Just recently, I decided to hop on the minimal shoe bandwagon and picked up a pair of FiveFingers by Vibram. It’s easy to see why these things are getting popular. Racing to keep up with consumer demands, many running shoe companies have decided to follow with the minimalist shoe design. → Read More
The Canon 60D is one of those ongoing gadget bugaboos that we have seen around for months, yet have no direct confirmation. This listing, found on image testers DxO Labs’ site, seems to indicate a 60D coming out soon. Previous rumors put it out in late August or early September, so this seems to coincide nicely with that. [via Canon Rumors] → Read More
Ah, Brookstone. Whenever I’m at the mall, I make a point of stopping by you and seeing all the things I will never buy. Weather-proof foot massager? Check. Combination laser pointer/tire gauge? Check. And now — iPhone-controlled quadcopter? Double check. → Read More
First thing I thought of when I saw these new watches from Breitling was “wow, these are pretty big.” They even wear larger than their ‘mere’ 45mm wide steel case would suggest. Probably because the case is on the flatter, broader side of things. This is Breitling’s newest watch to bear the ETA SuperQuartz COSC Chronometer certified movement – in the wonderful lineage of the Breitling Aerospace. The Chronospace is larger, has more going on, and is arguably easier to use than the watch it is distantly based on. The movement is the Breitling Calibre 78 (base ETA), and has lots of cool functions. These include time, 1/100 of second chronograph (with actually pushers as opposed to having to dig in the menu with the scrolling crown pusher), alarm, calendar, countdown timer, GMT time, and second timezone display. All in a really nice quality, dial LCD screen display in addition to the time and chronograph hand on the main time. Having that chronograph hand there makes it possible to use some of the more traditional chronograph functions, and I believe perhaps some of the slide-rule functions. → Read More
With the debut of Groupon personalization, I have little doubt that the daily deal site will double the number of deals (and double its revenue run rate) in just a few months.
According to CEO Andrew Mason, the service is churning out 75,000 transactions per day. Through personalization, Groupon will be able to offer 20, 30 or more deals per city per day. Assuming the current growth rate in subscribers — in the last four months the site has more than doubled to 12 million registered users— 2x is likely a prudish estimate.
It’s hard to fault a company that is making money hand over fist; however, as a user, I do have one piece of advice: loosen that death grip on the daily deal mantra. → Read More
Despite their clear commitment to the hardware version of the Kindle, Amazon continues to make the Kindle apps that run on the iPad and iPhone better. Today, version 2.2 of the app brings a full dictionary with it. This matches the functionality of Apple’s own iBooks app, but the Kindle implementation is even a little better.
Now in the Kindle app when you highlight a word, a definition will automatically appears at the bottom of the screen. And that’s not all — there you’ll also find links to further investigate the word on Google or Wikipedia. Though this dumps you out of the app and into the iPhone/iPad web browser, it’s a pretty nice feature. → Read More
Just a couple hours ago, news broke of the $99 Copia Wave5 e-reader, or tablet, or whatever you want to call a 5″ LCD-based device focused on reading. That isn’t the extent of the lineup, however: Copia has two more LCD-based tablets coming out soon, as well as two E-ink-based readers with Kindle-esque designs. → Read More
Delicious Froyo will be hitting the huge and controversial EVO 4G starting in early August, according to Sprint. The update will begin its OTA rollout on August 3rd and they expect it to be done by “mid-August.” Once it goes public, I’m sure there will be a way to force it onto your handset if you don’t feel like waiting. We’ll detail that once it happens. The improvements we’ve been talking about for weeks and weeks are forthcoming! But will it make the EVO last a full day on one charge? Only time will tell. Meanwhile, here’s the full press release, minus a bunch of EVO review excerpts they included. → Read More
We’ve just received word from Google confirming that they are not currently blocked in China and that a server issue was most likely the cause of their dashboard misread. One month ago, Google put up their watered-down engine to avoid being shut down completely in China. Because the Chinese government did not like the auto redirect to Google Hong Kong which was previously in place, the new degraded version at the center of all today’s confusion simply links to Google Hong Kong. → Read More
At Google I/O in May, the search giant indicated that they were about to take their commitment to location to the next level. Sure, Latitude had been around for a while, but everyone knew that Google could do more in the space. The announcement of some new location APIs seemed to a big part of the solution. And now comes the fun part.
Today on their Geo blog, Google is announcing that they’re beginning to open the Places API for business. The first developers getting access? Those working on check-in services. → Read More
Panasonic announced today that it will buy out two of its subsidiaries, Sanyo and Panasonic Electric Works, for $9.4 billion.
