You may recall that exactly one week ago, your old buddy Doug got all bonered up about NFL Network and Comcast finally reaching an amicable agreement. In particular, it was starting to sound like Comcast subscribers would not only get NFL network at no extra charge, but that we’d also get the very-excellent Red Zone Channel for free as well. I mentioned that it “seems way too good to be true” and, as it turns out, it looks like it is indeed too good to be true. → Read More
During Take-Two’s quarterly call today, CEO Ben Feder announced that BioShock 2 will ship on November 3 for the US and on October 30 in Europe. Yay! Press Release → Read More
So, the dust has settled and we can congratulate start-up photo notecard printing company Touchnote on getting their mobile app out the door in a mere 5 weeks, i.e. just in time to have it included in the Ovi launch FAIL. Thanks to the massive teething problems the Ovi store’s experienced today, you can’t yet find Touchnote for Mobile if you search for it, but we’re told this link will take you there directly, eventually. There are four apps available; the free central app, compatible with all Series 60 3rd Edition Feature Pack 1 and 2 phones, which comes with one free card credit so that users can trial the service. They can then buy extra card credits from the store, like prepaid mobile top-ups. Using the app, people can take a photo or select an existing image from their phone, add a message and the recipient’s address and send it directly from their mobile handset via WiFi or the phone’s mobile data connection. A physical greeting card is then created from the image and sent in the post. Within the UK, these photo cards are normally delivered on the next working day, provided the card is ordered before noon. It’s worth noting that Touchnote for Mobile is the only Ovi Store app that delivers users a tangible product. The launch is a terrific first step into mobile services for the privately-backed startup that will no doubt help expand its user base beyond the “tens of thousands” of visitors they started seeing after they launched a third-party API in March. Razia Ahamed, Touchnote’s business development and marketing manager, says that step increased web traffic tenfold and led to the present situation which sees 40% of Touchnotes orders come from outside the UK — double what it was two months ago. It also embraces that demographic of users who may feel very comfortable snapping shots on their mobile, but hasn’t yet started using Facebook, Picasa or any other web-based photo sharing service. CrunchBase Information Touchnote Information provided by CrunchBase → Read More
Well, it’s a certainly better than getting pubes in your keyboard, and about as bad as getting a 10-year-old hard drive “new,” but I think getting a crudely-drawn penis in your factory-sealed external drive has a special sort of horror to it.
If they can slip a wanger in there, they can do anything. → Read More
Last week AMD invited CrunchGear down to Austin to check out an overclocking event they were holding, at which many, many liters of liquid nitrogen and the much colder liquid helium would be consumed by thirsty processors.
They asked us, however, not to video the entire event, since they’d have their official video coming out shortly and some of the technology being used was still in development. No problem, we said, we’ll just dip our pulled-pork tacos in the spare liquid nitrogen. → Read More
New search engine Topsy, which has been in stealth development for three years, launches, well, now.
Before Google, search engines like AltaVista determined relevance based on how well a web page matched the query. Then came Google, which views the web as a network of documents. Today, all search engines analyze linking behavior around the web. When a web page is linked to a lot, it’s given more influence than other pages competing for attention around the same topics/keywords. Jeff Jarvis summed it all up nicely in 2005 “In this new world, links are currency. Links grant authority. Links build branding. Links equal value.” There’s lots more to it, but the notion that links create value is what drives Internet search.
Well, it’s no longer 2005. Back then blogs were giving Google fits because of how fast and irregularly they updated. Google had to make decisions on how often to index pages. Indexing is expensive, so there’s a tradeoff. Ping servers and blog search engines rose briefly to fill the niche, but Google indexes most popular blogs so often that those blog search engines are no longer much better.
Now, though, we have so much real time content being created that Google and the other engines can’t keep up. Most of this content is on Twitter, but FriendFeed, Facebook, Digg and lots of other services are adding to it, too. The result – more and more people are doing searches on Twitter Search in addition to Google. For me, someone who’s obsessed with news and stuff that’s happening right now, Twitter search is about 25% of my total Internet searches. The ratio keeps going up over time.
That’s where Topsy comes in. It’s not strictly speaking a real time search engine like Scoopler, which we wrote about earlier this month. Topsy is just a search engine. That has a fundamentally new way of finding good results: Twitter users. → Read More
Everyone wants more Twitter followers. It’s kind of the name of the game. But if you see some tweets in your stream that proclaim: “OMG I just got over 1000 followers today from http://twittercut.com” — don’t be fooled, it’s a scam. The link takes you to a site that requests your Twitter login and pass. It then sends out this tweet to all your followers — a typical worm.
