So here it is … we hope you will check it out and participate today!

http://polls.linkedin.com/poll-results/104541/ofhxz

The AMC Editor

I was never a fan of the original Dolphin browser for Android, but when DolphinHD was released for Android 2.0 and above I figured I’d check it out for the feature set alone. Little did I know that within a day I’d make it the default browser on my Motorola Droid.

Tapping the designated corner in the DolphinHD browser will let you control many browser functions with gestures.

Much like the Skyfire browser, which boasts unique in-house Flash video playback, DolphinHD’s feature set gives users significant feature enhancements over the default browser. There’s tabbed browsing, link sharing via your installed social networking apps, add-ons, themes, smoother in-browser multitouch, a generally high level of customization, the ability to save your cache and history to the SD card, and one of the most logical features for a touch-screen phone browser, customizable gesture support.

There used to be one other awesome feature: YouTube video downloading. But lest you think that only Apple played hardball with its application developers, Google forced Dolphin’s publishers to remove the feature for a Google and YouTube Terms of Service violation within a week of the browser’s release.

For me, the gesture support is Dolphin’s killer feature. It comes with several default actions, including jumping to your bookmarks, moving forward and backward in site navigation, jumping to the top or bottom of the page you’re on, reloading the page you’re looking at, and sharing the page you’re on. You can also set gestures to load specific sites, open new tabs, or add a bookmark. In all, Dolphin comes with 20 gesture options. A few have been wedded by default to predetermined gestures, but you can overwrite them easily with motions more to your liking, or move the gesture hot corner around.

Pulling up bookmarks is an easy win for gestures on a touch screen, but the two gestures I’ve been most surprised and impressed by have been for highlighting text and sharing pages. Suddenly, I no longer have to worry about remembering to clip a bit of text at home, where the desktop makes it a no-brainer. I can select text with my thumb, and as soon as I lift my thumb off the screen, the selection gets copied to the clipboard. Likewise, the share gesture means I can paste a link to the site I’m looking at into an e-mail, an SMS, a note in Evernote, a tweet, or a Facebook status update without complicated fiddling around on the phone.

Tabbed browsing is another feature I can’t imagine not having in a mobile browser, now that I’ve been using it for a few weeks. The tab bar can be set to disappear when there’s only one tab, and it will also hide, to maximize your screen real estate, as you scroll down a page. Being able to open tabs I want to read soon but don’t need to bookmark or add to ReadItLater, and yet not jump away from my current tab, is a feature that seems to mesh well with how I prefer to browse Web sites. DolphinHD does have a ReadItLater add-on available, along with one for Delicious and seven others. One of those seven lets you buy a license to remove the ad bar from the bookmarks, history, add-ons, and themes window.

Personally, I don’t use the add-ons, but the ones I toyed with worked well and added some slick, powerful tools to the browser. One add-on can back up your bookmarks to an SD card, another provides deep hooks into multiple Google services, and a third arranges your bookmarks in a 3×3 display similar to Opera Mini’s Speed Dial. The default list of bookmarks is not static but can be re-arranged by holding and dragging a bookmark.

In addition to gestures, DolphinHD offers add-ons, themes, tabbed browsing, and other features not found in the default Android browser.

One problem with the WebKit-based DolphinHD is that it felt slightly slower at times than the default browser, but because I’d played with a lot of Android browsers recently I decided to benchmark it against the default browser, also WebKit, and Opera Mini to see what shook out. I didn’t test Skyfire, despite the sweet Flash video support, because I’ve found it to generally be a buggy, crashy browser. So, I defined three tests for the three browsers and ran each three times.

The first was a cold start of the browser, with each application launched from the main home screen immediately after booting finished and clocked till Google.com finished loading. The second test checked load times for CNET.com, a site that represents a heavy content load of pictures, text, and video. The third ran the browser against the SunSpider JavaScript testing engine. This turned out to be slightly flawed in that Opera Mini was unable to complete the test in all three of its runs, freezing the test after a few seconds.

On a Motorola Droid running Android 2.1 and using Verizon’s 3G for network access, DolphinHD’s cold start placed it in the middle of the pack, with an average start time of 10.33 seconds. The default browser blasted through this test, going from zero to ready in 6.33 seconds on average. Opera Mini got to its Speed Dial page quickly, at 8.67 seconds, but even when the Google search Speed Dial button was tapped as soon as it was available, the browser crept to Google.com in an average of 13.67 seconds.

Loading CNET.com once they were warmed up, the browsers reacted much faster. DolphinHD and Opera Mini both finished rendering the page in 5 seconds on average; the default browser took 6.33 seconds. The SunSpider test saw Dolphin hit an average of 35,046.3 milliseconds, with the default browser a touch faster at 34,089ms. Opera Mini generally feels faster than the default browser when downloading sites, but not significantly so. Clearly, there’s room for speed improvements on the part of all three browsers.

It’s notable that all the extras Dolphin offers compared with the default browser aren’t dramatically slowing it down, even though there’s no doubt it could be faster. Throw in the gestures, tabs, add-ons, and bookmark management that I find preferable to those of the default browser, and Dolphin can count me as part of its pod–at least until the next better browser comes along.

Source: http://www.cnet.com/8301-19736_1-20005555-251.html

Froyo’s Dalvik virtual machine, the foundation that actually runs Android applications, includes new technology that runs software two to five times faster for heavy-duty applications, said Vic Gundotra, Google’s vice president of engineering, at the company’s Google I/O conference.

This chart shows the factor by which Android 2.2 exceeds 2.1 on various speed tests.

Speed is a big issue for the small, power-sensitive processors in mobile phones, especially as the smartphone duties expand to include tasks such as videoconferencing and games. Also faster is the Android browser, which inherits the V8 engine in Google’s Chrome for running Web-based JavaScript programs. And Froyo manages memory better for faster task switching, Google said.

