Google has updated its Hangout app to allow you to reply direct from the Notifications screen – and as Engadget noted, that also means you can now send replies from your Apple Watch. As usual with Watch apps, that means either choosing from a range of canned responses, or dictating a reply using Siri …  expand full story

Google has updated its text, video and voice messaging app Hangouts, adding all the new features added to the Android version last month – including intelligent, one-tap location sharing.

Google promised that it would be building more intelligence into the app, and the new location-sharing feature is the first step along that path. The app automatically detects when a contact in a text chat asks where you are, and allows you to share your location with a single tap …  expand full story

Messages for Mac may support a few different chat services, but there are still a variety of features that would vastly improve the experience of messaging on the Mac. Flamingo is a new app designed to make chatting even better with a whole host of features you didn’t even realize you were missing.

Unfortunately because Apple keeps iMessage pretty locked-down, you won’t be able to use Flamingo with that. You can still use it with your Facebook, Google Hangouts (text, not video), and other XMPP-based chat services. But should you use it for those things? Keep reading for our full review.

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Google’s Vic Gundotra just announced on his Google+ page a host of new Hangouts features meant to “go beyond the status update”. In short, you can now hangout on any post (an invitation will be added to the comments), call any phone number in the world and conference in anyone (free calling to US and Canada, international calling rates are “super, super low”), plus initiate a hangout session from the official Google+ iOS app by tapping the new hangout icon.

The executive also shared an interesting milestone for Hangouts on Air, saying “hundreds of people” whitelisted as part of their trial now have the ability to broadcast their hangouts to the world. “Our goal is to enable this for everyone on the planet”, Gundotra noted. You will also be able to automatically record a Hangouts on Air session and upload it to a private YouTube account for later viewing. These features require a new Google+ app, “coming soon” to the App Store. The official Google blog has more information.

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