Google Mapps 4.2 gives bike route directions and maps.

Bike enthusiasts got a treat this week from Google with the release of an app for biking route directions. Called Google Maps 4.2, the app, is available at the Google Android apps marketplace and is compatible only with phones running the Google Android operating system vesion 1.6 and higher.
The apps can work either in the direction mode with the touch of the bicycle icon on the screen, or as one of the layers of the Maps app.
In directions mode, the app will give you a route favoring roads that are considered good for cycling, roads with bike lanes and bike paths.
When open as a layer of the Google Maps, the app will highlight bike-only trails showing them in dark green, while showing roads with bike lanes in light green, and roads Google considers good for cycling get a green dotted line.
Google is said to get the information it displays in the app from different sources like bike organizations, bike maps, municipalities and riders who send in routes.
At this point, the data stored is said to cover nearly 200 cities all in the U.S.

For more, see CNET.com

Motorola Cliq smart phone will synch and stream various sources onto the screen.

Last month, Motorola introduced its first Google's Android phone, the Motorola Cliq scheduled to go on sale exclusively from T-Mobile beginning Nov 2 with pre-ordering for current T-Mobile customers starting from October 19 to November 1. The Motorola Cliq is priced at $199.99 for the pre orders and will likely remains at that price when it goes on sale to the general public, according to Barron.co.
With Google Android as the brain, the phone comes loaded with various offerings from Google like Google Maps with Street View, Google Voice Search, Picasa, Google photos sharing website, Gtalk etc.
But when it comes to e-mail services, the Motorola Cliq offers several options beside Google's Gmail, including Yahoo mail, Windows Live and others.
According to CNET.com, Motorola Cliq comes equiped with a full HTML Google browser, WI-FI capabilities and is Bluetooh and GPS ready. It also has a built-in music and video player, and a 5-megapixel camera with video recording capabilities.
But beside all its nice features, what Motorola is hoping will set the Cliq apart from the competition, is its featuristic interface called Motoblur which key element is it ability to synch information from different sources such as your work or personal e-mail accounts, Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and other social networks sites and automatically display any updates from those sources, on the screen.
In that new feature, Motorola tries to set the tone in what a smart phone should be: an Internet access and platform device. How true that assumption is going to ring, will depends on how widely and quickly the new phone is adopted before the next new thing comes out and takes all the novelty factor out of it.

For more, see CNET.com