Google coupons now available on the go.
(Credit: Google)Google has been giving companies in its business listings ways to offer digital coupons to visitors since 2007. It wasn't until this week, though, that Google could bring the same coupons to mobile users.
It works like this: Businesses add a coupon to their listing in Google's Local Business Center. When you search a Google local listing from your Internet-enabled phone, any available coupons show up. As with other mobile coupon sites and applications, you'll simply present your phone face at the check-out stand. The checker will enter in the coupon bar code and you'll get your discount.
Google's mobile expansion of its digital coupons brings the search and advertising giant in direct competition with coupon providers like Coupons.com, Coupon Sherpa, Cellfire, and Yowza. With the exception of Yowza, which is a mobile-only application for the iPhone and iPod Touch, each service has a mobile coupons site and at least an iPhone app. Yelp has also jumped into the mobile deal business by letting businesses place special offers to Yelp users on Yelp.com and in its iPhone app.
Users' biggest complaints with mobile coupons tend to boil down to one thing: variety. While national chains are easier (and generally more effective) for a coupon service to sign, millions of other shoppers may prefer discounts for local or specialized brands, restaurants, and stores. Any business model that can capitalize on a self-service coupon sign-up for local and national businesses should have the upper hand.
So long as mobile shoppers navigate to Google's site from their cell phone browsers, Google's coupon business should grow. After all, Google isn't creating a brand-new business for digital deal distribution, but extending one that's already in place.
Google made two significant enhancements to Google.com on mobile phones Wednesday.
The first, history sync, now makes it possible to carry over a record of your search queries when you switch between mobile and desktop versions of Google.com. Dubbed "Personalized Suggest," Google will now remember your searches and will add them into the list of search suggestions you see as you type into the search bar. The new feature saves you from browsing through your history to repeat a query.
Of course, you do have to be logged in to Google for this to work, and you've got to have Web History switched on. Enable it on a phone by selecting "save searches" in the Settings menu on Google.com. At launch, the feature is only available in the U.S. on Android, iPhone, and Palm WebOS phones.
Google Local on mobile.
(Credit: Google)The second addition today similarly gets the mobile and desktop versions of Google.com talking to one another. Google has redesigned local search to make finding places of interest while on the mobile Google site much more finger-friendly. Click or tap "Local" on the mobile browser and you'll see a Start screen with categories you can browse to find restaurants and other businesses nearby, similar to what you can do on Google Maps. You'll need to have the My Location feature enabled.
There's also a category for viewing the points of interest that you starred as favorites on a Google Map. Starring essentially bookmarks the location's Google Place page. Bookmarking isn't anything new, but the browsable layout is relatively new to Google, which generally favors bare links to graphical enhancements. This treatment has the mobile Google site looking like a mobile hot-spot-finding app you might find in an on-phone app store. We have to say, it's a nice change.
The rejiggered Local Search kicks off in the U.S. and China, with support for more regions in the works.
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Google)
Google has slowly been adding its location feature to Google's mobile applications. Last week, Windows Mobile phones were the latest to get the handy localization feature.
In Google's mobile maps apps, My Location appears as a blinking blue dot that shows either your approximate location, based on cell tower triangulation, or a more precise reading based on your phone's built-in GPS. The same principle now applies to search in the Google Mobile App. The blue dot will list your current location below the search box. Instead of specifying a city or zip code, you just type in your query, and Google will deliver the results closest to you.
The most recent version of Google Mobile App for Windows phones also weaves URL suggestions for Web pages into its search suggestions. By clicking one, you can bypass the search results page and go straight to the business' Web site. Furthermore, if you have Google Maps installed on your phone, the app can plot local search results on a map. Google signifies these locations in the search results with a red pin (pictured).
As a nod to those with privacy concerns, Google encrypts your location on its way to the server, and only stores the most recent location to make subsequent searching easier. Of course, not everyone wants to make their location known. You can disable the My Location feature in the settings under Advanced Options.
For those who use Google Mobile App to quickly find places nearby, this update does, indeed, make the app a more capable tool. It also steps into Yelp's mobile territory, delivering not only ratings as part of a search result, but also mapped locations. Combined with the map's directions feature, the mobile app could help drivers and passengers, especially, find their destinations faster.
Google Mobile App first became available for Windows Mobile phones in February 2009. To get the latest update, point the mobile browser to m.google.com.
Green is good. Red is bad.
(Credit: Google)We've established that Google knows quite a bit about you, and sometimes that's a good thing. Especially when Google plows some of that information back into new features.
Yesterday, my colleague Tom Krazit explored a new feature that's part of the traffic reporting on Google Maps, including how Google is addressing the privacy concerns of the feature since it taps users' information to provide some of its more granular traffic-reporting details. In addition to displaying traffic information for major highways, Google will display it for arterial roads, the class of thoroughfare that represents the next level down in terms of vehicular activity. (This could include expressways and higher-traffic frontage roads, for instance.)
