Live-streaming pioneer Meerkat has been pulled from the App Store

Meerkat, which last year kicked off the modern mobile live-streaming craze now led by Facebook and Twitter, has been removed from the iOS App Store. Ben Rubin, CEO of Meerkat maker Life On Air, broke the news on Twitter earlier today, calling it a "bittersweet" moment given his company's new release. On Monday, Life On Air revealed that it's been operating a private video chatting app it now calls Houseparty that's designed to facilitate group hangouts in a private, instead of public, context. It's amassed about 1 million users over the last year.

The end of Meerkat was an inevitability. The app had an explosive moment at last year's South by Southwest festival, which helped Life On Air nab $12 million in venture capital funding....

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Apple might shut down one of the most successful iMessage sticker packs

One of the more brilliant uses of iMessage stickers won't be around for much longer. The creator of Phoneys — a sticker set that replaces a friend's blue text message bubble with a fake one containing some sort of funny phrase — said today that Apple has asked him to completely change the app before this coming Thursday, or else it'll be pulled from the store.

The problem seems to be some combination of Phoneys using Apple's font and style and the company's disapproval of prank apps. It's not all that surprising — while Phoneys keeps its text message replacements good-natured, it's easy to imagine how some other sticker pack could take this concept and run with it to a much less appropriate place.

And at a basic level, the results of...

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HTC 10 will be discounted by $150 starting October 1

HTC has discounted its flagship HTC 10 a few times recently, but if you missed or passed on those sales, you’ve now got another opportunity to get a deal on the 10.

From October 1 through October 8, HTC will slash $150 off the price of the HTC 10. The flagship Android phone is normally priced at $699, so its price will drop to $549 during this sale.

HTC 10

HTC

HTC 10 will be discounted by $150 starting October 1 originally posted at http://phonedog.com

Google Maps will show where your next Calendar appointment is

Google has been all about change for its suite of productivity apps this week, and now we're seeing what happens when some of the disparate services combine. On Android, Maps and Calendar are joining forces to give a quick visual reference for where your various appointments will take place. You need to be signed into both apps with the same account, of course, but other than that it all seems pretty easy to set up and use. Just put the event's address in the "where" box when creating a Calendar entry and you should be good to go according to Google's Keyword blog. Maps information has cross-pollinated into Calendar previously, so it's pretty cool to see this go the other way, too.

Via: VentureBeat

Source: Google Keyword blog

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Google Maps now integrates with Google Calendar to help you navigate to upcoming events

Google Maps is getting a lot of love lately. After being updated with a blue dot direction beam and new voice commands, Google is now giving Maps some Google Calendar integration.

Google

Google Maps now integrates with Google Calendar to help you navigate to upcoming events originally posted at http://phonedog.com

What to expect to see from Google's October 4th event

It's that time of the year when tech companies trout out their newest wares hoping to cash in on the holiday season buying spree and Google is no different. On October 4th the search giant is holding an event to show off, well something, but most likely some new phones. The company is mum on the details but of course that hasn't stopped the rumor and leak machines from spinning up and pumping out what we can expect from the Android maker's celebration of consumerism.
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Samsung Galaxy A8 (2016) announced with 5.7-inch display, 16-megapixel camera

Samsung’s newest Galaxy A smartphone, the Galaxy A8 (2016), is now official.

Announced by South Korean carrier SK Telecom, the Galaxy A8 (2016) runs Android 6.0.1 on a 5.7-inch 1920x1080 display. There’s a 16-megapixel camera on its backside and an 8-megapixel camera on its face, as well as an octa-core Exynos 7420 processor and 3GB of RAM inside of its metal shell.

