Samsung has finally unveiled its Galaxy Gear smart watch and revealed a 'slimmer, lighter, faster' Galaxy Note 3 phablet.

Speaking at the IFA conference in Berlin, Samsung's CEO JK Shin said: 'For the first time we have given Galaxy Note 3 a warm texture-touch cover. It's slimmer, lighter, and more powerful and all in a beautiful design.'

He then told the crowd he was getting a call and unveiled the smartwatch, adding that the Galaxy Note is powered by the Galaxy Gear and he hopes the watch will become 'a fashion statement.' 

The surprisingly sleek wrist-mounted device has a solid touchscreen, runs Android apps and can sync with a smartphone to make phone calls and access the web. 

When an email is received on the watch, for example, it is automatically opened on the Galaxy Note 3.

The Galaxy Gear comes in six colours and will be available from 25 September. It will cost $299 in the U.S but UK pricing has not been announced.

Galaxy Gear has a 1.6-inch SuperAMOLED display and Samsung claims the battery life is 25 hours on a single charge.

Samsung said the watch was designed to be a companion for the Note 3, but there will be software upgrades that make it compatible with the Galaxy S4 and S3 from October. 

It responds to voice commands and when a wearer wants to answer a call, they can raise the watch to their ear. 

The speaker and microphone are positioned so it can be used like a regular phone.

Pranav Mistry, head of the think tank team, Samsung Research America said this made the watch more natural to use unlike 'speaking into the air like with Google Glass.'

The camera is positioned on the outside of the strap and Mistry said photos can be taken by pointing and shooting after a simple swipe of the screen.

Pre-installed apps for the Galaxy Gear include Evernote, which makes it easy to remember things by quickly capturing images and memories and bringing important reminders right to Gear.

On Android Market, Apple iTunes and other Mobile Apps platform, there are huge list of apps available that lets you to earn by using them. You can earn rewards, credit/debit card points, redeemables, gift cards etc.

But, to earn from these apps, you need to do real hard work and complete certain tasks like run to grocery store, take photos, videos, talk to people, watching trailer etc.

What if you will not have to do all these boring tasks and still earn quite descent money ? Sounds interesting?

Then, you should check this list of 10 Smartphone Apps that wil earn you real hard money, gift card and redeemables.

1. CheckPoints

  

The app lets you to earn reward points by just scanning bar codes of specific products from selected shops. When you redeemed enough points for gift cards/prizes by scanning specific amount of products, you can get them. You can also earn by recommending this app to your friends.

To get started, just download the free app on your Android Phone or iPhone. Switch it on whenever you go for shopping. Some big companies that participates here are : Amazon, American Airlines, Bath, Body Works, Home Depot etc.

 

 

                     

 

2. App Trailers

App Trailers is an Pay Per Install App that is available for iOS and Android Devices. Preview trailers about apps, suggest App Developers that what they needs to complete the trailer by sharing your honest opinion.

Upon watching trailer, you will get half a cent and you can get paid up to a dollar for trying out a demo (for an app). You can also use your referral code to earn points.

 

 

                    

3. Field Agent

Field Agent is an iOS App to earn money. You need to come out at field and perform some tasks. You will get the instruction of where to go and what to do. The job is First Come First Serve Based and must completes in 2 hours.

For completing each job successfully, you will get $2 to $12.

  

 

4. ThumbSpeak

ThumbSpeak iOS App lets you earn without going anywhere. Task is very simple. You just need to answer questions in polls and surveys. The app will pay you for your opinion via PayPal or cash in Gift Cards.

 

 

 

5. IconZoomer

IconZoomer is available for Android and iOS. Take photos of your lunch, your drink, your pet, you will get paid on each snap which is given as task to you.

You will either gets paid via PayPal or get free merchandize. If you wants, you can also donate to charity via Unicef.

 

                         

6. Mobile Rewards

Download the app, sign up for their free service. You can earn money by watching a YouTube video, sharing a product on your Facebook Wall. You will earn credits that can be redeemed via PayPal.

You can also earn by referring the app to your friend. On each sign-up from your referral link, you will get 100 points and also 10% of the referred person’s earning.

 7. EasyShift

A powerful app for companies to check their product’s price charging by re-sellers on customers and for we people (common users), the app is an easy way to earn hard cash while eating, shopping and exploring the city. On completing several tasks, you will be promoted to higher paying levels.

Payments can be processed within 48 hours and you will get paid via PayPal.

  

 

8. Get Paid To Play !

What About The Name ? Sounds Interesting ? Yeah, It is.

The app serves you one of the easiest way to earn money from smartphone. They will show you offers to download free apps or register to cool sites or even watch video ads and you will get paid for doing so!

