Google unveiled its completely redesigned Google Maps product on the web at I/O 2013, and at a panel dedicated to the new Maps experience, Maps User Experience Design Lead Jonah Jones and Engineering Director for Maps on the web Yatin Chawathe took us through what went into creating Maps and the engineering effort behind the considerable change seems prodigious.

Specifically, Jones and Chawathe took us much deeper into two of the main driving concepts behind the redesign of Maps, including “Building A Map For Every Place” and “Explore The World.” The former has to do with customizing maps every time a user clicks on a new location, in real-time and with more contextually relevant information, and the latter involves providing beautiful imagery including via Earth integration directly into maps, and with 3D virtual photo tours.

A Map For Every Place

In making a Maps product that is extremely adaptive to both a user’s personal input sources and to specific locales, Google had to rethink its approach to maps, and it looked to the way we casually share directions as a marker of a good system for surfacing relevant information. When you draw a map on a napkin, you are automatically filtering out the most important information, and doing it with your specific audience in mind. The result is a simplified map, that involves maybe a few major routes, as well as smaller roads, and a prioritization that doesn’t necessarily reflect how important a road is to the general population.

“A map draw for you is great because it highlights aspects and things personal to you,” Jones explained, adding that there’s also nostalgic value in something like a hand drawn map. Google wanted to be able to replicate both of these, and so it took an engineering approach to automate a process that’s normally human-powered.

Google didn’t want to exactly replicate the hand-drawn map, however, since it leaves out a lot of information that you want to still be present in a modern, digital, interactive map. But it did want to subtly highlight and downplay certain map elements, bring to the fore aspects that are useful and fading back others that aren’t as important. To do that, it took a big data analytics approach.

First, for a specific location the new Maps algorithm will analyze the entire set of people looking for directions in that area, and then highlight the routes that come up most often. Then from that subset they’ll focus in even further and weigh more vs. less important routes, based again on aggregated user data. They can see which roads are more popular, and then pop those out vs. the less important ones. Finally the less important ones are cut away, and you’re left with something resembling the hand-written map.

Once those are flagged, however, you could still be missing info on the ground regarding very small routes important to a specific place. Those are then targeted via a hyper local re-labeling algorithm that addresses just the immediate surroundings, adding labels to key routes and taking them away from other locations to decrease clutter and subtly change the focus.

That then informs the UI rendering of the Map itself, which still retains the street markers for all surrounding routes. Lines along routes important to getting there are made bold and lines on less important streets are thinned out, but not removed in case some users still require that information. It’s about drawing attention and changing perspective, not eliminating something altogether.

All of the above takes advantage of the immense processing power in Google’s data center to do the whole thing in real-time every single second, for every single one of Map’ millions of users. Yet the impact on a user’s computing requirements is minimal; Google sends even less data than it did with the previous version of Maps, keeping bandwidth requirements low.

Explore The World

Google’s other big addition to the new Maps experience has to do with bringing beautiful imagery to the web, in the form of both Google Earth 3D flyovers and the new virtual tours that provide an up-close-and-personal view of some prime spots. Those virtual tours also represent a massive engineering effort, one which Chawathe explained in broad strokes on stage.

The virtual tours are a crowdsourced effort, which users may not even realize they’re actively contributing to. The images are drawn from pictures uploaded to Google+, Panoramio and other sources within the Google photo sharing ecosystem.

To get from that group of photos to an actual 3D tour requires a lot more than just aggregating photos, however. Google says it can map not only where every photo in its database was taken, but can also tie each individual pixel in every image to a very specific location using its algorithm, making it much easier to stitch sets together. Once that process is complete, it’s left with a point cloud that can flesh out a region, but that’s a brute force approach, and some art is required to make it look good.

That involves filtering the photos, picking ones that show the landmark in context with its surroundings, ones that show the landmark clearly from visually pleasing angles, pics that capture architectural detail, interesting picturesque scenes in various lighting conditions and more. It picks these photos based on visual recognition tech and their popularity and ratings on Google properties; so an image that gets a lot of +1s on Google+ will be rated over one that’s got none, for example.

