Hasta La Gadget!

While Instagram is no doubt a popular app, there are third-party Instagram apps out there who are no doubt trying to capitalize on its success by using “Insta” or “gram” in their names to associate themselves with the app. This practice has been going on for quite a while now and it seems that Instagram is not too thrilled about it and has since updated its brand guidelines that warns its customers and developers not to use terms such as “Instagram”, “IG”, “Insta”, and “Gram” in the app name. It also tells developers to not use logos that are similar to Instagram or use the Instagram stylized font to name their product.

As it stands Instagram has begun sending out emails to apps that they believe to have violated their brand guidelines, and one of them is the Luxogram app who sent the email to TechCrunch. Instagram app for Windows Phone, 6tagram, has also renamed itself to 6tag as per Instagram’s guidelines, according to its developer. Given that Instagram’s parent company, Facebook, has been pretty strict when it comes to cracking down on similar names as well, we guess it was only a matter of time before this practice was passed down to them as well.

Instagram Cracking Down On Apps That Use “Insta” Or “Gram” In Their Names original content from Ubergizmo.

The Chromebook world is a weird one where apps trickle out slowly and in a manageable stream, with the most interesting ones costly coming from Google itself. The latest is software that was originally demoed at the Chromebook Pixel launch, then released for that computer exclusively, and now has arrived for all Chromebooks as of today.

The Google+ Photos app, for those who haven’t been following its long and winding saga, is a standalone app that takes the best of Google+’s photos features and adds things like automatic backup from SD cards, offline viewing of recent uploads, and auto-sorting of the best shots as well as simple sharing.

Maybe the best part of Google+’s Photos app is that it uses the company’s new Auto Enhance magic to subtly improve the quality of any uploaded photos without any action required on their part, so long as it’s enabled, and the Auto Awesome feature that generates GIFs and collages.

At Google’s I/O keynote, the features around images were probably the best part of, at least from a truly useful consumer development standpoint. Photos in the age of digital photography are just sort of a bulk nuisance item that we plan to, but never actually get around to organizing, sifting and editing. Google+ now does a really good job of handling a lot of that heavy lifting.

Chromebooks are still niche devices, but software like this makes them ideal travel companions or even better tools for users with light demands and little know-how of programs like Lightroom or Photoshop. Keeping the Photos app exclusive to the pricey, even-more-niche-than-niche Pixel wasn’t doing anyone any favors, so it’s nice to see it become more widely available.

All that new hotness thats coming to YouTube on Android? Well it’s making its way to iOS too. SURPRISE!

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After its acquisition of Waze this past June, Google announced this morning that it is deploying real time incident reports from Waze users to Google Maps mobile and apps users. Waze users can now search with Google, too. And if you’re into mapmaking, the Waze Map Editor now includes Google Street View. [Google and Waze]

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Instagram is getting defensive: it’s trying to shut down apps that use "Insta" or "Gram" in their name. So long, fakers.

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