Pokemon Go; Some Shocking Usage Statistics

     If you keep yourself up-to-date with the latest happenings in the tech arena, you must have heard of Pokemon Go. Once can’t remember the last time when a mobile game was well received like this.

Currently, the app is not available all over the world. You can download it officially only if you are from US, Australia, and New Zealand. But the limited availability couldn’t extinguish the burning desire of avid gamers all over the world. They found a third-party source and started feeling the brand-new Pokemon game.

You might have read reviews and gameplay details elsewhere. But today, I am focusing more on its usage statistics.

But before we do, let me give you a small overview of the game.

Pokemon Go; What is it actually?

In short, Pokemon Go is a location based augmented reality game available for both Android and iOS, in which you have to hunt virtual Pokemons appearing in the real world. Owing to the usage of camera and GPS, you feel like you play a physical game in the world.

The game has been creating a huge buzz since its release as it is not a regular play-on-the-phone -only type. You have to out yourself out of the four walls to get it going.

As the game is not available in Asia and Europe right now, I am sticking to the usage statistics of America only.

Pokemon Beat Tinder in Total Downloads

It’s true that the game was released a few days ago. But guess what?

The total download count made the dating app Tinder feel ashamed of its own. So what does it say? People love gameplay more than foreplay? ;)

Only after 2 days of the release, Pokemon go has been download on about 5.16% of all the Android devices in the US.

Twitter is Going to be Beaten in Number of Daily Active Users

Now that Tinder is not a challenge, Pokemon Go is all set to beat the well-established social networking site Twitter regarding daily active users.

More than 60% of the people who downloaded the game is using is daily. That means, about 3% of the total Android users in America plays Pokemon Go daily.

WhatsApp, Snapchat, Instagram, and Messenger are Already Behind

Now, let’s analyze the average amount of time each user put into playing the game. Pokemon Go is an entertaining game given that an average user spends about 43 minutes and 23 seconds playing the game.

If you compare the usage time of WhatsApp, Snapchat, Instagram and Messenger, you will find out the difference is considerable and the new mobile game kid in the market is knocking the socks off the competition.

Someone Took Advantage of the Game; Good for Them

You know the game isn’t available all over the world. That made apkmirror.com quite popular.

People searched (still does) for the apk file of the game to surpass the official app store. As a result, the daily traffic to apkmirror.com has been increased to over 6 million a day on July 6th. Two days ago (on July 4th), it was only 600,000 only.

Considering the total organic traffic in the last 28 days, they received the most (19.6%) from the term ‘pokemon go apk.’

You can still see them in SERPs right after Wikipedia for the term ‘pokemon go.’

N.B.- Image credits- SimilarWeb

Wrapping Up

That’s all. Everyone is talking about the game right now. So, I thought it would be great if I present a few usage statistics before you.

This one is the greatest example of how a simple app can take internet by storm. Unique ideas are alwarys well received. Moreover, this game connects with the external world.

Don’t forget to share the article.

Pokemon Go Becomes an Instant Rage; Coming to India Soon

What was initially outed as an April Fool’s joke, has turned out to be one of the largest success in the gaming industry.Nintendo’s augmented reality game, Pokemon Go, based on the anime series from Japan, has become a rage amongst the people in the US.

According to recent reports, the Android and iOS game has already exceeded the Twitter daily active count and has been installed on nearly 6% of all Android users in the US. As of now the game is available in the US, Australia and New Zealand only, however the game developers are planning to launch it in Europe, South America and a few Asian countries, hopefully India as well.

What’s all the noise about?

If you watch Pokemon or have watched it earlier, you would know what it feels like to enact the same in real life. As kids, it would be fun to watch the trainers catch Pokemon and battle them for awards and ultimate championships. If I were to tell you that you can do the same now, except through augmented reality, wouldn’t you get excited about it?

This is exactly what has taken the US by storm and made people go out of their houses into the wild. There have been reports of accidents, fatigue, robberies and museums putting up signs to discourage users from playing Pokemon Go on the streets.

However, there doesn’t seem to be any way to stop a bunch of people from catching a Pokemon at 3AM in the night. Exactly like in the anime series, users can throw (virtually) Poke balls to catch Pokemon, train them and fight them in championships.