Once it has a set of top-quality pictures, it determines an order in which they should appear that makes the most sense. Even then it wouldn’t be smooth as a finished product, however, since there gaps and the transition between angles would involve a lot of bizarre warping and image artifacts that would taint the overall experience. So finally, Google’s algorithm goes back to the larger set of images and picks ones that fit nicely in the gaps. These don’t need to be the best quality, since they’re just filling out the animation.

Jones said that what they’ve built is impressive, but still pales in comparison to what a human artist could achieve manually stitching together their own photo tour. He hopes to bring up Google’s automated process to the point where it’s impressive regardless of the source, and comparable with what humans are capable of working on their own.

In response to a question from the audience, Chawathe also said that Google could in the future look for a way to make its 3D guided tour feature a consumer tool. It sounds like it’s not something Google is currently developing, but putting that power in the hands of Google+ users for instance might make it more of a draw for photography enthusiasts. Google already showed that it’s making efforts in that direction with the new auto-enhance and auto-awesome features it introduced for G+ at I/O.

The World In Your Browser Changes As Fast As The Real One Does

These efforts show how Google is making use of its immense computer processing power to deliver experiences via Maps that reflect a continually changing world. It sounds like this is just the beginning for both of the projects, too, and as with every major change, we’ll probably see more refinement of these approaches as users come on board and provide more feedback.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Today’s three-hour-long Google I/O keynote came with plenty of announcements, but the company mostly assured us that it is focused on building frameworks that can benefit developers and consumers.

We saw a more unified company that needed three hours in one session to get their message across. Breaking today’s keynote up into two days would have disrupted the momentum coming out of a company that closed the day at an all-time high on the stock market. Key areas of the business saw updates, all relaying the important foundation necessary to move Google forward over the next 10 years.

From search to maps, everything is getting a new coat of paint, a new polished experience and a focus from every team within the company. The only announcement that didn’t fit into a “category” was its new music subscription service. Some are calling it a Spotify-killer, but to us, it seemed like a necessary and inevitable announcement.

Android

The day started out with Android, with the news that more than 48 billion apps have been installed from the Google Play store, thanks to 900 million activations of Android devices.

That’s great news for developers, showing that consumers really care. To make their apps better, Google introduced a new tool called the Android Studio, which makes developing in multiple languages and for multiple screen sizes easier than ever.

The takeaway is that Android is massive, is giving Apple a run for its money and all developers should consider building apps on its platform first, rather than second.

Chrome

That little project that Google worked on, you know…the browser? It’s the No. 1 browser in the world, to the tune of 750 million active users, and Google isn’t afraid to tell you all about it. Oh, it’s also a platform upon which to build apps, so developers should be doing that too.

The takeaway is that if you’re building apps on the web, people love Chrome and Chrome offers all of the open tools you need to build gorgeous things.

Google+

Whether you think that Google+ is a Facebook competitor or not, the 41 features introduced today will get your attention. The stream itself, which now has 190 million monthly active users, is now three-columned and has interactive animations all over the place. Google says that the stream was flat, so it needed a fresh take.

If you’re into taking photos, Google has finally integrated all of Nik’s professional photo suite goodies and will now auto-enhance your shots with something they call “Awesome.”

Not a photographer, but chat with your friends a lot? GTalk, Talk, Google Chat or whatever you’ve been referring to it is gone. Hangouts is in, and it’s an app for iOS, Android and the desktop. It has video and text chats, complete with emoji and presence. We’re just glad that they didn’t call it Babel, which was the real internal name for the project.

The takeaway here is that Google knows that you want to talk to your friends and family. It thinks that if it can integrate features to facilitate your communication from anywhere — at your desk or on your phone or tablet — they have you covered.

Search

Search is getting smarter these days. Google knows that you go to its site whenever you can’t think of something, but it wants you to be able to ask it questions naturally. You can do that on Android and iOS with Google Now, but the company announced conversational search for the desktop today. Speaking of Google Now, you can get public transit information, as well as details on your favorite TV shows, books and video games.

Knowledge Graph, which fires in little snippets of information when you perform a search, added some new languages and statistics.

The takeaway here is that Google wants even more of your searches, but would rather you sit back and relax while performing them. There’s no need to think about how to get the best search result, simply ask a question.

Maps

Getting the gist yet? Google is refreshing all the things to make them easier to use, develop for and discuss with your Mom and Dad. Speaking of Mom and Dad, they probably use Google Maps to get just about everywhere.

