Neiman Marcus is known for the outrageously beautiful and unique merchandise showcased in their annual Christmas Book. Think of the most amazing gifts you can imagine -- a beautiful Chanel handbag, a Orefici watch, or perhaps your very own tailored mermaid suit or customizable cupcake car.
For this holiday season, Google Catalogs has collaborated with Neiman Marcus to offer you a free, browsable copy of this year’s Christmas Book. We’ve also created the very first historic compilation of Neiman Marcus Fantasy Gifts from the past ten years. It’s called the Fantasy Gifts Retrospective and you’ll only find it on the Google Catalogs app for iPad, available for free in the App Store.
To celebrate the Fantasy Gifts Retrospective, we’ve picked out our favorite gifts from the past 10 years! Sadly, gifts from prior years are no longer for sale, but we trust you'll enjoy the 2011 gifts and the walk down memory lane.
Posted by Madhu Punjabi, Strategic Partner Manager Associate, Google Catalogs Team
Beaming a video with a single tap or unlocking a device with only a smile sounds like science fiction. Now, you can actually do these things (and more) with a phone that fits in the palm of your hand.
Wednesday morning in Hong Kong—together with Samsung—we unveiled Galaxy Nexus, the first phone designed for the latest release of Android 4.0, also known as Ice Cream Sandwich.
With a super slim profile, Galaxy Nexus features a 4.65” Contour Display with true high definition (720p) resolution and a lightning-fast dual core 1.2ghz processor combined with 4G LTE or HSPA+ technology. Galaxy Nexus also features the latest in software: Ice Cream Sandwich makes Android simple and beautiful, and takes the smartphone to beyond smart.
Beauty and simplicity With Ice Cream Sandwich, our mission was to build a mobile OS that works on both phones and tablets, and to make the power of Android enticing and intuitive. We created a new font that’s optimized for HD displays and eliminated all hardware buttons in favor of adaptable software buttons. We also dramatically improved the keyboard, made notifications more interactive and created resizable widgets.
The desktop-class browser is significantly faster, featuring a refined tab manager and the ability to sync your bookmarks with Google Chrome. Ice Cream Sandwich also features the best mobile Gmail experience to date, with a new design that lets you quickly swipe through your inbox and search messages even when you’re offline. Calendar boasts a clean new look and you can zoom into your schedule with a pinch.
Connect and share People are at the heart of Ice Cream Sandwich. We rethought how you browse your contacts with the new People app, which combines high-resolution photos and updates from Google+ and other social services. It’s also easier to capture and share your life with family and friends. Galaxy Nexus sports a high-end camera with zero shutter lag, automatic focus, top notch low-light performance and a simple way to capture panoramic pictures. Shoot amazing photos or 1080p video, and then edit and share them directly from your phone.
Beyond smart Galaxy Nexus isn’t just a smartphone—it’s beyond smart. Ice Cream Sandwich gives you complete control over the amount of mobile data you use by helping you better understand and manage it. We’re also introducing Android Beam, which uses near field communication (NFC) to instantly share webpages, YouTube videos, maps, directions and apps by simply tapping two phones together. Face Unlock uses state-of-the-art facial recognition technology to unlock your phone with nothing more than a smile.
This weekend marks the third birthday of the G1, the first-ever Android phone. Nine releases later, more than 550,000 Android devices are activated daily.
Starting in November, Galaxy Nexus will be available in the United States, Canada, Europe and Asia. Check out the Nexus website for a product tour and more info.
Posted by Andy Rubin, Senior Vice President, Mobile
We’re hearing from people at check-out counters throughout the country that paying with your phone is a little like magic. Just look at the ecstatic reaction on the faces of our friends who made their first Google Wallet purchases last Thursday.
Today, our partners American Eagle Outfitters, The Container Store, Foot Locker, Guess, Jamba Juice, Macy’s, OfficeMax and Toys“R”Us are rolling out an even better Google Wallet experience. For the first time ever in the U.S., at these select stores, you can not only pay but also redeem coupons and/or earn rewards points—all with a single tap of your phone. This is what we call the Google Wallet SingleTap experience.
With Google Wallet in hand, you can walk into a Jamba Juice, American Eagle Outfitters or any other partner store. Once you’ve ordered that Razzmatazz smoothie or found the right color Slim Jean, head straight to the cashier and tap your phone to pay and save—that’s it. You don’t have to shuffle around to find the right coupon to scan or rewards card to stamp because it all happens in the blink of an eye.
The Offers tab in Google Wallet has been updated to include a new "Featured Offers" section with discounts that are exclusive to Google Wallet. Today, these include 15% off at American Eagle Outfitters, 10% off at The Container Store, 15% off at Macy’s and an all-fruit smoothie for $2 at Jamba Juice. There are many more Google Wallet exclusive discounts to come, and you can save your favorites in Google Wallet so they’ll be automatically applied to your bill when you check out.
Organizing loyalty cards in your wallet is getting easier too. Today, Foot Locker, Guess, OfficeMax and American Eagle Outfitters are providing loyalty cards for Google Wallet so you can rack up reward points automatically as you shop. More of these are on the way.
