Sound effects come to Google+ Hangouts

Google Has Just Added Another Cool Source of Entertainment : Sound Effects For Google + Hangouts.

As teased by Google’s own Amit Fulay, there’s now a dozen different sound effects built right into Hangouts — expect everything from cheesy applause and laugh tracks to chirping, gongs, snare drums and ticking clocks. Your conversations will never be the same.

Additionally, developers can also include sound effects into their own apps with v1.2 of the Hangouts API. Right now, we can’t tell if Google will eventually allow developers to create their own sound effects, but that could be interesting for live shows and classes.

To use the new effects, start a Hangout in G+ and click on the “Google Effects” tab shown below.

In order to take advantage of this new feature, users will have to make sure they’re updated to the latest version of the Hangouts Plugin: v3.6. It should update automatically, but if you’re having any issues, you can download the plugin here.

These effects are vapid and whimsical, but sure to appeal to a certain set of Google’s userbase. Recently Google + Crossed 400 Million Users and 100 Million Monthly Active Members.Within 12 Months.

Read More

Google + Has 400 Million Members Now

The Social Networking site Google Plus Now Has 400 Million Users. As Announced By Google's Senior Vice President of Engineering Vic Gundotra.

He Announced the News Firstly in His Google +Profile  Today.He Also Added that Google Plus Has 100 Million Active Members Monthly.

He A This Week we also Hit an Important MileStone-Over 400,000,000 People Have Upgraded to Google +. It was Only One Year Ago that We Opened Public Sign-up. And We Could Not Have Imagined that So Many People Would Join it in Just 12 Months He Said.

 Has 100 Million A For Comparision ,Google+'s Biggest Competitor Facebook had 955 M active Users Only.

Users Only. Of Course the Methodolog of Counting Active Users Between the Two Companies May Differ, But By Seeing the Numvers Facebook is Currently Approximately 10 Times Bigger than the Google +.But Facebook Has to take Several Years to Reach Such Numbers While Google Plus Managed to do that Within 12 Months.

Read More

Google buys Snapseed's photo-editing service

Google has snapped up the digital photo editing service Snapseed as part of its effort to compete against Facebook's online social network.

Snapseed is the centrepiece of Google's acquisition of Nik Software, which developed the service's photo-editing technology.

The deal announced Monday gives Google a popular service that competes against Facebook's Instagram, whose tools are widely used to display, touch up and share photos taken on smartphones and tablet computers.

Facebook bought Instagram for $715 million in a deal that closed last month.

Google Inc. didn't disclose the terms of the Nik Software acquisition.

Snapseed could be used to increase usage of Google Plus, a social networking alternative to Facebook.

Although it has grown rapidly since its debut nearly 15 months ago, Google Plus is still experimenting with different features aimed at getting Web surfers to check into the service more frequently.

Google Plus now has about 400 million accountholders, according to a post Monday by Vic Gundotra, a Google executive who oversees the service. About 100 million users come to Google Plus each month, Gundotra said. Facebook boasts 955 million active users.

Read More

Google adds another cool tool to Search: The Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon

Forget using Google’s more powerful search operators, the best ones are the most fun ones. We’ve seen ’tilt’ and ‘do a barrel roll’, but over the past day or so, the company has added another cool new search operator: Bacon number.

No, it’s not a label that meatpacking companies assign to their pork products. It’s actually a new tool that calculates the connection between actors and actresses and the most famous actor never to have been nominated for an Academy Award.

Or as we know it: the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon.

To use it, type in the words ‘Bacon number’ (without quotes), followed by an actor or actresses name. Google will come back with how closely he/she has been to Kevin Bacon.

For example:

Bruce Willis and Kevin Bacon may never have worked together, but they have both worked with Bill Murray. That means the connection is made between two films. The higher the number, the looser the connection.

Never heard of the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon concept? Let Wikipedia explain:

Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, It’s a variation on “six degrees of separation” which posits that everyone in the world is no more than six acquaintance links from anyone else on Earth. That idea moved into the pop culture mainstream when it spawned a popular play and movie by the same name. It later morphed into a parlor game, wherein movie buffs challenge each other to find the shortest path between an arbitrary actor and the amazingly well connected Hollywood veteran Kevin Bacon.

Knowing he was part of a wider game, Good Guy Kevin Bacon actually started a charitable organization named SixDegrees.org. What a guy.

