Gadgetory

this episode of Android Authority is brought to you by carbonite automatic cloud backup for your computer files at home and at work start your free trial at carbonite.com with the offer code Android and you'll get two bonus months with purchase welcome back to Android Weekly my name is Jason this is where we cover the week's Android news and talk about what it means for you the Android user and so far what it means for you is that you can now download KitKat 4.4.2 to your Android device at least some of us can others are left waiting patiently for hours stop checking or we will play bad Christmas music until your battery dies so let's get started on that KitKat update that you may be lucky enough to get 4.4.2 so far this update seems pretty basic he deals with clearing the VM indicator fixing the delivery for the VM indicator various additional software fixes and security enhancements but the bigger question must be is why oh why are there so many frequent updates that so few people can take advantage of good question and I've done with the first part of the question in a show about three weeks ago titled why Android updates take so long you can go and check that out if you haven't already but the second part of that question deals with the kind of company that Google really is they are an engineering company now I know some of you may be thinking Microsoft and Apple and numerous other technological companies are engineering companies well they're all tech companies but they're not engineering focused in the same manner that Google is you see Google loves to make incremental improvements and whereas you know Apple for example in contrast is more design focused although they're you know engineering and tech company they're more design focused so when they push on a product they want it to be much more polished to be user friendly they they make a huge marketing push about that launch whereas Google will just quietly push these things out just like they're very iterative approach right and some of the booths little approaches may not be the best for the average user but they're really good for Google because that's how they operate hopefully over time Google what better Google will get better and communicating about why these changes are important so earlier this week friend of mine bought a nexus 5 I got my hand on it wow it was a lot better phone that I had expected very elegant premium but I noticed that he asked me about the newest update and what was this question would it screw up my phone that's what he was concerned about I hope that in time Google gets better at these launches and communicating it better to the audience you know they're more engineering focus not people focused I hope that changes over time let those trumpets sound because it is official the Google Play Store has the LG pad 8.3 and the Sony Z ultra yes that's correct the LG G pad 8.3 and the Sony Z ultra has officially arrived at the Google Play Store and the G pad is now available for 349 and the Z ultra is sold for a hefty 649 but for a limited time it includes free ground shipping all good news for sure but the question remains why why would these OEMs original equipment manufacturers buy into a deal that would put them in direct competition with their own devices doesn't seem to be a very sound business decision does it well in fact it's actually a very good business decision although Google does not give out sales stats of their Google Play Store devices it is believed that those devices that those you know goo play editions like the Samsung Galaxy s4 HTC One all that stuff have very few sales on the Google Play Store almost insignificant and that's not Google's ultimate goal is to make money off selling OAM devices like new Play Store their goal is to make Android developers happy and you do that by giving them easy access affordable access to phones that are unlocked and have recent Android updates and we'll always get recent Android updates because for them to do their job they need to be able to optimize on phones and different screen sizes of different hardware specs this is a play to help developers and early adopters like us not to ultimately make money selling hardware off the Google Play Store so as many of you may have guessed most of the time I'm a pretty happy man I love my work and I love my gadgets sometimes a little too much oh oh but sadly I'm not always smart about how I go about it you see this is me when after many hours of work my laptop died and I realized I forgot to backup my data hmm now I know what you're thinking you're thinking Jase hand over those geek credentials right now because every true geek knows that you don't just backup your data - and it's sort of hard drive no you back it up to the cloud automatically that's why I'm so excited that Carbonite agreed to be a sponsor in this week's show because they do just that whether you have one computer or multiple computers at home or at work that have an affordable plan just for you that automatically backs up your most important data to the cloud so you don't have to and I can hook you up with a free trial no credit card required if you go to carbonite.com with the offer code Android you'll get two bonus months if you decide to buy Plus you can get access to your backup files instantly on your smartphone or tablet with the free Carbonite app that's carbonite.com and they offer code for two bonus months is Android so when Microsoft recently made a bid to buy out Nokia's unit and Services Division it was thought that that would be the end of any possibility that you'd ever see Android on a Nokia device but we have learned that that is not the case there is something called Normandy which is an entry level Android device manufactured by you guessed it Nokia earlier last week the verge reported and All Things D confirmed that yes there is an Android Nokia device called Normandy now there's no guarantee that Microsoft will ever let Normandy see the light of day but reportedly within Nokia there is a sense that Redmond may be willing to pursue the project now what is happening here you ask is this just a project that Nokia had in the pipe before the Microsoft takeover or is this some sort of weird evil plan by Microsoft I don't think so I cannot see Microsoft pulling away in any way from its Windows mobile platform but we shall see tell me what you think in the comments below thanks for watching Android peeps you should know that on this channel whether it's Josh Joe with a tech ninja Kevin there's lots of great content for Android lovers and remember I know you're trying very kind of you you're welcome