The app works by sucking anonymous data from people using the My Location feature on Google Maps for Mobile. Google sends itself (and throughout the feature's trial has been sending itself) anonymous information behind the scenes, whenever you turn on the My Location feature on a mobile phone. Part of that data returning to Google's headquarters includes your location and speed.
While the expanded traffic map that has emerged as a result of the data gives drivers another layer of service, Google isn't the first to turn mobile data into local traffic. An Israeli start-up called Waze has even more hyperlocal ambitions. Waze also reports highway and side streets, some even smaller than arterial streets. In fact, Waze can use drivers' cell phone data in tandem with the car's motion to create fairly accurate city maps. Moreover, you can actively report traffic accidents and other incidents. Before you depart, Waze can create a real-time route that's more proactive than Google's traffic maps.
While Waze has bright ideas, it doesn't have heft. Like online social networks, it must build its user base to build its database. Google, on the other hand, has a firm hold on real-life users who already have account names and passwords. It also has established highways and arterial roads. If Google is smart, it will not only turn an eye toward even smaller byways, but will also adopt many of the interactive features that companies such as Waze are developing.
Google Maps for Mobile is free to download. On some phones, you can install it from the larger Google Mobile App suite. Visit m.google.com from your mobile browser to download Google Maps for your phone.
Article updated at 1:40 p.m. PT to include information about a rival service called Waze.
Gmail's Google Maps link to CBSi's address on the iPhone via Smart Links's translation. Instead of the lengthy URL, you now have the actual address with the link embedded to it.
(Credit: Dong Ngo/CNET)Chances are that you have seen extremely long links when you receive an e-mail that contains a Google Maps address or driving instructions. This gets annoying, especially on mobile devices, because not only do the links take up a lot of space, but they also make it hard to find out the important information, such as the address, hidden within it.
Now that has just changed for Gmail users who use the iPhone or Android-powered devices to read their e-mail.
On Tuesday, GoogleMobile announced the Smart Links feature, a mechanism that automatically shortens a raw link and converts it into a meaningful phrase with the link embedded. Click on the phrase and the link will open just like with the original raw link.
For example, when you receive a Google Maps link of CBSi's address via Gmail using the iPhone's browser, instead of seeing a long string of characters, you will see the actual like this 235 2nd St, San Francisco, CA 94105. The address is hyper-linked and when clicked on will launch Google Maps showing the location of our HQ office.
Smart Links is part of GoogleMobile's Interative Webapp series that focus on developing and enhancing Gmail features specifically for the iPhone and Android-powered devices.
Currently, Smart Links supports four types of links: Google Maps address queries, Google Maps directional queries (with one destination), Google Sites Web pages, and links to YouTube videos. It's available only in English and, for now, only works with e-mails composed in plain text format.
In the future, Smart Links will also work with more link types, such as Google Docs, according to GoogleMobile.
There's nothing you have to do to use this feature other than checking your Gmail account via the Web browser on an iPhone/iPod Touch (running OS 2.2.1 or later) or an Android-powered device.
Note that you need to use the mobile browser to take advantage of this feature, other mail clients, such as the iPhones Mail app, don't support it.
I tried the new feature with on my iPhone 3GS and it worked very well. However, I wish it also supported e-mails formatted in rich text or HTML formats. That would make it more useful as most e-mails are sent using these formats.
Without Smart Link, this is how the original link looks.
(Credit: Dong Ngo/CNET)
Article updated 6/5/09 at 8:05am PSTwith more information about countries of availability.
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Google)
Nokia S60 users can finally bypass the browser and start Google searches from the same application that most other smartphone users have been using for months. The free Google Mobile App has arrived on Nokia S60 phones.
As with CNET Editors' Choice winner Google Mobile App on BlackBerry, this Symbian build places a search bar at its heart. The search bar supports search suggestions, history, and edits to the history, all of which saves you typing on subsequent searches for similar topics. Submitted searches return results in the default browser.
The search bar is flanked on the top by icons for Gmail, Google Maps for Mobile, YouTube, and Picasa Web albums. Clicking either of the first three will launch each separate native app if you've got it installed, or will install it for the first time if you don't have it. A 'more" button fast tracks you to online versions of Goog 411, Google Reader, Google SMS, and Orkut.
The final feature in this approachable and endlessly useful app is the My Location feature that uses the phone's GPS or cell tower triangulation to guess your general neighborhood. With it activated, Google can automatically localize your searches, which takes typing your city or zip code off your hands.
You can launch Google Mobile App from Nokia's Today screen by pressing the phone's "back" key. Users can opt out by disabling the quick launch hot key in the app's Setting menu.
Get Google Mobile App for Nokia S60 by visiting m.google.com from your mobile browser, or mobile.google.com from a desktop. It is available for handsets used in Canada, China, Denmark, France, Germany, India, Italy, Netherlands, Poland, Russian Federation, Spain, Turkey, United Kingdom, United States, Finland, Hong Kong, Macao, Norway, Portugal, Taiwan, and Sweden.
