Google just made things a whole lot easier for those using Google Slides to give presentations. Slides now supports Chromecast so setting up is as easy as beaming it to a screen with one of the two.
Take a look:
“Google Slides helps you tell beautiful, meaningful stories. But sometimes, presenting these stories can be a hassle, especially when wires, cables and connectors are needed,” says product manager Ajay Surie. “Now it’s even easier to share your presentations on big screens—whether you’re in a school board meeting, in charge of the slideshow at your best friend’s wedding or pitching your dream business idea.”
“When you’re up on the big screen, you can use your smaller screen to advance slides, view speaker notes and stay on track with a built-in timer,” Surie adds. “This way you can focus more on telling your story and engaging your audience…instead of on logistics.”
You can cast from the web as well if you’re using Chrome and have the Google Cast extension.
For the new functionality, make sure to download the latest update to Google Slides for Android or iOS.
More than a year and a half ago, when Netflix updated their app for the then-new iPad, the company promised that HD video was on the way. They didn’t give a timeframe, but we figured it wouldn’t be too long before they brought HD to their iOS apps. Why else mention it, right?
Fast forward. Today, Netflix is finally making good on that promise. The new Netflix for iOS app will finally stream applicable content in HD. Of course, streaming in HD still depends on you having a strong enough internet connection to sustain it.
This announcement comes on the heels of another “we’re giving you better picture quality” announcement from Netflix. Last week, the company launched Super HD streams for all users. For a while, Super HD was only available through certain ISP partners.
Also inside this iOS update – AirPlay support.
From Netflix:
With our latest app, you can now also start streaming over AirPlay. This new feature is very simple and works on all iOS 7 devices. Choose a title to watch on your iPhone or iPad and start playback; If there is an Apple TV device connected to the same Wifi network, an AirPlay icon appears; Press the AirPlay icon and playback will move to your Apple TV. Use your iPhone or iPad as a remote control for the Apple TV during AirPlay. You can pause, seek, select audio or subtitles and stop playback from your iPhone or iPad.
Neat.
Be warned, you might not see HD and AirPlay support right away. Netflix says all members will have access by mid-October.
As of right now, you should be able to stream HBO GO to your television through Apple TV. But you don’t have an actual app with which to do it…yet.
What you can do is stream HBO GO to your television using Apple’s AirPlay feature on your iPhone or iPad. All you have to do to begin beaming content from your smaller device to your TV is download the update to the HBO GO app on your device.
(You’ll need iOS 6 or above and v5.1.1 or above on your Apple TV)
HBO GO already has dedicated apps on devices like Roku and the Xbox 360., so Apple is lagging behind a little bit here. But at least the HBO GO app now supports AirPlay, which makes streaming possible. Go get your Game of Thrones on, people.
DIAL stands for Discovery And Launched (I guess “DIAL” sounded better than “DAL”). It also happens that it was created and is maintained by Netflix and YouTube (with input from “a variety of partners”). It’s described as a simple protocol that 2nd screen devices can use to discover and launch apps on 1st screen devices. In other words, phones and tablets can use it to launch apps on TVs, set-top boxes and Blu-ray players.
“For consumers, DIAL removes the pain of having to launch the required app on the 1st screen before interacting with it from their 2nd screen,” the DIAL website (maintained by Netflix) says. “DIAL does not have any significant impact on the 2nd screen’s battery life and the only requirement is that both 1st and 2nd screens are connected to the same home network.”
“For device manufacturers, DIAL increases usage of applications on their 1st screen products (TV, set-top, Blu-ray, etc.),” the site says. “For app developers, DIAL helps link their 2nd screen app to their 1st screen app without requiring a manual launch or pairing process by the user.”
When one app is running, and another app is launched via DIAL, the device starts the app just as if it would if the app were started on the device itself (or from a remote control, which Netflix compares the protocol to repeatedly).
There is no cost or royalty structure attached to DIAL. As long as you follow the terms, anyone can use it.
GigaOm shares a little on why Netflix and YouTube teamed up:
“We realized in the fall of 2011 that we could create some potentially useful 2nd screen experiences,” Scott Mirer, director of product management at Netflix, told me via email this week, adding:
“At about the same time, we learned that the YouTube team was interested in much the same thing – they had already started to do some work on 2nd screen use cases. And so we approached them on collaborating… We also felt that having two major video services define and promote DIAL would help get it more widely adopted as a common solution to a common problem, vs. taking a proprietary approach. It’s been a productive partnership and we’re confident that we’ll get wider adoption because of it.”
