Google Plus Events : New Way To Get Together

In between the Nexus 7, Nexus Q, a bit of tongue wagging with the Jelly Bean on the day 1 of Google I/O 2012, there was apparently more stiff to look at. So today we decided to take a look at some other pretty recent stuff and news that caught the eye in the moments when we all were blown away by the Project glass!

Google plus notched up the 250Mn users mark just as the search giant' social network celebrated a year of existence. They also decided to mark the occasion with a Google+ tablet app. Timing was just perfect considering the launch of the first Nexus 7 tablet. And reports are that the iPad version would be round the corner. A yet another update the social network received was the introduction to Google events, a way to create beautiful invitations with instant sharing and a new way to get together with the family and friends. You can find a new item in the ribbon menu on your left in your Google plus account. Yes, that's Events!

You can choose your event theme from a range of themes available for you already. If you are not interested in the themes gallery, then feel free to choose a stationary or upload your own YouTube video in there. The options are pretty simple once you decide on the theme and we loved the simplicity, just one step and you are on your way. Look at our first event that we created for a very special person who will be introduced in a few days, and we found a theme that is just apt for the occasion:

See how simple it is, and as obvious the Event gets synced with Google Calendar. Any update that the organizer or the guests make to the event will be published on the event stream. This makes it easier for all to keep a track on what' happening.

During the time the event is going on you can upload photos directly to the event using the a service called Party Mode. The mode can be activated on your device and turned off when not required. While the mode is active, any photos taken in the event will get their own place so you won't have to worry about the manual upload and tagging guests in them. The Party Mode is also available on the  mobile app, making it that much more fun and easier to operate as the offline thing goes away with these new Events!

After the Event is over, all the guests who haven't uploaded their photos will get reminders to do it. Also, while everyone is uploading their photos Google Events will take a note to put them in chronological order. After the party all you will need is to visit the event page and the memories will be all yours to revive.


Go straight to the your Google plus account and create a personalized event for your close ones. Do invite us, and in the mean time here is a video for you:)

    

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Google I/O 2012 : Day 1

So we weren't that away from our predictions in March this year when we laid our our expectations on Google I/O event this year. There was Jelly Bean, there was Nexus 7 and developers did fill the event on the Day 1. I think the announcements are more or less over but there will be much stuff to discuss. Project Glass for instance was all over there, don't think Vic Gundotra got it off even for a sec ;). So here is a preview from Day 1.

But before we look in to it; Android activations are currently at 1Mn per day and already breached the 400Mn devices activated mark, making it pretty much the largest install base, and yes more than iOS. Here is a little celebration Google style: 

Jelly Bean

Finally, and as expected, the new sweet dish flavor of Android OS is here. Linked with the Project Butter, which makes the UI smooth like butter (of course) and makes it more faster. Introduced as the smoother and fastest of the Android version released till now, it has the lowest touch latency, triple buffering and CPU input boost. Here is a nice video for you to enjoy:

The notifications gets better with Android 4.1 (aka Jelly Bean), they expand more than what we see in version 4.0 (aka ICS). You can set priorities, they get more interactive and you are now able to perform more actions than ever. Pinch the notifications to expand or collapse them.

There is also a new re-sizable widgets option. So you now no longer have to adjust the widgets on secondary screens. Once the Home screen gets full, the widgets will get smaller to accommodate more when you try adding others on the main screen.

Nexus 7

There it is, the official Nexus tablet on Android' latest OS version. Made by ASUS and priced at $199 which we are sure will give quite a few jitters to the other ones out there. Its a 7 inch tablet with following features:

• 7-inch 1280×800 HD display
• Quad-core Tegra 3 processor 
• Android 4.1 (aka Jelly Bean)
• Scratch-resistant Corning glass
• 1.2MP front-facing camera (no rear facing camera)
• 8GB internal storage (16 GB for $249)
• 1 GB RAM
• Micro USB
• Google Chrome as the default browser
• Microphone
• NFC (Android Beam)
• Accelerometer
• GPS
• weighs 340 grams
• 198.5 x 120 x 10.45mm
• Wifi 802.11 b/g/n
• Bluetooth

Here is a introductory video for you:

Nexus Q

This is the world’s first social streaming media player which allows you to become DJ when. The Nexus Q allows you to stream your favorite media from the cloud to the biggest speakers and screen in the house. It has a sleek design and deviates from the typical black box of media streaming devices. It has a circular design and 32 LEDs. YOu may stream your favorite music, movies, or YouTube vids without having to download them.

