Parrot, a company largely unheard of in Canada, is bringing Android-based car stereo systems to this country.

But these aren't just typical stereo systems in your Ford Focus, or the ones teens are sticking in souped-up Honda Civics - they're full-fledged in-car entertainment units that do everything from playing music to creeping friends on Facebook.

Yup. The latter feature, however, can only be done when the car is in park.

Google's app and media marketplace is celebrating its first birthday – and the tech giant is offering several deals to mark the occasion.

And, they've released some numbers that hint at how successful their Android mobile ecosystem has become.

Google Play is the company's equivalent to Apple's popular App Store – both offer apps (obviously), magazines, movies, books, TV shows, etc.

I'll get to the types of discounts in a moment, but first: just how popular is Android?

Very popular, the numbers suggest.

Samsung launched its latest weapon in the battle with Apple this week, announcing its own application to manage tickets and coupons on Android phones. 

While the app store is littered with dozens of great apps that do everything from shooting videos to shooting aliens, many are notorious for draining your phones battery life as fast as a dog drinks water on a hot summer's day.

But a major U.S. carrier is releasing a list of the apps -- apps it has evaluated-- based on how many bits of data they'll hog, how much battery juice they'll suck up and how big a security risk they create for users.

While Microsoft is pumping a lot of money into Windows 8 app development, not all titles are accessible to Canadians.

It's not like we're getting short-changed on purpose. 

It seems many app developers, when selecting the region for their apps, pick the United States instead of the rest of the world...or even North America.

This, unfortuantely, rules out many apps from the Store that we get access to in Canada. 

Apple tossed out a big number yesterday, boasting about how many apps it has sold. But is that number really significant? No, not really. There was another number that was even more meaningful - the number of apps downloaded just last year.

Are you sick of those smug guys with flashy BMWs, who park their cars diagonally across two spots? Or the fellow with the Land Rover who parks on the curb, because he can?

We’ve all seen awful parking jobs and stared helplessly at their disgraceful automotive habits. But some folks have decided to call out the bad parkers.

An online news group in Russia has created an app to call out the most hideous parkers around.

If new market research numbers are anything to go by, the PC as we know it might be going the way of the floppy disk.

The idea isn't entirely new, but a fresh report suggests Facebook is looking to develop its own line of smartphones.

According to several sources who spoke anonymously to the New York Times, the social networking giant is hoping to release a handset by next year. 

Facebook has been previously linked with HTC, a popular cellphone manufacturer, to create a "Facebook phone" codenamed Buffy. So far, nothing has come from that partnership. 

But this new report, however, claims that Facebook is hiring the best minds it can to build its own phone. This includes hardware and software engineers who had a hand in the iPhone, as well as one who was behind the iPad. 

While there are no formal job postings for these gigs (talent is being scouted rather than solicited), several signs point to a major push for a Facebook phone. They already have the ecosystem - the social platform itself, along with apps. 

It's possible that this is Facebook's mobile strategy, a seemingly disorganized plan I lamented about last week. Why else would Facebook buy Instagram for $1 billion?

Heck, Mark Zuckerberg and co. could probably buy a smartphone company with all the money they raised from going public. But if an app was worth $1 billion to them, any beleaguered company looking for a lifeline (ie. RIM) might expect a little more cash.

It's tough to see a Facebook phone making a dent on Apple and Android, but executed right, Facebook could succeed in mobile.

- Maurice Cacho, MSN Tech & Gadgets

Apple has introduced app charts for Canada this week, letting us Canucks know what’s hot and popular north of the 49^th parallel.

With their new stats, we can see a list of the most-downloaded free and paid apps for the iPhone and iPad in Canada.