Also on the list is better integration with Microsoft Exchange, improvements to the Android Market for finding and installing applications, the ability to turn a phone into a portable Wi-Fi hot spot, and the ability to install applications on the SD memory card rather than build-in memory.

Google also plans to allow developers to automatically update their applications in the wild if they so choose, rather than merely prompting users to update with notification messages.

Those who wanted Android 2.2 today, though, were disappointed.

“Android 2.2 will be here soon, and some devices will get the update in the coming weeks,” said Xavier Ducrohet, technical leader for the Android software developer kit, in a blog post Thursday. SDK Tech. “I invite application developers to download the new SDK and tools and test your applications today.”

Android has become a very important part of Google’s overall strategy. Not only does it further the market for Net-connected, application-rich smart phones, but it provides a natural mobile connection to numerous Google services–advertising not least among them.

Gundotra’s speech was filled with potshots at Apple’s iPhone and iPad, the most direct competitors for the 60 and counting Android-powered devices on the market today. Gundotra touted statistics showing Android phone sales surpassing iPhone sales in the United States.

Why develop Android? “We faced a draconian future, where one man, one carrier, one device would be our future,” he said, offering a reference to George Orwell’s “1984″ in a reference to Apple’s rebel ad of that year and its tight control over the iPhone realm today. What he didn’t mention: when Android began, the target was Microsoft.

Microsoft remains a competitor, of course, but it’s also a major force in the corporate market where smartphones are a hot item. Android 2.1 and earlier versions had incomplete support at best, though, for tapping into Microsoft’s Exchange servers. That changes dramatically with Froyo.

Android 2.2 will include not only full support for calendar operations, but also options that let administrators require security features on the phone and remotely wipe data if a phone is lost. Also new is integration with Exchange global address lists so e-mail addresses don’t have to be manually recorded.

In the camera domain, Froyo will let people record video with LED flash. Today it’s limited to still photos. Also coming will be screen controls for those who want to control zoom, flash, white balance, geotagging, focus, and exposure levels.

One Apple potshot came during Google’s demonstration of Froyo’s ability to turn an Android phone into a portable Wi-Fi hot spot. Some Apple iPads lack 3G connections, but through a Wi-Fi connection, Froyo could link it to the Net.

For Bluetooth fans, Froyo will let users share contact information with others wirelessly. Bluetooth also will work for desk and car docks.

One knock against Android has been its relatively constrained internal memory. Phones such as the HTC Incredible, with 8GB of internal storage, are the exception, meaning things are harder for game developers and others who want more capacity.

Froyo 2.2 will let people store applications on the SD memory card, not just in the internal memory, though.

And for those who like Android’s driving navigation abilities or who read e-books late in the wee hours, Froyo comes with a car mode and night mode.

A frustrating part of the Android experience is manually updating applications, especially those that change frequently. In the future, people will be able to update all applications with one button press, and optionally let applications update automatically.

Chrome updates itself with no user intervention, as do Chrome extensions, a very Google-y philosophy. The company thinks applications running on phones and PCs should be like Web applications: updated continuously and behind the scenes, not a frozen collection of bits installed that’s rarely touched.

Source: http://news.cnet.com/8301-30685_3-20005514-264.html

Android 2.2 brings many of the camera options closer to where your thumb hangs out.

As part of the Android 2.2 “Froyo” update, which is being unveiled at Thursday’s Google I/O Conference, a very nice upgrade has been made to Android’s built-in camera software. Google has effectively made it a one-handed endeavor, and one that does a better job at matching its user interface to how you hold your device.

The biggest change is that the pull-down menu, which would often require two hands to toggle and navigate, has been removed completely. In its place is a very simple system of transparent dials that pop up with options when you press them. They also rotate as you rotate the device, so that they’re always facing the correct direction.

These may seem like two very small changes, but they have a dramatic effect on how much easier it is to identify and access camera features that, frankly, were not worth the hassle of weeding through menus to access, or that simply did not work while holding a device in portrait mode.

Besides the cosmetic makeover, there are now 13 in-between levels of digital zoom over the previous 5. On the Nexus One, you’re still limited to a 2x digital zoom, however you can now pick one of these in-between levels for a better framing of your shot. Google has also done away with the rather irritating plus and minus buttons to change the zoom level, and replaced them with a simple slider that requires a minimal amount of thumb movement.

As for video, there are now four settings for quality that combine some of the timing control limitations from the previous version of the camera software. While the standard high and low settings can handle videos up to 30 minutes in length, there’s now a specialized MMS setting that caps off at 30 seconds, as well as a high-quality YouTube setting that can do 10 minutes, which matches YouTube’s length limit.

We ran some quick quality check tests and noticed no real differences in things like camera noise, default white balance, focus time, and application launch time. All these things remain the same–though we did spot one change Google has made to the metadata it includes in its photos, which now lists the focal length. Previously (at least on the Nexus One) this was something that had been left off. This wasn’t a huge deal, but now that it’s listed in the camera’s EXIF data, you can do neat things like run your photos through Adobe Photoshop CS5′s image perspective and lens correction tools.

There might be a few more secrets tucked away within the updated app on other devices. If you spot any when you get the update, drop us a line.

Source: http://news.cnet.com/8301-27076_3-20005444-248.html

Google’s Android Day managed to get upstaged by another announcement: Google TV.

Earlier today, we provided the live coverage below of the second day of Google I/O earlier on Thursday. As expected the keynote focused heavily on Google’s smartphone operating system, with references to Adobe’s Flash player and shots at Apple’s strategy galore. But Google TV–an Android adaptation that puts regular television and the Web in one user interface–stole the show, complete with support from some of the consumer electronics industry’s biggest players.

8:23 a.m.: Welcome back! Day 2 of Google I/O is almost ready to begin, as the Running of the Geeks takes over the third floor of the Moscone Center. It’s expected to be all Android, all the time, and I think it’s safe to confirm those Smart TV rumors: Intel CEO Paul Otellini is front and center.