If you wanna know how it works, here is one for you:

 

Project Glass
Google shot off from all expectations and guesses on this one. WE knew Project Glass would be hell of a thing to watch out for but hey, did they present it in style. They fitted a few skydivers with Google glass prototype. From then on what the skydivers did was broadcasted live on Google Hangouts on Air. It really was a stunner of a hangout.

The divers to start off, jumped out of their plane on their way to the top of Mascone center. Then, from the side of the building they went all the way down to get on to their bikes and drove away.  The view presented to all there at the event was a bird's eye view, thanks to the Google glasses the skydivers were sporting.
Watch for yourself:

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Recommendations On Google +1 Button [Updated]

We recommended website owners to use the Google +1 share widget when we rated it as the best share widget in the market today. In the meantime Google seems to taking things really seriously regarding the share widget and it seems to be listening to website owners on that matter. This is pretty evident from the latest that we hear Google is doing with the widget.

Webmasters have always asked about suggesting more to their site readers. That' how Google says they started on this little but helpful feature. Starting today they are rolling a new feature, recommendations, on the plus one button. On the sites that have it (or will), once a user hover the mouse on the +1 button, you will see recommended articles from the same domain or sub domain that the +1 is on. This is a very nice feature to have for users, who look out for more informative recommendations on the same platform and for the webmasters in order to gain more readers and pageviews.

Recommendations On Google +1 Button

Yes, pageviews! I for instance will love to be suggested some articles from the same site that I keep visiting for information. If I am a webmaster of a site, that means the user stays glued on the site for more time and views more pages! What' more that as a webmaster, if I have the button already implemented on my site; Google says I won't have to worry about doing anything more. It will work out of the box and with the same implementation from which I implemented the +1 button on my site.

As a note, the feature is still in the preview mode and we got it from Google Plus Platform Preview where the search giant announces the features before they are available for general use. So if you are looking to get this feature on your site, this is the place to go!

Try it today once you get it for your site or on our site (yes we already have it :) ) and let us know how you think it is! Happy Crunching till then.

Update: 9th July 2012 
As per the mail that we received from Google, the Recommendations feature is now available to all users. So if you have a +1 Button on your site, just hover the mouse on it and see the related articles; just like your site or blog readers would see. Here is the mail shot ;) for more info and confirmation:

 

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ApnaCircle Launches New Profile

We were waiting to see Company Pages coming online the next week but we were in for a surprise this morning when we saw a new profile intimation on our profile page on ApnaCircle. Just as we landed on the profile page, this is what greeted us:

 

This new feature comes in after they launched their corporate site earlier this month. The look of the new profile is really exciting so we dive in for a treat straightaway without any delay :)

We would have liked to capture the full profile look for you, but the page is decently long and enough full and then you should be given a chance to view yours well, right ;). The upper part of the edit mode looks like this:

Nicely assembled with colors that don't pinch the eye so its good to look at. The Preview my profile link shows the read only mode of your profile or as you may guess the same look that is presented to anybody else who looks at your new profile. New tools to edit the profile have been added, as you see on the right there is a Quick editing drop that lets you do all the normal stuff of changing your profile pic, title or description as well as editing to your career graph, we talked about a couple months back. The career visualization has been added in to one of tabs that are just beneath the part that we showed in the above image.

This gives a card like feel to the whole profile with the most required details of a profile displayed on the virtual card as you see in above image. Don't miss out on the last option in the Quick editing drop: Add a link:

You could reference your blog yes but there is one thing new which is the other services that you see in the Add Link drop here. You now can provide links to other services like, YouTube, Flickr and even Quora.

With the Quick editing tools on the left, there is an interesting part on the right. The Share my profile drop allows you to share your profile on ApnaCircle, Facebook, Twitter as well as Google plus. Nice options and nicely laid ;)

And there is a link to your public profile as well. Although strangely its in an editable text box; wonder why! 

And if you think since this is cool and you may want to download your vcard, you got your wish. See that plus drop apart from Share my profile and My Account? Just point to it and you will have an option to download your business card in the vcard format to use. Plus in case you wish to go back to the old profile, there is a link for that too here. But since we love the new look, we won't be putting the screen shot for that here. It was "only so you know".

In case you are viewing someone else' profile who is not in your contact. The Quick editing gets replaced with how you may be linked to that profile, Share my profile makes way for Add to Contact and on the virtual card you will have a link to view that person' business and personal cards (depending on the information shared with you).

