slices a significant percentage off the top
Charles Arthur at The Guardian pitches an interesting idea to Microsoft’s new CEO. Drop Windows Phone and fork Android. Windows Phone was a wonderful project, but it was too late; the benefits of integration across handset, tablet and desktop simply haven’t appeared. The vast majority of people who use a desktop PC don’t use a Windows smartphone, and there’s no chance of that changing any time soon – or ever, actually. AOSP offers Microsoft the chance to remake its mobile strategy so that it exploits all the strengths of its most bitter rival – it’s free, widely available – and
My interview with Vlad Martynov, CEO of Yota Devices – the company behind the smartphone with a regular screen on one side and an eInk display on the reverse – is up on Forbes: “We asked ourselves what we liked and didn’t like with our current smartphones. While we loved the way it made us more productive and connected, there was one fundamental thing we all determined we didn’t like. Most of the time, the display is sleeping. It’s just a black box. While it’s sleeping, it’s useless. It has no value. “So, we asked ourselves how to solve it.
Sony’s research with consumers around their smartphones uncovers an amazing fact: …the consumer who’d prefer to have a smaller device doesn’t want fewer features. The Xperia Z1 Compact is being touted as a Sony high end smartphone in a small package. I’m not sure I’d class a 4.3 inch screen as small, but for Android manufacturers this is a step in the right direction. Looking forward to reviewing this handset in the near future.
