Google Photos and Duo App Updates Coming For Users in Low Connectivity Areas

[MacRumors]

Google announced a couple of notable updates for its Duo and Photos apps yesterday at the company's São Paulo event, where it pitched the features as ideal solutions for users in Brazil who live in low connectivity areas.

Google Photos received two new features to make photo backup and sharing easier when using the app in locations with poor network coverage.

Photos now backs up images in a lightweight preview quality that Google says "still looks great on a smartphone" and can be easily shared over poor connections. When a good Wi-Fi connection does become available, the backed up photos are automatically replaced with high quality versions.

We're also making it easier to share many photos at once even on low connectivity. Never mind if you're at the beach or hiking in the mountains, with Google Photos you can now share pictures quickly even with a spotty connection by sending first in low resolution so friends and family can view them right away. They'll later update in higher resolution when connectivity permits.

Video calling app Duo gained an audio-only calling feature that users can switch to when an internet connection is poor. The features for both apps are available in Brazil from today, and Google says it will be rolling them out to users around the world in the coming days.

Yesterday, Google also announced a new feature for Maps that lets users share their real-time locations with friends and family.

Article Link: Google Photos and Duo App Updates Coming For Users in Low Connectivity Areas

 

[DaveTheRave]

Duo will be a tough sell in a country where almost everyone uses Whatsapp.

 

[obitow]

Duo will be a tough sell in a country where almost everyone uses Whatsapp.

Duo is a tough sell everywhere. The app is great, but doesn't have any feature worth the migration.

 

[zorinlynx]

If Google expects long established Photos.app users to move to Google Photos, they really need to make their migration tool more powerful.

Right now, your album structure is not preserved when uploading your Photos.app library to Google. I have so much work tied up in my album structure that I feel eternally stuck with Photos.app and iCloud Photo Library because it would just be so much work to transition to anything else.

I'm fairly happy with iCloud Photo Library and Apple's ecosystem at the moment, but worry that if things go south in the future I'm going to have a hard time jumping ship. I always like to have an escape plan for every platform I'm on.

 

[CarpalMac]

The amazing thing about Google photos is the ability it has to recognise the content. I was searching for brakes and it showed me the photos it thought was related to the query. I was looking for of a brake caliper rebuild I did in 2004 on my motorbike and a quick scroll through the results showed them to me. It wasn't ever in a folder called brakes, nor ever tagged as that.

Not a great article but this gives a better example: https://photographyconcentrate.com/the-most-powerful-feature-of-google-photos/

My exact same photos are in Apples Photos and the same "Brakes" search returned zero results. Just tried it.

 

[question fear]

Duo is a tough sell everywhere. The app is great, but doesn't have any feature worth the migration.

It depends. Duo is a perfect fit for video calling with my parents, who both have iPhones, since i have an an Android phone. Likewise my wife has an iPhone, so if our son wants to video chat with me while I am at work Duo is perfect.

The hard part was finding an app that my parents could understand. Facetime was easy for them, but trying to explain Skype got complicated, and they don't do Facebook. Duo popped up and they were able to do it easily. Even my 3 year old knows how to use Duo and he can't read yet.

 

[DaveTheRave]

The hard part was finding an app that my parents could understand. Facetime was easy for them, but trying to explain Skype got complicated, and they don't do Facebook. Duo popped up and they were able to do it easily. Even my 3 year old knows how to use Duo and he can't read yet.

I recently did a Hangouts video chat with my father, who has a new Android phone. He was like "hey how'd you do that?"

 

[C DM]

It depends. Duo is a perfect fit for video calling with my parents, who both have iPhones, since i have an an Android phone. Likewise my wife has an iPhone, so if our son wants to video chat with me while I am at work Duo is perfect.

The hard part was finding an app that my parents could understand. Facetime was easy for them, but trying to explain Skype got complicated, and they don't do Facebook. Duo popped up and they were able to do it easily. Even my 3 year old knows how to use Duo and he can't read yet.

I haven't used Duo personally, but I'm somewhat curious what's really that much complicated when it comes to something like Skype in comparison?

 

[DaveTheRave]

I haven't used Duo personally, but I'm somewhat curious what's really that much complicated when it comes to something like Skype in comparison?

I haven't used it either, but it's my understanding that there's no Duo account to setup, create, or log in. It's just your phone number. Perfect for developing countries where many people go online for the first time in their life via a mobile phone - they may not even have an email address. So that kind of account ID requirement for a login (email, screen name etc) plus p/w just adds more friction.

I'm not familiar with Duo's interface...maybe it's just a simple button to start a video chat?