There will also be a progress bar to make you aware of your profile completion and suggest you options n how to make it complete:

Each of the 4 tabs Summary, My Background, My Contacts, and My activity on ApnaCircle provides you with more info on your profile. To edit any section just hover the mouse over the section and you will see an edit button to help your cause. Like you see here while we wanted to edit the our skills, sensing our mouse the Edit button showed up to help us.

The bottom of the page shows the visitors to your profile (total of 4 as compared to 3 in the header drop). While at the same place you may see the related profiles if you are in the read only mode or when checking someone else' profile. The right side bar spans up to show your recent activity on the site and interestingly notices your gender as well. This section makes more sense now that the Member viewing someone else' profile would be able to see his/her recent activities including the connections that they have been making and the interactions in the groups. See that there are details on both the groups the Member is part of and the groups that the Member is himself an admin. If the Member has any blogs attached to their profile then it also shows u here as the last item. 

Our Views:

This is a 10/10 update the site has provided its users with. There is so much of a professional look here that its hard to not love it the moment you see it. It seems Viadeo group is going to give LinkedIn a run for their money, and pretty soon as well. It was hard to find any mistakes here but we thought the below ones made sense. 

1. Each of the 4 tabs when clicked should have provided a data view without a page reload
2. In case the profile name is too large, like in our case the star fell off to the second line after we changed the name to test this.
3. The public profile URL in the Share my profile drop, should have been inside a non editable box and should always be public URL even when we are on Viadeo.
4. The profile visits layer at the bottom of the page shows 4 profiles, may do well to let the bar scroll and do a lazy load of the mini profiles as you roll over.
5. If you are viewing someone else' profile who has migrated to new one, use the plus drop on the right of the virtual card look and you will see an option that seems to be in french, although you are in English language??

 

Raj Dubey

Post Credit

Raj works as a Software developer in the ApnaCircle.com IT team that operates from New Delhi. He informed us about this feature on the ApnaCircle portal.
Connect with him either on Facebook or on ApnaCircle for his professional life.

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Promote & Edit Posts on Facebook

In the past few weeks Facebook rolled out a few small but interesting features. We covered them here for a collective information for you.

Edit Your Posts
How often you posted something on yours or others wall in a hurry, only to regret the typos or the err that you did. The only option then was to delete the post and redo it. And it was the same with comment posting as well. It was more of  a problem when someone in your network already commented on your post, you didn't have any option but to either leave the mistake as is or loose the comments as you deleted the post. Well not anymore, as Facebook introduced the option to edit the post or comment. 

Those of you who are on Google plus would (most probably) be familiar with this one. The only different thing is that once someone comments on your post, you will not be as lucky. So be quick or else you wont have another chance! Whatever prompted the social network giant to do the changes, this is an interesting page that might have had a hand ;)

Promote Your Posts
For fan and business page owners reach is always an important ting to be monitoring. How they wish there was something they could do on this. Admins be happy now as Facebook has provided a feature which could be of use here.

Facebook launched a service that now will allow you to promote your posts, thee by increasing the reach of your items. The only limit is that your page should have at least 400 likes. If you choose to promote a post, you can choose the budget that it will carry. Based on your budget the reach of that post will be calculated. Each fan page will have a different set of budgets and based on that the reach.

Apart from the regular pay option, you could also choose a coupon f you are in possession of one. Also your promoted posts stay in promotion for 3 days since the post was created. They will show up in the normal news feed and will be visible to friends of your fans once they interact with the promoted post.

As far as the metrics are concerned, you will be able to see how many people saw your promoted posts and how (organic, viral or paid). For any more details on the promoted feeds head to the Facebook Help Center page for Promoted Posts. 


Mini Profile on Fan Pages
Well we are not sure if this has been around for a while & we missed it or this is a new look to the mini profiles on the fan pages. While on the Facebook fan or business pages, you can see a very nice mini profile as you hover over the names; yours or anyone who interacted with your posts on your page. Here is a look for you:

Although there isn't enough relevant information about the profile on the mini version, but it does look a little cute card representation, whats say?
  

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Flipboard For Android on Play Store

After being available for a super use on Apple products since 2010, the social magazine app Flipboard is finally available in Google' Play Store for download on the Android devices.

