Rareshare, a community site for people with rare medical conditions, has shared some of it most recent growth data with us and the results are impressive. Since launching over the summer, the site has grown each month by between 35%-50%, and now has over 700 communities associated with different disorders. Given the nature of the site, the numbers are bittersweet, but it’s nice to know that so many people are finding others they can connect with.
Vistitors to the site are invited to contribute information and their personal experiences regarding each condition, and are also able to make contact with other users that are facing the same issues. Most communities offer a description of the condition, along with links to relevant websites that contain more specific information, and there’s a forum where the users can collectively give each other advice. → Read More
If you like buying stuff from Best Buy but you can’t stand actually entering the stores, you might soon be able to just sit in your car and wait for them to bring your in-store pickup purchases out to you as though it were a lukewarm bag of Chili’s Chicken Crispers. → Read More
Is this a gadget? Heck no! Do we insensitive nerds need help with gift guide ideas for the lady folk? Yes!
This is probably something you should have done in advance, but if you’re like me then a gift certificate is good enough! SmileBooks offers a variety of different sized photo albums to meet your needs/budgets. Download the SB software, upload some images, pick some patterns and you’ve got yourself a fancy photo album. It’s pretty high quality, actually. Kind of like your HS yearbook with a hardback cover and thick, glossy paper. → Read More
It may be fan made, but it’s pretty darn neat to watch. → Read More
Florida-based FriendFinder Networks (formerly Penthouse Media Group), a group of sites that includes Penthouse and Adult FriendFinder, has filed a registration statement with the SEC to go public.
Little known Russian investment bank Renaissance Capital is representing them in the deal. The company hopes to raise $460 million in the IPO.
The registration statement is still preliminary, but it gives deep insights on the financial condition of the company. Revenues for the first three quarters of 2008 were $244 million. The company claims 946,598 subscribers to its adult services.
The primary use of the proceeds from the IPO, the company says, is to pay off the nearly half billion dollars in debt on its books.
Penthouse acquired Adult FriendFinder in December 2007 for approximately $400 million. → Read More
Details of a portable solar-powered AA and AAA battery charger by Energizer were leaked last week and we’ll see the charger debut next month at CES. → Read More
The Blackbird 002 that launched last year may be impressive, but the design is nothing special and the price range isn’t very attractive at $1,799-$4,999. Now, HP with VoodooDNA has given us something to look at. → Read More
Pocket Life, a geo-aware social network backed by mobile network giant Vodafone, has launched to the public. The service allows users to update their friends on their current locations automatically, and also allows them to syndicate status updates and their recent activities to popular social networks like Facebook and MySpace. You can also use GPS to create a route (say, for mountain biking or hiking) and share that with friends over the network.
At launch Pocket Life is compatible with over 30 phones, including a number of Blackberries, Nokias, and Samsungs, with the iPhone listed as “Coming Soon” (you can see the full compatibility list here). If you have a compatible phone, you can download the software by visiting http://mob.pocketlife.com from your phone’s browser. You can also use the site from your computer at PocketLife.com, though this doesn’t feature automatic location updates. To get a feel for more of the site’s features, check out the walkthrough video. → Read More
Flippin’ through this week’s Best Buy ad, CG reader Carlos spotted something amiss. “Surf and e-mail with the simplicity of Windows XP”, said the header above the netbook section. That’s a great line; it’s simple and to the point. Thing is, the display of every netbook below the header is showing not XP, but Vista. → Read More
As we “work” our way through the holiday (or winter break as the school system calls it) we are once again reminded of Mike Arrington’s skill at dominating the trainwreck formerly known as The Conversation. I’ve watched Mike at close range for some number of years now, and it never ceases to amaze me how he does this. For example, several weeks ago we did a Gillmor Gang episode live onstage at LeWeb. For two days I noticed Mike trying to come up with an angle to run with – Loic LeMeur’s jacket fabric just one of several weak entrants – but nothing to write home or about. Yet within seconds of Loic making a comment about bloggers and what I’d like to call social mediots not having a life, Arrington suddenly lurched upright like a dog at the beginning of a hunt, then sat back in an insolent slouch. You know the rest, if you were online anytime in the next several days. My guess is that as soon as Mike understands the opportunity, all other sensory input continues to be recorded and stored while he plays out the scenario he’s identified. Analyzing his posts would reveal much of the same dynamic, but Arrington has a few tricks up his sleeve that separate him from others. A few notes on the Arrington methodology follow: 1. Think of it first. Seems obvious, but so hard to clone. Mike is what’s known as a natural athlete, for whom the mechanics of hitting the baseball are perhaps learned the first time contact is made with the ball. The feel of a clean hit cannot be replicated but only repeated. With a new idea. 2. Know you’re right. This is why people call Mike arrogant. Have you ever noticed how arrogant Ringo Starr is. No matter how pleasant or hip or whatever the interviewer is, Ringo always has that “I’m Chevy Chase and you’re not” vibe going, except Chevy stole that from Ringo. Arrogance when right is something else. And even when he’s wrong, Mike is still sure he’s right. 3. Be funny. Another big differentiator. (Ed note: Apple’s spell check redlines differentiator but offers differentiators as a replacement) Arrington has a sense of humor, which rules out most of his competition. The combination of being right and funny is devastating in almost every context, once you get out of high school where → Read More
Just in is a statement from Facebook that they will ban the fast growing (but non-label-sanctioned) music service Project Playlist. Last Friday MySpace banned Project Playlist and removed all traces of the service from its site.
