google

Google continues to slowly build Google Now into its services. It made the data-rich Now-styled notifications available through an advanced option setting in Chrome for Mac on Thursday, following basic implementation in Chrome for Windows and Chrome OS earlier this year.

You can activate Google Now notifications in Chrome for Mac by typing chrome://flags into your address bar, scrolling down to the Enable Rich Notifications, and changing the setting to Enable. The setting is limited to the most unstable of the browser's builds, Chrome Canary. Canary will only work on OS X 10.6 and newer.

Google Now … Read more

The young people these days are really into the Google, even more than the Apple or the Facebook.

That's the finding of a poll conducted for The Washington Post in which 94 percent of respondents between the ages of 18 and 29 reported having a favorable opinion of the Mountain View, Calif., behemoth, with 72 percent saying they have a "strongly favorable" view of Google.

That officially makes Google more popular with twenty-somethings than chocolate, which 90 percent of people say they "love."… Read more

Google CEO Larry Page has flatly denied involvement in a secret spy program operated by the National Security Agency, calling into question recent news reports that alleged the company gave spooks a backdoor into its servers.

Page said in a statement on the company's official blog today, which we're reproducing in full:

You may be aware of press reports alleging that Internet companies have joined a secret U.S. government program called PRISM to give the National Security Agency direct access to our servers. As Google's CEO and Chief Legal Officer, we wanted you to have the … Read more

SANTA CLARA, Calif. -- Reality isn't what is used to be. With increasingly powerful technologies, the human universe is being reimagined way beyond Google Glass' photo-tapping and info cards floating in space above your eye. The future is fashionable eyewear, contact lenses or even bionic eyes with immersive 3D displays, conjuring up a digital layer to "augment" reality, enabling entire new classes of applications and user experiences.

Like most technologies that eventually reach a mass market, augmented reality, or AR, has been gestating in university labs, as well as small companies focused on gaming and vertical applications, … Read more

BlueStacks' GamePop console for playing Android games on your TV announced on Friday that iOS-only games also will be available to its subscribers.

Using a new mobile-to-TV technology it calls "Looking Glass" to convert iOS games for play on non-iOS devices, GamePop has revealed that iOS-first Subatomic Studios will include its games as part of the console's $7 monthly subscription service. The console will sell for $130 when it's released later this year, but is free to early adopters at GamePop.tv through June 30.

Subatomic is known for the popular Fieldrunners game. While its games … Read more

Noting the contribution made by those who try to hack its security, Google has once again increased the cash rewards it pays out for identifying vulnerabilities in its services.

The Internet giant, which began swapping security research for cash a couple of years ago, announced the higher payouts and new rules for the program Thursday on the company's Online Security Blog.

The bounty for cross-site scripting bugs on Google Accounts more than doubled from $3,133.70 to $7,500. The reward for reporting cross-site scripting bugs in other sensitive areas such as Gmail and Google Wallet more than … Read more

It's looking like gamblers aren't going to be able to use Google Glass to enhance their poker face.

Even though the high-tech eyewear has not yet been released to the general public, casinos across the U.S. are banning Google Glass, according to the Associated Press.

Taking photos or videos is strictly prohibited in most all casinos, so it makes sense that a gadget touted as being able to record a video with a slight head movement or snap a photo with the wink of an eye wouldn't be allowed.

According to the Associated Press, casinos in … Read more

Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt answered questions at the company's annual stockholder meeting in Mountain View, Calif., on Thursday with some levity at North Korea's expense, and a pointed dig at China.

"I was troubled by continued reports of censorship and spying on people," he said of China's relationship with its citizens as a way of explaining why Google refuses to invest more resources in the country. China currently boast more than 560 million people using the Internet.

Schmidt made his comments just as news was breaking of the alleged participation of major technology companies, … Read more

Motorola has settled a patent-infringement lawsuit with TiVo over digital-video recording technology ahead of a patent trial scheduled to begin next week.

TiVo filed a patent-infringement claim against Motorola last October, saying that the Google-owned company's set-top boxes infringed on its patents related to DVR functionality. TiVo argued that were the court to rule in its favor, the "damages claim is likely to run into the billions of dollars."

The settlement, which was first reported by Bloomberg, was confirmed by a Motorola spokesperson, who declined to offer details of the settlement.

"We're pleased that all … Read more