Posts by Mike Elgan

walkingdead

A brand-new subscription news site called The Information published a story this week saying Google would launch a product within the next seven months called Nexus TV.

I believe and hope the story is true. Because I’m rooting for Google in the TV space. Here’s why.

google-auto-reply

What makes Google think users want canned messages? Google filed a patent application, published November 19, for algorithmically driven auto-reply.

As you might expect, the messages aren’t really “canned” in the way that an email vacation auto-reply might be. It’s actually quite Googlish.

Here’s what Google is up to, and why you might actually love this technology.

gpn

Google announced this week Google Play Newsstand, an app for reading non-book content (magazines, newspapers, blogs and more) on an Android phone or tablet.

Google Play Newsstand is an alternative to Flipboard. But Google gives us no strong reason to choose that alternative.

Here are the three things Google needs to change in order to turn Google Play Newsstand from also-ran to awesome sauce.

now2

Why does Google call it “Google Now”? Wouldn’t “Google Occasionally” or “Google Never” be more accurate?

Google Now is clearly designed to be used “now,” or all the time, or at any time. The “now” suggests that when something of interest happens, you learn about it “now.”

Trouble is, Google doesn’t present the service in a way that makes it useful as a real-time notification system.

wearables

Here comes wearable computing, and Android and the Googleverse have a huge head start. But will the Android devices lose the lead because they fail to target the women’s market?

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