Reader-Blogger-Plusser

While I had previously mentioned about Blogger being the most neglected of all Google acquisitions, and lamented (here and here) over Google Reader not getting its due share of attention by its owners, looks like the Big G has finally paid heed.

This, however, comes at a price.

Last week, Google announced upcoming changes to Reader on the Official Google Reader Blog. Google Reader is finally ready for a makeover to match the metamorphosis Google started Q2 this year.

The sad part the same blog post announced, is the decision to discontinue friending, following, sharing posts, and commenting on them from within the Reader. Instead, you will be able to share your posts on your Reader-specific-circles on Google Plus.

For me, Google Reader is the most-used web app and Android app today, and links shared by friends and people I follow form a hand-picked, human-curated list of posts that are really interesting to read. Some of these posts would introduce me to new blogs I would later subscribe to. Subscriptions from links shared on Google+ has been rare, plus there is considerable friction involved in moving from one app to another if one were to do so.

For many subscribers to RSS feeds via the Reader, this news has been criticized and protested against. Here are a few photos of people doing so outside the Google's DC office, and here is a blog post by an Iranian explaining why does it matter for Iranians, and other similar countries where the government filters social websites.

Another announcement last week by Google was the integration of Google+ profiles with Blogger. This would mean your readers would now be able to access your publicly shared items on Google+.

Though not acknowledged by Google, there are speculations in the blogosphere about other integrations, like, publishing a post on blogger will automatically post it to your Google+ stream as well, and comments on your Google+ will be integrated with comments on your actual post, and the comments can be seen at one place. Blog commenting is one of the few places where Facebook is, and Google+ is not. Integration with their own blogging service may be the beginning.

While the Reader features have not been rolled out yet (though the official update last week said next week), the feature to replace your Blogger profile by Google+ profile is already available for Blogger in Draft, and will be migrated to the regular blogger in the upcoming weeks.

There have been no reported protests against this Blogger change, but since Google+ does not allow profiles with pseudonyms, this would affect bloggers who write under a pen-name, if you will. Google has acknowledged this, and therefore made this change optional, unlike the Reader changes that are forced upon helpless readers.

With Google Buzz going off the track, and now Reader and Blogger being integrated with Google+, looks like the search giant does have some plans to support its social networking app gradually establish a place on the web led by Facebook.

Android ICS Face Unlock can be Hacked Easily

The list of features in Ice Cream Sandwich excited me, especially the changes towards easing multitasking, the powerful in-camera functions like live editing, single-motion-panaroma, the NFC Android Beam, and a few more. However, the first thought that flashed my mind when I heard about the Face Unlock feature was if a photo could be used to unlock your phone.

Several people wondered this, and the only statement from someone at Google I could find was in this tweet from Tim Bray: "Nope. Give us some credit". A terse statement that does not explain much, but isn't brevity Twitter's USP?

Image sourced from here

Maybe Android 4.0 could distinguish if the face it is trying to identify is a real person or a photo by reading it a few times in quick succession to look for facial expressions, assuming a real person may not be able to remain exactly still like a photo. However, this is not difficult to hack into either. Perhaps a short video, or even an animated gif could help grant access to your phone.

Google says this is "a completely new approach to securing a device, making it even more personal". While it may make your device more personal, I do not see how does this make it more secure. Or how can it ever be more secure than the traditional password or pattern-drawing mechanisms, unless used in combination with one of these.

Unless, Ice Cream Sandwich does an iris scan while registering the user's face, which may need precise positioning of the eyes and may not instantly unlock your phone.

I shudder at the thought of someone using my photo/video to unlock my unattended phone and access/misuse data from my always-logged-in Google account or impersonate me on Facebook and Twitter. Think about Google's own Wallet.

Top 10 Android Apps in India

(This post appeared on Pluggd.in last week.)

With Android phones available for as low as Rs 6,000 now, their sales have been been always on the rise in India. The next step after one buys an Android phone is downloading Android apps. With the market buzzing with 300,000 apps already, and hundreds still getting created every day, there is an app for almost everything under the sun.



Indian companies and developers are also targetting Android apps now, which are more popular than the Apple apps because of the price-sensitive Indian market. Here is a list of top 10 Android Apps downloaded by Indian Android phone users, not in any particular order though:

Google Maps: With GPS-enabled smart phones getting popular by the day in Indian customers, and people using navigation on their Android phones, this one really comes in handy. It also gives you details about nearby restaurants, ATMs, and petrol pumps. With the recently launched offline cache support, you may find your way out even when you do not have a data plan.

Facebook: The most popular social networking platform of all times finds a place in the top apps downloaded by users to instantly share with friends.

Talking Tom Cat: Oh this fun app does find a mention in the top 10. A very simple app that just records your voice and repeats back in a high-pitched, funny voice, is not loved only by kids, it is a good accompaniment to any gathering of friends or family.

YouTube: This is one of the many apps that are much better than the original browser apps. YouTube app provides in-page playback, which means whenever you click on a YouTube link on your phone/tablet, it opens up the app, and plays the video in a full-screen mode, and this happens so seamlessly that you do not even know that you left the browser (or any other app) to the app and are back.

Angry Birds: The pigs are getting greedier and birds angrier. Perhaps the most-addictive phone game has now found a liking in the Indian users too after it was opened to the Android ecosystem and was made free.

Twitter: An ideal app for a phone because of a word limit synchronous with an SMS, and the kind of urgency with which people tweet, it is faster and easier to tweet from your phone from wherever you are, about whatever you feel like.

Advanced Task Killer: Just because Android apps have no close button doesn't mean they shut down when you return to the home page or move on to another app, and continue using up memory. This app lets you kill them and release memory, improving performance of you phone.

Book My Show: A very simple and clean up that allows you to book your favourite movie, play or event even when you are on the move, it also lists venues in the nearest-to-furthest order.

Times of India: This app from the country’s highest-read newspaper provides you breaking news from local, national, and international areas to your Android device. It also comes with movie reviews, live cricket scores, and photo galleries.

Moneycontrol: The Markets on Mobile app is your gateway to all critical real-time information about the Indian and global markets through your Android device. It provides real time stock quotes, and helps you manage and keep track of your investment portfolio, watch Live TV and get in-depth coverage & analysis of financial markets, economy and business.

A look at these apps conveys a mixed feeling. There is no one category Indians are downloading apps in. There is social networking, games, utility, entertainment, and news. The Android App market is a versatile one and supports apps for all kinds of uses. While GPS aids navigation and check-ins, accelerometers and gravitometers have taken gaming experience to the next level. Cheap data plans and fast 3G connections in India mean apps relying on the connectivity are becoming popular.

Free apps mean the revenue depends on advertisements, which depends on the popularity of the apps. Depending on how popular your app is, this may fetch in more moolah than a download fee. Angry Birds, for instance, was once a paid app at $1 per download. It was later made freely available in the market, and now makes $30 million a month on advertisements, which is far more than Rovio could have made on charging that fee. 30 million downloads a month is unconceivable even for a game as addictive as Angry Birds.

For utility apps like BookMyShow, the ROI of developing an app comes in the form of an increase in the number of users who pay through the app, if not for the app.

If you are a company that relies completely/partially on the Internet for business, what percentage of your development efforts (and $$) do you think should you spend on app development? For a company that is completely into app-development, what do you think will you develop? A utility app or a game? The first kind of company can outsource to the latter. There is another question for developers though, should you target Native or HTML5?

So long, Steve Jobs

Never has any tech news afflicted me so much as today's; I haven't had been so emotional ever at the demise of anyone I didn't know personally. Steven Paul Jobs, the great visionary behind Apple, the creative genius who changed the way the world computes, listens to music, and connects to people, passed away today. He was 56.

Steve was diagnosed in 2004 with neuroendocrine tumour, a rare form of pancreatic cancer, and though the tumour was successfully removed, he had to undergo a liver transplant in 2009. At both these occasions, he had to take months off from Apple, and his shoes were filled by Timothy Cook, who later took over when he finally resigned as the CEO in August this year.

I still find it hard to believe.

Though he had lost considerable weight and appeared thin during and after these surgeries, Jobs dealt with the disease very gracefully, and still delivered very energetic and passionate speeches. Just yesterday, a colleague commented that watching Steve Jobs present was like watching a movie.

Steve was the kid who dropped out of college and managed to assemble and sell his first computer when he was 16. He was the genius who laid the foundations of a company at the age of 21 that would later change the face of consumer electronics in particular and technology in general. He was the founder who was fired from his own brainchild at 30. He was the courageous, persistent fighter who then founded another company called NeXT, which was then bought back by Apple 11 years later and Steve was appointed the CEO the next year. This Act II changed the world, with innovative products like iPod, iPhone and iPad.

While Apple has replaced the home page on their website with an obituary and created an email id to share thoughts, memories, and condolences, a statement from his family reads "Steve died peacefully today surrounded by his family".

Even though I am an open-source proponent and was never an Apple fanboy, I must admit there was a certain class imbibed in his products by Steven that no one else could ever match. The rare combination of genius, creativity and passion Steve Jobs had is awe-inspiring. You will be deeply missed by billions of people.

The world is at a loss.

Here is a list of few inspirational reads about Steve Jobs. Please feel free to add more in comments.

• One of the very impressive articles I read about Steve on TechCrunch: It Just Works.
• A detailed report about Steve's health issues, ultimately leading to his demise on LA Times.
• What Steve Jobs did when he was fired from Apple on DNA India.
• Steve Jobs' 2005 Stanford Address video, and the transcript.

Google Reader Pushed Down

A few weeks back, I had written about the neglect their own feed reader received at the hands of Google. Last week, Google Reader was removed from the top navigation bar (yes, the new black one that was launched in preparation to Google+ release), proving it was not mere overlook and negligence as I had cribbed, but a well thought-after decision. Google Reader is still available from the More menu though, and Google Sites has taken its place on the navigation bar.

This change may be attributed to the declining popularity of Google Reader in the US as compared to Google Sites, which looks like on a rise from the following graph obtained from Google Trends:

Google Sites

  

Google Reader

  

Average traffic from United States in the last 12 months

However, the same graph for all regions shows that Reader is still used by more users than those using Sites, worldwide:

Average traffic from All Regions in the last 12 months