Apparently, that was just the beginning of a larger strategy that will help Google compete with Apple’s Airplay feature. GigaOm is now reporting that Google is working an an “open” alternative to Airplay that will help third-party developers take better advantage of this functionality – beaming content from the mobile device to the television screen.
GigaOm’s Janko Roettgers says Google is hoping to bring “a number” of device and software vendors on board. Roettgers quotes Google product manager Timbo Drayson as saying, “We really want to move the whole industry forward.”
To give you a better idea of the concept, in case you’re unfamiliar with Airplay, here’s how Apple describes it on its site:
AirPlay lets you wirelessly stream what’s on your iOS device to your HDTV and speakers via Apple TV. Or mirror exactly what’s on your display to the big screen. Vacation photos, blockbusters, the latest games — AirPlay and Apple TV put it all on your TV.
….
Take control on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch while the action unfolds on your widescreen TV.3 Patrol the air while commanding the cockpit from your couch. Browse the latest in interior design ideas and save your favorites on your iPhone or iPad. With AirPlay, your TV displays talents it never knew it had.
Now envision similar concepts with Android-based devices and the larger Android ecosystem of apps and content.
As the array of Apple devices has broadened, Apple has continually looked for ways to keep them connected to one another. One of the most recent examples of this trend is AirPlay, a feature that allows users to stream content from one device to another. For example, a video being played on an iPhone could be sent via AirPlay to an Apple TV. While Apple devices are not the only ones compatible with AirPlay, Apple has generally tried to exert a measure of control over which devices are AirPlay compatible and which are not.
Now, however, an app called Airtight will allow Google TV users to receive content via AirPlay from their iOS devices. The app, which is $.99 in the Android App Market, allows the Google TV to become an AirPlay receiver. With the app installed on their Google TV, users will be able to stream content from their iOS devices to their television. The app is not without its limitations, however. It does not currently support streaming music, nor does it support DRM-protected content, which means that any movies you get from the iTunes Store will not play on your Google TV. The app also does not support mirroring, a process that allows users to send the screen view from their iPad to their Apple TV.
Reviews of the app have tended to be positive, and the developers say they are looking into bringing music streaming to the app. However, mirroring and DRM playback are not likely to ever be added. Look for more interesting developments on this in the future.
Do you have a Google TV? If so, give Airtight a try and let us know what you think in the comments.
I still remember when Dave Winer showed me RSS and what it did. It changed my life and continues to, even after we switched much of our reading behavior to Twitter (a new iPad app is coming on Friday that uses RSS, more about that when the embargo ends).
But since RSS has there been a new protocol that’s changed our lives in a big way? I haven’t seen one until Apple announced AirPlay.
What is AirPlay? It lets you play video instantly and wirelessly from your iPhone or iPad to your big-screen TV which has an Apple TV attached. I had my nephew, Kian, video me in my family room where I show you what it does.
Yes, you can already recognize the downside to this new protocol: it was developed by Apple and isn’t yet available on other devices or to developers who might, um, want to put it on Android devices.
I can see why Apple might want to keep it for itself. It’s a killer feature. Reading on Wikipedia you’d learn that the protocol lets you wirelessly stream audio, video, and photos.
But it wasn’t until the past week that we’ve seen iPad apps that really use it. In my tests with three of these apps I’ve found that they completely change my TV viewing patterns.
Here’s why.
In old-school YouTube viewing I’d watch a video on a laptop, or on my iPad, but if I wanted to show it to the whole room, say, to my wife or my sons, I’d have to get off the couch, find the remote for either my Apple TV, or a controller for my Xbox, and figure out how to browse to what I was viewing. Lots of times it was way too frustrating to find what I was viewing on the iPad that I’d just give up.
Here, try it yourself. Go watch a video on ted.com and then try to watch that same video on an Xbox, Apple TV, Roku, Boxee, PlayStation, or Wii. I have most of those devices in my family room and they are just nearly impossible to use.
It gets worse when you have your own video that you shot on your iPhone or iPad. I hate having to hand my iPad around just to show people something cute my kids did or the BBQ place we visited at SXSW.
No longer.
Now I just click a new AirPlay icon on these new apps and BOOM it starts playing on my big screen TV.
Anyway, the three apps that I’ve been using in the past month that have changed my viewing habits quite radically are:
1. TED iPad app. I love watching TED videos and since these are usually about 18 minutes each (some shorter) I like watching them on my big screen so that I can tweet on my iPad while learning from these great speakers.
2. Squrl. Squrl lets me watch lots of videos, especially from YouTube and other places, and I can curate those videos into pages. Much of the videos here are playable via AirPlay. I thought the Netflix and Hulu ones would be, but they are giving me an error, I’ll try to find out. I did an extensive video with the founder that you should watch.