 The app is available for a free download in the Play Store and is compatible to Android version 2.2 (codenamed Froyo) and above. For those of you who are not aware about this app; Flipboard is a very popular social magazine app that presents web pages, important information from around the web and RSS feeds in a very stylish magazine interface. The app is available since this Thursday. The Android version of the app was first released as an exclusive on Samsung' latest buzz smartphone, S3. But it seems the exclusivity wasn't on hold for long as last Thursday the app made its way to the Play Store to be available for all Android devices running 2.2 and above; and with some good integration features.

According to their official blog, the app comes in with YouTube and Google plus integration. The integration is as simple as clicking on the ribbon menu to choose the service, adding the account information to complete the process and that's it. Now when anyone from your circle adds a video or shares a new posts, you will be able to view the video and post right from within the Flipboard app. The experience is pretty much smooth with nearly all YouTube app functionality available in the app so you could subscribe to a user and like or dislike the video posted. As far as the Google plus integration is concerned, you could move around in your circles and do a plus one or comment on the shared posts.

The app which is supposedly optimized for smartphones and not for tabs (no not yet) seems like will present the its first page as a large tile'd content. The tiles are however flexible in their position so if one like they can reposition them to suit their need. More so if you are the kind who like to categorize the pieces according to their interests. The app can be downloaded at the Google Play Store.

We are sure Android users will love the app, we have tried it on iOS and its always a lovely experience. Though we are not sure about how the iOS users will feel as the speculations were that this app (like Instagram) was exclusive for the iOS devices. We know how users reacted when Instagram released their Android version. Will it be a similar outburts is yet to be seen. We will keep an eye on it :) 

If you are and Android device owner do let us know your experience about this app. And if you are an Apple fan, feel free to comment on the exclusivity issue. We would love to hear both sides!
     

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Google+ Cover Photo Updates

Google started rolling out updates to provide users with more choice on choosing cover photos. The update that was started yesterday is supposed to be rolled out to everyone over the coming days. Chances are you should already have received the updates but if you don't see them, they should reach you in a day or two. 

You now have a Gallery of cover photos to choose from. Currently there aren't many of them in there but they should increase in numbers soon. What's more is that cover photos now automatically gets re-sized to fit the size that Google uses, plus you can always drag the cover photo to make it fit perfectly. 

Apart from the default Gallery for cover photos, the cover photos that you used (or using) also gets a new album space like the profile photos. You may see all of them under 'Cover Photos' when you click the 'Change cover photo' that pops up when you hover on your cover photo. So no deleting the current cover photo when you want a new one. And, the cover photo album will have the photos in their entirety and not just the cropped version that you or other see on your profile.

Another update that Google says was in high demand from users was the ability to share from the profile tab. The share box earlier was at home on the Home tab or the stream page as they call it. You will now see the familiar share box on your profile page as well which makes it easier for you all to share updates right from the profile tab without any need to go to to the Home page.

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Google Offers iPhone App Arrives

Google Offers iPhone app has finally arrived for the iPhone users. While the iPhone users had the option earlier to use the web version but a standalone app always provides faster access and a loads of other features that are not available on the web version of the same product. While Apple was busy preparing a send off note to Google Maps it seems the search giant was quietly preparing the launch party for an app that would be very useful for the iPhone users as they grab the deals on the go. The app interestingly is very similar to its Android counterpart, that was released late last year. The iPhone version is for now, and as with quite a few releases of most of the apps from different directions, is available only for the US users. The users will be able to buy the deals from right within the app and also be able to locate if there are any deals nearby to their location. They will also be able to redeem the deals at locations by showing it right on their iPhone without any need to print the respective coupons.

If the users wish to save the deal for later, they even will have that option as well. Users will be able to save the deals on their smartphones, which is unlike the experience they were used to previously on the web version of the product. Google Offers is very deeply integrated with Google Maps on Android and while we right now do not see the same with this iPhone app, its pretty obvious to think the search giant would do that soon considering the recent steps from the smartphone giant ;)

Besides the normal purchase and save features users will be able to track their offers in 'My Offers' section, both in the iPhone and for easy access on the web too. And as a very
convenient feature, you will be able to create notifications when new deals are available or when the deals that you purchased or saved before are about to expire. Putting the user experience and usability right at the center of the feature. 

The app allows users to browse the offers in a map view that allows to you side by side find the locations that may suite you best for a particular offer that you may be viewing. You can also launch a search based on categories to find a deal suitable for you. With the Groupon like app already available and the deals that the search giant has made with the local players and businesses to offer deals to users, it was only a obvious step that the app was launched only in US. Also with the possibility of virtually sans printed vouchers, the risk of loosing the transaction confirmation is very minimal. The app was in the pipeline and if the market competition is anything to go by, it was only delayed by Google while they should have hurried a bit. We will see how it goes with the maps integration with this app but for the meantime it is good news for iPhone users, especially if you are a deal of the day type person.
You could download the app from Apple iTunes.