Sanyo is the largest lithium-ion rechargeable battery producer and 11th-largest solar cell producer in the world with a quickly-growing solar panel manufacturing arm according to company statements. → Read More
How long did Blizzard spend developing StarCraft II? Since 2003, give or take some time here and there when the company needed all hands on deck for World of Warcraft. So you’d think that would be enough time to figure out how to implement anti-aliasing into the graphics engine, right? You see where I’m going with this. → Read More
According to the Mainland China service availability page it looks like Google Web Search, Google Images and Google News are down in China, again. In fact if you parse the chart it looks like just about the only thing still up is Gmail.
However reports on Twitter say other wise, as many users claim that the service is working fine. We also tested Google.com on Webpulse and received a big thumbs up in terms of availability. → Read More
With the announcement of the $99 Ocean Reader Copia Tablet we are entering familiar territory. As you probably remember, netbooks went through the same race to the bottom as ebooks and this Ocean Reader is the first of the lot to hit our shores with any fanfare.
While I’m sure a mention in the WSJ is fairly important, the Copia and the Alex and the Farfenugen or whatever is next to ride down the ereader/tablet pike will enter a strange market. There are currently two – if not three – popular platforms. I’d say the Kindle is far and away the most robust followed by the Sony ereaders beloved by PDF downloaders and trailed by the Nook whose viability I’m bearish on. While a multi-purpose device like the Streak can exist in this ecosystem, any ereader that advertises itself as primarily an ereader will be sunk. → Read More
When asked about Google’s partnership with Zynga, Mr. Schmidt said “we haven’t announced it” but “you can expect a partnership with Zynga” in the future. Google’s partnership with Zynga was reported earlier by the blog TechCrunch.
That sure sounds like an announcement to me, buried 13 paragraphs deep in an article summarizing an interview with Google CEO Eric Schmidt with the Wall Street Journal. Or an announcement of an announcement. Or perhaps an announcement of an expectation of an announcement. → Read More
Last night, Amazon unveiled the latest edition of the Kindle, which sports a better screen, slimmer profile, and — most important — a relatively affordable $139 pricetag for a Wifi only version (the 3G version still goes for $189). To mark the occasion, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos made an appearance on the Charlie Rose show, where he discussed the future of the E-book, and why there’s plenty of room for the Kindle in a world where tablet PCs like the iPad are on the rise. You can watch the full episode right here, and the show has graciously provided us with the clips and transcripts below.
The overarching theme of the conversation is that Bezos wants the Kindle to remain a device that’s dedicated to reading, especially long-form reading. Bezos explains that with the Kindle, Amazon isn’t looking to “create an experience” — they want the author to create the experience. This, he believes, makes the Kindle a differentiated device from the iPad and slew of tablets that will be hitting the market by the end of the year. Because unlike other devices, he says, the Kindle’s lack of glare and other design choices help it disappear from the reader’s mind as they get wrapped up in a new book: → Read More
Former Yelp VP of Finance/Administration Vlado Herman takes a step up the ladder and becomes, as of today, Yelp’s Chief Financial Officer. The Yelp Blog introduces his promotion with an adorable poem: → Read More
The prices, they are dropping, dropping. Yesterday had Amazon lowering the bar yet again with the announcement of a new, improved, and cheaper Kindle. Today we have news of a 5″ tablet (the same size as the Dell Streak) selling for a paltry $99. It’s called the Ocean Reader, from a company called Copia, and although they’re marketing it as an e-reader, its 5″ LCD screen suggests it’s more of a tablet.
Incidentally, there was actually news of a device like this at CES, but this is totally different from the hardware they showed then. They must have decided E-ink was for the birds. → Read More
As you’re undoubtedly aware, location is one of the hottest fields out there right now. Startups, services, devices, and advertisers are all hovering around it. As you’re also likely well aware, Apple likes to be in control of their own devices. So it should come as no surprise to hear that Apple is moving to be in complete control of their own location database.
Back in June, Apple changed its privacy policy to reflect some of the newer things they were doing with regard to location. This worried some people — including two U.S. Congressmen who sent a letter to Apple asking about the change. A couple weeks ago, Apple responded to that inquiry with a letter from Apple’s general counsel, Bruce Sewell. The overall main points of that letter have already been covered quite a bit (basically, none of the data Apple collects is linked to a specific user or device and no data is shared without consent). But buried on page 5 of the 13-page letter is a bit of information that’s rather interesting. → Read More