Mobile Maps users will get a new experience come summertime, while the desktop experience got such a complete overhaul that they’ve only made it available in preview mode as to not give anyone a heart attack. Want to see it for yourself? Check out our hands-on look.

The takeaway here is that Google Maps has been a force for almost 10 years. It was time to make the product more user friendly, helping you discover new places and not just get from point A to point B.

The rest

Google’s CEO Larry Page made a triumphant return to the I/O stage, a day after discussing his vocal issues. He even discussed a world where cool things could be built without the moonshotters being bothered.

All in all, it was a solid day for Google. There were even fighting robots. The future is bright for Google; the foundation for everything has been (re)laid out. Unification.

We’ll be here for the rest of the week, hanging out with developers and listening to some roundtable discussions. If you want to watch the full keynote, have a gander here:

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

This is the evening before Google’s I/O developer conference and there’s already been quite a bit of chatter about what the company will announce and share at the conference. One important thing to note is that there will only be one keynote this year, a mega three-hour session where Google will talk to the attendees about all of the important things that have happened over the past year and what to expect moving forward.

For the first time in a long time, Google will be coming into the conference as a hot property in its entirety, a company that has many things going on that are getting attention. The truly important part of this I/O, which will be the third after Larry Page’s return to the CEO role, is that Google is much more than just a search company.

Last year, the focus was on the future, with Sergey Brin’s Project Glass stealing the show. While there was other interesting news, such as the Nexus 7, Chromebox and ahem…Q, the focus and hype were generated by the exciting future that Googlers were concocting in Mountain View. Page missed last year’s I/O, due to voice issues that he addressed today, and we’ve reached out to Google to see if he’ll be keynoting tomorrow.

This year, all the cards are on the table, and the new Google — Google Now, if you will — has to show developers that focusing on building on top of Google properties is the smart bet, even more so than for its rival Apple. Why? Because Google touches everything and everyone. From moms to CEOs, geeks to elementary school students, Google is surrounding us with the tools we need every day.

The best way to look at Google right now is by slicing up the company into three categories, something that we’ve never been able to do with them before.

Utility

Google started as a search company and this remains its No. 1 asset. It’s through this product that the company has figured out unique ways to collect and display information, something that has benefitted everything it has done since. You’d be hard-pressed to find someone who hasn’t gone to the web to “Google” something that they couldn’t figure out on their own. That utility has gotten social, thanks to Google+. Additionally, Gmail search results have been brought into the fray and other items unique to the person performing the search.

The pure utility of search has also carried over to its Maps product, a space that Google handily owns. Once again, the first problem of figuring out how to collect geo location information all over the world was only part of the solution to how to provide a tool that people could rely on. It’s rumored that Maps will be getting a facelift, potentially being announced this week. From the looks of what has been leaked, Google wants to make your map experience a bit more personal and social, too.

The unification of Google’s productivity tools, another important utility, shows that Page wants consumers to feel like the company has something for all of their needs. Instead of hunting around for Google Spreadsheets, people simply have to go to Google Drive and create the document of their choice. That was a long time in coming. Ahead of I/O, the company announced further unification by bumping up everyone’s free storage, as well as giving them one place to buy more space.

You have to have a browser to view the web, right? Well, Google has consumers covered with Chrome. The browser has become more of a platform for developers to build upon, giving them the tools to let consumers perform actions that they normally would in a tab on a website. This browser has become an operating system for its laptop and desktop devices.

The Google Now feature is a perfect example of how all of this utility is being wrapped up into one useful experience, finding its way to every device and OS to serve as your personal assistant.

Communication

Gmail has been continually improved, an approach that Page mentioned during Google’s last earnings call, but has become a bit cluttered with all of the other communication functionality that the company offers. Within Gmail, you’ll find Gchat, Voice and some Google+ features here and there. It needs work, and the rumored unification of chat could be a right step forward.

Eventually, no matter what Google product you’re using, you should be able to start and engage in a chat. This means that if you’re performing a search, the chat experience should follow you.

Google Voice is still a product out on its own, doing well, but should be folded into Google’s overall chat strategy at one point. The optimal experience for a user is to go to one app to contact someone by voice, video or text and then do it without thinking about whether they’re using the right tool. Google’s not there yet, and the product will suffer over time if left dangling.