But Facebook remained silent even as music label insiders called them “irresponsible” and suggested litigation against them was on the way.
This is a big blow for Playlist, which just yesterday announced that they had their first label deal, with Sony BMG. The other three big music labels, however, remain hostile to the service.
The entire application has been removed (it used to be here), and the embedded playlists have been removed from user’s profiles. An image of what the application used to look like is below. Over 660,000 Facebook users are affected.
Facebook’s statement: → Read More
Blizzard’s World of Warcraft now has 11.5 million subscribers. Assuming each subscriber pays $15 per month, that’s approximately $172.5 million per month in raw revenue. That’s quite a bit of coin. → Read More
The Revolabs Solo USB microphone is a wireless mic/speaker for use in a meeting room setting. It can connect to a computer via USB, or to an A/V system with audio in/out. It consists of a charging base that connects directly to the audio source and a removable mic/speaker component. → Read More
Would you trust your postal mail with a company called Zumbox?
I ask, because startup Zumbox enters public beta today with a fairly interesting (but not entirely new) alternative to traditional snail mail. Here’s how it works: instead of sending bills, statements, advertisements, postcards and the likes to a street address, a business can now send those to a digitized street address, without the need for actual paper or stamps.
Let me try again: Zumbox basically created a digital mailbox for every street address in the US it could find (150 million), which can be used to receive mail that was sent to a physical location instead of an e-mail address. This approach is based on the fact that while not everyone has an e-mail address, everyone supposedly has a unique street address, and that businesses tend to have street addresses for their customers more often than they have e-mail addresses. → Read More
We already know that the Kindle, Amazon’s electronic book, is sold out for Christmas, but people are still looking for them. Searches on Google for the term “Kindle” picked up in October to nearly triple the level during the summer. It’s settled down a bit, but search volume is still at about double the previous rate.
Not finding any available Kindles, searches for “Sony Reader” are picking up as well, although the clear preference is still the elusive Kindle by nearly two to one. If you really want one, just do yourself a favor and wait for the next version to come out early next year. → Read More
Ah, the eternal struggle of figuring out where to put your gadgets while they charge. So far we’ve got: the floor, a table and/or desk, a chair, a window sill, a dresser, and your bed. Now add “Plug-in Shelf Portable Cell Phone Charging Station” to the list. → Read More
Following in the footsteps of services like Twitpic and Twitblogs, internet startup 2pad has launched 2tweet, a new service that allows you to Email any number of photos and videos to a designated Email address (twitter@2pad.com) to immediately generate a web gallery that is Tweeted to all of your followers. 2tweet will use the first 113 characters of the Email’s subject line to lead off the tweet, and will then append a link to your web gallery.
To begin using the service, you’ll need to confirm your account with 2tweet and enter your login credentials so that it can broadcast tweets on your behalf. After that, Emails sent the twitter@2pad.com will be automatically posted without any other actions needed. 2tweet is very similar to Posterous, a Y Combinator startup that just closed a $725,000 funding round.
2pad, the company that makes 2tweet, allows users to mine their Email boxes for pictures and videos and automatically generate web galleries with them (if you enter your login credentials, it can also monitor your incoming and outgoing messages for new media and automatically add it to the gallery). → Read More
Well look at that, the Vatican has blessed (lol get it?!) an iPhone application that contains the Breviary prayer book. The application, iBreviary [iTunes link], has the book in several languages, including Italian, English and Spanish (with others due soon), and will only set you back $0.99. → Read More
We’ve been around for a few years now and we know that a lot of you have been following us since the beginning so we wanted to reward those folks. Think of it as our version of Best Buy’s Reward Zone program. Otherwise known as the CrunchGear Loyalty Rewards Program. TeleNav has always been supportive of us and so we’ve teamed up to give away a years worth of free service for your Verizon Wireless BlackBerry Storm. So how do you win? → Read More
iGo, a leading developer of multi-device chargers for laptop computers and mobile electronic devices, plans to roll out some new items at their first-ever visit to CES, just a few weeks away.
The iGo Laptop Charger, with iGo Green™ Technology, lets you “[c]harge your laptop and other devices from any standard wall outlet, including automatic shut-off and recovery to reduce vampire power.” → Read More
New York City
San Francisco, CA