You can earn money by Watching Video Ads, Downloading Free Apps, Registering for Free Sites and also for Downloading Paid Apps or registering Paid Websites. Payment will be processed via PayPal.

  

                     

        

9. JunoWallet

Available for lots of mobile and desktop platform, JunoWallet lets you earn JunoCredits by Playing Games, Watching Videos, Doing Surveys, Making Calls Inviting Friends (3 Level Rewards), and in many more different ways.

You can then use JunoCredits to get Gift cards of Google Play, Amazon, iTunes, XBox, Playstation, eBay and many other firm.

   

                          

10. GymPact

The App rewards you to motivate gym, homeand RunKeeper workouts. Exercise at the gym and earn money. Seriously! Once you’ve made a week-long pact on GymPact, you get paid for every day you go, and you have to pay for every day you skip.

You’re getting $0.50 to $0.75 per workout which must lasts a minimum of 30 minutes.

  

 

Asphalt 8: Airborne was due to be released back on Aug. 8. Obviously that didn't happen, however there's now a new release date on the cards — next Thursday, Aug 22.

But if you can't wait that long, Gameloft is giving away a pre-launch code to one lucky winner, who'll be able to play the game before anyone else. To enter, you'll need to subscribe to the developer's YouTube channel and fill out the form on its website.

Asphalt 8 is one of the new Android titles optimized for OpenGL ES 3.0, the new 3D graphics standard included in Android 4.3. The title promises 180 events, 47 licensed cars and social integration, including  Facebook support.

Google recently released a device tracker that allows you ring your device, see your device’s location or completely wiped the device, all from a web interface. It is without doubt an awesome feature that will help with the recovery of your lost phone. But according to the folks at CyanogenMod, it’s simply not secure enough. See, if Google’s servers were compromised (by a hacker, or even the government), everyone would suddenly be traceable. The info is sent to Google’s servers, and it can be used by someone else.

CyanogenMod’s upcoming service is a bit different. Instead of sending the information through the server, your browser instead sends a public key. The phone authenticates the public key and sends an encrypted key back. The server cannot decrypt this key; only the browser can. This establishes a secure connection that cannot be decrypted on the server side, even if someone manages to get hold of that data. Using this connection, you can track or wipe your device.

It isn’t a foolproof service. If the server was compromised and you entered your password, you would become traceable. However, that would make one user traceable, instead of all users at once. It’s not perfect, but it’s far better than Google’s service.

The service is not out yet, but will be eventually. The source code has been fully published, and the CyanogenMod devs encourage people to check the security and safety of the service. Remember, services like this are improved with the help of the users.

Dedicated mobile gaming devices have been on the decline, and we all know that. The new gaming giant is Apple, with more than double the consumer spending on games than the gaming optimized handhelds as a whole. However, for the first time, Google Play has surpassed the Nintendo 3DS and Sony Playstation Vita in game sales.

You may be thinking, “Well of course Google Play has more consumer spending on games; they have far more devices!” You are absolutely correct. There are 1.25 billion smartphones and 180 million tablets in this world (of which only a fraction are Google Play enabled), and only around 200 million handheld consoles. But consider this: a majority of smartphone games are free to play, and ad revenue doesn’t count. The rest of the games are cheap. Almost all games are under $5. Handheld console games are much more expensive, added more per unit to consumer spending totals. Google Play still won out.

 Google Play still has quite a way to go if it wants to pass the iOS App Store in consumer spending, but it’s getting there. Games on Android are becoming better every day, especially with the rise of Google Play Games and the services it offers to developers. With these services, developers can spend less time on multiplayer and leaderboards and more time on the actual game.

A day after learning that the HTC One Developer Edition would be skipping the Android 4.2 update and go straight to Android 4.3, HTC’s president of global sales has now revealed that the company is working to release the same update for the HTC Droid DNA and all HTC One variants in the US and Canada before the end of September. It seems the only thing standing in the way of your HTC One or Droid DNA from receiving the news software is carrier certification.

Android is an operating system that is truly global, and Google is expanding the capabilities of Google Translate today to reflect that by adding important new languages. First are two new languages that can be used for handwriting recognition, and those are Hindi and Thai. It's especially important for handwriting recognition for languages such as these because they have a non-Roman character set that is difficult to use on a standard keyboard layout.

Today's update is also expanding the capabilities of Google Translate's "camera input", which reads languages you capture from physical objects with your phone's camera, to Afrikaans, Greek, Hebrew and Serbian. With these new capabilities in Google Translate for six more languages, Google is adding to an ever-expanding list of foreign languages that can help people communicate whether they're traveling or hosting travelers themselves.

Messaging service WhatsApp has updated its mobile apps with support for one-press voice messaging. The new feature, activated by holding down the microphone icon, allows short message clips to be recorded and exchanged as part of a conversation through the instant messaging service.

