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  You know what photos we’re searching for, right? (Image credit: Photographer / Shutterstock) Search is increasingly becoming human. While users from my generation have been used to search operators like “and”, “or” and the plus and minus signs, search queries are becoming more and more natural language like. Take for instance Facebook’s Open Graph search, which launched earlier this year with mixed reception. You can use natural language like “photos of my friends taken in Tokyo,” for instance. Google has announced a better way to find photos, which uses natural language, as well as photo recognition. This new feature lets you search for photos within your Google+ network using simple queries. To make search even better, Google is now employing “computer vision and machine learning,” which will recognize even generic images based on their characteristics. With this update, you can simply do a search for “my photos of flowers” and Google will come up with images of flowers from your Google+ photos. You can then add qualifiers to focus your search: “my photos of flowers in New York,” for instance. This has a few implications, of course. First, Google is moving toward doing away with tags and captions. With the new update, Google’s algorithms (neural networks?) will attempt to identify the image based on image recognition. Product manager Matthew Kulick says this is limited to English searches within Google.com (no support for other country domains, yet), and when you are logged in via Google+. Going beyond photo search, of course, the bigger implication that comes to mind is that this improvement will tie in well with Google Glass. With Google improving its image recognition technology and having an improved ability in recognizing faces and objects, tying this in with persistent photo and video captured through wearable computers will become a rich source of data and analytics for the search giant.

Welcome to the latest entry in our Bonus Round series, wherein we tell you all about the new Android games of the day that we couldn't get to during our regular news rounds. Consider this a quick update for the dedicated gamers who can't wait for our bi-weekly roundups, and don't want to wade through a whole day's worth of news just to get their pixelated fix. Today we've got n adorable brawler, a licensed adventure book (what?), a new arcade racing game, and old arcade racing game, and Square's latest casual title. Without further ado:  Sci-Fighters Sci-Fighters is a ported browser game, a simple multiplayer brawler vein that takes its cutesy science fiction inspiration from Flash Gordon and the like. Done With This Post? You Might Also Like These:[New Game] Gameloft Releases GT Racing: Academy Free+ To The Market, In-App Purchases Not Included [New Game] CSR Racing Revs Its Engine On Android As A Free Download [New Game] Mini Motor Racing Has Little Cars And Big Races In One Massive Download [Update: Gameplay Trailer Added] Race Of Champions For Android Screenshots Make Us Drool, Want To Go Go-Karting [Bonus Round] Sci-Fighters, Judge Dredd: Countdown Sec 106, Race Illegal, Mensa Academy, And RE-VOLT Free was written by the awesome team at Android Police.

Help save that valuable mobile data with just a few taps in Chrome Beta One of the lesser talked-about features rolled out at Google I/O last week was a new option for Chrome on mobile devices to cut down on the bandwidth used while browsing. Well the feature has been rolled out in an experimental capacity as part of the latest Chrome Beta update on Android, and it's a quick way to help save on data usage while browsing. Like most systems that work to preserve data while browsing, Google routes your browsing traffic through one of its own proxy servers, compressing it along the way as data is sent back and forth to your phone. Correctly, Google has chosen to only route HTTP connections through the proxy, and HTTPS request will always be sent directly. Google claims data savings can be as much as 50-percent, which is nothing to sneeze at. To enable this new feature, you'll have to be running the latest Chrome Beta update (version 28, technically) on your phone or tablet. You will likely be greeted by a splash page the first time you open Chrome Beta after the update, but if you're not, head to the browser settings, scroll down to "Bandwidth management" and then tap "Reduce data usage" and hit the button at the top right to enable it. (If you don't see the option, try heading to "chrome://flags" in the navigation bar and enabling it manually.) You'll be able to come back after you do some browsing and see how much data you saved by enabling this new feature.

One of the more interesting alternative launchers out there (that is to say, one that isn't just a grid of apps and widgets plus a drawer) is Action Launcher. This premium custom launcher has been gaining fans since its launch, thanks to a unique gesture-based app drawer and a focus on speed and usability. With version 1.7, developer Chris Lacy has added some of the features this younger launcher lacks, most notably icon theme support - the various theme packs for GO, Nova, and Apex launchers should work with Action Launcher Pro now. A stock Jelly Bean icon pack is included. Done With This Post? You Might Also Like These:Nova Launcher Updates With Jelly Bean 4.2 Compatibility, Quick Settings, And Other Goodies Nova Launcher Updated To Version 2.1: New Apps Menu, Better Icon And Wallpaper Selection, And More Theme Options [New App] Mobint Joins The 4.0+ Launcher Party With Jelly Bean-Inspired Holo Launcher HD Create A Killer Retro LCD Android Theme With A Few Quick Downloads Action Launcher Updated To Version 1.7: Icon Pack Support, Wallpaper Scrolling Toggle, And More was written by the awesome team at Android Police.

Memorial Day weekend! This week was a busy one, so it will be nice to have that extra day to relax and catch up on rest from all of the traveling we have been doing lately. This week was highlighted by Android 4.3 tidbits, Verizon’s comical press event at CTIA, and talks of a “Google [...] This Week in the Life of DROID: 5/24/2013 is a post from: Droid Life Click the post title to continue through and join the conversation!