 

Raj Dubey

Post Credit

Raj works as a Software developer in the ApnaCircle.com IT team that operates from New Delhi. He informed us about this feature on the ApnaCircle portal.
Connect with him either on Facebook or on ApnaCircle for his professional life.

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Facebook Acquires Face.com

There were rumors and now there is the confirmation. After about 2 months of a $1Bn deal to buy Instagram, Facebook made another acquisition. This time its a facial recognition provider company called Face.com. The deal was officially declared on Face.com blog. The details of the sum offered for the deal were not disclosed but is considered that Facebook might have paid something in the region of 80 to 100 Mn USD.

 "Facebook has acquired Face.com! Our mission is and has always been to find new and exciting ways to make face recognition a fun, engaging part of people’s lives, and incorporate remarkable technology into everyday consumer products. If you’re anything like us, Facebook is a part of your life every single day." This is what Gil from the Face.com team had to say on the blog post while making the acquisition' official announcement.

For those not aware about the company, Face.com is a 3yr old Tel-Aviv, Israel based start-up that provides APIs for third party developers so they can integrate the facial recognition software in to their applications. Apart from that they also have released a couple of very famous applications on Facebook. One is the Photo Finder which lets you find all your and your friends' pictures on the social network that are yet untagged. The other is called Photo Tagger which lets you bulk tag photos on Facebook.

With their technology, Face.com can identify your photos on Facebook in live video as well. Face.com also has a stand alone app for iPhone, called the Kilk, that can identify your friends in real time and can adapt image filters to people' faces. Facebook is said to bring the Face.com team on board and in house but its being reported by Face.com that Facebook will still be supporting their third party developers with the APIs.

Clearly the social network giant is turning a lot of attention to the hand held devices (read mobiles and smartphones). The Instagram acquisition and Facebook camera app give a great deal of support to the thought. What's more is that Face.com reported in their blog to be thinking in the same direction as well. This is what they had to say:
We love building products, and like our friends at Facebook, we think that mobile is a critical part of people’s lives as they both create and consume content, and share content with their social graph. By working with Facebook directly, and joining their team, we’ll have more opportunities to build amazing products that will be employed by consumers – that’s all we’ve ever wanted to do.

Neither Facebook nor Face.com has yet provided any details on the mobile development they might be thinking of, but what is sure is that its going to be much fun for the you guys out there who love to be on the go and still be connected to their network. Stay tuned!
          

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YouTube Party Inside Google+ Hangouts

When Google do some acquisitions that make sense (read Google Buys Meebo) and provides some good and pretty useful features to their social platform (read Google Plus Local With Zagat); they mean real business and its very obvious (like we mention time and again) that the search giant is doing every bit that it can to continue the upward push with their social networking platform, Google plus. They continue to expand its presence but with that they are providing a platform where the Google family products finally seems to making their way.

Google has announced the availability of a new YouTube app within the Google+ Hangouts. The search giant and their product that is a vast collection of videos are already integrated with each other and the integration now goes to the next level. With this app you will be able to not only share the videos with your pals inside the hangout but could also control and save the videos right there. The only prerequisite is that you and all the other participants have this new app installed. Yes, that's pretty much it for a start! The only restriction is that the app can be used from the regular Hangouts only, it won't be available in the Hangouts on air to start with.

This is like starting a web party where you can share your favorite videos with your friends and see what they like as well. And what's more is that if you love a video that's playing in the hangout, you are very welcome to share the same with your circles. Pretty cool haan!

From within the app anyone will be able to add a video and do a drag and drop to reorder the playlist and even skip forward or go backward to a video. There is also a search tool so you can search for your favorite videos online and share them within the hangout and then if you want to our circles on the network. And don't worry f you want to start the chat again, just hit the 'Push to talk' button. Besides, you could (like mentioned earlier) save the whole playlist, that you and your pals created, in your YouTube account either as public or privately store it for later viewing.

The app is available worldwide in around 60 languages.
 