Effectively a touchscreen-based push-to-talk feature, the new voice messaging button in WhatsApp records when it's pressed down, and to dismiss your own message you simply swipe it away. It's also possible to listen to voice messages privately by holding the handset up to your head — WhatsApp detects the change and switches speakers accordingly.

The new feature is rolling out on Android, as well as iOS, Windows Phone, BlackBerry and even Symbian devices.

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There are many visions for the future of computing, and by-and-large they all involve some form of distributed storage and processing. Sure, our computers, tablets, and smartphones will continue to evolve and become more powerful, but so too will cloud services and the internet infrastructure that connects it all.

Whether we're looking at connected headset displays, constantly-syncing smartphones, or present-anywhere virtual machines, the cloud is going to play a significant role in computing in the years ahead.

A decade ago, cloud services weren't a thing that we interacted with on a daily basis. "The cloud" wasn't even a term, though it did exist - its role was making data more efficient. Case in point: the BlackBerry Network Operations Center. The NOC managed traffic between device and server by streamlining and compressing data that was sent to devices on the BlackBerry network.

The NOC was necessary then, back when you were lucky if your phone was capable of 100Kbps downloads, and even luckier if your carrier ever came close to providing that. Today we live in a world of LTE that can hit 50 megabits down, or even 75 or 100. The speeds are absurd, rivaling what's available for most home wired connections.

Of course, that's if you have a good LTE connection, which not everybody does. 4G connectivity is spreading, but rural and poor areas will lag behind for the foreseeable future.
like HTML5 apps, it’s a future that’s always coming but never quite arriving, and for a similar reason: the web just isn’t good for everything, and will never be as good for everything.

Take Google’s Chrome OS for example. The Chromebook Pixel is probably the most beautiful thin client ever conceived. And one of the stupidest. It’s a powerful machine that costs as much as the Adobe suite, yet can’t run Photoshop. It has a retina display that won’t display Premiere or After Effects. It’s utterly dependent on the internet in an age when the internet is still utterly undependable.

There are, should be, and increasingly will be software and services that make sense to be cloud-based. Not just things like messaging or browsing, which are born of the web, but anything that benefits from collaboration or cooperation. Other than that, nope, sorry. Code it natively so I can access all the power and performance native enables. 
 

There's only one consumer operating system today that qualifies as a "thin client": Chrome OS. Google's second operating system, Chrome OS is built on top of a Linux core but is designed primarily as a WebKit browser-based system. As such, the Chrome browser (based on WebKit), a media player for music, photos, and videos, and a file browser are the only apps that are installed on Chrome OS.

Shipping in both Chromebook laptops and Chromebox desktops, the hardware Chrome OS runs on is typically lightweight in both its physical and computational measures. With the majority of the processing happening in the web browser and in the Google cloud (Chrome OS ties in nicely with Google's serices), high-powered hardware isn't needed for the Chrome OS experience. Most Chromebooks are relatively cheap, with retail prices in the range of $200 to $400.

Even so, in early 2013 Google released the Chromebook Pixel, a high-end Chrome OS laptop with a super-high-resolution touch display, powerful Intel Core i5 processor, aluminum unibody shell, and a high-for-a-Chromebook $1299 pricetag. Much like Google's line of Android-powered Nexus devices, the Chromebook Pixel wasn't meant as a market-dominating move, but more as a demonstration to consumers and partners of what can be done with Chrome OS.

Rather than a thin client, what seems to be evolving is a client with a nice physique. Not emaciated, it’s a right-sized machine backed up by an amazing cloud.

Chrome OS is ahead of its time, and hopefully Google will someday meld its strengths with the native strengths of Android. Dropbox, having already bought Mailbox, may one day field their own cloud-based operating system. So might Facebook, who’s already got a bunch of apps and strong cloud infrastructure. And Amazon has server-sided browser in Silk, who knows what’s next?

The clients that run any or all of those wouldn’t be thin either, they’d just be remarkably fit, and that’s what we want from the future.


We've been saying it all along: the cloud is the future of computing. But it's not the be-all-end-all of computing. While there's no doubt that the cloud will be more and more involved in our daily computing needs, especially as mobile networks grow stronger, faster, and larger, it's not going to replace our devices as we know them.

Our laptops, smartphones, tablets, and whatever other new forms of personal computing hardware arise in the coming years will continue to become more powerful and more personal, and the cloud is only going to help in that. If it's serving up additional processing power when it's needed, having all of our content on tap at a moment's notice, or simply getting us our emails, the cloud will be there.

But the cloud is going to need better infrastructure if it's going to be with us in new and omnipresent ways. More servers with better redundancy, greater bandwidth, and broader connectivity will all play a part in expanding the reach of the cloud.