Oftentimes, updates to apps are very minor. Bug fixes, little visual changes, nothing to write a changelog about. But thankfully, people keep a sharp eye out for the cool little visual changes that happen in some apps. The latest Play Store update to version 5.8 adds a cool new animation to the hamburger button.

As you can see in the video above, the hamburger button flips into an arrow like it does in other cars. But when the top bar is hidden when scrolled down, these buttons fade or slide out of the way. It’s these touches of refinement that makes Android more of a pleasure to use. What do you think of them?

Source: +Kirill Grouchnikov (2) (3)

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There are plenty of different messaging applications out there, with even more coming down the pipeline, and now Yahoo is getting into the mix, too.

The company has unveiled Livetext, a brand new way for people to get in touch with folks, but with a bit of a twist to the norm. While some messaging platforms have a focus on video and others, text, Livetext bridges the gap between the two and provides users with a live video of the person they’re talking with, but with the conversation still primarily focused on text entry.

That’s right. With Livetext, there’s a real-time video feed that shows the reactions of what’s being said in text, but there’s no audio. The videos are completely silent, and communication, outside sign language and hand signals, is still left to texting. There’s a video below that shows it all works.

There’s no sharing of video or pictures, and the conversation that you’re having with someone in the moment is all there is. Once you’ve finished, it’ll be deleted.

Livetext is available in Ireland, Taiwan and Hong Kong right now. It’ll be available for Android (and iOS) in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, France and Canada beginning Thursday, July 30.

What do you think of the idea?

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If you’ve been thinking about picking up a new Chromecast, Amazon and Google have offers on the little stick that might make you pull the trigger.

First up, Amazon is offering a free $10 Amazon gift card with the purchase of a Chromecast, which is $29.99. Simply add both the Chromecast and the gift card to your cart, and the cost of the gift card will be subtracted at checkout. This offer is valid through 11:59 pm PT on August 9.

The Google Store has a Chromecast offer of its own. If you buy two Chromecasts at once, Google will knock $15 off of your total. The Chromecast is $35 at the Google Store, so with this promo, your total will be $55.

Google will also give you a free Google Play move rental when you buy and set up a Chromecast by December 31, so that’s another bit of motivation to pick up a Chromecast.

Chromecasts can come in handy for getting content from your phone or tablet onto your TV, so it may not be a bad idea to take advantage of Google’s offer and outfit your home with Chromecasts. But if you really only need one, you could grab Amazon’s deal and get a gift card in the process. Because you know that you’ll eventually need to buy something from Amazon.

Sources: Amazon, Google

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Sprint has seen fit that the mobile market needs another family plan, and so the Now Network has debuted a brand new Family Share Pack to compete with the other major wireless carriers.

This new offer is for four lines that offers unlimited talk and text, while throwing in 10GB of high-speed data that is shared between those four lines. All of that can be had for $100 per month. The family that might need a bit more data for each person, though, can opt to pay $20 more per month — $120 — to get 40GB of shared data per month. Sprint is also offering to waive the per-line access fee for all of the lines as long as you’re paying for the plan.

The catch here is that to sign up for this Family Share Pack, you’ll need to switch four lines to Sprint and then pick up a phone through Sprint Lease or Sprint Easy Pay. To help the switchers out, Sprint is offering to pay off the contracts and old phones, as long as the switchers trade in their old devices at the same time.

The new Family Share Pack launches on Friday, July 31.

What do you think of the new plan from the Now Network?

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Alcatel OneTouch announced two new devices today for the Sprint prepaid MVNO Boost Mobile. Alcatel hit a home run earlier this year with the release of the budget Idol 3 phone, so let’s see if they can continue their awesome streak with these new budget releases.

First up, the Alcatel OneTouch Conquest is available today for $129.99 (plus tax) at  http://ift.tt/1U6TRxb. If you’re not familiar with how prepaid MVNO service providers work, you typically pay the full price for your phone up front. Then your contract is month-to-month and usually pretty cheap since you’re just paying for the phone service. So with this rugged Conquest phone, it’s a budget phone at $129.99. The price isn’t too hard to swallow. The specs will not blow you away, but Alcatel OneTouch has proven they know where to cut corners and can get decent performance out of their budget devices, so it will be interesting to see how the Conquest performs. Here are the features:

• IP67 waterproof and dustproof
• Android 5.0 Lollipop
• 5-inch 720p HD touchscreen display with Dragontrail Glass
• 5-megapixel auto focus camera with LED flash and 2-megapixel front camera
• Quad-core 1.2GHz processor
• 3G/4G LTE/Enhanced LTE

The second Alcatel OneTouch device announced today is the Elevate. The Elevate is not available today, but will be available next month at www.boostmobile.com for $99.99 (plus tax). The 4.5-inch display is intriguing. Phones are getting so big these days that it’s refreshing to hold a phone that’s usable with one hand. It’s also great that this phone is launching with Android 5.1. Here are the announced Elevate features:

• Android 5.1 Lollipop
• 4.5-inch FWVGA display
• 5-megapixel auto focus camera with LED flash and 2-megapixel front camera
• 3G/4G LTE/Enhanced LTE
• Quad-core 1.1GHz processor
• 2,000mAh battery

So, how do you do you feel about the new Boost Mobile offerings from Alcatel OneTouch? Are you in the market for a new phone on Boost Mobile? Or a budget phone in general? Let us know your thoughts and/or questions by commenting below!