   

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Viadeo Eyeing IPO

Facebook (FB.OQ)did crash at wall street, or did it not? It doesn't hurt to be optimistic but we all know what's going on with the social network giant since going public. The voices which were thick at the start due to the expectations and excitement have come close to choking since then. Whether the expectations were too high, the price was over ambitious or Facebook took to wrong time to go public? The speculations will be written and discussed at length for some time to come. What remains to be seen is how Mark and Co. handles the situation they find themselves in.

Much of the blue & white talk, at present we are here to be more orange-ish in color. Whatever seems to going on with Facebook, Viadeo; the second largest professional (and social) network in the world and the biggest competitor of LinkedIn is, as it looks, unfazed by the trouble the social network giant find themselves in. Viadeo seems unperturbed of the consequences that Facebook is going through and is of the opinion that the issues and condition will not dent social media valuations. And on the same note, they themselves are panning on going public in two years from now.

Viadeo' Chief Strategy Officer (CSO), Olivier Fecherolle thinks the impact of Facebook' IPO are limited on the professional network. Looking at the LinkedIn (LNKD.N) status, he seems to be making a point! Headquartered in Paris, France Viadeo is with a global user base of around 45Mn. The company' major chunk of user base comes from Europe, China (operates under Tianji banner), Latin America and India (under the ApnaCircle.com brand name). The site offers enough cream to target the professionals, job seekers and well as head hunters. They did open a new office in San Francisco, USA, in the second half of last year; in an effort to boost the presence in LinkedIn backyard.

The company was reported to be thinking of going public mid last year. The plans were however shelved, rather postponed, citing reasons as focus on growth in emerging markets. As per Olivier, Viadeo's fund raising round that was completed in April this year was a big boost and the company is looking to grow more in the emerging markets with the fund thus raised. Obviously the plans to go public have also received a growth in the minds due to this fund raiser.

This is what Olivier has to say to Reuters a few days back: 

It was our last (funding) round before a possible IPO," said Fecherolle. "We will use this money to accelerate the geographies we are targeting such as China and need time to execute (the plan) before coming back to potential investors.

An IPO could be planned for around two years' time, depending on market conditions and Viadeo's development, with the company most likely to choose between France and the United States for a stock exchange to list on.

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Developers Can Now Reply In Play Store

The news comes as a welcome relief for both the app users and the app developers. Now rather than the sending an email to developers or joining them on forums or some other platform, users can be on the app reviews section in the Google play store where the app developers are now allowed to reply to their queries.

The update was announced yesterday as the restriction was taken off from the Play Store. Now developers will be able to interact with their app users more quickly in the reviews section rather than the section be a one way stream. Good reviews will be heartily welcomed and the bad, or rather unfair, reviews could be better dealt with. There is a small restriction yet, as the ability to provide replies to app feedback is available only to the top developers, that is the developers who are already with the Top Developer Badge. For the rest of the developer community the restriction will be lifted off in the time to come. Google has not provided with any timeline on when all of the developers would be able to interact with their friends on the review section, but that seems enough a good reason to think that(hopefully) it won't be late.

The earlier limitation prevented the developers to be able to quickly discuss the issue with the users and thus provide a satisfactory response or an estimated fix time. This led to users getting furious sometimes making the developers pay in terms of the app reviews and user satisfaction. Now that the developers will be able to quickly discuss, its good news for both the parties.

 

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Facebook Plugin For WordPress

Starting today WordPress publishers can easily integrate Facebook features, such as social publishing and mentions, through the new Facebook for WordPress plugin. The plugin was built by Facebook engineers in collaboration with open source partners, and makes it simple for anyone to make their WordPress site more social; no coding required. The plugin will also work on mobiles and support i18n (or internationalization)

That's what Matt Kelly, engineer at Facebook had to say on the Facebook developers blog yesterday. The social network giant has released the Facebook plugin for WordPress (available here) with an intention to cover the vast majority of the bloggers and website owners who use the WordPress platform for their sites. This doesn't come as a surprise since WordPress is the most widely used platform for publishing content. It alone accounts for nearly 17 percent of all sites and, if you can believe it, 49 of the top 100 blogs use WordPress as their publishing and sharing platform(reports CNET). The list includes giants like CNN and New York Times. Some of them it seems are already using the plugin to wider their social reach with ease. Interested users may head here for the installation instructions of the plugin.

Matt further clarifies that after you are done installing the plugin, you could cross post the content published to WordPress to your Facebook Timeline as well as the Facebook Pages that you may manage. To be able to mention the names of your friends and pages as you share the content is more of a bonus. While you can also comment on any post that may be trending on the social network.

