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Google Reader is a useful tool to help keep readers updated on current news. Google is updating this "long-ignored RSS app", giving it a new, modern design but removing the social features of this site. The problem? The social aspect of this site is not as in-your-face like Facebook, but instead enables your friends to keep you updated on things that you may not be subscribed to in Google Reader. The writer of this article even accuses Google of taking away the social features on Google Reader to drive people to Google +, which sadly, I can see them doing. Haha, nice try Google.

My article is on Google's recent announcement that they will discontinue Google Reader, among other services. There was a strong response to this because there are many people who use it on a daily basis.  Google Reader is a RSS feed, or Really Simple Syndication or Rich Site Summary. Basically it is a technology that tracks websites for updates. Imagine you love to get your news from the Internet, and you like to go on The Verge, Wired, Lifehacker and Gawker. You visit all of those sites daily to get the news. But when you frequent a lot of websites, going to them all separately may start to take a lot of time. So here comes Google Reader, where you subscribe to all the various sites and get direct updates sent to just this one place, making it easier to absorb information. There are several different RSS feeds, but Google Reader is one of the more popular ones, and thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of people use this service daily. Google stated that over the years Google Reader's usage has declined, but that still means there are many people who rely on it go get all their information.  When Google announced its plan to discontinue the service, many people were lost as to why they would stop such a seemingly successful service and this has now lost the trust of Google by many people.  Regardless, it is clear that many people will have to find a new RSS feed or go back to visiting every website manually.

This article notifies readers that Google has boosted the speed and their browser's hardware acceleration with the launch of Google Chrome, version 18. Google paid more than $210,000 to outside researchers to identify and prevent a number of bugs, flaws, and hacking challenges from this past year so these same problems wouldn't be involved in this new update. This interests me because I am a Google Chrome user both at home and school and when I hear that another version is offered that speeds up Web applications, various software's such as Adobe Flash Player, games, internet, etc, I am more than pleased to get on my computer to update my browser to overall experience a better and more efficient use while on my computer that Google has to offer. But in my opinion, the most intriguing part of this article is how even with Google constantly updating and improving their web browser, Google Chrome, in the month of February, Google's browser is only third with 18.9% of users, next to Firefox with 20.9% of users, and in first, Microsoft Internet Explorer with more than half of users at 52.8%. People are least invested in Google's web browser and this largely adds to the reason to why they are constantly changing their Google Chrome design to attract but also to maintain their users. My thoughts are how I think it be interesting to see what Google has next up their sleeve because they have the money, technology, and resources to develop a browser that has enough features and limited problems to double and almost triple their amount of web users in hopefully the near future. 

Google+ has decided that it is time they make a new look for their social networking site. The new design allows you to drag apps in whatever particular order you would like. Also, the timeline pictures are bigger so it is easier to view. Google+ also came out with a new addition, chat. The web designing for this page is similar to Facebooks; when viewing pictures on a timeline. The new look on Google+ will allow people to be more organized and nicer to look at. As web designers, they are supposed to catch the viewers eye. If a site does not appeal to the viewer they will not even bother looking into the website. By creating this new look, google+ is hoping to have more additions to their site. They designed this new look for Google+ to more flexible for people when viewing profiles, and it is evident because that is what most people want. They prefer when things are made easy for them.

As we found out, on July 1, 2013 Google Reader won't be available and as for Rss readers, they'll need to resort to other alternative ways to continue to use them such as Reeder, FeedDemon, and soon, Feedly.

This article is basically about how Google has Forked WebKit with Blink, making a new web engine for both Chromium and Chrome. WebKit is usually referred to as the glue that binds the moodern web: the rendering engine powers Apple`s Safari, Google`s Chrome and many mobile browsers both past and present. Google believes that Chromium`s multi-process approach has added to much complexity for both the browser and WebKit itself, so it`s creating a seperate, simpler fork named Blink. Although the new engine will be much the same as WebKit from the start, it`s expected to change over time as Google strips out unnecessary codes and tweaks the underlying platform. The company has also confirmed that both Chrome and Chrome OS will be using Blink in the future.

The title may sound a bit on the good side but if you ever got a look at the comments you would understand on how change could be back at some times. I have recently started using google reader myself and had found the old user interface much effective and this sudden change is not a change i think i can adapt to.

This article is about how Google is negotiating with music labels to launch their own streaming service. Google is currently working to argument their current download store with a streaming service that could take on the likes of Slacker and Nokia music. The outlet's sources suggest that Google is currently in the negotiation stage with record labels, and that it's service would likely feature both paid and free ad-supported components. While this news remains a rumour for both Apple and Google, it seems that the race is now on for which company is both willing and able to supplement it's music store with a streaming service. 

Google has added Web apps on to the desktop and the new page has bigger and friendly icons. it also added new technologies in Chrome that securely execute low-level code in the browser. Some of the new apps are gmail, Google Reader, Google News, and of course Angry Birds. Sounds good and even better then how it was before.

A giant, spinning 3D helix of a bookcase, by Google. How cool. A digital bookcase for your digital books is what Google Books thinks is best. Over 10, 000 books can be held at any one time, so you'll probably never reach the limit. Navigation is done by spinning it around or swiping it up and down. It's kind of like browsing through a REAL bookstore. This is very practical for any and all avid readers, and can apply to almost anyone - you don't have to fill up the thousands of spaces immediately to love it.