The game developers have very smartly placed exclusive Pokémon’s in unknown locations, making people explore locations they have never been to before.

Mind-blowing Pokemon Go Stats

Within 2 days of launch, the app was already installed on 5.2% of all Android devices in the US. Within a day of launch itself, it had surpassed the number of Tinder installs on all Android devices in the US.

Over 60% of the users who have the app installed on their phones, are using it daily, which is already higher than Twitter in terms of daily active user count. Considering it is a game, and a very famous one at that, the average usage time is at around 45 mins, while the closest one, WhatsApp, only garners 30 mins.

This sudden rage also ended up increasing Nintendo’s stock price by 20%, never seen before in the last 30 years. The retention time of the app is also said to be extremely high when compared to other games. However, let’s wait for a few months once the rage dies down.

Can this fame sustain?

Do you remember flappy bird? It was a very simple game that rose to fame for its interesting gameplay, but failed to sustain as similar games launched on Android and iOS. Pokemon Go however has a lot going for it to become dormant in the coming months.

Firstly, there isn’t a game similar to this one out there, and cannot be, since Pokemon is Nintendo’s property. Secondly, flappy bird did not have much variation in it, whereas Pokemon Go is augmented reality, which has so many permutations and combinations that you can literally never run out of challenges.

Thirdly, the game has an emotional connect with the users, as the developers have brought to life what we wanted to do as kids. A combination of these make it a sure shot success and can propel it to higher levels.

While the game is unofficially available everywhere else, we strongly recommend not to download the .apk file available on the internet because of some security and privacy concerns.
Do watch out for more updates as Nintendo reveals its plans to launch the game outside of the US. We will be first one to let you know when the game launches officially in India.

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BlackBerry Bringing 3 Android Phones Neon, Argon & Mercury This Season

We do not remember the last time BlackBerry launched a phone that killed the competition. The company kept repeating the same mistakes every year, which led to a huge decline post-BBM era.

BlackBerry launched its first Android device, after almost being forced to so as to stay in the competition, called the Priv which failed to make any impact in the smartphone industry. It was known for being overpriced for the features it offered, even though the design was quite unique and reminiscent of the older BlackBerrys.

The Canadian manufacturer was now resorted to launching three Android-based smartphones, hopefully by July itself. According to reports, the three smartphones are set to be placed in the three key segments in the market right now, to take on Samsung, LG and the major Chinese manufacturers.

The smartphones will be announced at the MobileBeat 2016 Conference to be held at San Francisco from 12th-13th July. It is one of the conferences where there are talks by leaders and influential people, technology keynotes, case studies and announcements.

Expected features of the smartphones

BlackBerry will be launching the three smartphones in the US and we hope they will be subsequently available in India. The phones have been codenamed very uniquely – Neon, Argon, and Mercury. The phones are expected to be made available to the users in subsequent quarters.

Neon

It is expected to be the first out of the three to be available to the users. The phone will sport a 5.2-inch full-HD display, powered by a Snapdragon 617 chipset, housing 3GB of RAM and 16GB of internal storage. A decently sized 2610 mAh battery will be present in the phone.

The phone will not come with a physical keyboard, will support QuickCharge 2.0 and sport 13MP camera with flash at the back and an 8MP camera at the front. The smartphone will most probably be available on sale in a week or two from official unveiling.

16GB of internal storage should be now done away with, so if BlackBerry is offering such low storage for its base model, it better be cheap.

Argon

The larger of the two keyboard-less smartphones, Argon will come with a 5.5-inch QHD touchscreen powered by Qualcomm 820 chipset, 4GB of RAM and 32GB of internal memory. The phone will house a larger 3,000 mAh battery with QuickCharge 3.0 for quick charging.

Argon also has a 21MP shooter at the back along with an 8MP shooter on the front. The phone reminds us of the Priv and it is also more like an upgrade to the Priv, sans the physical keyboard. It will be available in the last quarter of 2016.

Mercury

This phone will be the last installment from BlackBerry for the time being. The form factor is expected to be different, with a large touch screen and a physical keyboard below it. However, unlike Priv, the phone will not have a slider and instead have a bar form factor, like the Passport.