The Facebook Plugin For WordPress nearly has all the features that you are used to on the web version of the social network. So you will have the Like, Send and Subscribe buttons. The Comments ability is included with SEO support; You will be able to click the Recommendations bar to start getting recommendations. You will be able to Like content and also able to add the what you are reading to your Timeline. 

There will be added widgets for support. Here is a look to what they are and what for:

  
Facebook Plugin For WordPress has the current version as 1.0 and is compatible with WordPress 3.1.1 or higher(up to 3.4). The plugin has already been downloaded nearly 11K times. According to WordPress.org page, it seems to have an average rating so far; with 23 ratings.
 

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Apple Likes Facebook, Minus One For Google

Day one of WWDC 2012, the annual event from Apple turned out to be a major heartbreak for the search giant. Not that it we didn't see it coming, especially after the acquisitions they made last year, C3 Technologies in particular. The other things expected on day one also turned out to be true. iOS6 was finally introduced with some new and good to use features. Facebook is now integrated more in the system, Siri will be able to more with your commands, a new way to store all your passes and yes there is more ;)

Apple Maps

Lets start with the bad news for Google. Apple has shown the exit sign to Google Maps and replaced it with a map technology developed in-house. This didn't come as a surprise, a) for the growing rivalry between the two giants in the smartphone arena, and b) although Apple is using Google mapping app as of today, Google has kept a few features like turn by turn directions spoken exclusively for Android smartphones. Apple gave it away last year when they acquired C3 Technologies, hinting the new product to be developed in house.

The new mapping technology will have voice navigation, real time traffic details and will offer alternate routes for the user as well. And while Google is still collecting the 3D images of the structures like flyover etc, Apple has already moved ahead with it. With the help of C3 Technologies, Apple has incorporated the 3D view within the new mapping feature. And it gets better as Apple' very own voice assistant, Siri, will now have access to this map feature. So you will be able to ask Siri for directions and there will be 3D maps available for the voice assistant to use for your help!     

While We Are On Siri

And while we are on the topic, Siri has a few enhancements as well. Besides it makes its presence on iPad available now, which would be enough of an excitement for the iPad users.

The virtual assistant that interprets voice command and talks back to the user will now be available in more languages and has learned a lot about movies. If Apple is to be believed on the partnership with Yelp, then Siri should soon start suggesting you the prices and ratings of restaurants when asked about the laces to eat.

The big bonus comes with the fact that Siri is now able to open up more apps, on the devices for you, then it was in the previous versions while its introduction on iPhone4S.

Apple Did Like Facebook 

Rumored to be achieved it iOS4, the Facebook integration finally happens in iOS6. After the Twitter integration in the previous version, this is a much anticipated and welcomed feature by the iOS users.

What this means is that you will now be required to provide your Facebook password just once and use the integration rather seamlessly, as you can like/suggest pages from the safari browser. Or even better, since the integration spans to the app store; you will be able to recommend apps to your friends as well.

And it doesn't stop here, your Facebook events and reminders (including the birthdays) will be available in your phone itself.

FaceTime, Now On 3G

The limitation of FaceTime usage was there for 2 years since it was introduced. Not anymore! You will now be able to use FaceTime over 3G connections apart from the WiFi usage that existed before. This will make the users use the feature more than it was since the start.

Something On Microsoft

Whether Apple is worried about Microsoft sync or not, we will discuss some other time. But for now Apple with a few other players in the game have introduced a feature that they seem to call 'Eyes Free'. They are building a tech that will allow users to use Siri as well their iPhone while driving and without moving their eyes off the road.  Seems interesting!!

It Gets More Smart

iOS6 seems to have more smart feature. So if you were amazed what Galaxy S3 could do, listen to this. iOS6 introduces a new feature called, call when you leave. You set a reminder to call someone when you leave the place (building) and the reminder alerts you as you get out. The phone detects that you are leaving the place!

It also lets you decide what notifications not to receive when you are sleeping for example. This feature prevents the messaging and other notifications to disturb you during the time.

Store your Tickets With Passbook

With this app you could store all type of tickets. t will store your movie tickets, train tickets and airline tickets etc and makes them available digitally with the help of QRCodes and 2D bar-codes. Not a feature anyone expected, but a handy one nonetheless.

MacBook Pro

Apple announced the next generation MacBook Pro model. Less than an inch thick when closed and measuring 15. inch diagonally, it is being termed as the most amazing computer Apple has ever made. Its supposed to have a battery backup of around 7 hrs.