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Google)
Windows Mobile owners tired of opening their browsers every time they want to start a Google search can now put that habit to rest. On Wednesday, Google released a version of Google Mobile App for Windows Mobile phones (rate it here).
On Microsoft's mobile platform, the free, native application installs a home screen plug-in from which you can launch a handful of Google's mobile services. About two thirds of Google Mobile App is dedicated to its search field. The other portion is populated with thumbnail icons that open your Gmail, Picasa Web albums, Google Docs, and so on, in your default browser, except the Google Maps icon, which will open or install Google's downloadable map and directions application on your phone.
While Google Mobile App for Windows Mobile surfaces your history and search suggestions just like the BlackBerry and iPhone versions, the Windows Mobile version is the first not be a full-screen application. Even when you open Google Mobile App for Windows Mobile from the program menu, you'll see it as a strip floating at the top of the screen.
Treating the mobile app as a horizontal swatch is actually an asset, thanks to some time-saving tweaks Google added to this version--like mapping the app to a hot key so you can start a search without having to first open an app from the program list, and searching within a specific domain. These make Google's mobile application a quick-acting reference resource for anyone with a Windows Mobile phone.
Google Mobile App will work on Windows Mobile smartphones and Pocket PCs in the US, Canada, United Kingdom, France, Italy, Germany, and Spain.
Google's Mobile App with Voice Search for the iPhone has a few hidden features, the company announced Thursday. The hidden menu offers theme color changes and allows users to ditch its default sounds for others of their choosing. The app also features an option to open links in the program. Google said it will discuss more details at Macworld next week.
Families First, Georgia's largest nonprofit family service agency, has launched the I Am The Solution initiative to provide a community for people to make at least one "selfless" resolution for 2009. The agency claims its initiative "hinges on an interactive, online community" that will allow users to create profiles, set deadlines, track progress, and most importantly, communicate with others to "stay motivated." So far, the organization has signed Atlanta Falcons Linebacker Keith Brooking, hip-hop singer Big Boi, and best-selling author Ron Clark to join the service in the hope that they will attract more users. Throughout the year, Families First will profile and give awards to individuals who achieve their selfless resolution.
The New Platforms Fund launched Friday, offering start-ups small investments ranging from $1,000 to $3,000. The fund is being launched by Herman Blackbook, a consulting firm that works with small companies. Participating companies will receive marketing and development strategy, along with the funding. "The goal of the fund is to seed up to 10 cutting-edge ideas with both money and human capital to bring them from concept to alpha stage," according to a press release. The fund is ready to dole out cash now for those firms Herman Blackbook wants to work with.
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AOL)
It's been a busy two days for AOL Mail. On Wednesday, AOL launched a beefier version of the AOL Mail gadget for iGoogle. On Thursday, AOL won a few more fans with the introduction of its beta feature AOL Sync.
AOL Mail for iGoogle improves upon the previous gadget by replacing the preview-only capability with functionality that lets you compose, reply, and fully manage your in-box from the iGoogle page.
AOL Sync beta, launched today, targets mobile and desktop users with the ability to sync their AOL address book and calendar in real time to Microsoft Outlook, the iPhone, BlackBerry, phones running Windows Mobile, and phones made by Nokia, Motorola, and Samsung.
You'll get started on AOL's Sync site, where you'll sign in to get access to the mobile or Outlook plug-in. On that end, AOL has turned to Funambol, which brings open-source push synchronization to companies like AOL.
It's a little disappointing that AOL Sync beta won't yet sync e-mail, but we're always big fans of two-way syncing and if this beta catches on, message-syncing would be the next logical step.
Reporters were put into a frenzy this week when Google announced it was set to launch version two of its mobile search application for the iPhone that included the addition of voice-powered search, allowing you to skip the keyboard altogether. But now the question is, where is it?
My colleague Josh Lowensohn reported on the application on Thursday, and duly noted on Friday afternoon that it still wasn't available in Apple's App Store. But as of Saturday afternoon, the application was still MIA. A search on the App Store returned only the older version of the Google Mobile App.
According to The New York Times, Google planned to release the free application through the iTunes Store "as soon as Friday." The application, an update to Google Mobile App, is meant to allow you to talk into your phone, ask any question, and the results of your query will then be offered up on your iPhone.
One reason for the delay could be that it has been bogged down by Apple's App Store approval process, which can take days or even months. Indeed, the Google Earth app for the iPhone took several days to appear in the App Store after its release. And Buzzd CEO Nihal Mehta noted that it took three months for his company's application to arrive in the App Store after it had been submitted. In other words, it's difficult for third-party developers to determine exactly when the application is going to be made available.
Perhaps from now on, when developers release an iPhone app, they'll learn to add a caveat that while the application has technically been released, it may take several days or even longer for it to actually show up in the App Store.
Update November 18, 8:20 a.m. PST: The updated version of Google Mobile App with voice search is now available from the App Store.