Google+ on the other hand, has been leveraged as a way to tie all of Google’s products together socially. If you want to share a document from Drive, you can share it with your circles. If you find a cool place to eat on Google Places, you can share it with a circle. The concept of “circles” as a way to organize your contact list is the core purpose of Google+, with its stream and photo capabilities still serving as “nice to haves.” I would suspect at some point that you’ll be able to send an “Email,” which is just another type of message, to a circle from Gmail, much like you can from Google+. The company isn’t worried about competition, so thinking of Plus as a Facebook competitor is a mistake.

Mobile

Both of the categories above are converging with Google’s most important focus, mobile. It’s open-source strategy with Android is paying off, with 71 percent of all smartphones sold in Q1 using the OS. It’s not just phones that fall under mobile, though; it’s tablets, laptops, Glass and gaming devices like OUYA.

At I/O, we expect to see a small refresh of its tablet and phone line, with incremental improvements being added. It’s not the time for whiz-bang features, as more focus will be given to the operating system itself. The Nexus 7 is a decent alternative to the iPad, but the Nexus 10 never really got off the ground. A lot of that had to do with the fact that it’s Wi-Fi-only, and it’s possible that 3G/4G could be added to make the device more attractive.

At the end of the day, all of the utility and communication strengths will shine brightest on devices that you aren’t sitting at for eight hours a day. Picking up a conversation that you started on your desktop, finishing it on your tablet and then picking it up again in the morning from your phone is powerful. It’s possible with Google’s products now, but it’s not apparent to consumers. That’s why Google has been so focused on the presentation of its products and not just the integration.

What to expect this week at I/O

Want a visual? Here you go:

Expect less bravado and more focus from Google. While the three-hour keynote will probably be split up among different products, expect to hear some of the same messaging. The idea of making things easier for users, more delightful and accessible by everyone, everywhere will be the battle cry.

Google wants you to use its products, and it doesn’t care where and how you use them. Whether it’s on a video game system, a refrigerator or Glass, the company has something for everyone, whether they’re at work, in the car, in their bedroom or living room or out on a hike. We’ve been surrounded, but now it’s Google’s turn to tell us why that’s a good thing and how it’s easier than ever to get something out of it.

We might hear some gaming and music news, but expect it to fit within Google’s focused mission, and to not distract.

The Mountain View giant is a busy company, but all of its products and efforts are finally moving in the same direction under Page.

We’ll be updating you with all of the information on our live blog tomorrow, so keep your eyes peeled.

[Photo credits: Flickr, Flickr, Flickr]

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Pinterest works best on the web, with its big images and pinning from other browser tabs. But mobile is the future and Pinterest needs to play catch up there. Today Pinterest mobile added search suggestions to make single screen pinning easier. Its iOS and Android apps also got basics like notifications and mentions. Pinterest will need to add value, not just port its website, to win on mobile.

The problem with Pinterest on mobile is that it’s fundamentally a collection site — and you need other places to collect from. That’s a breeze on the web with its bookmarklet for pinning, or quick multi-window browsing so you can add things onto your boards. But on mobile with just one screen visible, finding content can be a chore.

Pinterest is trying to fix this with a few updates today. First, search suggestions, also known as a typeahead, can quickly find you people or things when you just type a few letters. Instead of having to dream up what kind of apple-based recipes other users are pinning, typing “apple” now reveals a drop down of suggestions like apple pie (expected) and apple cider vinegar (now that’s discovery).

While already allowed on the Android app, Pinterest’s iOS app also now allows you to type in URLs within the app by hitting the ‘+’ sign at the bottom of the screen to bring in outside content. However, most people don’t know the exact URLs they’d want to pin from, so this may work better with cut and paste. Still, you’re going to have to jump back and forth between your mobile browser and Pinterest to make it work. That’s a lot more friction than on the web.

Finally, both of Pinterest’s core apps got some fundamentals added. Somehow there were not in-app or push notifications before, but now there’s both. You can also now tag people with @mentions from mobile, which feeds in nicely with the new notifications.

Pinterest is one company I’m honestly a little worried about when it comes to mobile. I feel like the nesting instinct is very natural on the desktop that you’re often using from home, your real nest. On mobile the desire to collect and arrange seems both less natural and inherently more difficult with the small screen. Pinterest might flourish on the tablet, but it will have to work hard to make its phone experience as alluring.

