Google announced today that while it might have 90 million Google+ users, it has 250 million people using its Android handsets. That's 700,000 activations per day, on average, with over 11 billion downloads from the Android market in all.
It's been over two months since Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) launched and the adoption rate is nothing short of pitiful. It's sort of a disaster.
Quick, go scrounging through your change drawer. Did you find a few dimes? Good, because that's all you'll need to buy some of the Android Market's best apps this week and beyond. Now I just have to figure out how to shove a dime into my computer.
It's not that Android users don't use their apps, they do: Nielsen says Android users spend about an hour a day on their phone with two-thirds of that time being spent apps. It's that they're all spending their time in the same apps (probably because most apps just suck).
Google's official video player for Android, long available for Honeycomb tablets, finally works with Android phones (2.2+). You can use it to watch videos you store on your phone or flicks you got from the Market. It streams over Wi-Fi and supports offline viewing too. [Android Market via TechCrunch]
Google just launched a new Android Market for Android 2.2+ users and added book and movie downloads to the Market. What's bigger news to me though, is that sticking true to Google's recent trend, Android Market looks a lot better.
Google's seen an impressive jump in downloads from its Android Market app store, with their mobile advertising sales director for Europe Ian Carrington revealing it was just a year ago that it was only one billion downloads, "and that first billion took two years to happen...the last billion took 60 days." [The…
A problem that has plagued Android Market was that you didn't really know if an Android app would work with your Android phone. Google has rolled out a device compatibility check in the Android Market website to solve that. [Android Market via Android Central]
Popular Android emulator developer "yongzh" has had all of his apps yanked from Android Market without warning, he told users today, signaling that Google's recent bans (started last month at the behest of Sega) are all but over.
Well, phooey. Google is blocking users with rooted Android devices from renting movies via Android Market. Apparently, it's "due to requirements related to copyright protection". I guess Google thinks people who use rooted phones are pirates who steal movies.
Buried in a businessy press release from PopCap are two gems: That Plant Vs. Zombies and Chuzzle are coming to Android via the Amazon market-and that they'll be free apps of the day. PvZ for free is quite good. Chuzzle… [Kotaku]
What's this? An AT&T Android device that doesn't shackle you to the official Android Market? The new Samsung Infuse 4G lets you flip the toggle to download any Android app from any market. That's great! But is it the future?
And just like that, the Android Market got a weensy bit better, with in-app billing. Expect to see a lot of those free apps suddenly introducing worthy in-app upgrades. [Android Dev Blog]
If there's anything the Japan quake has taught us, it's that disaster can strike at any moment. PDC's Disaster Alert app for Android can help you cope with this scary fact by giving you real-time alerts on the world's active hazards, including earthquakes, tsunamis, floods, storms and more. [Android Market]
In-app purchases for Android will finally be a reality next week. Developers get a head start on the fun and can start uploading their apps and setting prices now, but can't publish them until the service is live. [Android Developers Blog]
The German site Android News claims to have the first screenshots of Amazon's App Store for Android. But what does it reveal, exactly?
Late last night Google finally published an official response to the dozens of malicious Android applications that had infiltrated the Android Market. Updated.
N64oid, a Nintendo 64 emulator, will let you indulge your nostalgia wherever you go. Though other video game emulators for Android devices exist, nothing else can bring you this kind of 64-bit gaming goodness. $6. [Android Market]
Google has removed 21 apps from the Android Market that were confirmed as malware. The apps were designed to get root access to the user's device, collect data, and download additional code. These are very bad things the apps were doing. And they were downloaded by at least 50,000 users.
