Presenting to you the 'Know-It-All' app!!

I was reading an article a couple of years back about a product that claimed to read your mind and show you stuff even before you knew you wanted to see it. Sounds like an exaggeration, doesn’t it? Actually it isn’t. This product that I am referring to just doesn’t stop surprising me by proving time-and-again that it knows me better than I do!

So here’s the deal.. it knows that I am a follower of technology and shows me news articles related to that. It also knows that I absolutely love music and am a die-hard fan of A. R. Rahman and so it shows me all the latest news he is involved in! That’s not all, I get to see the show timings of my favourite shows, weather forecast etc etc. Are you still wondering what I am actually talking about? Daaaah!!! Google Now ofcourse!!! I dedicate this article to the most innovative product of our time, “Google Now”. Below are some of the awesomest features which make Google Now one of the most enviable products.

1. Set reminders: Ya I know, there’s nothing new about setting reminders. There are hundreds of free apps in the app store (both iOS and Android) which help us remember what we usually tend to forget. What if I tell you that setting reminders just requires you to give a voice command “remind me to..” followed by what reminder you actually need to set? Aah... Siri does exactly that! What if I tell you that all you need to do was type in the search box in Google Now “remind me to...” followed by what you need to be reminded of, and your reminder would be set? Not good enough? Well, guess what? Assume you were working on your workstation & your phone is in your pocket / bag and you suddenly think of something you need to do but has to be done some-time later. All you need to do is open a browser and type www.google.com. In the search bar, type “remind me to ...” followed by the task you had thought of doing, hit Enter. Voila!!! A reminder will automatically be created on your phone through Google Now. This is obviously assuming that you have signed-into your Google account on your web browser and this account is the same account you’re signed-into your phone.

2. Is Google Now trying to be my wife? I keep getting this thought because it knows exactly what I’m upto! I had recently booked movie tickets for a Saturday evening 6pm show. I casually opened Google Now at around 4pm to find a ‘Card’ which mentioned my show timing, the name of the movie, theatre address and an option to start Google Navigation. What’s more is that based on the traffic it also showed me the time at which I should leave so I make it on time! Seriously??!!! The interest of wives isn’t just restricted to what movies you’re watching. They also need to know everything about your travel plans. A few months back I went to Chandigarh, for which I had booked my flight tickets well in advance. 2 days before my flight, I automatically started seeing the weather forecast for Chandigarh along with my flight schedule (if it is delayed or on-time). Needless to say that it started showing me the weather forecast for Mumbai a couple of days prior to my return flight. Brilliant isn’t it? Oh and I almost forgot! Just like your wife, you can’t give surprises to Google Now because it knows what you’ve order online, when it is dispatched and what is the scheduled date of delivery.

3. I seek happiness in simple things of Life: We often tend to have a long day at work and get a thought in our mind about when we’ll actually reach home. Open Google Now you silly!! It knows where your home is and knows when you’ll get there (you let it guess the address or set the home address through settings). You remember in point 2, I told you how Google Now tries to be my wife? I was serious! It tracks things you search for on the net (on your phone and pc) and shows you relevant ‘Cards’. For example, I see cards with live cricket scores because I search for scores on the net. I see ‘Cards’ of movies, music, bollywood because I search for a lot of them on the net. It also brilliantly integrates with Google Calendar and shows me all my office meeting invites, birthdays on Google Now.

Pheww!! Now isn’t that a product worth blogging? I’m guessing that you’ve tried most of these features already and are loving them as much as I do. If you haven’t yet configured Google Now on your phone then do it right away!! Once you’ve done that, just say “Ok Google” and enjoy one of the best apps for your cell phone! Oh, and this app is available on Android and iOS.

So what’s your favourite Google Now feature? Do mention it in the comments section. Till then, “Ok, Google”! J

Mirror mirror on the wall, what does mobile technology bring for all? - Part 2

The invention of the wheel is believed to be the greatest invention of all time. I wouldn’t dispute that. However, the ‘innovations’ in mobility have proven to be amazingly exciting! Who would have thought that one fine day a cell phone would actually help us reach our destination with ease! Or a device, initially conceived for making voice calls would actually talk to you when given the right commands! Fingerprint sensors, heart-rate monitors, 41 megapixel cameras (seriously??!!), gesture recognition... mobility has been taken to a different level!

In July 2011, Teched2day made some predictions w.r.t. trends in mobility. Some of them didn’t really pick-up (although I would still put my money on them) and we hit the nail for some. Here’s an addition to that list based on my understanding of trends in ‘Mobility’.

This form-factor just ain’t good enough! We have seen the cell phone evolve from a bulky ugly black brick with a ‘thing’ called antenna awkwardly popping out of it to a sexy looking glass body phone which is used for making a fashion statement more than anything else. But all of this so-called evolution has been on the cell-phones. In-other words, mobility, for a very very long time has meant cell-phones. Then ofcourse, came tablets, an extended version of cell-phones which according to me is more of a quasi-mobility device. Why does mobility have to be addressed through a block shaped device? And then came Google Glass and Smart-Watch, giving mobility a new definition, or I would say, a new form-factor. Critics and technology experts have had a love-hate relationship with both these devices but I would reckon that this is just the beginning. The smart-watch seems too lame in it’s current state to me, since it has a dependency on a cell-phone, but the concept of Glass is WOW!! I see a lot of potential in the area of our day-to-day wearable items being replaced with devices enabling mobility. Glass, I’d say is just one of the possible form-factors.

Steven Spielberg is the new Einsten! I am a huge movie buff and so often tend to draw analogies through movies. I was watching a Steven Spielberg movie recently called A.I..... Brilliant!!!! Way ahead of its time!

Coming straight to the point, when we look around, we see everyone connected to the internet. This enables us to track every damn thing one does on the net. Yeah... you heard me.. Every single thing we do on the net is being watched!! This provides us with a lot of data. Data about what we do, or how we behave. Ask someone working on ‘Big Data’ and they will tell you the size of such data they deal with and use for predictive analysis.

One such example of A.I. is Google Now. For those who haven’t really used it... USE IT!!! It is brilliant! It anticipates the information you would want to see based on your past activities and show you results before you even know that you need it!

Biometrics is no longer safe! So, it seems cool to unlock your phone using the new fingerprint scanner. But isn’t it scary? Your fingerprints, which are unique to you are being stored somewhere!

There is this fad about using these gimmicky features to attract customers to buy their phones. But we fail to understand the risk in letting OEMs store our biometrics. This trend of using biometrics to access mobility devices will increase. Isn’t the retina scanner a very obvious feature for Google Glass? What next? We start using our DNA as well???

Let me know your views on this article through your valuable comments. Don't forget to Get Teched!!!