It needs to add unique value on the platform that takes advantage of mobile. Pin suggestions based on nearby businesses and board suggestions based on nearby users. Instant uploads from your camera roll to a private board might be a bit aggressive, but some way to more easily pin photos you’ve taken on the go would be great. Whatever is does, it needs to go beyond cramming its website into a smaller box.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Mozilla today launched the latest version of its Firefox browser for Mac, Windows and Linux, and the highlight of Firefox 21 is additional support for Mozilla’s Social API. This API allows social providers to integrate directly with Firefox and the organization it launched in cooperation with Facebook at the end of last year. Today, it is adding Cliqz, Mixi and msnNOW to the mix.

The new Social API integrations, Mozilla says, “help you stay connected to your social networks, no matter where you go on the Web.”

Once installed, users can access these integrations from buttons in the browser toolbar. Cliqz users, for example, will be able to see content recommendations right in the new social sidebar in Firefox, share links across their social networks and preview Twitter commentary, all without actually going to Cliqz. The integration with Japan’s Mixi and Microsoft’s msnNOW works in the same way.

The Social API, Mozilla writes, “has endless potential for integrating social networks, e-mail, finance, music, cloud possibilities, services, to-do lists, sports, news and other applications into your Firefox experience.” Now that it has landed in the Firefox stable, chances are we will see a number of additional integrations in the near future.

Also new in this version is preliminary support for the new Firefox Health Report.

Similar to what Microsoft is doing with Internet Explorer, Firefox will now also provide users with suggestions for how to improve the application’s startup time.

Firefox For Android

The Android version of Firefox was also bumped up to version 21 today and with it, the team has integrated support for two new open source fonts, Charis and Open Sans. The fonts will replace the three Android default fonts to enable “a more visually appealing and clear reading experience on the Web.” The difference is “subtle, but beautiful,” Mozilla says.

Additional features are the ability to save media files through a long tap and access to your recent browsing history through the back and forward buttons.

This new version for Android also includes some HTML5 improvements and the browser now scores 421 out of the 500 possible points on HTML5test.com (plus 14 bonus points).

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

A handwritten note is becoming a lost art in the age of email, Facebook, SMS, and more messaging apps than you can count. But if anything, that rarity has only led to increase its value and perceived thoughtfulness, even as our penmanship skills decline. Today, a startup called Postable is bringing back the “handwritten” note with a service that allows you to type in handwriting fonts, then print to high-quality card stock.

Postable got its start back in 2011, when co-founders and lifelong friends Scott Potash and Jesse Blockton grew tired of all the thank you notes they had to painstakingly handwrite. However, instead of immediately launching a service that took thank you card creation to the web, they first decided to target one of the bigger hurdles with building such a service: the fact that people don’t have each others’ mailing addresses anymore.

In March 2012, the team launched a free, online address book service. “The easiest way we thought to get people’s addresses would be to ask them to give them to you,” explains Blockton. “It’s just a simple, friendly crowdsourced address book.”

This original service, which became popular with brides, new parents, and others about to send out a lot of thank yous, provided users with a custom URL (www.postable.com/name) which they could send out to friends and family along with a personal request for mailing information. Recipients would click the link, fill out a form, and later the complete address book could be downloaded in variety of formats, including Excel, as a text file, or they could just print labels directly.

This free service grew to “tens of thousands” of users, though the company won’t disclose exact figures.

Today, the second phase of the plan comes into play, as Postable launches thank you cards. At launch, there are around 100 different cards to choose from, sourced from 24 different indie designers with whom Postable has a revenue sharing deal touted to be at “double the industry standard.”

When you go to type out a card on Postable.com, you can select from one of 12 different handwriting fonts, or 10 different stylistic fonts, if you’d rather not try to give your card the appearance of a handwritten note.

The cards themselves can be printed on a few different card stocks, including Crane’s Lettra, cotton paper, and a “brown bag” recycled card.

The service itself has also been designed to make writing out your notes as easy – if not easier – than doing it by hand. After you click on a recipient’s name, Postable autofills the “dear so-and-so” portion of your note, for example, and the spacing and font size automatically adjust as you type.

