>> Google launches a friend locator for mobile maps. Dell may want to make smartphones and happy birthday to Loaded. It's Wednesday, February 4, I'm Natali Del Conte and it's time to get Loaded.
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>> Google launched a friend location service called Latitude today. It's a lot like Loopt or Buddy Beacon and that it lets you find your friends and family on a map at any given time. It uses Google Maps My Location service that combines cell tower triangulation and GPS to pinpoint a person's location. We tested it this weekend for the CBS Early Show, take a look. The Geller family is always on the move.
>> It's constantly a challenge to keep up with my daughters because they're always on the run, they're out with their friends, they're now in their teen years, so they have more independence.
>> This one is yours. And sometimes the parents don't know where 14-year-old Jordyn or 16-year-old Carly are hanging out.
>> We usually don't get the call or text message until later.
>> So, who better to test the new Google program called Latitude that allows users to track each other using just cell phones. It's using a combination of GPS and what's called cell tower triangulation. If they don't want you to know where they are, they can choose your name and block you.
>> Oh really?
>> We'd rather...
>> They have full control, you can't override it.
>> Oh, right.
>> What?
>> Don't tell them that.
>>Yeah. We gave them cameras to record a video diary as they tested out the new program.
>> Jordyn, do you know your Mommy is and Carly?
>> She's at the mall.
>> Which mall?
>> I don't know.
>> It looks to me like they're at the Westchester Mall.
>> And sure enough Mom was, but when Nance looks for Carly at the mall...
>> It says that she's in Harrison, New York. And she's actually never been in Harrison, New York.
>> What about keeping tabs on mom and dad?
>> It's 12:02 a.m. and I'm sitting at home waiting for my parents to come home from the city, and it said that he is swimming in the Hudson River?
>> The Gellers live in an area that has spotty cell phone receptions, so they found that when they went to more urbanized areas the accuracy of the program increased. This program can work with pretty much any phone with Internet capabilities, except the iPhone for now. Latitude will work on almost any phone with Google Maps, except the iPhone, but we're told that's coming soon. To test it yourself, visit google.com/latitude.
MySpace is naming names of sex offenders. The company provided the Attorneys General of two states the names of 90,000 registered sex offenders that have been banned from its network. This comes right after report by 49 state Attorneys General that concluded that online bullying is a much bigger issue than child sexual predators. But still 90,000 the shere number of the accused does give pause. According to John Cardillo the president of a security company that MySpace uses to look for sex offenders, some of these people just switch from MySpace to FaceBook where it was recently discovered that there are at least 8,000 offenders. Scary! Rumors are a swirl that Dell wants to get into the mobile phone business. The speculation is that the company will actually introduce two phones. One based on Google's Android operating system and the other based on Microsoft's Windows mobile platform. I'm not super optimistic that Dell will make the greatest cell phone in the world, but I also think that they have no choice, but to try. Let's just hope they do better in the cell phone market than they did in the MP3 market. Amazon has got game, digital ones. The company already offers downloaded and streamed movies and music, but now they want to sell video games with that model. The service is called Amazon game downloads and it has over six hundred titles for less than $10. You don't have to fork out the $10 right away though. You can download the game and play it for 30 minutes before you decide whether or not you want to purchase it. Obviously, this is geared towards casual gamers and PC gamers, but it could expand quickly from there. You can find it yourself at amazon.com/gamedownloads. Game on. You may have fallen in love with those Sony Vaio Lifestyle P Netbooks, but realize that given the state of the economy, it might not be wise to spend a thousand dollars. Well, here is a little offer to sweeten the deal. Verizon and Sony are teaming up to offer $200 off the netbook if you sign it to a year mobile 3G contract with Verizon. Of course in the end you are paying more for the computer because of the monthly service, but this seems to be a trend with netbooks these days. We have several viewers tell us that it was a popular model in Europe and I know the Sony Vaio is not exactly in netbook, but we'll just use that term for argument's sake. Regardless, you've got until March 31 to take advantage of this offer. Toshiba will launch an ultra sexy touch screen cell phone with the decidedly unsexy name TG01. Despite the forgettable name this phone is so pretty hot probably because it looks like it takes design cues from the iPod Touch, but it's also got some pretty impressive specs. It comes with the huge 4.1-inch QVGA screen, support for MicroSD, a 1 gigahertz CPU, assisted GPS, Wi-Fi, 3G, DivX and thank the heavens Flash support. All that wrapped in case that's just 9.9 millimeters thick. It will launch formally at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona in February. Those are all your headlines for today, but before I go I want to wish a Happy Birthday to Loaded. One year ago today we launched the show in this very same room. It has been quite a year for me and the Loaded crew and we just want to take the time to thank you for watching the show and for all your feedback and support. Happy Birthday Loaded. I will see you tomorrow. Thank you for watching. I'm Natali Del Conte with CNET TV and you've just been Loaded.