Sony provides many theatres with 3D glasses, but unfortunately it has decided that it will no longer provide 3D glasses for free. May 1st will be the last day Sony will provide 3D glasses, then "we" as in the people who watch 3D movies would have to pay for the glasses to watch the movie. 

Google Wallet continues on its slow (but exciting) march toward letting you pay for things simply by tapping your phone against a special, NFC-enabled credit card reader.

This article briefly discusses the upgraded Twitter App for IPhone's and Android Apps. This will be at great use for those who constantly use this App to tweet for the following reasons. To commence, one is now allowed to copy the tweet while holding over the text which will be useful because when wanting to remember a tweet and save it in your notes per se, you don't have to constantly memorize the tweet and go back to read what it is if you forget. You can simply copy and paste the tweet. Also, it will be fast and easy to use without having to leave your timeline when viewing a profile. This will also be at use because you don't have to re-scroll through your timeline after viewing a profile and going back to see the timeline. 

this article is about smartphone apps that can help you even through the toughest valentine days. they talk about apps that'll help you get a cab for cheap, make dinner reservations at a restaurant, get a fast valentines gift, and help you make a sweet and loving card. I like this article and i find it very helpful because valentines day can get really stressful and this will help us guys get through it safely and not making a big dent in our wallets.  

Wrong link brooooooooo

Who hasn't played or at least seen the angry birds apps on the app store or on the web? Well they are becoming more and more popular, and people are trying to buy more and more things to do with them. Now not only can you buy things such as; cases, plush toys, and baby clothes but now you can buy an actual angry birds speaker dock.

Apple thinks about everyone when they made the iphone. For the visual and hearing impaired apple has a special iphone download that can help these people.Using special patterns of vibrations and alerts for particular contacts.

This article is about the ranks on YouTube videos. The Google-owned video-streaming platform is changing the way it ranks the results when you search something that you want to watch. It is looking to reward videos that receive the most watched time. Recently, YouTube added ''Time Watched'', so if you like to create videos, you can better evaluate the performance of your videos and channel. YouTube was already making moves in this direction, and back in August, it announced that it was updating it's discovery features with a view towards surfacing videos with the most time-spent on them, rather than the most clicks. The results is leading to bigger change, as it looks to keep people on it's videos for longer. This article can relate to many people because a lot of people upload videos to YouTube and even more watch videos on Youtube.

We should all probably know that when technology starts upgrading as time goes by, we always want to get the new products. Our generation is getting more and more into technology and in this article, it explains a study of how we are digitally getting distracted in our academics. This study shows that 47% of teachers should make courses and content in digital literacy into a school's curriculum. I agree with this because as our generation spends our days mainly on our phones or on computers, we wouldn't be distracted on the technology if we have our work finished with it. The only back draw to this is that many students would just go on Google or Wikipedia for their answers as the Internet has a huge amount of information displayed for us to use. This article relates to portable computing because it's starting to affect how we do in our education. In addition, it relates to eLifestyle because we're using this technology as a daily part of our lives and if we start to use it as a method of education, we can use it as a form of gaining new information.

The article, by Neha Prakash, is about a study on the effects of technology on the current generation of students. The study concluded with 87% of teachers saying students were easily distracted and had short attention spans. This is most likely due to the internet providing such quick and easy access within a keystroke in search engines such as Wikipedia and Google. Students are used to having things accomplished and out of the way so quickly that they no longer have the attention span to complete more complicated and time consuming tasks. Due to this, students lack time management and also do not check if their sources are reputable. A solution to this problem could be to incorporate digital literacy and technology into schools' curriculum. With this additional knowledge, methods of education can be improved in today's technological environment. This relates to elifestyle in that we use technology so much that we can take it for granted. Normally, we do not acknowledge the consequences of repetitive and prolonged use of social media, search engines, cell phones, and so on. As the class of ICS2O, we learn to use technology in a healthy balance in our lives. We are at the forefront of electronic education, using sites such as diigo, Google Drive, and Google Reader to complete assignments and engage in the events of the outside world. While there are negative impacts to the overuse of technology, like most other things, technology, used in balance with other aspects of life, can be beneficial.

This article states that a new study has shown that more and more kids/teenagers are distracted by technologies which affect their learning.  87% of the teachers in this study have said that "technology is creating an easily distracted generation with short attention spans."  Other teachers also claim that "technologies do more to distract students than to help them academically."  Teachers, though, remained somewhat optimistic about digital impact, with 77% saying Internet search tools have had a "mostly positive" impact on their students' work. I think that technologies help out a lot in kids learning however it could still distract them. A lot of kids use the internet with homework and study help which could in some cases is a very beneficial thing. They would learn and find out more about the subject they are studying. Lee Rainie, director of the Pew Internet Project, says that maybe it is not the problem with tech, but the lack of digital literacy training in students that creates the problem. I agree with this also. 

This article is about how Google has a new web engine for Chromium and Chrome. What they basically did was they "forked" with WebKit and Blink. WebKit is described as the glue that binds the modern web: the rendering engine powers Apple's Safari, Google's Chrome, and many mobile browsers both past and present. Google believes that Chromium's multi-process approach has added too much complexity for both the browser and Webkit itself, so it's creating a separate, simpler fork named Blink. Although the new engine will be very similar to WebKit at the start, it's expected to differ over time as Google strips out unnecessary code and tweaks the underlying platform. The company has also confirmed top us that both Chrome and Chrome OS will be using Blink in the future.

It is incredible how people want the new phone. 2 million iphones sold within the first 24 hours is amazing. What could make people want the device so bad? Maybe it is quality of the phone