8:28 a.m.: The place is amazingly full for an 8:30 a.m. event after the conference party the night before. Your comments are flying in fast and furious, hang on a moment as Josh gets up and running. To answer a few questions, it’s not clear whether 2.2 will be available today, perhaps for the N1, but carriers tend to control the pace of the updates for other phones.

8:29 a.m.: Josh manages to get our Sprint card software up and running on his Mac, but only after Boot Camping to Windows. “Windows 1, Mac 0,” Josh says, kicking off the first fanboy battle of the day.

8:34 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): Danny Sullivan from Search Engine Land says Eric Schmidt is at the keynote. Schmidt would have to be there given Otellini’s attendance, otherwise there would be a protocol parity violation and the universe would implode.

8:35 a.m.: Lights going down…

8:36 a.m.: Vic Gundotra comes back out, hoping people enjoyed the party last night. 24,000 people watched the stream on YouTube yesterday, Vic says. He’s going to start with a story: his first day at Google.

8:37 a.m.: That first day, Vic met Andy Rubin, the head of the Android project. At that point Android was a secret, Vic says, and after Andy’s pitch Vic expressed skepticism: why does the world need another operating system? Andy’s response? 1. It’s critically important to provide a free open-source operating system, so hardware makers can build whatever they want.

8:38 a.m.: 2.: Rubin said that if Google didn’t act, “we faced a draconian future, where one man, one carrier, one device would be our future,” Vic says, with a picture of George Orwell’s 1984 book. The clear allusion is to Apple and Steve Jobs, and developers respond with a healthy cheer.

8:39 a.m.: Vic says Android partners have made over 60 compatible devices, although he doesn’t say anything about how fragmented those different devices might be. 21 companies are making Android devices in 48 countries on 59 carriers.

8:40 a.m.: Last year, Android partners were selling 30,000 units a day. In February, they were selling 60,000 a day. As of this point, 100,000 Android phones are being activated a day. Android is now second in U.S. smartphone sales, second only to RIM. According to AdMob, Android phones are first in Web usage.

8:42 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): I’ll be interested to see Android incursions into feature phone market, not just iPhone-class devices.

8:42 a.m.: Vic says that Android users have navigated over 1 billion miles, although I’m not sure how they know that. “There are some who say people don’t use Google search on smartphones,” Vic said, in the second shot at Steve Jobs in 10 minutes. People are searching on smartphones with Google, Vic says.

8:42 a.m.: So how will Google and its partners keep this going? With 20 demos! Seriously, 20?

8:43 a.m.: Vic officially announces Android 2.2, code-named Froyo. It has five pillars that we’re about to run through.

8:45 a.m.: Speed is the first. Android is built on the Dalvik virtual machine. “We have big dreams for Android, and part of those dreams means Android will go to new places with new chip architectures,” Vic says, 15 feet away from Intel CEO Paul Otellini. Froyo will ship with a just-in-time compiler that will speed up application performance by 2x to 5x, Vic says. They’re about to demo a game, running on the same hardware but with one phone on Froyo, and one on Eclair. The Froyo phone can maintain 40 frames a second because of the compiler.

8:46 a.m.: The second area is the enterprise: and those people want specific features, Vic said. There are 20 new enterprise features, and one of them is Exchange-friendly technology: auto-discovery, security polices, and GAL lookup. These phones are also getting remote wipe.

8:47 a.m.: Developers will have new services to use: such as an application data backup API. Android backs up applications when moving to a new phone, but not the data. Froyo will allow developers to move data with new applications.

8:49 a.m.: Shot number 3 at Apple: Google announces a cloud-to-messaging API that “is not designed to compromise” for the lack of multitasking. Vic demos the API, showing how a desktop in Google Maps can send directions to his phone with an “Android intent.” That’s not a text: it kicks the device into navigation mode automatically once it receives that intent. The crowd likes it.

8:49 a.m. (Josh Lowensohn): Did Vic just say “boom”? I’ve heard that on another company’s keynotes…

8:49 a.m.: “That’s how you do a cloud-to-device API,” Vic says. He brings up another example where you can send an article you’re reading on your desktop to your phone, which automatically brings up the article on your phone without having to press any other keys. “We can’t wait to see what you’re going to do with this API.”

8:50 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): Cloud-to-device messaging API in Android reminds me of WebSockets in HTML land. I wonder if it’s related. It’ll certainly help once Chrome OS arrives.

8:50 a.m.: “You’re going to love this,” Vic says: Tethering and portable hotspot.

8:51 a.m. (Josh Lowensohn): It’s fitting they’re demoing this with an iPad.

8:51 a.m.: “You should be able, at the platform level, to enable tethering.” Android devices will be portable hotspots, and we’re getting a demo: a Nexus One enabled as a hotspot.

8:52 a.m.: Now we’re moving onto the browser. The most popular thing people use smartphones for? Phone calls, text messages, and Web browsing. That means Android has to constantly improve the browser, and Google has improved the performance by 2x to 3x: Froyo is getting the V8 technology from Chrome.

8:53 a.m.: Demo time: A Froyo machine, an Eclair machine, and an iPad. Guess which one is going to look bad. They are running benchmarking tests on all three machines. They start the iPad first, just for kicks, and believe it or not, its browser is slower than the Android machines.

8:53 a.m.: This keynote so far is one big running joke at Apple’s expense.

8:54 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): JavaScript speed in mobile browsers is a big deal, for sure, but so are the other parts of handling a Web page–parsing the DOM and all that. I think that needs as much attention as JavaScript.

8:54 a.m. (Josh Lowensohn): Which means we’re probably never going to see Google Nav on the iPhone…

8:55 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): I wonder when Google will brand the Android browser as Chrome, like Apple did from the start with Safari on iPhone. Google is usually pretty smart about brand equity.

8:55 a.m.: “Froyo has the world’s fastest mobile browser,” Vic says. They’re working on ways to get more capabilities that are usually reserved for native applications and get those into Web applications, like the camera or accelerometer. Google will demo some of the more advanced browser features not available in Froyo. They demo a Web maps application that can rotate with the accelerometer.

8:55 a.m. (Josh Lowensohn): Funny you should say that Stephen, b/c the current Android browser icon looks like Mozilla’s minefield.

8:56 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): I wanted that orientation feature in the Nexus One I was navigating with two days ago. Had to hold the phone backwards when I was walking around.

8:56 a.m.: What about uploading pictures to Google Buzz through the camera? The demo gods fail Vic this time, but the idea is to let Web applications access the camera.

8:57 a.m.: Mobile devices should be platforms on which people use voice input more often, simply because of the limited input options. Demo time again, as Google demonstrates the voice search capability with a long query: Pictures of Barack Obama with the French president at the G8 summit. It works, as Vic channels Steve with a “Boom!”

8:58 a.m. (Josh Lowensohn): Voice search in Froyo looks like it starts up a bit faster, and Google has made the whole interface much larger and finger friendly.

8:59 a.m.: Voice recognition is coming in more and more languages, but the next step is understanding human intentions, Vic says. “Call 5th floor restaurant,” for example, triggers the dialer. Google manages to get the Buzz Web app running again briefly before it crashes, returning again to the speech capabilities. As with the camera and accelerometer, Google wants to make it so Web apps can access the voice recognition software, demoing an English to French translation service.

9:00 a.m.: Vic formally announces support for Flash 10.1, in the least surprising development of the day. “Turns out people on the Internet use Flash.”

9:01 a.m.: Vic relates a story about how his daughter couldn’t access her favorite Nickelodeon site because it runs in Flash, but she could on Vic’s Android device. “This is what openness means.”

9:02 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): Note that just as Google is supporting Flash Player 10.1 in Android–no announcement of actually building it in–Adobe is adding support for Google’s VP8 code into Flash Player in the next year. The two companies are very buddy-buddy these days.

9:02 a.m.: We’re now moving onto the Android Market. Users are installing more than 40 apps on Android devices, Vic says, and users want to search within apps and move to removable storage. The search function on the Android home page can now search applications as well, finding a Safeway transaction within the Mint Android application by typing “safe.”

9:04 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): The YouTube stream is working for me and some others–might be a local issue.

9:04 a.m.: People want to move apps to the SD card, Vic says. Froyo will allow this to happen in a secure way, and in a way where the user doesn’t have to worry about it. Back to demos: Matt the demo guy moves Need for Speed from the device to the SD card, where it can still be launched and played.

9:05 a.m.: Updating applications has been improved, which developers like. “I’m kind of embarrassed you felt you had to clap there,” Vic says. Android developers will now be able to set their applications to update automatically.

9:06 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): The auto-update idea is very Googley. Chrome updates itself with no user intervention, as do Chrome extensions. Google likes it: says it’s just like with Web apps.

9:06 a.m.: Matt the demo guy starts an app called “Crashes” which, well, crashes. It’s an error-reporting exercise to demonstrate how error-reporting will now work for Android developers: they’ll get the stack trace of a bug that lets them know exactly what went wrong. Developers really like that one.

9:08 a.m.: So what’s next for the Android Market? They are showing off an Android Market that’s PC browser-based, where you can browse, add reviews, and link your Android devices with your account. The market shows you all your Android devices associated with the account, and lets you download apps right from the store. Shot number 93,984 of the morning at Apple involves the App Store purchase process and the need to connect your iPhone directly to your Mac or PC. Android devices will now be able to download applications over the air directly from the PC or Mac.

9:08 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): Tom–you missed a couple. It was Apple potshot No. 93,986.

9:08 a.m.: What’s next for the Market? MUSIC. Android devices can now purchase and download music from the Android Market, over the air.

9:09 a.m. (Josh Lowensohn): And the upcoming version of Android Marketplace on the Web will finally get a search box!

9:09 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): Basically, Google is working to reproduce iTunes abilities with just a browser, no iTunes.

9:10 a.m.: What about people who already built iTunes libraries? Google is planning to let users run software on their home systems to let non-DRM music run on Android devices. They’re demoing an iTunes library, but first they have to hang up the demo call that really called the restaurant. “Magically” all your music is available to your device but with a catch: as a stream.

9:10 a.m. (Josh Lowensohn): This is legitimately awesome–as long as you have an Internet connection.

9:11 a.m.: Now, we’re going to talk about advertising. “It turns out that we know a little bit about advertising,” Vic says.

9:12 a.m.: Google has been providing advertising for 10 years, and in order to provide a healthy ad ecosystem, and you need advertisers. “We’re not working with a handful of partners and charging them a million dollars,” Vic says. Google says you need flexible advertising formats, and that advertising needs to be measured.

9:13 a.m.: “It turns out that we have some tools you might have heard of,” Vic says, reminding people that Google has AdSense and DoubleClick. Google is also open to innovation in advertising, he says. iAd clearly has Google’s attention.

9:15 a.m.: Google is currently running a beta project: AdSense for Mobile Ads. Ads are tricky in mobile devices because the screen is small, although you can do tricks like hooking up directly to the Android marketplace, banner ads, text ads, and new for today: expandable ad format. “Users would like to stay within the context of the application they are using,” Vic says, consciously or unconsciously echoing Steve Jobs’ iAd presentation a month ago.

9:16 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): By the way, the official Google blog post on Android 2.2 aka Froyo now is live: http://android-developers.blogspot.com/2010/05/android-22-and-developers-goodies.html

9:16 a.m. (Josh Lowensohn): Looking at this video ad with a player, it looks like the Froyo update adds a quality selector button to the YouTube player. That’s a nice touch, as you currently have to toggle a two-level-deep contextual menu to switch between low- and high-quality levels.

