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Although Google sends many products to an early retirement, Google Groups is still alive. It's almost a fossil in terms of Google-years. The service lets you collaborate with teammates, set up meetings, and manage group discussions. You can also read decades-old posts on most devices, including your affordable Chromebook. We explain what Google Groups is and delve into its features.
How to set up a group in Google Groups
Read archived messages in Google Groups and take a trip down memory lane
Google is famous for axing many products, but Google Groups is still functioning over two decades later. The service lets you manage group discussions, collaborate with teammates, organize meetings, and email large groups of people. But it hasn't been as active since it suspended support for Usenet. However, you can find and read archived posts on your Android phone, desktop PC, or laptop. This tutorial teaches you how to set up Google Groups.
Google Groups lets you email a large group of people at once. You can also organize meetings, start group discussions, and collaborate with team members. Some might call Groups a social networking fossil, more so since it dropped Usenet support. Still, you can access archived groups and peruse old posts on your Android phone, laptop, or budget Chromebook. This tutorial teaches you how to post on Google Groups.
Telegram Beta gets widgets and QR codes for joining groups
Joining groups is about to get easier than ever
Telegram only recently gained huge momentum thanks to people switching from WhatsApp due to the upcoming new terms of service, but the company isn't resting on its laurels. TestingCatalog took an extensive look at the latest Telegram Beta, version 7.5, and found quite a few forthcoming changes: The update introduces widgets, QR codes for joining groups, and options for reporting content.
Signal groups are getting a lot better with @ mentions and admin controls
The rollout process is a bit finicky, though
WhatsApp enjoys mass appeal in the messaging space, while Signal continues to be a popular choice only among privacy enthusiasts, at least in my corner of the world. That perception about Signal is rapidly changing, thanks in large part to the constant inflow of new features that bring it closer to its peers. The latest feature update focuses on Signal groups, bringing some admin controls and an option for direct mentions.
Google Groups on mobile gets its long-overdue Material Design refresh
It doesn’t look like it’s straight out of 2005 anymore
For almost as long as we can remember, Google Groups has paid almost zero attention to its interface. Things turned around for the desktop version of the service back in March when it got its first design refresh in years, but the mobile site was still left stuck with an even older and more dated UI. That’s going to change pretty soon, as the company has announced a Material Design treatment for Google Groups in mobile browsers, bringing it on par with many of its mainstream web apps.
Group calling and a low light mode in Google Duo have been rumored for some time, but we now have our first glimpse of the features in action. Cody found evidence for groups in a teardown back in March, with hints of low light mode appearing in November. Thanks to an anonymous source, we have screens of both.
Smart home gadgets exist to make your life easier, but there's one way they almost universally make it harder: setup. It's easy to say "turn on the kitchen lights," but more complicated to get everything on the right Wi-Fi connection and grouped for that convenience. That is, unless you use Alexa. Turns out, you can add devices to groups with just your voice.Of note, the current help page for creating device groups actually makes no mention of this functionality. So far as we can tell, it was silently revealed via the latest Echo newsletter:
Ever wanted to watch Facebook videos in sync with friends over the internet? Well, apparently somebody has. To that end, Facebook is opening a feature called Watch Party to all Facebook Groups. Watch Party lets users of the social media platform synchronize their viewing of video content with others and chat about it in real time.
At the start of this month, WhatsApp added some new features to group conversations in the beta version of the Android app. Those features and more are now rolling out to everyone in the stable channel, and they include expanded admin controls, group catch-up, and participant search.
I've come to expect great things from every new Telegram update. Each one seems to enhance the quality-of-life for the users, and the latest brings some of those. Version 4.3 adds a much better group mentions and reply system, an overhauled UI for inviting contacts to join Telegram, and other minor improvements.
In its quest to bring all of the things into the core application, Facebook has decided to sunset the Groups app on September 1. If you're not deep in the FB world, then you might be forgiven for forgetting that this even existed — I sure did.
Fans of Microsoft's Outlook will be pleased to hear that last year's most useful new feature is now coming to the Android app. Outlook Groups has had its own distinct app for a while, but after introducing the smart collaboration tool to the desktop email client it was just a matter of time before it was included in the Android Outlook app proper. That time is now.
So your church group decides to pay for a new well somewhere that needs it. You'll have to collect $20 from each person, then bundle it all up and make sure no one's welching. That's a considerable amount of work for a big group, not to mention a lot of awkward conversations - you can only hear "I left my wallet at home" so many times before you snap, earning a scornful look from the deacon and a thrashing from your grandma after Sunday pot roast.
Facebook knows the future is in mobile. It just isn't entirely sure what to do about it. The company has experimented with creating its own home launcher and marketing a dedicated Facebook phone, but neither found all that much success. It created a news app called Paper, which has yet to make it to Android. Then it followed up with a Snapchat clone (we got that one). Now the social giant is releasing an app that goes back to its roots. It's called Facebook Groups.
One of the biggest problems with Google+ has been its inability to create a group wherein all peers are equal. You can create a hashtag that everyone can post to but you can't control the membership of, or a Page that a few moderators can share to, but it's difficult to add users to (for non-public posts, Pages can only add users to circles once they add the Page first). Communities finally fixes this problem by creating public or private groups that anyone within can share to.
Today at the Facebook Mobile event, Mark Zuckerberg announced the newest version of the Facebook Android app with support for Places and Groups. We didn't have to wait long, as the update hit the Market mere minutes after the announcement (don't you just love how instantly apps go live in the Android Market, as opposed to some other markets we won't be naming here?).