Samsung

Samsung Galaxy A8 (2016) announced with 5.7-inch display, 16-megapixel camera originally posted at http://phonedog.com

Japan's noisy iPhone problem

I cancelled my iPhone 7 Plus order last week. Yes, I still had a two-week wait before it was scheduled to arrive, but it wasn't impatience that got the better of me. It was where I live: in Japan. iPhones sold here (and in Korea) hold the dubious honor of being customized for their markets. We're not talking about extra mobile wallet functions, but a limitation; a constraint. Ever since the iPhone 3GS arrived in Japan in 2008, taking a photo and even a screenshot (ugh) has been accompanied by a mandatory shutter noise -- one that iPhone users elsewhere probably turn off right away. Even switching to mute mode doesn't halt the awkward 'passht' added to discourage covert photography. I'll soon leave Japan and return to my native England, at which point I'll reconsider upgrading. I'm not buying another Japanese iPhone.
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Facebook is testing a clone of Snapchat stories inside Messenger

Will Super Mario Run help Nintendo sell consoles?

Earlier in September, Apple started its keynote event, the one where it eventually debuted the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus, with a bit of a surprise. Nintendo’s own chief game designer, Shigeru Miyamoto, took the stage and unveiled Super Mario Run. It’s an endless runner game, and its reveal was kind of a big deal.

Apple

Will Super Mario Run help Nintendo sell consoles? originally posted at http://phonedog.com

Top 10 iOS Apps of September 2016!

We've compiled a 'Top 10' list of our favorite iOS apps to hit the App Store in September 2016. The apps highlighted in this video include Allo, Marline, Weather Widget, Zip Zap, Patch, Keelo, Odio, NBA 2K17, Cardboard Camera, Blend. Which app is your favorite? 

Apple

Apple iPhone 7 Plus

Top 10 iOS Apps of September 2016! originally posted at http://phonedog.com

Fuze is the first iPhone 7 headphone jack case you can preorder

It was only a matter of time until iPhone 7 accessory makers started delivering a slew of cases to bring back the 3.5mm headphone jack. But I didn't expect the first case that you could actually preorder -- Fuze -- would come from a tiny Austin outfit's Indiegogo campaign. For the most part, Fuze doesn't pack in any surprises. It's a traditional case for the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus that includes a headphone jack and also recharges your phone. That's it! But given the outcry against the loss of the 3.5mm port, its basic feature set might still win over some fans.

Source: Fuze (Indiegogo)

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Google wants to educate students about universities right from search results

Google is constantly tweaking its search results page to include more information typically found deep within websites, and now its search engine will surface college and university data starting today. Now, when a user searches for a school using Google, the results page will show information culled from the US Department of Education's College Scorecard. That includes the school's graduation rate, its average total cost with financial aid, the average salary after attending that school, and the institution's acceptance rate and undergraduate tuition cost.

In the long term, these types of additions to Google search bolster the company's core advertising business. The more queries users input into Google's search engine, the more...

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Google wants to educate students about universities right from search results appeared first on http://www.theverge.com

Hands-free 'Ok Google' commands come to Google Maps

The "Ok Google" command has expanded since the debut of Android KitKat, allowing devices to respond in various smart ways to those two words. Now, Google Maps on Android has this ability too, whether you're in the middle of a road trip or doing something else. Once it's enabled in settings, you can choose whether it works only while Maps is open or from any screen. Say the magic phrase then follow it up with something like "find a gas station" or "How's traffic ahead?" and it will let you know.

Source: Google Maps Blog

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Waze carpooling service now available to all users in San Francisco area

Google's Waze Rider service, which lets people carpool to and from work with drivers using the Waze app, has come out of its pilot program and is now widely available in the San Francisco area. It's been rolling out to users over the last several weeks, the company confirmed to The Wall Street Journal today. Waze Rider is different from ride hailing services like Uber and Lyft in that it's meant to pair two people headed in the same direction. Drivers are only reimbursed for the mileage driven during their carpooled rides; they're not really making much profit — if any at all. Riders are charged a maximum rate of 54 cents per mile. Both drivers and riders are limited to two rides each day, which again underlines the intended purpose of...