Cards cost $2, plus standard postage, which is often less than the “real” cards you buy individually at the store. However, frugal shoppers know they can find packs of lesser-quality thank you cards for less at any drug store – so Postable may not work for those pinching pennies.

A number of services have stepped in to make letter-writing and card-sending more convenient for those of us whose cursive skills are largely forgotten. For example, services like Red Stamp, Sincerely, Apple’s Cards, Lettrs, Inkly, and many more help fulfill this need. But some of these services come at the space with a mobile-first mentality, in the form of an app. Postable is a bit different because it’s not targeting the one-off note jotted on the go (though that’s supported), so much as it’s going after those who have a mountain of cards to send – such as after a wedding, for example.

That tends to work better on the web, with a larger keyboard to type upon. That being said, Postable plans to release native apps in time. But for now, the service works well on iPad in the browser.

By the end of the year, the company also plans to offer a broader selection of styles and support for different occasions beyond just the “thank you” note.

Based in New York, Postable has raised $500,000 from friends and family.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

We’re just a few days away from the start of Google I/O, the search giant’s annual developer conference, and while we actually know very little about what Google plans to announce during its massive, 3-hour keynote on Wednesday, there is something brewing in Mountain View that has Microsoft’s Office division on edge. Over the course of the last week, Microsoft started a very negative anti-Google Docs campaign that fits the mold of its more general Scroogled anti-Google ads. But why the sudden focus on Google’s productivity tools? That reason, I believe, is Quickoffice in the browser.

Quickoffice, which Google acquired last June, allows users to read and edit Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents on the iPad, iPhone and Android. Unlike Google Docs, which remains a relatively limited productivity suite when compared to Microsoft Office, Quickoffice does a very nice job at allowing you to open and edit Office files without losing the document’s layout and other advanced features that Docs can’t currently handle. Just last month, Google brought Quickoffice to Android and the iPhone and introduced the new Chrome Office Viewer for displaying Word, Excel and PowerPoint files. Google doesn’t say so explicitly, but it’s a fair assumption that this tool uses some of Quickoffice’s magic as well (it was previously only available for Chrome OS).

When it comes to editing Office documents in the browser, Microsoft’s own Office Web Apps are an underrated gem in the company’s lineup and right now, Google doesn’t have anything in its repertoire of web apps that comes even close.

Quickoffice, however, is coming to the web. When Google introduced the Pixel Chromebook in February, it also dropped a hint that it was porting Quickoffice to Chrome, using its own Native Client technology. At the time, Google’s Sundar Pichai said that many people love Google’s productivity apps, but in the business world, Microsoft Office is still the de facto default. Having Quickoffice available for Chrome and on Chromebooks, he said, “completes the story for a lot of users.” During the February event, Google said that it would take about three months to launch the browser-based version of Quickoffice with full editing capabilities – and that puts the launch date almost exactly in line with next week’s I/O.

Microsoft knows that the competition in the online productivity space is about to heat up and may just put it on defense. For many potential Office 365 and Office Web Apps users, a full-blown Office-compatible productivity suite in the browser from a company like Google presents a very viable alternative to using Microsoft’s tools. It’s no surprise then, that the folks over in Redmond are launching their anti-docs marketing campaign now.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

As a parent of three technically savvy kids I find it disturbing that we haven’t even “scratched” the surface of Scratch, an amazing, object-oriented programming language from the MIT Media Lab’sLifelong Kindergarten Group. That may change, however, as it’s much easier to get started in Scratch thanks to a new release of the platform that lives entirely in the browser.

You can try the programming language here and the new version allows for webcam interaction with the on-screen sprites and you can now add vector-based graphics that will scale without losing resolution. You can also create your own programming “blocks” and add new logic to your programs or games.

The new interface is similar to the old, desktop-based system except it’s a bit simpler and you can store your programs on your computer and then upload them anywhere. A “backpack” will hold objects from one project to the next so you can bring sprites and backgrounds with you to new games. Everything runs smoothly right in the browser. You can see a Scratch-generated tour of 2.0 here or you can just start playing.