Mercury sports a 4.5-inch full HD display in a square-ish design like the Passport, and houses a Snapdragon 625 chipset, coupled with 3GB of RAM and 32GB of internal storage. The plus point of the smartphone is the large battery at 3400 mAh supporting QuickCharge.

The phone also has an 18MP rear camera and an 8MP front camera for selfies. Mercury seems to be a revival of its flagship Passport phone, with a new operating system. The phone will be available to consumers from Q1 2017.

Can these three phones turn-around BlackBerry’s fate?

BlackBerry recently reported a $670 million net loss, and while the company isn’t doing as bad as it did in 2014, it still isn’t in a good shape.

Lenovo Vibe C2 Announced in Russia, Features 5-inch HD Display and 4G LTE

     Lenovo has introduced yet another budget 4G smartphone for the Russian market. The Vibe C2 comes months after Lenovo introduced the Vibe C. The Lenovo Vibe C2 comes with a 5-inch HD display and is powered by a 1GHz quad-core MediaTek MT6735P SoC coupled with a 1GB of RAM. At 8.5mm thickness the phone is definitely on the chunkier side.

On the storage front, the device offers 8GB/16GB of internal memory which is further expandable up to 32GB. The camera setup consists of an 8-Megapixel primary Sony 219 sensor and a secondary camera is a 5-Megapixel unit. Lenovo Vibe C2 is backed up by a 2,750mAh battery and runs on Android 6.0 Marshmallow.

The Lenovo Vibe C2 comes with the usual host of connectivity features including 4G LTE, WiFi 802.11, Bluetooth 4.0LE, and GPS. Furthermore, the Vibe C2 would be offered in Black and White colour while the pricing details are yet to be revealed. If rumours are to be believed, then the Moto E3 might come with a similar set of specifications.

The Russian market is currently being dominated by the Chinese brands and in fact, Lenovo is one of the most popular Chinese smartphone brands and commands a market share of 10%. Lenovo is trailed by Asus and ZTE at the market share of 4% and 5% respectively. A staggering 1.2 million Chinese brand mobile phones were sold in the first two months of 2016 thus marking a 50% YoY. It is very likely that some of the countries might see a Lenovo branded variant of the Moto E3 this year.

Bag A Chat- A Unique App For WhatsApp Users To Manage Chat Professionally

With many people practically living their whole lives on WhatsApp and Hike messenger nowadays, this Pune based App was a need of the hour. Introducing Bag A Chat– a unique app crafted especially for WhatsApp and Hike users that will help them manage their chats professionally.

The patent pending app helps one to safely and smartly save and organise their WhatsApp/Hike Messages. The chats and media are saved on the cloud, meaning they can be easily accessed from anywhere in the world.

Started in November last year, the app is a unique concept that doesn’t have any other competitor in the market right now. Apart from the saving feature, the app comes loaded with loads of other features like setting message reminder, label messages for logical grouping and an easy & quick search option. The app also provides its users with cool analytics that includes interesting Graphs based on Conversations.

For people concerned about the security angle, be rest assured, the app is completely secure app because no data transfer takes over the net as the app provides its users with 100% offline access.

Bag A Chat can serve as a big asset to businesses as they can opt for business integration through API. The app’s business feature can look after customer support, project tracking and manage customer care verticle.

Founded by Anand Desai, a Senior Project Manager at Sungard for 11 years, the unique app making company hasn’t received any funding as of yet. According to Desai, the company’s immediate plan is to make more and more people aware about the app and drive in new customers.

Unfortunately, the App is currently only available for Android users. But, iOS don’t get disheartened, the iOS app is under construction and can be expected to hit the markets very soon.

Samsung Galaxy Note 7 will be Announced on August 2

Samsung Galaxy Note 7 will be Announced on August 2

Samsung Galaxy Note 7 has been pictured in more than one leaks and the likely specifications have also been detailed out. However, this time around Samsung sent out invites to the media and the event called Galaxy Note Unpacked 2016 will take place in Rio De Janeiro and also in London. The rumour mills have been pointing out that this iteration of Galaxy Note 7 will come with a dual edged display much like the Galaxy S7 Edge.