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I don’t think the Note 7 will ever recover

Samsung has experienced quite the rollercoaster ride during this second half of the year. Samsung started off strong with the initial release of the Galaxy Note 7, and despite the fact that the Note 7 ultimately didn’t differ much from the Galaxy S7 apart from the S Pen experience and the new Iris Scanner, Samsung stood a good chance to snag converters who were unhappy that the iPhone 7 didn’t come with a 3.5mm headphone jack.

Samsung Galaxy S7

Samsung

I don’t think the Note 7 will ever recover originally posted at http://phonedog.com

iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus arriving in Cricket Wireless stores

After launching at major US carriers on September 16, the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus are now making their way to prepaid operators.

The iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus today launched in select Cricket Wireless retail stores. Here’s what Cricket’s pricing for the new iPhones looks like:

Apple iPhone 7

Apple iPhone 7 Plus

Cricket Wireless

Apple

iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus arriving in Cricket Wireless stores originally posted at http://phonedog.com

Huawei will unveil a new flagship on November 3, could be the Mate 9

Flagship smartphone season will continue through to at least November 3, as Huawei just announced an event for that date.

Huawei today handed out save-the-dates for an event on November 3 in Munich, Germany. There aren’t many details about what Huawei will show at the event, but the company does tease that it’ll unveil “a new flagship device.”

Huawei

Huawei will unveil a new flagship on November 3, could be the Mate 9 originally posted at http://phonedog.com

Android Wear 2.0 Developer Preview 3 released with Play Store, Google delays full release to 2017

It’s been a while since developers had a new build of Android Wear 2.0 to test out, but that drought ends today.

Google

Android Wear 2.0 Developer Preview 3 released with Play Store, Google delays full release to 2017 originally posted at http://phonedog.com

Google Maps gains new voice commands

Google Maps users, you’ve got some new voice commands to try.

Google today announced that it’s got new voice commands in Google Maps for Android. When you’re in navigation mode or driving mode, you can say “Ok Google” and then give a voice command, allowing you to perform tasks without looking at your phone’s display. Any time that you see a white microphone in the upper right corner of your screen, you can give a voice command.

Google

Google Maps gains new voice commands originally posted at http://phonedog.com

Download Android Wear apps right from your wrist

Android Wear smartwatches aren't yet completely independent of your phone, but they just took one giant step in that direction. Google is releasing a third developer preview of Android Wear 2.0 that offers Google Play Store access on your watch, complete with support for paid downloads, beta tests and multiple accounts. Browsing is limited to recommend apps and keyword searches, but you can choose to install apps only on the watch -- important when some Android Wear 2.0 apps won't be available on phones in the first place.

Source: Android Developers Blog

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AOL's Alto Dashboard is a daily organizer for your email

In this era of texting and instant messaging you might not be emailing many long, heartfelt letters to your best friend from college. I certainly don't. But I'm still drowning in a sea of less personal correspondence: Receipts. Bill payments. Flight confirmations. Even with apps like Gmail sorting these assorted messages into tidy little folders, it's pretty easy to lose track of the things I might need to know. Alto, the email app from AOL (Engadget's parent company), is attempting to fix inboxes like mine with its new feature, Alto Dashboard. Out today, the dashboard places the most important bits front and center and lets you act on them, without ever leaving the app.
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Wireless Emergency Alerts are about to get more detailed

The FCC has voted to strengthen the Wireless Emergency Alerts system, which sends warnings about missing children, natural disasters and other dangerous events directly to citizens' cell phones. The new rules allow government officials to write up to 360 characters, rather than 90, for 4G LTE and future networks, and it requires participating carriers to support the use of embedded phone numbers and links in all alerts. For example, in an AMBER Alert, the message may now include a link to a photo of the missing child.

Wireless Emergency Alerts are about to get more detailed posted first on http://ift.tt/1tUdcCk

LG X power with 4,100mAh battery, LG G Pad X II with built-in stand both hit US Cellular

US Cellular is adding two new Android devices to its lineup today.

