Research firm IDC has posted its quarterly report on the smartphone market which suggests that Windows Phone devices have finally overtaken BlackBerry smartphones in terms of shipments. This also means that devices running Microsoft’s OS take third spot in terms of smartphone shipments during the first quarter of 2013.  According to the report, Windows Phone devices accounted for 3.2 percent of total shipments while BlackBerry devices fell to 2.9 percent from 3.2 percent in the previous quarter.

It’s also worth noting that Nokia has expanded its Windows Phone portfolio to lower price points with devices like the Lumia 720, Lumia 620 and the Lumia 520. In fact, the Lumia 520 costs less than Rs 10,499, so it makes sense that the shipments are increasing. On the other hand, BlackBerry only launched its new BB10 based Z10 in January and its QWERTY Q10, which happens to be its bread in butter device has not launched in many parts of the world including India. Plus, its Q5 smartphone was only announced two days ago, and will not arrive before June. In fact, if anything can say that the growth in Windows Phone shipments is still slow.

Android and iOS seem to be in league of their own with 92.3 percent smartphone shipments being shared between both the platforms. Actually, it is Android, which is really running away with the market share. Yesterday, Google announced that there had been 900 million Android activations which was up from 500 million activations a year before. Additionally, 75 percent of the total smartphones shipped in Q1 were based on Android.

While, Apple managed 17.3 percent, it should also noted that it shipped 37.3 million iPhones in Q1 in the wake of the iPhone 5, and this was its best best quarter ever.

IDC posits that 162.1 million Android smartphones were shipped in Q1, an increase of 71.8 million units from 90.3 in 2012.

Android is on a roll, and if Windows Phone and BlackBerry want to make a fist of it, then both the operating systems need to eke out market share from Android. Windows Phone seems to be in the right direction, as devices like the Lumia 520, Lumia 620 and the Lumia 720  are selling quite well in emerging markets like India.

Google has updated its Play Books and introduced a cloud feature which allows you to save the books on the Google Cloud and then access them from any device. Both the iOS and Android versions of the app have been updated and for now and users can store up to 1,000 files on the cloud as long as they are under 50MB.

Once a user saves a book on the cloud, it can be accessed on the Internet, mobile devices and tablets. Google also says that the last read page, bookmarks and notes will be synced across all devices, so you will never have to worry about flipping the pages to where you last were when you switch devices.

The introduction of cloud service and syncing across devices, gives Play Books a distinct advantage over Apple’s iBooks which currently does not support sync across various devices. However, it brings Play Books to parity with the Amazon Kindle app, which employs ‘WhisperSync’ technology for a similar use case. You can download the latest version of Google Play Books from the App Store and the Play Store for free.

Mozilla has launched the new version of its open source browser Firefox for the desktop platforms including Mac, Windows and Linux, as well as the Firefox browser for Android. The all new Firefox 21.0 comes with feature and performance improvements along with a set of new options, with the major one being additional support for Mozilla Social’s API, which will now expand social integration from Facebook to Cliqz, Mixi and msnNOW.

Apart from this, it has also added ‘Do Not Track’ options for letting users customize the privacy settings, and a new Firefox Health Report feature to help improve performance, fix problems and let users see how their browsing experience compares against other browser services.

As far as social network integration is concerned, Firefox will now highlight these integrated social networks in a Firefox sidebar featuring updated content and notifications on the browser’s tool bar. The concept was already introduced by Mozilla when it had partnered with Facebook in December last year, but now the company has expanded the social integration platform by adding multiple new options.

Also, Firefox for Android now features custom open source fonts Charis and Open Sans which will replace the default Android fonts. Mozilla believes this will make the visuals more appealing and will offer better reading experience on the Web.

To upgrade the browser, Firefox 21.0 is available on Firefox.com and the existing users can upgrade to it automatically. Google Play users will be updated to the new version over next few days.