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Our amazing mobile devices have made it possible for us to be constantly connected and always reachable. While it’s great that family and friends can get in touch with us at any point these days, it also means that pesky telemarketers and spam callers also have a direct line to us. No one likes receiving spam calls, but when you see an incoming call from a number you don’t immediately recognize, you don’t want to ignore it just in case it turns out to be important.

Sync.ME aims to solve this for its users. Describing itself as “the best caller ID app in the market”, it capitalizes on crowd-sourced, global contact data and links with your own social networks to make sure you know exactly who is calling or if a number is spam and is best avoided (or even blocked).

When you first open the free Sync.ME app, you’ll be briefly presented with the app’s main features — Caller ID, Call Blocking and Reverse Number Lookup. You’ll then be asked for your phone number and be prompted to sync your contacts with the Sync.ME app by allowing it to upload your contacts list to Sync.ME server’s. Not everyone will be immediately keen on this, but uploading your contacts allows Sync.ME to match them with social network profiles as well as improve the Caller ID function and Lookup functions. You can also connect your Facebook, Google+ or VKontakte accounts.

When you’ve synced your contacts and logged into your social accounts, the various data sources will be merged and your contact list will be updated with profile pictures for your friends, which provides a much better Caller ID experience, as well as job, address, birthday and website data to flesh out the info available. If you’re the sort of person who does not obsessively prune their contact book, this is an easy way to clean it up in one fell swoop. It also means if you get a call from someone who was not in your contacts but is a Facebook friend, for example, you’ll immediately recognize who is calling.

There are some known issues with regards to social accounts. One that is frustrating, and not easily fixed, is due to recent Facebook API changes. The data Sync.ME is now privy to might not reflect your friends list accurately — for me I had many friends missing and some present that I was definitely not friends with on the social network.

But the real magic of Sync.ME lies in its ability to identify spam callers. Sync.ME alerts you that any incoming call is from a potential spammer and also lets you report numbers as spam in order to flag it for other users. You can create a blacklist of contacts and immediately have those numbers blocked — perfect if a particular number bugs you frequently. And if you missed a call from a number you don’t recognize and want to check its legitimacy before calling it back, you can make use of the Reverse Number Lookup function to find out if it has been marked as spam too.

Some users may be uncomfortable uploading their entire list of contacts to Sync.ME — and the app is basically functionless unless you do — so that is worth considering before installing the app. Linking social accounts and giving Sync.ME that access is another thing to ponder and not everyone will want to grant those permissions.

For those that do opt to use it, the overall experience is fluid and enjoyable. The UI is simple and easy to follow, and the app feels very polished. Sync.ME makes for a more than adequate unified contact list and caller ID app. There are some known bugs with social accounts, but the ability to cut spammers out of your life is certainly neat.

Check out Sync.ME on Google Play where it is available to download for free.

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There are thousands of launchers for Android, many of which are the same old recycled designs with nothing unique to add to the mix. Some are very unique. You could even say too unique, because they cease to be functional. And of course, there are a few gems that we all love and use every day.

Microsoft is trying to get into the launcher game, and its attempt is actually a pretty good one. It’s called Arrow Launcher and it’s launched in a private beta, but it’s already looking nice. It has three pages that you cannot edit. The first is People, which will allow you to interact with your contacts and even bring up a dialer. The next is Apps, which you can figure out on your own. And the last is Notes and Reminders, where you can add stuff you need to remember.

The dock at the bottom is very traditional, but swiping up on it reveals some of your frequently used apps. I don’t know about you guys, but I love the layout. No fancy widgets, just utilitarian and seemingly very useful. I especially like the Notes and Reminders page. What do you guys think? Leave a comment!

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Do you like to avoid waiting? Do you like to avoid people in general? Google’s got your back with the latest update to Google Search. When searching for shops and restaurants, Google will show you the busy times and when the lines are longest.

With the new feature, you can check out graphs of the busiest times on specific days of the week. This will allow you to avoid as much human interaction as possible! Plus, you won’t have to wait in line as much. It’s definitely a very useful feature, so check it out! Search for your favorite shop and see if it’s one of the millions supported.

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Wireless charging is a great technology, and one that I use everywhere I go. I have a charger at home and in the car, and I don’t plan on going back to cables. But there are a few drawbacks to wireless charging, like charging speed and the inability for metal devices to charge wirelessly. The speed issue has been resolved courtesy of Qi, but what about metal devices?

Qualcomm has gotten past that with its WiPower technology, which allows the charging to pass through metal. This means premium devices like the HTC One may have wireless charging in the future! It can also charge devices requiring up to 22 watts, so it doesn’t skimp on speed.

With all of these different wireless charging standards, it’ll be tough for consumers. WiPower is based on the Rezence standard, though it isn’t mentioned whether it works with the Qi standard (likely not). Will it make it to devices, or will Qi still rule?

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Google has announced it is expanding messaging support with Google Now today, allowing you to send message with only your voice to contacts on WhatsApp, Viber, WeChat, Telegram and NextPlus.

Google Now’s expanded messaging support works just like it does with any other app, allowing you to saying something like, “Viber message BugDroid hey I’m messaging you with my voice,” and that’s it. Google recently announced it was looking to take Now to the next level by incorporating more third-party apps into the service. On top of being able to use you voice to message anyone on WhatsApp, Viber, WeChat, Telegram and NextPlus, you can also say things like “Show me apartments for rent near me on Zillow” or “Shazam this song.”

Initially, Google Now messaging will only work in English, but it won’t be limited to users in the US. More languages will be coming soon.

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