One more thing—in response to user feedback, we’ve improved transaction details for the Google Prepaid Card with real-time transaction information including merchant name, location, dollar value and time of each transaction. Here’s what it looks like:
Finally, a special thanks to Chevron, D’Agostino, Faber News Now, Gristedes Supermarkets and Pinkberry who are now also working to equip their stores to accept Google Wallet.
It’s still early days for Google Wallet, but this is an important step in expanding the ecosystem of participating merchants to make shopping faster and easier in more places. If you’re a merchant and want to work with us to make shopping easier for your customers and connect with them in new ways, please sign up on the Google Wallet site. And if you’re a shopper and want to purchase a Nexus S 4G phone from Sprint with Google Wallet, visit this page.
Posted by Spencer Spinnell, Director, Emerging Markets
Mobile technology and the web have made it easier for people around the world to access information and communicate with each other. But there’s still a daunting obstacle: the language barrier. We’re trying to knock down that barrier so everyone can communicate and connect more easily.
Earlier this year, we launched an update to Google Translate for Android with an experimental feature called Conversation Mode, which enables you to you translate speech back and forth between languages. We began with just English and Spanish, but today we’re expanding to 14 languages, adding Brazilian Portuguese, Czech, Dutch, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Mandarin Chinese, Polish, Russian and Turkish.
To use Conversation Mode, speak into your phone’s microphone, and the Translate app will translate what you’ve said and read the translation out loud. The person you’re speaking with can then reply in their language, and Conversation Mode will translate what they said and read it back to you.
This technology is still in alpha, so factors like background noise and regional accents may affect accuracy. But since it depends on examples to learn, the quality will improve as people use it more. We wanted to get this early version out to help start the conversation no matter where you are in the world.
We’ve also added some other features to make it easier to speak and read as you translate. For example, if you wanted to say “Where is the train?” but Google Translate recognizes your speech as “Where is the rain?”, you can now correct the text before you translate it. You can also add unrecognized words to your personal dictionary.
When viewing written translation results, you can tap the magnifying glass icon to view the translated text in full screen mode so you can easily show it to someone nearby, or just pinch to zoom in for a close-up view.
Tap the magnifying glass icon to view translations full screen.
Finally, we’ve also optimized the app for larger screens like your Android tablet.
While we work to expand full Conversation Mode to even more languages, Google Translate for Android still supports text translation among 63 languages, voice input in 17 of those languages, and text-to-speech in 24 of them.
Download the Google Translate app in Android Market — it’s available for tablets and mobile phones running Android 2.2 and up.
Earlier this year, we introduced the Google Docs app for Android. Since then, many users have downloaded the app and enjoyed the benefits of being able to access, edit and share docs on the go.
Today’s update to the app makes Google Docs work better than ever on your tablet. With an entirely new design, we’ve customized the look to make the most of the larger screen space on tablets. The layout includes a three-panel view, which allows you to navigate through filters and collections, view your document list, and see document details, all at once.
Looking at the details panel on the right side, you can see a thumbnail to preview a document and its details before opening it. From the panel, you can see who can view or edit any doc.
New 3-panel view for improved browsing
Autocomplete makes sharing with others on the go even easier
These features are now available in 46 languages on tablet devices with Android 3.0+ (Honeycomb) and above.
You can download the app from the Android Market and let us know what you think in the comments or by posting on the forum. Learn more by visiting the help center.
We just released the latest version of OnTheFly™, our airfare shopping mobile app, for Android. One of the new features in v1.2 is flexible date search, which enables you to browse 35 days of potential departure dates on a calendar combined with an interactive “temperature” graph.
You can also save and access search history now, including particular itineraries of interest. We’ll even check price changes for those itineraries so you can know the best time to plan that dream trip.
We started the Google+ project to help make online sharing more like real-world sharing. Of course, in life we increasingly share on the go, so over the past ~90 days we’ve developed Google+ apps for Android, iOS and the mobile web.
During this time we've made lots of improvements to the project, and in fact, the team just announced its 100th new feature overall (open signups). But our work is far from done, and today we're bringing seven additional Google+ features to your mobile device.
Seeing someone face-to-face is one of the most important ways you can connect with them. Unfortunately we're often too busy, too far away, or too unpredictable to make meetups a regular occurrence. That's why we're making Hangouts available on phones with Android 2.3+ and front-facing cameras (iOS support coming soon). Just find an active hangout in the Stream, and you can join your friends face-to-face-to-face:
Hangouts on your phone: Stream View (left), Green Room (center), Portrait View (right)
101, 102, 103. You asked for it
We take your feedback very seriously, and we do our best to deliver your most-requested features as quickly as possible. So today we're launching three more things you've been asking for in Google+ mobile:
Improved SMS support. Users in the US and India can now post to Google+, receive notifications, and respond to group messages via SMS (with more countries on the way). To start texting, just verify your phone number in Google+ settings.
Improved +mentions support. To add someone in your circles to a conversation (or simply get their attention), you can now +[their name] inside a post or comment.