  

Besides, these there was introduction to the new features on Safari and some enhancements made to the Email app. You will now be able to add images and pictures directly to emails from the email app, something that bothered users quite much in the previous versions.

They did mention the Mountain Lion(Mac OS X 10.8), but its features were already let out a few months back. It should rather be on sale by now we think!!

 

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QuickSeoResults Reseller Program

 The Canadian founded SEO company, Quick SEO Results known in the market more for its SEO offers has now opened its reseller program for public. Their DIY SEO (Do It Yourself) program is already trending in the market while their 30 day free trial offers their customers solutions for the normal problems that they approach the company with. The company' SEO tools help the customers in making small modifications to parts of their site that when combined to the whole effort paid for the site benefits them in every aspect of SEO.

The reseller program which is open for website developers, startups and digital agencies creates exciting opportunities for them in terms of additional profits areas as well as in terms of providing their existing clients with services that are already tried and tested in the market with result proofs. The company has been smart with the reseller program introduction not only by making it easier for people to join(making the sign up process easy and hassle free, so to say), but also by incorporating perks in the program that many website owners and consultants look for in these programs.

While their 30 day free trial is already a hit in the market, the resellers that join them are free to extend this period for their clients in case they wish to do so. The resellers are not bound by Quick SEO Results and they are allowed to tun in as many customers as they would like to. Clients in turn can use the services provided by the program without any time cap applied by the  reseller or company in turn. In fact as a surprise, resellers are not bound by the pricing the company offers. As per the Quick SEO Results Reseller Program, the resellers are provided the freedom in terms of the pricing they offer their existing and/or potential customers.This is a great term as the resellers, due to the fact that the company does not impose any upper limit on the price, have full control over the gain that they get as they offer the services of Quick SEO Results to their clients.

And this is not all. Resellers are allowed to market their clients' company under their own brand name. Thus providing the white label option to their customers. Resellers may thus have access to certain tools that power them to progress report their clients. Resellers will also have full access to the company' SEO specialists and provide them the support that may be required for managing the customers. This access includes the on page SEO recommendations, keyword recommendations and analysis about the competitor as well.

Quick SEO Results works as an aggregate of Clicking Labs.

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LinkedIn Passwords Leaked Online

First it was the new mobile calendar app that was reported to be transmitting the full meeting notes and other data on both the iOS and Android platform and now its the password hack news. It really is turning out to be a very bad week for LinkedIn.

LinkedIn security was breached when the passwords were leaked for around 6.5Mn of its users. Considering the total user base to be in approx 160Mn range, the whole of the user base wasn't at risk; but the issue is still a very high importance one.The reports came out on Wednesday when the leaked passwords were posted on a Russian web forum, with a message that was encouraging other hackers to help in decrypting the hashed passwords. 

Members whose passwords were compromised were reported to have received mails that asked them to confirm their mail ids. The link in the mail obviously didn't take them to LinkedIn' site, rather a site selling counterfeit drugs. However these users have been told that they will receive information through email on how to change the password, but the mail will be without any links. Analysts however reports that the number of users whose passwords were compromised may even be larger than what is actually reported. They say that since any password that was leaked may be used by more than one LinkedIn member, seems to make sense!

The passwords (minus the usernames) were posted on the Russian web forum by the user who hacked the security system. The passwords were encrypted with the SHA-1 cryptographic hash function, that are generally considered relatively secure. However it also means that passwords are stored as unsalted hashes, making it much easier to decipher them using precomputed rainbow tables. While a few may have been arguing about the seriousness of the reports, LinkedIn seems to have acknowledged the same on their Twitter account.

 
As a safe guard, even if your password is not hacked and you are not one of those 6.5Mn or whatever the actual number may be, its a good idea to actually change your password. And since we are on the 'change password' topic, why not do it for all other accounts where you may be using the same password as that of LinkedIn. Be advised that the hackers after possessing your passwords have equal or may be more chance of attacking other online accounts of yours just to check if they could get in.
 
Oh and by the way the mobile calendar app issue that we talked about right at the start, it seems the updated version for the Android devices is already available on the Google play store. So update your app manually if it hasn't been on the auto update. As for the iOS version, it seems that the update is available but waiting on Apple' own approval for now.

Aiko Ylara

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A Social Media Strategist at Quick Seo Results, Aiko is a passionate social media marketer. She loves to roam around the digital world. Currently lives in Philippines.
Circle her on Google plus to stay in touch with her posts and all day to day updates and here is her business page on Facebook !!

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