There was nothing earth-shattering or all that new about the newest update to the Android mobile operating system, Jelly Bean 4.3. However, some owners of the device that Google itself designed and sells directly, the Nexus 4 smartphone, report that the update turned their phones into glossy paperweights, and it’s not clear why. [More]
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Google Says No (For Now) To Facial Recognition Apps For Glass
By 6.3.13
As consumers test Google’s Glass device on the streets and subways of America, many people have raised privacy concerns about the possibility of developers creating facial recognition apps for the wearable computers. But Google is trying to calm those fears by saying it won’t allow such apps… for the time-being. [More]
Google Thinking About How To Let Users Cherry-Pick App Permissions
By 5.20.13
When you download an app from the Google Play store — or when an update to an already downloaded app includes a change in permissions — users are required to accept those permissions before downloading. But there is no way to say no to any single permission, so users are either begrudgingly downloading apps with permissions they don’t want or not downloading otherwise acceptable apps because they are concerned about these permissions. But one Google engineer says there may be some hope. [More]
AT&T Customers Will Probably Have To Wait Before Using Google Hangouts Over Cellular
By 5.20.13
If you’ve got an Android phone, you might have noticed that your pre-loaded Google Talk app has recently been updated and is now “Hangouts,” the name of Google’s video chat service. But if you’re an AT&T customer, you might have to wait a while before you’re allowed to use that app over the carrier’s wireless network. [More]
Facebook Home Earning Oodles Of Negative Feedback From Google Play Reviewers
By 4.15.13
Earlier this month, Facebook announced Facebook Home, the massive upgrade of its Android smartphone app that basically puts the social networking site front-and-center on your device. The app began rolling out to customers late last week, and some of the responses may have you waiting to press “update.” [More]
Facebook “Home” Makes Facebook The Center Of Your Android Phone’s Universe
By 4.4.13
As promised, Facebook has announced a big new update to its Android mobile platform that integrates the social network deeply into the phone’s operating system, making it the foundation of the smartphone interface. [More]
Facebook Android App Wants To Bypass Google Play Store For Updates
By 3.15.13
As most Android users know, one of the nice things about the operating system is that you don’t always have to get your apps through the official Google Play app store. But usually, any future updates to an app come through whichever store you downloaded the app from. Except now Facebook is asking some Android users to accept an update in the app itself that would allow future updates to be pushed through without notice. [More]
Want Ad-Blocking Apps On Your Android Device? Don’t Expect Google To Sell Them Anymore
By 3.14.13
Until yesterday, Android users could go into the Google Play store and find a bunch of apps developed to block ads from showing up on your wireless device. But now Big G has decided these types of apps violate its policies. [More]
Nike Assured Me An Android App For FuelBand Was In The Works, Ditches That Plan, Shrugs
By 2.11.13
Consumerist reader Jeremy is a fan of Nike’s FuelBand, a fitness tracking wristband that’s become pretty popular in the workout world. But he has an Android phone and currently there’s only an iOS app that syncs up with the FuelBand. So he asked Nike Support on Twitter if it’d be releasing a Droid version and was pleased when it replied that yes, the app was in the works. Cut to today when Nike announced it’s ditching that idea. [More]
Great… Now There’s Android Malware That Can Infect Your PC & Turn It Into A Listening Device
By 2.4.13
In general, the malware relationship between PCs and mobile devices has been a one-way street, with infected computers passing on their digital disease to their mobile mates. But now come reports of at least two infected Android apps whose malware heads in the other direction. [More]
More Nexus 4 Phones Plummet To The Ground, Smash Themselves
By 1.28.13
Google is always innovating. They’ve brought us the beginnings of a consumer fiber network, smart glasses, driverless cars, and even bringing donkeys back to life. One little-known Google project is the Nexus 4 smartphone, which is unlocked, shiny, and comes with its own field of gravity that pulls it to the ground, violating all known laws of physics. Or so our readers tell us.
Capital One Android App Traps My Phone In Infinite Updateless Loop
By 12.17.12
David’s Android smartphone, a Galaxy S, is still working just fine. It just has one problem: he can’t upgrade it to a newer version of the Android operating system. He’s stuck on 2.2. So what? It doesn’t affect him all that much except for how his bank’s app requires a newer version of Android than that. His phone gets stuck in a loop of being unable to update. [More]
Verizon Closing Its App Store Because You Can Buy Apps Everywhere Else, So Why Bother?
By 11.6.12
Those Verizon Wireless customers with a Blackberry or Android phone will soon have one less icon on their phoens come January 2013, as Verizon announced it’s killing off its branded app store at that time. Why? Simply because with all the other ways for customers to access apps for their phones, the company says it’s not needed anymore. [More]
It Gets Worse: Galaxy Nexus Takes 3.5 Months To Show Up Using 2-Day Shipping
By 10.23.12
Just a few hours ago, we shared Dan’s complaint about Google Play and its inability to ship him a phone. Jameson responded to our call for stories about Nexus orders gone wrong shortly afterward, sounding a little guilty: maybe he could have saved Dan and other customers all this trouble. See, he ordered a Galaxy back in July, and it took three and a half months and a lot of wrangling with Google to get it to show up. [More]
Motorola To Customers: Sorry, No Android Upgrades For Your New-ish Devices
By 10.17.12 — Updated: 10.24.12
Customers who bought the Motorola Photon and other very recent smartphone models are unhappy. When they bough the phones, Motorola bragged that they’d soon be upgraded to a newer version of the Android operating system, Ice Cream Sandwich. That’s not the very newest version, mind you, but it’s a newer version. Now, their phones are less than a year old, and the promised upgrade is never going to come. [More]
Apple Co-Founder Steve Wozniak Would Love To Have iTunes On His Android Devices
By 10.2.12
Although Steve Wozniak helped Steve Jobs found Apple back in the day, he’s a man of many technologies and uses Android devices in his daily life. But he thinks Google and Apple should be able to get along, because Apple and Windows managed to do so so it can’t be totallyimpossible. He expressed his desire to get iTunes on his Android devices yesterday during a tech-new site Q&A. [More]
Hey, Verizon And Motorola, I Want My Ice Cream Sandwich
By 9.19.12
Reader GC owns an Android tablet purchased from Verizon Wireless. Customers were promised that the device would receive an update to the latest version a newer version of the Android operating system, called Ice Cream Sandwich, by now. The promised update has come for the larger version of the tablet, the Droid xyboard, but not for its little brother. Sure, GC could jailbreak the device, but why do that and void the warranty when the update was supposed to be here by now? [More]
Apple Hates Your Kitten Videos, No Longer Pre-Installing YouTube On iOS Devices
By 8.7.12
When the next versions of Apple’s iPhone and iPad devices hit customers’ hands this fall, they will come without the YouTube app that was one of the initial big marketing points of original iPhone back in 2007. [More]