Samsung was having a rough time competing against the likes of the Micromax Canvas HD. Its answer was the Galaxy Grand, but that device was quite under-specced to compete with a Canvas HD. Now the company has revealed the Galaxy Grand Quattro which basically is revamped version of the Galaxy Grand, but has a quad-core processor instead of a dual-core chipset. The device is up for sale on the Samsung India e-store for Rs 18,260, which gives it a decent chance to compete with devices like the Micromax Canvas HD.

Apart from the processor, it also has a smaller 4.7-inch screen that has a WVGA resolution, which improves the pixel density when compared to the Galaxy Grand. Samsung offers an 5-megapixel auto focus camera in the back and a VGA front facing one. It also has dual-SIM capabilities and has an 2,000 mAh battery. Like most Samsung devices it even has a microSD card slot that can support up to 32GB of storage.

On the software side of things, it runs on Android 4.1 Jelly Bean in a TouchWiz wrapping. Samsung also brings a gamut of motion controls that we have seen in the Galaxy S 4 and also the easy mode for novices. It is available in black mist and frosty white colors, just like the Galaxy S 4.

There is always a communication gap between a person who uses a product and a person who makes it. This discord is obviously not good, and this also holds true for apps. Google is taking a huge leap in reducing this discord, as all app developers will now be able to respond to user reviews on the Google Play store. As is the case, the announcement was made on the official Android developers blog where Google talks about identifying and prioritising bugs based on user feedback and also getting ideas from users about the addition of new features.

Earlier, only top Google Play developers had the ability to respond to user reviews, but now the service has been opened to all developers. This is a big boon for both developers and the users as a bad review on the Play Store can actually drag the overall rating of the app and in the process can determine the destiny of the app. This also gives users an opportunity to interact directly with the app developer, which can help in resolving issues much faster.

Earlier today Instagram for Android and iOS got updated to version 3.5, introducing features like ‘Photos of You’ which is a photo-tagging functionality ala Facebook. Besides the tagging function, Instagram has also improved the quality of uploaded photos, added camera grids and fixed some bugs from the previous version.

With the Photos of You feature, one can add and tag one’s photos on Instagram just like how you would do on Facebook. It replaces the ‘@username’ kind of tagging that you normally associate with Twitter. The Facebook-like tagging feature also brings with it similar kind of privacy settings wherein you can select people with whom you want to share the photo or even hide them from certain users.

In addition to the above, the latest update also improves the quality of uploaded images on older devices running on Ice Cream Sandwich and above and also added grids to its camera to help amateur photographers click their desired photo.

You can download the latest version of Instagram for free from the App Store and the Play Store. In the meantime you can see how the Photos of You feature works in the demo video below.

So for the last year everyone has been saying that the next version of Android will be Android 5.0 Key Lime Pie. Well that’s what they said when Android 4.1 was launched but Google went ahead and launched Android 4.2 and now Android Police claims to have found evidence for Android 4.3 in Google’s server logs.

According to the report, there are device running internally at Google that are running a build of Android labeled 4.3 build JWR23B. Currently there are Nexus 4’s and Nexus 7’s running the new build, but the Nexus 10 is nowhere to be found.

With Google I/O just two weeks away, we could actually see Google announce Android 4.3 which also retains the Jelly Bean nomenclature as seen in the logs, instead of Android 5.0 Key Lime Pie. Google is also expected to launch a set of new Nexus devices and perhaps also the rumored Motorola made X-Phone.

LG had announced its F series of Android smartphones earlier in the year at MWC, and now it has officially launched the devices. Starting tomorrow, LG will roll out the Optimus F5 in Europe, but over the next few weeks it will make an appearance in Asia, Central America and South America. This also means that the Optimus F5 could be coming to India pretty soon. Only a few days ago the company had announced its intentions to bring the Optimus G Pro to India.