Via Thenext Web

Read More

Clara Schumann's 193rd birthday Google doodle: 10 things to know

To commemorate the 193rd birth anniversary of Clara Schumann, the German musician and composer, Google has posted a doodle on its homepage. Here are 10 things to know about the doodle.

1. The doodle shows Clara Schumann playing the piano along with her eight children.

2. The colours of the doodle are in sync with Google's official logo colours - blue, red, yellow and green.

3. Schumann and her children stand in place of the two O's and the second G of the Google logo.

4. Born on 13 September 1819, Clara Schumann was raised by her father. Her parents divorced when Clara was only four years old.

5. In March 1828, whe she was eight years old, Clara performed at the Leipzig home of Dr Ernst Carus, director of a mental hospital at Colditz Castle, and met Robert Schumann, who was nine years older than her. Schumann admired Clara's performance and so much that he asked permission from his mother to discontinue his studies of the law, and take music lessons with Clara's father, Friedrich Wieck. She later married him.

6. Clara made her public debut in a concert in the Leipziger Gewandhaus at the age of 9. She was acknowledged throughout Europe as a phenomenally talented child prodigy. She was also instrumental in transforming the kind of programs expected of concert pianists.

7. At the age of 18, Clara Wieck performed a series of recitals in Vienna from December 1837 to April 1838. Clara Schumann's reputation brought her into contact with the leading musicians of the day.

8. In 1839, Robert Schumann and Clara Wieck wrote a petition to the Court of Appeals to marry without the consent of Friedrich Wieck. They got married on September 12, a day before her 21st birthday.

9. Her family life was hit by tragedy. Four of her eight children and her husband predeceased her, and her husband and one of her sons ended their lives in insane asylums.

10. She herself became deaf in her later life. She often would need a wheelchair. Clara suffered a stroke on 26 March 1896, and died on May 20 at the age of 76.

Read More

Google doodles 'Star Trek: The Original Series'

On the occasion of the 46th anniversary of Star Trek: The Original Seriesthe Google doodle goes where "no man has gone before".

The interactive doodle that appears on the Google home page on Saturday shows the characters of the cult science fiction television series that aired on NBC in the US from September 8, 1966 to June 3, 1969 as letters of the Google logo and also lets you participate a little interactive tale, but there are no points to earn though.

The letter 'G' in the Google logo is Mr Spock, perhaps the most memorable character from the series. The first 'O' plays the character of Nyota Uhura and the second that of James T Kirk, the commanding officer of the USS Enterprise. The letter 'L' seems to resemble Hikaru Sulu.

The doodle opens in the bridge of the Starship Enterprise and then the second 'O' and the 'E' go out of the red door to the transporter room and the transporter beams them to an unfriendly planet where they are challenged by an alien. On defeating the enemy they return to the Enterprise. All this doesn't happen on its own, but you need to click your way through the doodle to make the action happen.

The iconic instrumental Theme from Star Trek by Alexander Courage continuously plays in the background. The doodle ends in classic Star Trek style with the USS Enterprise zipping past in the backdrop of stars and the Google letters appear in yellow.

The first doodle that Google posted to commemorate a television programme was on September 30, 2010 for the 50th Anniversary of the popular animated series The Flintstones.

Read More

Gmail for iOS Updated To Open Links in Chrome

Now Google+ for iOS got the ability to open links in Chrome for iOS, all of Google’s apps are now getting the ability. The latest is Gmail for iOS, which received an update just today adding the feature.

Just a couple of weeks later, Google’s recent acquisition Sparrow was also updated to add this, despite the creators having said there would be no new feature updates.

The Open in Chrome functionality makes more sense when you think about how restricted Chrome is on iOS due to iOS’ lack of a default browser setting and its Apple-imposted lag in Javascript performance. Adding the ability to open links from all of Google’s apps in its Chrome browser allows Google to offer its users a pocket universe inside iOS in which it can travel back and forth between apps and its browser.

Read More

A nifty Gmail filter to banish all non-personal email from your inbox

If you find Unroll.me or Gmail’s own unsubscribe feature ineffective, this Gmail filter works a treat for me:

Has the words: “If this email does not display properly”, skip inbox.

Or in visual form:

Step 1:

Step 2:

Read More