China’s Alibaba bets $215 million on chat app Tango
Facebook has made it a pretty darn good time to be a messaging app maker — just ask Tango. It’s received $280 million in funding including $215 million from Chinese e-commerce behemoth Alibaba, which is looking to bolster its forces against competitor Tencent. That gives it a minority interest in the video chat app, which has 70 million active users and 200 million in total. Tango has also stretched out recently with a social platform SDK for other apps that makes it easier for users to invite friends, for instance. According to Bloomberg, Alibaba could go public as soon as next month and its investment means Tango could be worth as much as $2 billion. We’ll write a witty conclusion in a second, but first we’re going to go learn some coding.
Update: Alibaba led a $280 million investment round, but only bet $215 million of its own cash. The post has been updated to reflect that.
Filed under: Software
Source: Tango
‘Okay Google, take a photo’ comes to Search for Android app
Glass users are all too familiar with the battery of commands required to get the headwear to spring into action. Beginning today, two of those lines are available in the Google Search for Android app. If you say “Okay Google” followed by “take a photo,” your device will launch the camera app. Similarly, “take a video” accomplishes the same, albeit it in movie mode. Of course, we prefer to speak into a smartphone only when absolutely necessary, and with plenty of other methods for launching into photo mode (including, of course, simply tapping the camera icon), this is a feature we don’t plan to use anytime soon.
Filed under: Cellphones, Google
Source: Google
SmartRecruiters aims to modernize the hiring process
There has been a big effort in the hiring industry to make it easier for possible candidates to apply for jobs. SmartRecruiters is changing that focus from the applicant to the hiring manager. They are leading the way with a new innovative tool that lets hiring managers work on-the-go.
There are many companies and apps out there to assist the job-seeker find and apply for potential positions. What about the hiring manager? What advances have been made to make their life easier or even modernize it? Sifting through applications is a modern version of a ball and chain limiting the ability of the hiring manager to be away from their desk.
To solve this decades old problem, SmartRecruiters just announced the release of their first ever hiring app for Android. That’s right, a hiring app. This app gives executives that are making hiring decisions the ability to take the recruiting process mobile. It enables the decision makers to engage talent real time and make faster, better hires.
According to CareerBuilder, nearly half of candidates use their smartphones when job searching; 59% use their tablets but only 33% of Fortune 500 companies have adapted their career sites for mobile devices. This also means that most of those comapnies have not updated their equipment to let the hiring managers go mobile.
Maksim Ovsyannikov, the Senior Vice-President of Product for SmartRecruiters, stated that when building their Android app, they had several goals that they wanted to accomplish like making it look good and easy to use. Another one of their goals was to make it a natural companion to the desktop experience.
The world is mobile, right? Well, as it turns out, not the world of recruiting. — Maksim Ovsyannikov
To measure the success of the app as compared to the desktop expereince Maksim explains that user preference of mobile workflow over that of the desktop (where supported) is a great barometer. In addition to keeping track of those trends, another source was user feedback. Maksim also stated that “time and time again once they started using our Android app, they preferred to use it to review new candidates over doing so on their desktops in all cases”. That is a strong statement to make, but in an industry that hasn’t seen a big technological change since internet applications became the new standard, this is a welcomed upgrade for many hiring managers.
SmartRecruiters is a freemium, end-to-end hiring platform. The platform gives hiring managers and recruiters everything they need to post jobs, manage candidates, and select the right individual while removing the complexity from the process. The app can be found on the Google Play Store.
The post SmartRecruiters aims to modernize the hiring process appeared first on AndroidGuys.
Grocery King releases free version, no coupon needed
If you’re tired of going to the store three times a week to purchase all the good stuff you forgot on your initial visit, Grocery King aims to end this with a new free version of its existing shopping list app.
Grocery King offers a highly customizable shopping list experience that learns from the user. The more you use it, the better it gets.
This list is also more than your average list, as it lets users create them by picking from hundreds of photos of everyday items in 24 different categories. Grocery King aims for a more visual and fun experience to give a more natural feeling to creating your shopping lists.
Many additional features help differentiate Grocery King from the other shopping list apps available. The app offers cloud-based sharing and syncing of lists to enable real-time coordinated shopping with friends and family, inventory control of current items within the app, price tracking across previous shopping history and price comparison between stores (managed manually) and the ability to store their retailer loyalty cards, coupons and gift cards within the app.
Available on the Google Play store for the past four years, Grocery King was the number one shopping app for two years in a row and still ranks within the top five paid apps in the “Shopping” category even four years later. The free version is ad-supported and has some feature limitations.
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LINE’s internet calling service goes live on Android, starting at 2 cents per minute
If you’ve been waiting to give LINE’s Call service a try, now’s your chance — so long as you live in the right country, anyway. Those using LINE’s Android app in Colombia, Japan, Mexico, Peru, the Philippines, Spain, Thailand and the US can dial most any phone number at rates that might well beat what their carriers would offer. Americans get one of the best deals: their calls start at 2 cents per minute using prepaid credit, and they can pay 70 cents per month for an hour’s worth of talk time. The Chinese will get a similar bargain when Call reaches them in the near future, and LINE-to-LINE conversations are always free. There’s no iOS support yet, but we wouldn’t be shocked if the corresponding app update arrives relatively soon.
Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile
Via: TechCrunch
Source: LINE, Google Play
Opera 20 brings appless video chat to Android
For those of us who are overwhelmed by the vast array of video chat apps out there the new version of Opera may offer an appless video chat solution for you.
Opera 20 brings to Android a WebRTC-compatible browser that allows users of the browser to enter into a video chat across mobile phones and computers simply by entering the address of a video conference into the URL bar of the Opera 20 browser. If you are the creator of the video chat, then you have to visit a site such as appear.in to get an address for the video conference to share with your friends or colleagues. No special software or apps other than Opera 20 is needed.
The WebRTC (real time communication) protocol is a newer standard that promotes communication between browsers without having to rely on third party solutions to enable communication. With the addition of this protocol into the new version, Opera has joined the ranks of Firefox and Chrome who have been offering the protocol since last fall.
You can find the updated version of Opera in the Google Play Store.
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Uber now insures drivers (and passengers) whenever its ridesharing app is turned on
Surge pricing and conflict over its presence (in some cities) aren’t the only issues facing Uber and other ridesharing services these days. Unanswered questions abound about who pays when an UberX driver gets into an accident. Rather than wait for insurance companies to figure things out — and continue leaving its drivers and customers in a potential coverage no man’s land — Uber’s extending its insurance policy to offer contingent coverage when a driver has the Uber app on, but isn’t on a trip. Prior to this change, drivers’ personal policies were the only insurance available, and it’s unclear whether personal insurance will always apply in such instances. So, that’s why Uber’s now offering coverage up to $100,000 for bodily injuries (at a max $50,000 per person) and up to $25,000 for property damage if an accident happens and the driver’s personal policy won’t pay out.
The coverage the company’s offering is certainly better than nothing, but it’s far from the $1 million policy that kicks in when drivers are actually on a trip, and provides a lot less than most personal policies, too. That said, it’s also important to mention that the move is really a stopgap measure. According to Uber, it wants to help out drivers “while the insurance industry and state governments update policies and regulations for the new world of ridesharing transportation.” Makes sense to us, but might we recommend joining the Peer-to-Peer Rideshare Insurance Coalition to help them along?
Source: Uber
Esurance video appraisal lets a rep use your smartphone’s camera to assess damage remotely
This is one cool tool we hope to never use. Esurance’s new video appraisal feature for the insurer’s Android and iOS apps helps speed up the post-accident process significantly. Typically, you’re required to get a vehicle inspection after an accident before the insurance company can send out an estimate for repairs. With the refreshed app, however, an appraiser can use your smartphone’s camera to assess the damage while also communicating with customers and the repair shop. You’ll still need to set up an appointment (through the Esurance app), but since the agent won’t need to travel, you’ll be on your way much more quickly. Video appraisal requires a smartphone running Android 4.0+ or iOS 7, a front and rear camera with autofocus and a WiFi or LTE connection. Tablet compatibility is in the works. It’s available today in the latest version of the Esurance app.
Google Play Store update adds finer security control for app purchases
Making it smoother for you to buy up all the in-app items you need (or make it harder for your kids to do the same), Google’s latest update to the Play Store is adding a new “Require password” settings option, as well as a more eye-catching in-app purchase reminder when applicable apps are downloaded. These security changes might well be in response to a recently-filed class action lawsuit against Google Play, and the ability for children to really ring up those in-app purchases within a 30-minute window. In the company’s defense, however, the default setting requires users to input their password for every app and in-app item.
Apple recently added an in-app purchase nag warning inside its iOS 7.1 update, noting that once the password has been entered, users won’t have to reenter it for 15 minutes. Google’s store update also adds the ability to batch-install apps (ready for that upgrade), although it’s curiously dropped the batch-uninstall function. The fight against bloatware might take a little longer next time.
Filed under: Internet, Software, Mobile, Google
Via: Android Community
Chromecast app updates to version 1.5.3, adds easier navigation and MAC Addresses [Download]
With all the Google apps getting updated today, we were wondering if the app for Chromecast was also going to get some love. Sure enough, today the Chromecast app updates to version 1.5.3, adding some navigation changes and the ability to show the MAC address of your Chromecast in case you have network access issues. The full list of changes includes, as per the Play Store page:
What’s New
- Easier navigation.
- Improved time zone display.
- Display the Chromecast MAC address, to help with network troubleshooting.
- Fixed a crash when launching device settings screen.
Mostly minor changes, but all in the hopes of making Chromecast the go-to media streaming tool. Also of note is the improved time zone display, which is a change we’d expect given that Android head Sundar Pichai mentioned at SXSW that Chromecast would be coming to many other countries in the very near future.
You should be seeing the update via the Play Store now (links below) but if you’re a bit impatient for the download, we have that down below as well:
Let us know how you find the updated app and if you spot anything different!
Application: Chromecast
Price: Free
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