Features wise, it is a mid-range product. It is powered by a 1.2GHz dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon processor and has a 4.3-inch IPS display with a qHD resolution. LG has packed a large 2,150 mAh battery and it has 8GB of internal memory, 1GB of RAM, and a microSD card slot to boot. There is a 5-megapixel rear camera and a 1.3-megapixel front facing camera.

It runs on Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean and has a number of custom LG software features as a part of its Optimus UI like QSlide, Live Zooming, Video Wiz, and QTranslator. These features are quite similar to what Samsung offers with its TouchWiz interface. QSlide is similar to Samsung’s multi-window feature and QTranslator is similar to what users can achieve with S-Translator on the Galaxy S4.

iPhone jailbreakers are a resourceful bunch. Well, they have to be considering the type of restrictions Apple puts in place on iOS. Now legendary iPhone hacker Saurik aka Jay Freeman has claimed to have achieved root access on Google Glass Explorer Edition via a known exploit for Android 4.0, but claims it was first discovered by a hacker known as B1nary. According to him, Google Glass runs Android 4.0.4.

Freeman spoke to Forbes and said the hack was simple enough and he managed to crack the device by simply fooling it into thinking that it was an emulation instead of real hardware only in a matter of hours. Since emulations are meant for testing software, all permissions are enabled and root access is achieved.

Apparently, Saurik is not the first to root Google Glass as developer Liam McLoughlin also managed to root the device. It’s worth noting that Google Glass is still at a very early stage and still not near shipping. These early loopholes will probably help Google make the device even more secure. That said, these roots can also possibly help developers sell it to a third party and not worry about Google deactivating the product remotely.

#ifihadglass I would jailbreak it and modify the software (obviously). As Google actually sold me one; I did my part. cache.saurik.com/tinyimg/glassb…

— Jay Freeman (saurik) (@saurik) April 26, 2013

Tony Stark is back as the metal-suit-wearing-villain-bashing superhero in Iron Man 3 which released earlier today and the movie makers have collaborated with another company to promote movie. After Alcatel featured its One Touch Idol and the One Touch Idol Ultra in the movie, Gameloft has now launched the official Iron Man 3 game for Android and iOS devices.

Gameloft describes Iron Man 3 as an endless ‘flying’ game where the user takes control of the superhero as he zooms through different locations in his quest to stop the evil ‘A.I.M’. The game features numerous side-missions as well as boss battles against the likes of Crimson Dynamo, Ezekiel Stane, Living Laser and the M.O.D.O.K. The game also offers a host of customization options where you can develop and upgrade up to 18 different Iron Man suits which include the iconic MK II, MK V and the Silver Centurion among others.

The game is quite heavy and you will require about 795MB and 644MB of space on your Android and iOS devices respectively. To download the game for free, head over to the Play Store or the App Store and in the meantime you can watch a short demo of the game below.

Last month, Samsung had announced that it will bring the Galaxy Note 510 also known as the Note 8.0 Android tablet to India in May. Originally, the tablet was unveiled at the Mobile World Congress in February as the Galaxy Note 8.0. As promised the tablet is now up for pre-order on the Samsung India eStore for Rs 30,900. Samsung is throwing in a book cover worth Rs 2,699 with every pre-order.

The tablet runs on a 1.6GHz quad-core Exynos processor, with 2GB of RAM, 16GB of internal memory and has an 4,600 mAh battery. As for the display, it flaunts an 8-inch 1280×800 pixel display, and it runs on Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean. Currently only the white model is available, and only the 16GB variant is available, but users can use the microSD card slot to expand the memory. It also has a 5-megapixel rear camera and a 1.3 megapixel front facing camera.

The biggest feature for many would be the fact that it can accommodate SIM cards and can be used as a phone too for voice calling, though we are not big fans of making calls with by slapping a 8-inch display against our cheeks.

As it is a part of Samsung’s Note line of products, it features a S-Pen and has a number of features that are tailor made for the stylus. Additionally, Samsung is billing as an eReading apparatus, and it has built a reading mode in the tablet that optimizes the screen brightness levels for heavy duty reading sessions.