While it is intriguing so as to why Samsung skipped the number 6 in the Note series and instead is about to announce Note 7. However, one of the deduction says that it you take into consideration the Galaxy Note Edge released in 2014 the next Note should be aptly numbered Note 7. This is what Samsung itself has to say about the nomenclature, “The Galaxy Note7 will minimize confusion about the latest mobile technology from Samsung, and provide full alignment with Galaxy S smartphone.”

Furthermore, the rumours have also pointed at a possibility of an Iris scanner for authenticating purposes and this is a feature that is not so hard to imagine since Samsung is already using it in its Tablet.

A quick recap at the specifications, Note 7 is expected to come with a 5.7-inch Super AMOLED display, Qualcomm Snapdragon 823 (or an equivalent Exynos powerhouse), 6GB of RAM. 64GB/128GB/256GB storage options, dual edged display, 12-Megapixel primary camera setup, and a 5-Megapixel secondary sensor. Of course, all of these specifications are rumoured and need to be taken with the proverbial pinch of salt.

The Galaxy Note 7 Unpacked event will take place at 11:00 a.m EDT in New York along with simultaneous events at London and Rio De Janeiro. The event will be live streamed at Samsung official site.

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5 Casual But Addictive Games for Android You Must Try

    You don’t always wanna play hardcore games like Asphalt 8 or Modern Combat on your Android and I have two reasons to support my argument. First of all, these games require an internet connection all the time and you can’t always guarantee that and secondly, you can’t play them while having coffee or on your commute back to home from work. Games like these need your undivided attention.

     At times, you need some casual games that you can play without any missions to complete, but then they should be addictive and worth your time. So here are some casual-yet-addictive games that you can play on your Android to make the most out of your free time.

1. Floors

First in the list is Floors by Ketchapp Games and this one is an endless arcade platformer, but, with a twist. You have to dodge spikes while running on various floors and collect rubies in the process that will unlock other characters. The game is challenging as you will be given a random floor from a set of 4 sections with different types of spikes that you need to dodge.

The reason it’s so addictive is because there is no load time and you kind of challenge yourself when you see that you have died for a silly reason. Those being your poor reflexes, concentration, etc and that you should have done better in the next chance. Hence, the story continues!

2. Chameleon Run

The next game you can try is Chameleon Run and as the name suggests, this game has to do with changing colors and running through obstacles. The objective of the game is to run, dodge obstacle and change color so as to land with the matching color of the platform. The game has pixel perfect physics and the camera angle is also amazing that gives you a pseudo-3D like environment. If you have loved color switcher, this game will entice you even more.

The game is $1.99 on the Play Store and as easy as it may sound, it’s very difficult to match your reflexes with what the game requires. This is what makes it so addictive. You challenge yourself that you can do better than this and then end up playing for hours.

3. Side Swipe

Side Swipe is a minimalistic game that you can play almost anywhere you can take out some free time. The goal of the game is very simple, when you see a shape, swipe the screen according to the color before it hits the ground. So an Orange ball needs to be swiped left before it hits the ground and the blue need to be swiped to the right.

Sounds way to simple right? Well, I too thought so but my opinion changed soon. The game will start simple but after a while your reflexes will be put to test and it will become difficult with the high speed and multiple objects coming your way. Still way better than swiping all those photos on Tinder, I guess!

4. Skyward

Skyward is one is an endless game where you need to place the two spots (red and blue) on the path in order to progress. If you miss the chance to place them in time or if you place them in air, it’s the end of the story. Well, that’s the very basic description I can give about the game and frankly you should play the game yourself to know it.

 The game has ads and you can buy the ad-free version for just $1.99. However these ads are not obtrusive and it’s easy to make peace with them even while playing for hours.

5. Current Stream

Lastly, we have Current Stream and unlike all the others which are reflex based, this one is a puzzle based game. The idea of the game is simple, you need to solve puzzles by rotating tiles, supplying energy to all light bulbs. The good things about the game are its beautiful visuals, relaxing, high-quality ambient music, and more than 200 challenging levels.

The game will look very simple but with so many permutations and combinations, it can be difficult to find the path of light and that’s what makes this game so addictive.

Conclusion

So these were 5 addictive casual games to play on Android. I am sure these are not the only addictive games out there and the list is way too long. These games are only a matter of personal choice and you can also contribute to the list by leaving a comment. So do try out these games and share which one is your favorite out for the five.