Silently Installing Itself On A Device Near You: The Green 'Google Settings' Icon - It's Just Google Play Services 3.0

Do not freak out. Yes, a big green icon has magically popped up in your app drawer; no, it isn't bad; and yes, it is pretty much useless.

If you caught the announcement of Google Play Services 3.0, aka "Google+ Sign-In," you're already halfway up to speed on this. Google Play Services is an APK that many of Google's apps rely on to hook into Google+ and, just like the Play Store, Google has the ability to silently update it. Recently, they started rolling out an update for it, and along with a bunch of new app integration stuff, it came packing this superfluous "Google Settings" app.

If you don't have the update yet and want to join in on the fun, you can manually update by clicking right here.

Adobe Releases Photoshop Touch For Phones, Pisses Off Tablet Users By Making It A Separate $5 App

Adobe has kind of a scattershot mobile strategy. On the one hand, it released six apps back in 2011 for tablets that ranged from okay to awesome. On the other hand, it killed off five of them last year. The tablet versions cost $10 each. Pricey for an app, but Adobe knows how to bring it's A-game. Today, it's bringing it again with a phone version of Photoshop Touch. A distinct piece of software for $5.

Nearly all of the features of the tablet version are available here, including layer support, selective editing, and an array of touch-friendly gestures and menus that made the original app so dang nice. Also, as before, you get a small amount of Creative Cloud storage (2GB) with your purchase. Not a bad deal.

The real bummer is for tablet users who have purchased Photoshop Touch already and will have to re-buy the nearly identical software if they want to use it on their phones as well. Using myself as an example, I purchased three of the initial six applications. While it's not impossible to find the discontinued titles on the Play Store and install them on new devices, it is fairly difficult. I already feel like $20 went down the drain on apps that won't be supported anymore. Shelling out yet another $5 for the same title on a different device is a drag when very few other developers on Android follow this model.

Still, if you want to give it a go, grab it from the widget below.

Photoshop Touch

Google's biggest supporter, Samsung, could be its worst enemy

With the popularity of the iPhone, carriers found themselves in a tight spot. Don’t carry the iPhone, and miss out on thousands, possibly millions, of activation's every year. Carry the iPhone, and bend to the will of Apple. Google may soon find themselves in a similar situation, in the spot of the carrier, with Samsung playing Apple’s role.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Google is becoming concerned with Samsung’s popularity, and the control it may give them. Last year, Samsung alone consumed nearly 40 percent of the global market. With a large percent of those smartphones being Android, it’s safe to assume there are more Samsung branded Android phones being sold than any other manufacturer by a large margin. This gives Google plenty reason to be nervous.

Not only is the threat of Samsung commanding control over Android from Google a very real concern, so is the fear that Samsung may fork Android, taking complete control of the platform cutting Google out completely. There is also the fact that Samsung could very easily leverage the Galaxy brand and ditch Android for something entirely different.

Google has a plan though. Besides throwing their weight behind different manufacturers for Nexus devices, Google is also making their own hardware now, like the Chromebook Pixel, and the first real Google -Motorola phone has yet to see the light of day. Andy Rubin has said that Motorola will, hopefully, be used as a tool to keep Android balanced. We’ll have to wait to see how that works out as soon as this summer.

Via: The Verge

Source: Wall Street Journal