Sometimes, updates break things. That seems to be the case for some HTC owners who, upon receiving a silent update to the newest version of Google Play Services, are having trouble using apps that rely on location data. According to HTC phone users in this support thread, Google Now continually asks to turn Location Services on, location-dependent applications like Foursquare and WeatherBug don't function properly, and Maps is unable to lock onto a location. The good news? Google's looking into the problem. The bad news? No ETA. And unfortunately, because Google Play Services updates in the background automatically, wiping data won't help. Done With This Post? You Might Also Like These:Silently Installing Itself On A Device Near You: The Green 'Google Settings' Icon - It's Just Google Play Services 3.0 [I/O 2013] New APIs For Location, Single Sign-On, And Google Cloud Messaging Google Play Services Can Now Be Installed Manually From The Play Store Latest Google Maps Update (v6.10) Causes The HTC Rezound To Reboot, Leaves Users Finding Their Own Way Home Google Services Bug Causing Location Issues For HTC Owners, Google Working On A Fix was written by the awesome team at Android Police.

Remember the Motorola device by the codename XT1060 that we reported as likely being Verizon’s variant of the XFON? It cruised through the FCC today, sporting Verizon’s LTE band 13 and CDMA frequencies. It also supports GSM bands as well, so the device can probably be taken overseas on a global roaming journey, like many [...] Verizon’s Motorola XFON Hits the FCC as Model XT1060... Click the post title to continue through and join the conversation!

The HTC One has been in the news a lot over the past few days. With rumors of stock Android models, bigger 5-inch screens, and patent lawsuits from Nokia. Today[...]

Google Hangouts, the darling of I/O 2013, is said to be Google’s answer for unified messaging. They have been admittedly slow to pick up on the importance of messaging, and especially poor at making sure their messaging services work well with one another (and others). Hangouts was supposed to solve that, bringing us a one-stop experience for all of our messaging needs. A noted omission was SMS messaging, popularly known as text messaging. A huge part of the overall scope of messaging, many thought it to be something that would come in time to Hangouts, as Google Voice was set to be cobbled into Hangouts at some point, and the GMail Google Talk application utilizes it. Recent news of Google’s move away from XMPP is troubling news for SMS fans. If XMPP is unfamiliar to you, don’t worry. Like many back-end technologies, you’re not supposed to hear about it. XMPP stands for Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol, and is the standard for things like IM (instant messaging) and the SMS architecture for Google Talk. If you used Google Talk to send an SMS, you’ve used XMPP. More importantly, you’ve used XMPP via a Google service that is, in many ways, Hangouts. No more XMPP Google has decided to drop support for XMPP, noting a change in “technical demands”. While those demands aren’t detailed, it should be noted that Google has decided not to support the server-to-server connections for XMPP, which is the real crux of the issue. That particular set of protocols is what would make Hangouts a true messaging monster. That would put your Google Hangouts server in touch with whatever SMS server your non-Google-using friend was on. Google still supports client-to-server commands, but those are limited to those of us using a Google chat application like Hangouts. Some believe Hangouts also prevents us from deleting the history, or going off the record. While it may access those functions differently, they’re still available. Cause for concern Google helped push XMPP forward, so it’s very curious that they now wish to move away from it. The real concern is the openness of XMPP, and that Google no longer supports it. The inability to chat with someone away from Google’s servers doesn’t serve the wants of many users. The real concern is availability and implementation. If Google no longer supports an open messaging platform, instead opting for one that is only good on their servers, it severely limits your pool of friends to chat with. The utility of Hangouts now depends on either your friends or the industry getting in line with what Google is doing. While convincing your friends to get on board may be pretty simple, asking the rest of the industry to do so may prove next to impossible. What’s really going on? Hangouts is, essentially, a cloud messaging service that operates (of course) within Google’s parameters. They have the service, and the right to implement the technology which suits it best. If XMPP isn’t something they’re comfortable with, they don’t have to use it. Security is a priority for Google, and a server-to-server messaging protocol like XMPP may have struck the wrong chord. Messages are kept in the cloud, and Google is notoriously protective of their data centers. Another way into that pool of information is not something the folks in Mountain View would even entertain. Hangouts also uses a different method of accessing and notifying users of messages. Rather than “read receipts” like you find on many other messaging services, Google utilizes a “watermark” system. This watermarking protocol engages in a more real-time setting, where you can see if your message has been read, and if the person or people on the other end are responding in real time, desktop or mobile. This is very different technology, and may not have worked cohesively with XMPP. The permissions Hangouts asks for Lessons learned For mobile, the switch from Google Talk to Hangouts was little more than a facelift. The deeper issues reside in back-end utilit

Customers in 21 cities across 6 counties will receive higher speed data this fall C Spire Wireless, a regional carrier primarily serving the Southeastern U.S., has announced today that it will be expanding its LTE coverage to South Alabama and Northwest Florida starting this fall. The rollout, which will offer customers drastically higher data speeds, will cover a total of 2,899 square miles across 21 cities and offer the service to 687,000 people utilizing and 146 cell sites. Here's the city breakdown: Alabama: 15 cities in the south Alabama counties of Mobile and Baldwin, including Mobile, Prichard, Saraland, Satsuma, Chickasaw, Daphne, Fairhope, Foley, Gulf Shores, Loxley, Orange Beach, Summerdale, Robertsdale, Silverhill and Spanish Fort Florida: 6 cities in four northwest Florida counties, including Gulf Breeze, Destin, Fort Walton Beach, Mary Esther, Cinco Bayou and Miramar Beach There isn't a detailed schedule for when the areas will start to roll out other than "this fall", but we'll surely hear more about the specifics as we near that launch window. Source: C Spire Wireless