The platform is great for kids of all ages and it’s a far sight better than most early computer education which consists mostly of typing tutorials and Microsoft Office lessons. If you’re looking for a STEM star and not a cubicle drone, this is the platform for you.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Since the launch of personalized magazines this March, social magazine maker Flipboard has added 6 million new users to its platform, bringing its total number of users to 56 million – and that’s before the feature even arrived on Android, which now comprises roughly half of Flipboard’s user base. Today, that changes as the personalized magazine option arrives on Android phones and tablets, alongside the launch of a new web-based magazine editor designed with the needs of curators and publishers in mind.

Android users have a couple of unique options, including the ability to “flip” items from other native applications such as YouTube, the browser, or their own photo gallery, into Flipboard. The updated app is also now making use of Facebook Single Sign-On for registration, the company notes.

In addition, while previously a mobile-first and generally mobile-only company, the launch of the online magazine management tool shows that Flipboard is carefully considering how it should proceed when it comes to the web. The company has previously acknowledged that there are challenges with Flipboard’s magazine sharing features – that is, when someone tweets or posts a link to a Flipboard magazine on the web, it can be inconvenient for those who click that link from their non-mobile device.

For example, if you click on a link to Flipboard co-founder and CEO Mike McCue’s awesome “Metazine” magazine (a magazine of magazines!) at http://flip.it/qyXu1 on the web, you’ll only be taken to a landing page which directs you to download the app to your mobile devices for access. This is something the team is working through now.

As Flipboard head of product Eugene Wei explains, the web has mainly served as a companion to Flipboard’s mobile and tablet applications to date. “But,” he adds, “we think the web is super important, and we plan to do more on the web over time…I think a lot of our partners want things like embeddable buttons or badges to help drive more viewership to their magazines,” Wei says. He points out, too, that the Flipboard has a limited web presence with its web browser add-on, the Flip It button.

The new web interface for magazine management is a good first step in thinking about what role the web should play in this mobile-first company. On the newly launched site, editor.flipboard.com, users can create, edit and share their magazines much as they could previously on mobile, as well as take advantage of new, web-only options, like re-ordering the stories, photos and videos within their magazine, deleting content, or even changing the order of the magazines under their account.

Flipboard also announced today that The Financial Times has launched on its platform. FT.com subscribers will get unlimited access to FT content on Flipboard, while other Flipboard users will be able to access FT blogs and videos. This is the second major media publication to offer paid subscriptions through Flipboard, following The New York Times’ subscription debut last summer.

CEO Mike McCue had hinted at this Android release during his chat at TechCrunch Disrupt NY 2013. At that time, he also shared that users had now created over 1 million magazines using the new tool, and some of those might even be worth paying for in the future.

Whether or not some of the upcoming analytics features for publishers will also be worth paying for, however, has yet to be determined, says Wei. He notes that the stats and measurements Flipboard will offer curators today on the new Editor interface will become more robust in the future, informing magazine creators what stories work for their readers, what other types of stories or magazines they read or curate themselves, and how readership data is trending over time.

To manage your own Flipboard magazines from the web, you can sign in to the Editor interface here.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

When the AP Twitter stream was hacked a few weeks ago leading to a massive drop in the equities market, I went off. I found the fact that the AP – a news organization staffed by intelligent people and with a long history of adapting to new media – could be hacked through a phishing attack was unconscionable. It would be like Bank of America being hacked by a group of script kiddies.

Sadly, this happens over and over. Why? Thankfully the folks at the Onion had the foresight to explain what exactly happened when the “Syrian Electronic Army” “hacked” their Twitter stream.

If you run your company’s social media account, read it. The takeaways are here:

I think the third suggestion is the most important – always change your Twitter password on a regular basis and, more important, never ever ever ever click on a link that suggests you should change your Twitter password via the browser. If you must change your Twitter password, either do it through Twitter.com directly or, barring that, email Twitter. If you’re the AP or the ACLU or the Boston Pony And Terrier Lovers Of America Club, I’m sure they’ll help out.

Twitter itself needs to offer dual factor authentication or, at the very least, send you a text when someone changes your password. This is imperative. Twitter is now a medium for corporate communications and for it have the security of a web forum is unconscionable. The person in charge of your Twitter feed should also have a completely separate email address, outside of your domain, and that person should have a process in place to check the URL of the password change page and then only change the password if everything is kosher. At the risk of raising script kiddie, I would say that most “hackers” depend more on the stupidity of their marks and less on their technical skill.

Don’t be stupid.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch