Latest offerings from Google take aim at Apple, Facebook
SAN FRANCISCO — Google used its developers conference Thursday to announce new products that challenge its biggest rivals in fields ranging from payments to pictures.
The search giant pitted itself against Apple, Facebook and even Yahoo by launching Google Photos, a free app and online service that helps users organize, store and share images and videos.
Google Photos aims to store a person’s entire lifetime of photos and video — not unlike Apple’s iCloud, Yahoo’s Flickr, or Facebook’s social network or photosharing service Instagram.
What differentiates the product is its goal to provide users an easy way to share images while maintaining greater control over who sees them, executives said.
Google Photos will “let you hold on to the memories that matter, even if you weren’t the one who was holding the camera,” Google Photos director Anil Sabharwal said.
Sabharwal said the product would serve as an unlimited back-up for users’ highquality photos and video. The service will store photos as large as 16 megapixels and video of up to 1080p resolution. Flickr allows users to store up to 1,000 GB of space.
The app is available on the web, Android and Apple devices and works without downloading or launching another app.
Google has long struggled with social media. Its early social network Google Buzz died, and its Google + prod-
uct has never emerged as a real competitor to Facebook. Google executive Bradley Horowitz said his team decided to create Google Photos outside of Google+ to give photography “its own seat at the table.”
The company said sharing on Google Photos has to be deliberate. “There is a reason in Gmail that we don’t have a button that says publish to Internet,” Horowitz said. “In the same way, Google Photos is that private
sacred secure safe place where all of my memories can live without agenda.”
On Google Photos, pictures are automatically organized by subject: people, places and things. For pictures taken without geolocation tags, Google can recognize certain landmarks and label them. Users can also search photos using terms such as “food in Hawaii” or “golden retriever.”
There is one catch to the unlimited storage plan. It’s free for users who let Google compress photos from their original format. Users can pay $10 a month for a 1 terabyte service that stores photos in their original uncompressed format, although executives insist they have no plans to generate new revenues from photos for now.
On Thursday, Google also said it was working on a range of developer tools and software intended to improve its Android smartphones, smart watches and Internet-connected devices.
Google introduced Android Pay, its attempt to answer Apple’s mobile payment system Apple Pay.
With Android Pay, smart phone users can wave their device to buy items at 700,000 stores and restaurants, using near-field communications technology. Android Pay now works with Visa, MasterCard, Discover and American Express credit cards.
Google is including a standardized fingerprint reading system in its next mobile operating update to verify payments.
Google also said HBO Now, the premium network’s new online streaming service will be available for Android devices this summer. HBO Now debuted on Apple TV in April.
Google added that is working on projects to standardize how connected versions of ordinary devices, from smart door locks to home thermostats, communicate. Google plans to preview an operating system for the Internet of Things called Brillo in the third quarter.
And the company unveiled a new version of its Carboard virtual reality viewer, which supports both Android and iOS phones.