Hasta La Gadget!

Alongside a bump up to Android 4.1.2, Verizon’s Galaxy Note II update (which is apparently rolling out now) adds plenty of improvements and features. As well as fixing several bugs with its calendar and email apps, the refresh adds Multi Window support to some key players, including Gmail, Facebook, Twitter, Kindle and Google Maps — a feature that was there from the start on the global model. There’s also a new notification panel editing menu within settings and Samsung’s Smart Switch app to speed up migrating content from your old device to another, although whether you’d need that when you’re updating your own Note II is a good question.

Another bullet-point caught our attention too. Tucked away at the end of the change log issued by Verizon is, would you believe it, the removal of one of its preloaded apps. Shopping app Zappos gets dropped during the update.

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile, Samsung, Verizon

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Source: Verizon

It had look like e-hailing service Uber and yellow taxi drivers in New York City had finally reached a victory, with the city approving a 12-month e-hailing pilot program to test allowing customers to hail yellow taxis from an app or other electronic service. Yesterday, Uber had announced its return to NYC, along with a few details about its service. A mere 24 hours later, the service has been blocked…again.

The approval, however, didn’t stop livery cab drivers and others from continuing to go after the program, and today they saw at least a temporary victory, with Appellate Division Associate Justice Helen E. Freedman tossing out an emergency injunction against the e-hailing program and calling for a fast review by a panel of judges in appeals court.

The livery cab drivers’ attorney Randy Mastro said in an email to Bloomberg: “This faux ‘pilot program’ is so fundamentally flawed and illegal in so many respects that it had to be stopped. And now it once again has been.” Such a change comes at a bad time for the e-hailing service Hailo, which had temporarily been denounced for working outside of the rules of the program, but that just received its approval by the TLC today.

The current expectation is that the panel of judges will hear the case some time this month, although that hasn’t been officially confirmed. All of this follows the lift on the first ban that took place last week by NY Supreme Court Justice Carole Huff, who addressed and dismissed many of the claims against the program, including ones about facilitating discrimination and making things harder on the elderly.

[via Bloomberg]

New York City e-hailing taxi project halted is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

As tightly integrated as Google’s many services can be, the company has been dancing around a glaring omission: why couldn’t we add times mentioned in Gmail messages as Google Calendar events? Logic is at last taking hold in Mountain View, however. Starting this week for those using US English, Google is rolling out a Gmail web update that automatically underlines dates and times; click on one and it will pop up a box to quickly add a calendar event scheduled for that time, with an option to edit basic details first. It’s such a simple addition, but it could mean the world for those of us waiting for Gmail to catch up with our native email apps.

Filed under: Internet, Google

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Source: Official Gmail Blog

It was just a matter of time, really. We’re well acquainted with Facebook letting us tag friends in our photos, so it’s no shock that a similar feature has just spread to the social network’s mobile darling, Instagram. The Android and iOS apps will both hit version 3.5 today, letting users tag others in a shot (whether or not they’re human). A new Photos of You section has also been added to members’ profiles, where you can see any photo linked to that account. As you might imagine, Instagram is already trying to head off potential privacy issues — account holders have until May 16th before their Photos of You sections become public, and settings will let them turn down connections to any revealing (or simply inaccurate) images. The update is already available through the iTunes App Store and should be landing soon in Google Play. Hit up the source links if you’ve ever wanted to see how other Instagrammers see you.

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile, Facebook

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Via: Instagram

Source: App Store, Google Play

On January 14, Google kicked off its 2013 Doodle 4 Google contest, which sought doodles from students K through 12 across the nation on the theme “My Best Day Ever.” The first stage of the contest has reached its end and Google has selected winners from each state, publishing their doodles in each age group and asking the public to vote for the one they like most.

Over 130,000 drawings were submitted, according to the announcement, all of which were sorted through for a roster of winners categorized by state and age group. The public is being asked to vote on the doodles they feel are best, with each person being able to vote once per age group for the sum of five votes total. You can see the winning doodles here.

Google informed the winners in a rather exciting way, sending an official “Googler” to each student’s school to make the announcement and join in the celebration with them. The Internet giant praised the entries, calling the imagine and creativity involved in them impressive. Among the winners, five national finalists will be selected, and then from those a final single winner will be chosen.

The contest is being offered in partnership with the American Museum of Natural History, which will hold an exhibition from May 22 to July 14 showcasing the winners from each state. The contest first started back in 2008, and had run annualy since then, with variations of the contest being offered elsewhere across the globe. Last year’s contest garnered 114,000 entries.

[via Google Blog]

Doodle 4 Google 2013 state winners revealed, contest opens to vote is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.