LG X Power

LG

U.S. Cellular

LG X power with 4,100mAh battery, LG G Pad X II with built-in stand both hit US Cellular originally posted at http://phonedog.com

Ask, and Siri will make Skype calls for you

When Skype updates on desktop and gives the "improving your experience" message it's usually pretty easy to dismiss that as a bald-faced lie. But the latest iOS update actually sounds really useful. The VoIP service will now tap into Siri for making calls, pull contact information from the app into your contact list and, like Facebook Messenger before it, make incoming calls look like regular ones. It all sounds genuinely useful. As always, if the update hasn't hit your iOS 10 device yet, that's what the source link below is for.

Source: iTunes, Skype blog

Ask, and Siri will make Skype calls for you posted first on http://ift.tt/1tUdcCk

Pacemaker lets you create and share mixtapes made with Spotify streams

Pacemaker, the DJ app that allows you to stream and beat-match songs from Spotify, is attempting to resurrect the mixtape. Today the company is introducing the Digital Mixtape, a new feature in version 2.0 of the app that will allow you to use its beat-matching capabilities to create mixtapes that can be shared with friends.

Mixtapes are still popular on sites like SoundCloud and Mixcloud, so Pacemaker isn't exactly breaking new ground, but it is making them dramatically easier to create and quickly share. You can use all of Pacemaker's great mixing features like Mix Now — which lets you mix tracks at the press of a button — and effects like reverb, loop, and Hi-Lo to make a mix like you normally would, but now you can share it with...

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Lose It app promises to log your meal just by taking its photo

Keeping track of what you eat has proven to be a pretty effective method in aiding weight loss. Studies show that food diaries not only help people manage their daily caloric intake, but it also just helps them be more aware of what they're putting in their bodies. Unfortunately, noting down your every meal can be tedious and time-consuming. But what if you could do so just by taking a photo of your food? That's exactly what Lose It, a food-tracking app, is trying to do with a brand new feature called Snap It. Using a combination of machine learning and Lose It's own vast database, the app aspires to figure out what you're eating based on your photo alone.

Lose It app promises to log your meal just by taking its photo posted first on http://ift.tt/1tUdcCk

Pacemaker's shareable, editable 'mixtapes' make everyone a DJ

Ever since the original Pacemaker DJ device in 2008, the Swedish team has been rethinking how we mix music. Today, Pacemaker's iOS app gets an overhaul that drags the mixtape well and truly into 2016. Pacemaker had long since moved on from being a facsimile of the DJ booth, instead allowing all music lovers to pick tunes from Spotify, and create seamless playlists stitched together by the app's in-house AI DJ "Mållgan." Today Pacemaker expands on that with a bunch of social features that blend elements of Soundcloud and Spotify with, of course, a little DJ twist.

Source: iTunes

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Spotify's mobile lyrics feature is launching first in Japan

After several years of rumors suggesting an imminent launch, Spotify is now available in Japan, one of the biggest music markets in the world. The service will compete against the likes of Apple Music and Google Play Music, as well as local apps like Line Music and Awa, in a country that hasn't taken to streaming music as much as the rest of the world. Sony is launching its PlayStation Music service, which uses Spotify for content, on the PS4 and PS3 in Japan today as well.

Spotify is also introducing a new lyrics feature on mobile and desktop, which will be available in Japan before anywhere else. Spotify had supported lyrics on the desktop since early last year, but the feature was recently disabled as the service ended its...

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Skype's latest iOS app update lets you make calls with Siri

Microsoft is fast taking advantage of a key new feature in Apple's iOS 10 update. Today the company released a new version of Skype for iPhone and iPad, and deeper Siri integration is its biggest new addition. You can now ask Siri to place a Skype call to any of your contacts without launching the Skype app first. This is limited to the regular consumer version of Skype for now; Microsoft says it will be available in the company's Skype for Business iOS apps in October.

iOS 10 lets you store Skype details for your family, friends, and coworkers right inside the contacts app. And incoming Skype calls will now appear on screen with an interface nearly identical to that of regular phone calls, making the whole experience feel a bit more...