We believe Samsung has managed to get pretty competitive pricing considering the 16GB iPad mini Wi-Fi+Cellular model costs Rs 29,900.

Like the Xperia S, Sony has posted its first Android 4.2 AOSP for its latest flagship, the Xperia Z. An Android AOSP is a means for converting the Android software stack to a vanilla Android state and to further this cause Sony is pursing a separate AOSP project for the Xperia Z.

Currently, most of the core Android features of the smartphone are running in a plain vanilla Android environment. This includes SD card support, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, GPS, and the LED light. The camera is also working internally, but the code is based on proprietary binaries, which means that Sony cannot publish it. The same is true for the modem. This also means that one cannot flash the AOSP in a hurry and expect the phone to operate within standard parameters as the project is in a very early stage.

Sony also has its hands tied to a certain degree because part of the code is from its developer partners which is not open source. The good news is that Sony says that it will release the binaries for the NFC module in the near future.

The AOSP project at Sony is maintained by senior software engineers Johan Redestig, and Björn Andersson and it is available for users on the company’s official GitHub repository.

Facebook introduced quite a few innovative features when it launched the Home launcher app for Android devices. Last week, an update for Facebook brought some of these features like Chat Heads and Stickers from Home to the iOS devices. Today, the social networking giant has officially introduced the Stickers feature on Facebook Messenger for Android devices.

For those who are unfamiliar with the concept of Stickers, they are basically emoticons with more emotions than the regular ones. To use Stickers, just tap on the smiley button in the chat window and select the one you want to send. Just to remind you, these Stickers only work when chatting on Facebook and won’t be visible when sending a SMS.

To enable Stickers, just download the latest version of Facebook Messenger for free from the Google Play Store.

Facebook Home has passed 500,000 installations via the Google Play store. The milestone was noticed by analyst Benedict Evans. Facebook Home was first released to users in the US on April 12 after it was rolled out to international users on the 16th.
The 500,000 user number in itself is pretty modest considering Facebook has in-excess of 1 billion users, but the fact remains that the Facebook Home software is only available on very few Android smartphones.

Comparatively, the main Facebook app on Android has between 100 million and 500 million downloads, but it works across a wide range of Android smartphones including devices running very old versions of Android.

Notably, the rating of the app itself is not particularly flattering on the Google Play store. At the time of filing this report, the rating stood at 2.2, which is not impressive at all.

According to Opera’s latest report on the state of mobile advertising for the first quarter of this year, iOS leads over Android in mobile devices based impression volume and continues to remain the top platform in terms of monetization from advertisements, with the highest average eCPM and greatest percentage of publisher revenue. The findings recorded more than 50 billion ad impressions per month from over 12,000 sites and apps reaching about 300 million global consumers. Also the major category to drive the revenue growth and gets maximum traction has been recorded to be music, video and media.

According to the report, iOS leads the market when it comes to driving ad revenues from users, generating close to 45 percent of traffic and about 50 percent of revenue alone. With 31.91 percent of overall smartphone traffic, the iPhone has recorded a slight lead over Android devices with 31.26 of traffic recorded this quarter. On the tablet front, Android tablets have been noticed to be doing well, and have picked up by a small yet significant share in contributing to ads. Meanwhile, the iPad dominates, growing to over 6 percent of all ad impressions and over 12 percent of all revenue. It has also been recorded that, Samsung’s Galaxy S III has driven 11 percent of all Android traffic, which is about 2 percent up from 9 percent last quarter.

As far as the countries are concerned, India ranks fifth among the top countries in ad revenue generation from mobile devices, and contributes a major chunk of the 14.25 percent of total impressions registered from Asia Pacific. At the top, the US contributed approximately 60 percent of all ad requests registered in Q4 2012 and this quarter has dipped by almost 10 percent to 50.67 percent. European markets have been recorded to have generated over 21 percent of ad requests, up from 14.61 percent the previous quarter.