Hold on Tight…There’s a Lot of Goo, Goo, Google Here

Believe me I didn’t plan it this way, but there was a lot of relevant info about Google products this week. I didn’t realize how much I had until I started to put this edition together.

The ramifications of last week’s Google I/O conference are still being felt by the tech media and users. They made a lot of changes and unified some products into a cohesive unit. This was never so evident in the makeover of Google+.

Now I have been somewhat negative about Google+ since it came out. I tried it and couldn’t decide what the point of it was. I still used it to post links to my blogs, but not much more than that.

Last week’s announcement caused me to take a second look, and I must say I like it better…although I still haven’t quite got the point yet. They definitely made it easier on the eyes and their total revamp and addition of user’s photos was a great move.

I have set up my iPhone to automatically send photos to Google+ immediately after I take them. They go into a private file and I can easily choose to share one or more whenever I want. And I can quite improve my photos quickly and easily using their built-in post processing tools. I like that simplicity for my simple iPhone snapshots.

I have been storing my photos on Picasa for years and those photos are now in albums on Google+. Google has obviously put a lot of time and effort into Google+, but they still have a long way to go to overtake Facebook in the social media world. But they keep plugging away (see story #5).

I also like what they have done with voice activated search, both in Google Search and in Google Now. The latter is available on iPhone and Android Phones…and critics are saying the iPhone app is kicking Siri’s bottom. I know I said in a previous edition that I wasn’t interested in Now, but I think I will give it a try just to see what all the shouting is about. I’ve included a guide to setting up Now if you are interested (story #4).

There’s more to the world than Google, and we have got some other interesting tidbits for you…including a story about Twitter security and a new feature added to Evernote. So, let’s get ‘er done! - JRC

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