9:17 a.m.: Vic is trying to make the point that different advertisers will need different ad formats. He’s demoing the click-to-call option that Google has been using for a while. They’re now showing the expandable format, which can incorporate Maps, call to click, or other formats right within the application without having to launch the browser. Vic also shows off how DoubleClick can allow developers to serve “the most relevant ad to the user: sometimes from Google, sometimes not.”

9:18 a.m.: More information on the new Google Ads can be found at google.com/mobileads. Developers are getting into the beta project, and will get a $100 credit for setting up ads in their applications.

9:19 a.m.: Now, we’re onto devices, highlighting the newly released Sprint HTC Evo 4G. We’re running down the spec list, highlighting the screen size and 4G network, the kickstand, and the 8MP camera.

9:19 a.m.: Google is giving away Sprint Evos to everybody at the conference. They like that.

9:20 a.m.: “Those of you who are watching on YouTube, I’m sorry. Remember to register next year,” he says.

9:21 a.m.: “Thank you for supporting Android,” Vic says. “Thank you for voting on the side of openness and choice. It’s halftime, Vic says, and we’re about to see where Google is going next for Android. Rishi Chandra, project lead for “a new initiative,” comes up on stage. “I’m going to introduce you to Google TV: a new platform that we believe will change the future of television.”

9:22 a.m.: First, however, Google has to tell us why TV sucks today. Americans spend 5 hours a day in front of the television, and advertisers spend $70 billion on television advertising. Worldwide, 4 billion people watch television.

9:22 a.m. (Josh Lowensohn): @Scott, nope–no date was given. Yet.

9:23 a.m.: “People just love television. TV just works.” It’s a pretty brainless exercise, as we all know, and the basic format of television hasn’t really changed over the years. But more and more people are getting entertainment from mobile devices and PCs, based on their connections to the Web.

9:24 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): @Scott from Google blog: “Android 2.2 will be here soon, and some devices will get the update in the coming weeks. I invite application developers to download the new SDK and tools and test your applications today.”

9:25 a.m.: The Web hasn’t really made it to the TV, Chandra said. The PC industry has certainly tried over the years, but it just hasn’t happened. So you’re left with awkward compromises: a family huddled around a laptop, for example. “Video should be consumed on the biggest and brightest screen in your house. And that’s your TV.” He notes that many people have tried to make this work, but there’s three reasons why it hasn’t worked.

9:25 a.m.: 1. They try to dumb down the Web for TV. You’re essentially re-creating the Web: “It’s WAP all over again,” Chandra says, eliciting knowing groans from the mobile-oriented audience.

9:26 a.m.: 2. These systems are closed, and 3. they make you choose between TV and Web, toggling the “input” button. “If you give a user a choice between Web and TV, they’re going to choose TV: it’s the experience they know.”

9:27 a.m.: Google’s strategy is to make TV and the Web better, and the plan is Google TV. The tagline: Where TV meets Web, and Web meets TV.

9:27 a.m.: Google’s pitch is to improve findability, give more control over what you watch, make existing content more interesting, and make your TV more than a TV. Demo time.

9:29 a.m. (Josh Lowensohn): I was sold at better search. I am having bad flashbacks of trying to use my Comcast box’s search tool to find a show.

9:29 a.m.: Vincent Dureau, technical director for the project, is going to lead the demo. They flip on NBC Bay Area, flipping through a bunch of channels. So far, nothing big, but Googlers are using a special remote control: you’ll need a special remote to use this, adding to your living room collection of 26 remotes.

9:31 a.m.: TV Guide is the tried and true program-discovery method, but Google wanted to make the process more like the Web. They’re adding a search box to Google TV, bringing good old Google search to television. Vincent’s wireless keyboard isn’t working, and he switches to another backup television? While we wait, we’re watching Will Farrell funnel beer.

9:32 a.m.: Finally, it comes up. A search bar drops down from the top of the screen, resembling the Android search bar. It can search both television and the Web, Chandra says, trying a test query for MSNBC. That brings up television listings for MSNBC as well as Web searches generated by that term.

9:34 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): I’ve yet to see a keyboard control that looks like it would fit into the classic living-room entertainment milieu.

9:34 a.m.: You can search for specific shows, and link the service to your DVR to search that as well. Another demo attempt is derailed by the connectivity issues that surfaced during yesterday’s keynote, and tension is building. Finally, Google manages to find a working box, only to lose connectivity again.

9:37 a.m.: Vincent has to move around to try and get a better signal. He’s using a wireless keyboard that seems to be the main problem, in that this place is lit up like a Christmas tree with wireless signals. Unfortunately for Google, we’re getting a sense of why television is called “a vast wasteland,” as the Today Show moves between bizarre Nicholas Cage quotes and Octomom updates.

9:37 a.m.: Google is asking attendees to turn off their cell phones, as the interference has ground this demonstration to a halt. Awkward.

9:37 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): There ought to be some company that offers keynote demo rehearsal stress testing. They could have a giant box that spews out 2.4GHz radio noise and charge $1,000 an hour. Maybe a big unshielded microwave oven.

9:38 a.m. (Josh Lowensohn): Google TV search was pulling up apps too. Maybe this will be tied into the Chrome Apps store unveiled yesterday?

9:38 a.m.: Finally, the search box comes back up on the screen, as an embarrassed Chandra resumes the demo. The search box pulls up content from both the TV and the Web, showing that episodes of House are available on Fox, USA, and Hulu.

9:39 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): @Josh, well, they did say bringing the Web to TV… An app store would be handy for YouTube pay-per-view.

9:40 a.m.: “To a user, it doesn’t really matter where I get my favorite content.” They select a specific episode of House, which gives the user the choice of recording a future airing of that show or watching it on Amazon Video or Hulu. If you pick Amazon video, it takes you directly to Amazon where you can play the trailer or download episodes. While that happens in the background, the episode starts playing as it appears on the TV.

9:42 a.m. (Josh Lowensohn): Interface looks a bit like Windows Media Center. Just sayin’.

9:42 a.m.: The idea is to avoid having to switch manually between “TV mode” and “Web mode.” You can also browse for content within the Google TV software, bringing up your Netflix queue, for example. It brings up your instant queue and suggestions. This isn’t new to anybody using set-top boxes connected to the Internet, but the difference with Google’s pitch is that you didn’t have to switch the input to your Xbox or other device.

9:43 a.m.: There’s a ton of video on the Internet, Chandra says, everything from YouTube cat videos to ESPN highlights. Google TV users can browse to YouTube.com, and play any video available there. Switching sites and switching channels is basically the same process, he says. Video content is “unlimited,” he says, and can be very personalized.

9:44 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): That volume control slider in the YouTube-on-TV demo looked exactly like the volume control slider on my Android phone.

9:44 a.m. (Josh Lowensohn): That’s Windows Media Center…look familiar?

9:45 a.m.: Chandra’s two-year-old son watches Sesame Street, but he only likes Elmo. Chandra can search for Elmo clips that he has bookmarked, or directly from Sesame Street’s site. He brings up Elmo’s “Alphabet Rap.” “How can you not love Elmo?” Chandra wonders.

9:47 a.m.: “I just created my own episode of Sesame Street,” he says. Upon switching back to TV, ironic Today Show clips continue to play, highlighting Pakistan’s decision to block Google’s budding rival, Facebook. The search box can also find archived clips, such as “2010 State of the Union.” Within the search box, you can get video results, text results, and find the video directly from Whitehouse.gov. “I can access the content I want to whenever I want,” says Chandra, who must not like watching sports live on television.

9:48 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): This Web-on-the-TV demo seems like a good opportunity to talk about Flash support. Even if Web developers take Steve Jobs’ memo to heart and ditch Flash tomorrow, there’s a lot of Flash-hosted video out there on the Web today.

9:48 a.m.: The search box provides a way to link the big-screen TV with the reams of Web content: “a million channels.” Chandra says he’s actually a sports nut, meaning he’s maybe about to address the licensing issues inherent in sports television consumption.

9:50 a.m.: He simulates the Suns-Lakers game from last night and shows how you can do a picture-in-picture view that layers Web content such as box scores or fantasy sports data on the same screen. “This has totally transformed how I watch sports,” Chandra says. Other companies have tried to offer these kinds of sports-related widgets on the past on televisions, namely Intel and Microsoft’s ill-fated Viiv and Windows Media Center projects.

9:51 a.m.: It’s more than just video: the TV would also be good for music, games, and social-networking sites. Chandra goes back to the Google TV Home screen and brings up bookmarks, which can be used to bookmark channels or Web sites, side by side. He heads over to Flickr.

9:52 a.m.: The best photo viewer in your house is your big screen TV, he says. That’s only possible now, however, since you can access any Web site from your TV with Google TV. You can get Facebook games, too, or Pandora. Or shopping sites. Or…

9:53 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): Logitech’s statement on Google TV partnership: http://www.logitech.com/google/GoogleTV “We’ll be providing the full product details for our Google TV companion box later this fall….We’re creating a system that includes a companion box–an external device that connects to your TV through an HDMI port–and an intuitive controller that’s been designed to take full advantage of everything the Google TV platform offers.”

9:53 a.m.: “We can now create an experience which is the most comprehensive, personalized, and accessible entertainment experience out there.” So far, no details on partners, availability, pricing, or system requirements, or, everything you need to know to make a purchase decision.

9:55 a.m.: Vincent gets into the hardware: there are going to be TV sets, Blu-ray players, and set-top boxes. They will work with existing cable and satellite boxes, he says. There are four specs: Wi-Fi and Ethernet, HDMI connectors, an I/R sensor, and a “strong processor.” There will also be a GPU, but no specifics yet.

9:56 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): This sounds like pretty high-end hardware to me. In other words, not cheap.

9:56 a.m.: Google TV input devices will be required: a keyboard and a pointing device. However, you’ll also be able to use your Android phone as a remote control. You can connect over Wi-Fi, and you can use voice search to search your television.

9:57 a.m. (Josh Lowensohn): The voice search feature will be nice for people who don’t want to have a keyboard sitting around in their living room. Not so useful for channel surfing though.

9:58 a.m.: Different people in the house can connect multiple remotes, therefore, to the same Google TV box, which seems like a divorce catalyst just waiting to happen. You can find videos on your Android devices and push them directly to the TV, as Chandra shows us a clip of Conan O’Brien’s recent visit to the Googleplex.

9:58 a.m.: Developers will be able to build their own applications and devices through an API, Vincent says.

9:59 a.m.: On the software side, Google TV runs on Android 2.1, and Google will upgrade over time. The browser, as might be expected, is Google Chrome. And the other component? Flash 10.1.

10:00 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): What happens when the TV audio track commands your Android phone to change TV channels? New idea for advertisers.

10:02 a.m.: By using Android, that means you’ll be able to run Android apps on your television. The search box can also find applications through the Android Market, putting the mobile version on the Google TV screen. You can then search within the Android market and open applications like Pandora, running the mobile app on the TV. One interesting note: the application does not expand to fill the screen, meaning that Google has just introduced another possible fragmentation screen for Android apps.

10:03 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): Official blog post about Google TV: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/05/announcing-google-tv-tv-meets-web-web.html

10:04 a.m.: Brittany Bohnet comes up to demonstrate the desktop-based Android market, and how you can purchase applications for Google TV through the market. She downloads a Twitter app, and the app appears on the applications screen of Google TV.

10:05 a.m.: Developers now have other ways to get their applications out there, and will have two application frameworks for Google TV: Web apps and Android apps. An SDK won’t be available until after the products ship, a date Google has still not outlined.

10:05 a.m. (Josh Lowensohn): This news would seem to bode well for Android tablets, yes? Big, widescreen displays with easy-to-click buttons.

10:07 a.m.: Many applications and sites will run on Google TV as-is, but Google plans to show developers how to optimize their sites for Google TV. Google will also release APIs for Google TV applications. YouTube is getting in on the act, having designed a version of its site called YouTube Leanback, a way to make YouTube easier to see at the “10-foot” experience that those in the biz call the TV experience.

10:08 a.m. (Josh Lowensohn): I wonder if they’ll push this over to game consoles, as they’ve already had a living room version of YouTube available for a while: http://news.cnet.com/youtube-launches-tv-friendly-site-for-consoles/

10:08 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): Google says this about Google TV availabilty on the blog: “These devices will go on sale this fall, and will be available at Best Buy stores nationwide.”

10:09 a.m.: You can get recommendations from friends, and suggestions from YouTube. It’s also sorted by default channels, and you can customize channels. Before, you had to give up control of your experience, but this service allows you to put more control over the full-screen experience. Expect to hear more about that in several weeks.

10:10 a.m.: The NBA has developed a site for Google TV. NBA.com created a new user experience for the Google TV product. They show off highlights of the Suns-Lakers game from last night, so we’ll get to see who the Celtics will eventually steamroll in the finals.

10:12 a.m.: You can also set your DVR to record Game 3 of that series through the application, although they can’t show us that because they’re trying to do everything wireless, and believe it or not, it’s hard to get 5,000 people to turn off the multiple wireless devices they have in their pockets.

10:13 a.m.: Brittany is back to show off how Google Listen will work on the Google TV devices, although, because of the wireless issues, it’s not working. It finally arrives: it’s a podcast RSS reader that will now have videos in it as well, and has therefore been renamed “Google Listen and Watch.”

10:16 a.m.: “Live HD video podcast right on your television.” This lets you sync subscriptions across devices, and you can search within the Listen app from the search bar for specific podcasts. Another application was developed by an engineer who moved to Google recently but who’s wife doesn’t speak English, so she doesn’t understand American television. So he created a Google Translate application for Google TV, sort of a combination of the Google Translate service and the auto-captions recently introduced in YouTube.

10:19 a.m.: Chandra comes back on stage to talk about “partners and timelines.” This idea has a lot of potential, he says, because the TV experience has been closed and fragmented. This could help create a new category of devices that are open to developers and users. “Our goal is to have the same impact on the TV experience that the smartphone had on the mobile experience.”

10:19 a.m.: The Google TV program will be open-sourced into Android and Chrome streams, he said.

10:20 a.m.: Google has partnered to deliver three Google TV devices: The first is from Sony, as reported over the last few weeks. They’re going to launch a line of TVs and Blu-ray players. Logitech is also on board, launching a “companion box” to integrated Google TV with your current system, and Logitech being Logitech, they’ll create peripherals. And Intel’s Atom chipset is the power.

10:20 a.m.: Coming in fall 2010.

10:21 a.m.: Google has also extended its partnership with Dish Network for this project. Dish subscribers will have an enhanced version of this service. Best Buy, as Shankland noted above, will distribute the devices.

10:22 a.m.: Developers can start optimizing their sites now, but the SDKs won’t be available until “early 2011″ and the open-source part won’t happen until later in that year.

10:22 a.m.: Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google, finally makes an appearance.

10:23 a.m. (Josh Lowensohn): Chairs are coming out, too. This is going to be a panel.

10:24 a.m.: 20 year ago, Schmidt heard pitches for electronic television. 10 years ago, PC companies tried to integrate this, he said. “We’ve been waiting a long, long time to make this happen.” It took a lot of things to make this happen, such as the development of the Web, fast processors, and other technology. It’s been harder to marry old technology and new technology than the new tech guys thought, Schmidt said.

10:25 a.m.: Schmidt brings up Paul Otellini, CEO of Intel and a Google board member. Also here are Sir Howard Stringer, CEO of Sony; Jerry Quindlen, CEO of Logitech; Charlie Ergen, CEO of Dish Network; and Brian Dunn, CEO of Best Buy. Last but not least, Shantanu Narayen,CEO of Adobe. That’s a panel of heavy hitters.

10:27 a.m.: Schmidt asks Otellini why the Atom processor is so cool (basically). Otellini says that the chip is actually a separate version of Atom, with specialized circuitry for television devices, like HD video encoding and decoding. So it’s not just a Netbook motherboard we’re talking about. Otellini said this was one of the uses that Intel had in mind for Atom all along.

10:28 a.m.: Schmidt jokes with Narayen about the recent tiff between Apple and Adobe, asking him why Flash is so important. Narayen says that it’s all about engaging experiences on the Web, and it’s all about getting that content and applications to any device. “This is about trying to create family harmony,” he says.

10:30 a.m.: Schmidt’s channeling his inner Charlie Rose here, moving on to ask Narayen if there’s anything special in Flash 10.1 that makes this possible. Narayen says Adobe tweaked the product to improve battery life.

10:31 a.m.: Stringer is next: Schmidt wonders if people are going to go out and buy new televisions because of this? Stringer calls it “thrilling,” confirming that he’ll have televisions out and ready for the holiday season.

10:33 a.m.: Stringer points out that Sony Ericcson “dominates” in Japan, prompting Schmidt to remind Stringer not to use the word “dominant,” but rather “significant market share,” as Schmidt and Otellini dissolve into giggles.

10:35 a.m.: This is basically an advertisement for Google TV partners, giving them a chance to highlight their technology. Logitech’s Quindlen talks up their plans to deliver peripherals and boxes, allowing Google TV users to get up and running quickly.

