After yesterday’s announcement by Verizon CFO Fran Shammo that unlimited data plans would soon be a thing of the past, VZW spokesperson Brenda Raney has released a statement for the company. In it, she doesn’t talk about the end of unlimited data directly, but instead mentions that if policy changes are to happen when shared data plans roll out, that customers will be informed ahead of time so that they can evaluate their choices:

As we have stated publicly, Verizon Wireless has been evaluating its data pricing structure for some time. Customers have told us that they want to share data, similar to how they share minutes today. We are working on plans to provide customers with that option later this year.

We will share specific details of the plans and any related policy changes well in advance of their introduction, so customers will have time to evaluate their choices and make the best decisions for their wireless service. It is our goal and commitment to continue to provide customers with the same high value service they have come to expect from Verizon Wireless.

I’ll let you decipher that.

Via:  Verizon

Cheers Cory!

A newish tablet UI called Chameleon, that we first reported back in mid-March, is now seeking backers via Kickstarter. The tablet UI was once just a side project, but after receiving enough feedback during their initial preview, they decided to make it come to life, hence the need for funding.

If you are not familiar with Chameleon, think of it as a living set of tablet screens. It can adjust based on data connection, location, time of day, etc. But rather than just being a blank slate of emptiness (aka normal Android tablets), it can be customized using live tiles with weather, Twitter, photos, Gmail, calendars, and more. Using gestures, you can swipe around to activate functions, flip home screens or launch into your app drawer. It really is quite the interesting take on a tablet UI, and one that we fully support as a team that tends to get bored with the stock Android tablet experience.

So, why the Kickstarter? Again, they need to funding to make it happen. If you support them, they will give you early access to it before being published to the Google Play store. It will cost you $5 to get in on that, but if previous UI overhauls are any indication on price, this thing could sell for much more. 

The popular deals-site Daily Steals, is looking to clear out their inventory of Motorola 32GB XOOM WiFi tablets with their newest “Last Call” sale. The tabs only run $240, but are factory re-certified and come with a 90 day warranty for anyone who is wary of buying “used” tech items. As we always say, the XOOM is the OG Android tablet -being the first pure Google Experience tab on the market, the XOOM has a very healthy developer community and is also kept up quite well by Google themselves. For this price, I don’t think you’re going to see a better deal.

Via: Daily Steals

Cheers Justin!

See what I did there? While the rest of the world is spouting off in their best Honey Badger voice, “Oh my gosh, the Android is just sooo fragmented,” I took the other route. OpenSignalMaps posted this report that shows off the thousands of different devices that have downloaded and installed their app. They even used the words “fragmented” in their findings, however, I’m just not buying the idea that having multiple devices available is a sign of fragmentation. I look at it as choice. Oh who am I kidding, I’m really just sick of every non-Android site with nothing to write about, finding another reason to bring up “fragmentation.” The platform seems to be doing just fine if you look at every market share analytics report over the last 2 years. Again, I’m over it.

But hey, check out these neat charts! Samsung clearly has taken over the world of Android. HTC is a distant second. Verizon is the top carrier. ZTE somehow is smacking T-Mobile in the face. And AT&T is no where to be found.

If you hit up the source link, you can actually hover over each of those tiny boxes and it will tell you which phone, carrier or manufacturer it is. Have fun! 

What, you didn’t have your celebrity Android fix for the day? Well, here you go. George Clooney was in Malibu this week filming a smartphone commercial and just so happened to have a Galaxy Nexus on him. We are going to go ahead and assume it wasn’t a commercial for the G-Nex since they blacked out the Samsung logo on it, but thought we’d share anyway. I wonder if it’s running 4.0.4? AOKP maybe? LTE or unlocked? How does George roll?

Now, back to the NBA Playoffs or a beer or kimchi tacos or your son’s baseball game or whatever it was you were doing for the evening. 

If you search apps made by Google on the Play Store you’ll get some pretty big hits: Gmail, Google Search, Maps and Youtube are all prominently displayed on the front page. Second page brings you apps like Google+, Play Music and Google Voice which are all still part of Google’s large portfolio of well-used apps. If you head over to the last page you’ll see an app named “Schemer” buried in with the barely installed apps that Google has made. You would never know it unless you looked, but Schemer is Google’s attempt to get you up off the couch and living your dreams. Google even looks to be putting as much time into it as they are on Google+.

According to literature from Samsung and Japanese carrier DoCoMo, the Galaxy SIII that will be made available to Japanese consumers will sport a full 2GB of RAM compared to the single gig that international and US buyers will see. Like the Americas though, the Japanese model will sport a Snapdragon S4 processor instead of Samsung’s new quad-core Exynos chip. If this bump in specs is true, it will be interesting to see how all of these SGSIII devices compare benchmark-wise when all of the mobile sites start getting their hands on them.

Although the true question may be, why the heck do they get 2GB of RAM and we don’t?

Via: Unwired View | Pocket Now