Picasa, the Google-owned photo-sharing service, has gone live with version 2.0 of its software. The service"s new edition includes some basic photo-editing tools, including the ability to brighten dark images; CD burning; integration with Blogger; a collage-generating tool; and the ability to send pictures easily through Gmail.
Google bought Picasa last summer and has many rivals in the online photography market. Yahoo! and Microsoft offer rival software, while there are also many online photo services. Users of the new version will be able to export their pictures from the software to many of these online services for printing.
Picture collections can also be password-protected and easily grouped together within the software so users can keep track of their images more easily. You can also make your pictures into a movie file or a screensaver.