10:35 a.m. (Stephen Shankland): I find it curious that Google believes both in the easy, passive version of TV with YouTube LeanBack but also the interface-heavy modes controlled by a keyboard, search, configuration.

10:38 a.m.: Dish Network’s CEO thinks this service will attract more subscribers, and also increase the amount of time they spend using that service. He lets slip that Google has been working on Google TV for several years, dating back to the early days of Google’s partnership with Dish on TV advertising.

10:41 a.m.: Schmidt gives Best Buy a nod as the “surviving” big-box retailer. Dunn notes that the holiday season provides a ton of Best Buy’s profits, saying that Best Buy has an internal slogan that “this is the most important holiday season of all time,” which they trot out every year.

10:45 a.m.: Stringer notes that beyond the set of partners being feted on stage, third-party developers will be able to create even more. Schmidt picks up on that, urging developers in attendance to build the things that Google and its partners can’t envision. This is a chance to change the way that people experience television, he says.

10:46 a.m.: We’re now getting a commercial for OnStar as the show wraps up. That will do it for Day 2 of Google I/O, but we are certainly not done digesting the Android 2.2 and Google TV announcements, and check back throughout the day for ongoing coverage. Thanks for hanging out again with us this morning, and thanks for reading CNET.

Source: http://news.cnet.com/8301-30684_3-20005447-265.html

Last October I conducted a simple poll: What’s your favorite iPhone Twitter app? The winner, with around 28 percent of the votes, was Tweetie 2, then a $2.99 app.

Last month, Twitter acquired Tweetie, rebranded it, and dropped the price tag. The result: the official Twitter for iPhone, aka Tweetie 3.0. It just landed in the App Store with a hodge-podge of new/improved features and the sure-to-be-popular price of “free.”

The app now lets you view trends, search, and browse without actually having a Twitter account. You can also sign up for one right inside the app.

The search feature has been reorganized and enhanced (results now include Top Tweets, for instance), and Retweet is now part of the main toolbar.

Some nice tweaks, sure, but how does Twitter’s app stack up against other favorites such as Echofon, TweetDeck, and Twitterific?

Personally, I can’t say I’m a fan of the rebranded Tweetie. The interface looks bland and colorless compared with TweetDeck and Twitterific, and the lack of toolbar labels and built-in help are sure to confuse newcomers to Twitter and/or Twitter apps. (Actually, that’s true of many of the apps.)

On the other hand, it’s free–and ad-free, unlike the freebie versions of some of the others–so it’s hard to complain too much.

What do you think of Twitter 3.0? Are you, like some App Store reviewers, bugged by the new icon? Are you happy to get a formerly paid app free of charge? Tweet–or just type–your thoughts in the comments.

Source: http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-19512_7-20005490-233.html

This is Square, an accessory to the recently released Android version of an iPhone app (hands-on) that’s aiming to revolutionize personal mobile payments the way that PayPal first simplified payments online. We demoed the Android version of Square at the Google I/O developer conference on Wednesday in San Francisco. We walked away with an activation code and that lightweight peripheral burning a quadrangle in our pocket, giving us a sudden desire to sell T-shirts from our car.

Register an account, plug in a peripheral, and start swiping credit cards.

Square, so named for its pivotal cube-like plug-in, accepts credit card payments from individuals and digitally tracks both cash and credit transactions. Photos you take of the merchandise serve as a reference point, and your own account mug reminds the payee with whom their money has just exchanged virtual hands. The Square app securely shields the payer’s credit card details so the payee never sees the credit card number or security code, then e-mails or texts a digital receipt.

After downloading the app from the Android Market and going through the sign-up process, Square will mail you the free card-swiping accessory.

There are two points of interest regarding Square that especially itch our brain. First, Square is clearly battling PayPal for the same cut of your pocket change. And why not? There’s money to be made when one deals in money, especially when those piles of cents add up.

Square charges the seller 2.75 percent of the total plus 15 cents for every card-swipe, and 3.5 percent plus 15 cents for transactions made with a manually-entered card number. PayPal makes anywhere from 1.9 percent to 2.9 percent of each sale, plus 30 cents, based on PayPal’s tiered pricing structure for e-commerce, and 5 percent plus 5 cents for each micropayment.

PayPal made some sizable cash by undercutting banks’ transaction fees and by getting users to voluntarily swap money among bank accounts, courtesy of PayPal’s service. Square is headed in roughly the same direction, but with a few start-up advantages. Square already benefits from PayPal’s proven success in priming users to trust a third party with their bank account details–or at least a dummy account–and the addition of a physical card-swiper turns Square-holders into independent merchants who can now process your credit card on the spot.

This leads us to a second point of interest. The quick exchange of funds through the more casual channels of PayPal, Square, and other money-transfer services like TwitPay, make it easier to set up and scale impromptu, informal businesses. We hesitate cracking open a can of legal worms, but we can see how Square’s card-swiping “cube” could quickly support its own branch of the informal economy.

Source: http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-19736_7-20005441-251.html

Mozilla continues developing a mobile version of Firefox for Android.

If you’ve been following the development of Mozilla’s Firefox browser for Android phones, you might be interested to know that Mozilla has just begun releasing nightly updates of Firefox Mobile (code-name Fennec) for Android.

The nightly builds still reflect the early-days pre-alpha version of Fennec like the one we test-drove in April. Needless to say, these builds are targeting dedicated testers and bug-hunters who don’t mind rebooting their phones when instability strikes.

If you’??ve got an Android phone running version 2.0 of the operating system or higher, you’??ll need to uninstall previous builds of Fennec before downloading the latest. Manual uninstallation and reinstallation will be temporary, however. Auto-updating will come to Android developers and testers eventually.

Source: http://www.cnet.com/8301-19736_1-20005397-251.html