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BlackBerry DTEK60 Android phone shown in leaked images

BlackBerry may be done developing hardware itself, but that doesn’t mean that we’re done seeing the BlackBerry name on new smartphones.

BlackBerry

BlackBerry DTEK60 Android phone shown in leaked images originally posted at http://phonedog.com

Twitter opens its Moments feature up to everyone

Twitter will now let any of its users create a Moment.

Moments, best known as the feature you have to swipe past to see your notifications, are collections of tweets that generally focus on a single subject. It may be people tweeting reactions to a baseball game, news updates on an emergency, or just a bunch of jokes about the presidential debate.

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Meerkat team confirms it created the mysterious Houseparty app

Those rumors of Meerkat's creators quietly developing a group video chat app, Houseparty, were well-founded. The company (actually called Life on Air) has confirmed to The Verge that it built Houseparty under a pseudonym, Alexander Herzick, for about 10 months. The company even admits to creating fake Facebook and LinkedIn pages to maintain appearances. Meerkat's crew reportedly wanted to both avoid criticism for changing its strategy and to reduce the pressure after becoming a sensation, albeit a short-lived one after Twitter's Periscope invaded its turf.

Via: The Verge

Source: Houseparty

Meerkat team confirms it created the mysterious Houseparty app posted first on http://ift.tt/1tUdcCk

An end of an era for BlackBerry

BlackBerry has been around for a very long time. That goes without saying at this point. The company is well-renowned, and it’s created some ridiculously popular smartphones, and software, over the years. For a lot of folks, a BlackBerry-branded smartphone was their first device.

BlackBerry

An end of an era for BlackBerry originally posted at http://phonedog.com

Apple keeps track of everyone you try to chat with on iMessage

iMessage is supposed to be a private way of chatting with friends and colleagues, but a report from The Intercept this morning points out one glaring flaw: though Apple doesn’t know what your messages say, it does get to see who you might be talking to.

When you try to contact someone through Apple’s Messages app, the app automatically pings Apple’s servers to see if that person has an iMessage account. When that happens, Apple gets to see who you’re trying to contact, whether they have an iMessage account or not.

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GoTenna's new communicator crowd sources for a better signal

If you're a fan of exploring the great outdoors, especially in areas of devoid of cell service, you may have already sought out a GoTenna. These walkie-talkie-like enablers pair with your mobile device via Bluetooth so you can send messages and GPS data to others in the area using radio frequencies. Today the company is pushing the off-the-grid envelope even further with the introduction of GoTenna Mesh, along with a new premium subscription service and an SDK for developers to play with. The addition of mesh networking makes it one of the first devices of its kind, providing mobile (not fixed point), off-the-grid, long-range communication to users -- so long as there's a smattering of devices to help leverage its capabilities.

This is also the first time GoTenna is launching its product internationally, utilizing available public radio spectrums in each area. Early birds can pick up a set starting at $129 on Kickstarter, but if you wait for the retail launch it'll run you $179 per pair.

GoTenna's new communicator crowd sources for a better signal posted first on http://ift.tt/1tUdcCk

T-Mobile will offer unlimited high-speed data in Europe, South America through 2016

The holiday season is coming up fast, and T-Mobile is giving its customers the gift of unlimited high-speed data overseas.

Beginning this Saturday, October 1, T-Mobile customers will enjoy unlimited high-speed data in many European and South American countries. This bottomless high-speed data offer will be good through December 31, 2016.

The full list of countries included looks like this:

Europe

T-Mobile

T-Mobile will offer unlimited high-speed data in Europe, South America through 2016 originally posted at http://phonedog.com