The reason to watch out for this is not only for the tweets of your friends and the retweets, but the links seem to have originated from the account twittercut — which was suspended. But then the links started up again from the account tweetcut (which has also been suspended). In other words, it looks like the perpetrators are just jumping from account to account to keep this thing going.
As a Twitter Search shows, the worm is spreading quickly. Do no put in your Twitter credentials to it. → Read More
I’m a big fan of coming up with ridiculous “App For That” headlines. You know, the kind that mock Apple’s iPhone App Store commercials that basically proclaim there’s an app for everything you could ever possibly want to do. So it brings me great pleasure today to report that the next time I need one of those headlines: There’s an app for that.
App For That, is a website that gives you a series of user submitted “App For That” jokes, which you can vote on, tweet out, email, etc. The service looks like the iPhone’s text app, with submissions written in chat bubbles. Below that is a submission form for your own jokes. → Read More
Yay for Seiko Epson! The corporation just announced a breakthrough in the layering of organic material that should allow for larger OLED screens eventually. The current method, called Vacuum Thermal Evaporation (VTE), has problems producing uniform layers for large screens. This new method however overcomes the problems by using inkjet techniques, which should allow for larger screens. → Read More
Where’s my saltshaker?
Photo Rumors has been tipped off by a reliable source that Samsung plans to announce a new DSLR next month, the GX-30. Keeping in mind the relationship that Samsung has with Pentax, I’d assume it’s just a clone of the newly announced K-7 since the GX-20 was clone of the K20D with a few cosmetic differences. → Read More
A few weeks ago, we wrote about the impending launch of Contenture, a monetization network for sites built around micropayments. The idea is that while traditional online advertising models work for some sites, others are better suited for custom-tailored approaches — and that’s what Contenture can offer. Today, it has launched its service is giving TechCrunch readers a special deal.
If a website owner signs up with the promotional code “techcrunch,” they will receive double affiliate commissions for a full year. A pretty good deal considering that because the way the network works, it’s in your interest to have more site owners sign up. That’s because the larger the network is, the more likely it will be that users sign up for Contenture accounts. And the more that do, the more you’re likely to get paid. → Read More
So long as there is blood coursing through my dumb veins I will never shop at Best Buy again. Why? Because I feel the store’s anti-shoplifting measures went above and beyond what’s necessary at the weekend. Let me explain. → Read More
Former AOL Digital Chief and founder of startup incubator Launchbox Digital John McKinley’s mother fell ill recently and McKinley turned to the web to find answers on how and where to seek care for his elderly parent. McKinley found a distressing lack of resources that helped adults find the right care providers for elderly parents. He found that many of the existing services were targeted towards the care providers instead of the consumer, with services often focused completely on making sales commissions off of connecting seniors with care facilities. And McKinley found that none of the existing services offered a user-friendly web interface to find customized care. McKinley vowed to create a portal aimed towards the consumer and today, is officially launching OurParents, a free elder care matching service, focused on assisting adult children with aging parents find the right care solution that meets the parents’ and family’s health care needs.
OurParents’s transparency is derived from the site not making money from any matches that take place via the site. OurParents aims to provide an unbiased service that helps families sort through the decision of whether in-home care, a senior community, assisted living facility, nursing home care, or hospice care is best for their elderly parents. And the site does a lot of the fact-finding work for you. → Read More
Well, it’s not the news we were expecting but it looks like Best Buy will be getting a new PS3 bundle a week after E3. Already in the BB database is a limited edition 80GB PlayStation 3 bundle that includes two yet to be announced games. → Read More
The E3 Expo is just around the corner and late last week Capcom dropped by NYC to showcase a handful of games ahead of the games expo. On hand were the following titles: Spyborgs, Dark Void, Marvel vs Capcom 2 and Monster Hunter Freedom Unite. I wasn’t overly enthused to preview any of the games except for Marvel vs Capcom, but I rarely walk away from demos disappointed and this time was no different. → Read More
Gyminee, a fitness-oriented social network that was part of the TechStars class of 2008, has closed a $525,000 seed funding round led by FF Angel LLC, with a number of angels including Garrett Camp (StumbleUpon) and Tim Ferriss also participating. Alongside the funding news, Gyminee is also announcing a total rebranding – the company will henceforth be called DailyBurn (which is significantly easier to spell), and the site has seen a complete redesign.
Gyminee first launched in late 2007, coming out of beta in January 2008 (the company had launched before it joined the TechStars program). Since then it has grown to 125,000 members, and while the site has to deal with some users dropping off as they get lazy and stop exercising, it reports that active users have managed to shed an average of 6.2 pounds of fat, or gain 5.75 pounds of muscle, depending on their goal. → Read More
