Here is something I never thought I would be doing, posting an open letter to Google and to Matt Cutts that essentially begs them to look at what is happening to Gear Diary as a direct result of their Panda and Penguin algorithms; and yet, here we are. If it is happening to us, then I know [...]
How To Fix the Ugly MIME Headers When Using Gmail on a Windows Phone
If you have a Windows Phone and you use Gmail, then whether you realize it or not, you have sent at least one email that was received looking like this:
Google Wants to Pretend It Is from the ‘Land of And’
As noted pretty much everywhere last week, Google introduced new stuff at Google I/O. They also had a keynote by Larry Page, and one of the things he said that was picked up widely was: Every story I read about Google is “us versus some other company” or some stupid thing, and I just don’t [...]
Google Announces Game Center Clone ‘Google Play Game Services’
At Google I/O last week we got to see a number of new things, including the music service we already reported on as well as the ‘-1′ to Google’s myriad chat options with ‘Hangouts’ combining chat and talk. But as a gamer who has enjoyed more and more games coming to Google Play in a [...]
Google Launches Spotify-like ‘Google Play Music All Access’
For a couple of years or more, there has been constant speculation about when we would see an ‘iRadio’ service from Apple, with some more reasonable speculation that by capitulating to streaming price demands they might have something by this June. Google has also been rumored to be working on a similar service, though more [...]
Gmail, Drive and Google+ Storage is Now Unified
One by one, Google added services that all involved storage. It used to be 10 GB for Gmail, 5 GB for Google Drive and Google+ photos. Now it’s 15 GB total for free accounts and 30GB total for Google Apps accounts. Gmail, Drive or Google+ photos all count to the unified pool of storage. Not [...]
Huawei Ascend Mate Australian Launch Review
Huawei is making a splash in Australia with the launch of the new Huawei Ascend Mate, a 6.1-inch “phablet” to take on the Samsung Galaxy Note II. At the launch today in Sydney Australia, Gear Diary was able to spend some one-on-one time with the phone that Huawei describes as “Designed for a multimedia experience”. [...]
Careful, Google Is Listening
I had two very odd encounters with Google ads yesterday. It’s common for Google to push ads based on emails, as Microsoft helpfully pointed out in their “Scroogled” campaign. But usually those ads appear because of something in your email or search history. That doesn’t explain the ads I saw yesterday, as they were dead-on [...]
Google Reader and Google Keep, You Get What You Pay For
Google Reader and Google Keep are two different services, but when placed side by side they offer a cautionary tale for anyone using the web. There has been a good deal of chat among the Gear Diary team on our backchannel, and Judie, Mike, Carly and I have been further discussing the demise of Reader [...]
Google Keep Review – Neat Freaks Need Not Apply
Yesterday Google launched a new service called Google Keep. After playing around with it a bit last night, I have a much better idea of what it can and can’t do, and what it really is. Will it be good enough to replace Evernote? Is it even close? In a word, no. Google Keep [...]
Google Keep Launches – Google’s Evernote and OneNote Answer
I was just starting to listen to This Week in Google live after work, when right before the show they shouted Google just launched Google Keep! I’ve already got it installed on my phones and my tablet. What IS Google Keep? It’s very similar to services like Evernote or OneNote. It’s designed to take notes, make checklists, and more. [...]
Chromebook Pixel – A Bad Idea?
Chromebooks have been a bit of a mixed bag for many people. Some users love the idea of a lightweight, browser-focused operating system, and others feel like a computer that just runs browser apps is a waste of money. When Chromebooks occupied the $199-$300 space, they fit a niche as a lightweight “secondary machine”. Yesterday [...]
Picashare Picasa Sync iOS App Review
I hate synching my devices to computers. It’s much simpler to use iCloud and Photostream than it is to fire up the beast that is iTunes these days. In an all-iOS environment, this works great. But if I have a number of photos that need to be edited in Picasa, it’s a pain to download [...]
Why ChromeOS Is Positioned to Attack Windows 8, and Windows 8 Deserves It
I have something of a unique perspective on ChromeOS. See, one day in December 2010, I came home to find a mystery package on my doorstep from Google. It turned out the “Sure, I’d like to beta test a Chromebook” form I’d filled out netted me a CR-48, one of the original beta Chromebooks. So [...]
How to Get Your Google Contacts onto Your iPhone
In the past week, we’ve heard results from AT&T and Verizon, and in the particular case of Verizon which had iPhones account for TWO THIRDS of its smartphone sales, 20% of those sales went to former Android users. I have detailed my years long Android exclusivity, which just ended in late December with the purchase [...]

