+1’ing comments. When you read a great comment in the Stream, you can now +1 it directly from your iOS device (with Android coming soon).
The most important part of Google+ is you, so we want to make sure you have meaningful ways to personalize your experience -- from selecting just the right people to share with, to switching between the app, the web, and SMS as you see fit. Today we're excited to bring three new options to mobile users:
Edit your profile photo. You can now put your best face forward, from where you happen to be. Just visit your profile, click edit, and you can choose or take a new picture.
Customize your notifications. Some notifications may be more important than others, especially when you’re on the go. Now you can decide which ones you see (or not) on your phone.
Make some room. If you’re taking lots of photos, or installing lots of apps, then internal storage can sometimes shrink. That’s why you can now move the Google+ app to SD storage on Android devices.
Edit your profile photo (left), Notification settings (center), Move to USB (right)
107. So long Huddle, hello Messenger (and hi there, photos)
As we move from limited field trial to open beta, we’re renaming Huddle to Messenger. More importantly, we’re adding new functionality to Messenger that makes group communication even more fun: photo sharing. So now when you’re sitting down for a meal, or kicking back on vacation, you can show your circles what’s happening, right this second:
Messenger: Homescreen (left), Choosing a Photo (center), Posting a Photo (right)
We hope you enjoy today’s round of Google+ mobile features. There’s plenty left for us to do, so we’ll keep listening, and working to make your mobile experience that much better. In the meantime, you can try the new app (on Android and the mobile web today, and on iOS soon), and let us know what you think.
In May we announced Google Wallet—an app that makes your phone your wallet—with Citi, MasterCard, Sprint and First Data. With Google Wallet, you can tap, pay and save using your phone and near field communication (NFC).
We’ve been testing it extensively, and today we’re releasing the first version of the app to Sprint. That means we’re beginning to roll out Google Wallet to all Sprint Nexus S 4G phones through an over-the-air update—just look for the “Wallet” app. Here’s a demo of Google Wallet in action:
Google Wallet enables you to pay with your Citi MasterCard credit card and the Google Prepaid Card, which can be funded with any of your existing plastic credit cards. As a thanks to early adopters, we’re adding a $10 free bonus to the Google Prepaid Card if you set it up in Google Wallet before the end of the year.
When we announced Google Wallet, we pledged a commitment to an open commerce ecosystem. We appreciate Citi and MasterCard for being our launch partners. And today, Visa, Discover and American Express have made available their NFC specifications that could enable their cards to be added to future versions of Google Wallet.
Our goal is to make it possible for you to add all of your payment cards to Google Wallet, so you can say goodbye to even the biggest traditional wallets. In fact, we’ve got a video of our first customer, someone who is ready to replace his famously over-stuffed wallet. We hope Google Wallet gives him “serenity now.”
This is still just the beginning and while we’re excited about this first step, we look forward to bringing Google Wallet to more phones in the future. You can learn more about Google Wallet at google.com/wallet.
Posted by Osama Bedier, Vice President of Payments
Last year in the US, we introduced Voice Actions, a series of spoken commands that let you control your Android phone or tablet with your voice. You can call businesses and contacts, send texts, browse the web and complete other common tasks, all just by speaking into your phone.
Today, we’re pleased to announce that users in the UK, France, Italy, Germany and Spain can now use Voice Actions in British English, French, Italian, German and Spanish.
To use Voice Actions, tap the microphone button on the Google search box on your home screen, open the Voice Search app, or press down for a few seconds on the physical search button on your phone to activate the “Speak Now” screen. You can see how it works in this video.
Speak any of these commands to perform a Voice Action on your phone:
send text to [contact] [message]
call [business]
call [contact]
go to [website]
navigate to [location/business name]
directions to [location/business name]
map of [location]
And of course, you can still conduct a Google search using your voice.
Use Voice Actions to get directions, or send a text using just your voice
Voice Actions is available on phones and tablets running Android 2.2 and higher. If you don't have Voice Search on your phone yet, you can download it from Android Market - if you do have Voice Search, you can just start using Voice Actions.
We think Voice Actions helps you get things done on your phone faster and easier. Give it a try, and let us know what you think!
Today, we launched a new version of Google Goggles that enhances the camera on your Android-powered phone. With this new opt-in feature in Goggles, you can simply photograph an image using your phone’s camera, and Goggles will work in the background to analyze your image. If your photo contains items that Goggles can recognize, the app will notify you.
Let’s say that I’m going on vacation, and I decide to use my Android-powered phone as my primary camera. Goggles would identify landmarks, paintings and other interesting objects in my photos. I can share these facts about my vacation with my friends right from my Goggles search history.
(l-r) Goggles has found a search result for this popular landmark; Find out more about this item in your photo within Google Goggles
Photos you take with your phone’s camera will only be seen by Goggles if you enable the Search from Camera feature. Here’s how:
launch Google Goggles
tap Menu > Settings > Search from Camera
Manage your opt-in status from the settings menu
Google Goggles 1.6 is available for Android 2.1 and newer devices. Download by clicking here or by scanning the QR code below:
