For years, YouTube has allowed its users to upload however many videos they wanted, but with a catch: unless you were part of one of YouTube’s special partner programs, no video could be more than 10 minutes in length. Today, YouTube is changing that: it’s boosting the maximum upload length to fifteen minutes, giving the site’s millions of amateur directors a bit more leg room.
YouTube imposed the 10 minute restriction to help cut back on piracy (of course, it’s always been possible to simply string together multiple 10 minute clips to create a longer video, but that’s harder to distribute and has a worse viewing experience). Obviously the fifteen minute limit is still going to be irritating in some case, but it’s good to know that YouTube is actively working to extend it. In its blog post, YouTube explains why it can finally make the change: → Read More
Elon Musk certainly hasn’t been on the down-low lately. Well, with the Tesla’s IPO and then Toyota huge investment and manufacturing deals. Then there’s the lawsuits and his devoice. So yeah, it’s no wonder that Jon Favreau modeled his Tony Stark character after Elon — or so says Wikipedia.
But last night he had a friendly fireside chat with Stephen Colbert, where it was really nothing more than reading of the man’s resume and talking about his ventures. Of course Colbert talked circles around the PayPal co-founder as he tends to do. It’s not like The Colbert Report is known as a hard-hitting news program anyway. That’s more the style of The Daily Show. Click through for the video. → Read More
Google’s mobile ads are becoming more location-aware. Today, Google is introducing mobile display ads for both the iPhone and Android phones which can be geo-targeted. Advertisers will be able to check a “location extension for display” box and their ads will become geo-enabled when viewed in mobile browsers or apps. A little double-arrow will open up the ad and show the business pinned on map with two big blue buttons to get directions or call the business. Google will only charge for calls or clicks.
Google already offers so-called “location extension” ads for mobile search, but this is the first time it is expanding the concept to mobile display ads. Google says that mobile ads that offer a location generally see an average 8 percent increase in click-through rates over plain-vanilla mobile ads, and click-to-call mobile ads see a 6 percent increase in clicks. → Read More
This artful re-editing of the current available Kinect video shows us how amazing it would be if you could play Dhalsim by stretching out your neck to grotesque lengths at your next beer blast. → Read More
TechCrunch reader Saul Lustgarten checks in to tell us he logged on to Facebook this morning and noticed that the list of his friends who are having their birthday today was preceded by a crude message, reading “fuck you bitches”.
Yeah right, we thought. I checked it out on my Facebook profile and didn’t notice anything off.
Then, I followed Saul’s suggestion of switching my main language to Spanish instead of English, and lo and behold (click for full-size image): → Read More
How’s this for absolutely dominating an increasingly lucrative and fast-growing segment?
Google currently boasts a mobile search market share of 98.29%, with it closest competitor Yahoo taking up just over 0.8% of market share and Microsoft’s Bing barely touching even half that, according to recent data from StatCounter as relayed by Pingdom. → Read More
Motorola has just announced its financial results for Q2 2010, reporting total sales of $5.4 billion, which is slightly below what it recorded in the same period last year. Earnings came in at $162 million or $0.07 per share, compared to GAAP earnings of $26 million or $0.01 per share in Q2 2009.
Zooming in on its Mobile Devices unit, Motorola reported sales of $1.7 billion, down 6 percent compared with the year-ago quarter.
The company shipped a total of 8.3 million handsets last quarter, 2.7 million if which were smartphones – its line-up consists of 12 such devices, including the Droid and Droid X. → Read More
The 3DS might have been the star of the E3 2010 and for good reason, too. It’s the long-awaited refresh that brings honest-to-goodness glasses-free 3D gaming to the DS platform. It’s pretty amazing actually. I got a chance to play most of the games at E3 and walked away impressed even though my eyes couldn’t make out the 3D in some of the titles.
Nintendo revealed the upcoming gaming console at the massive gaming trade show but failed to announce the price or release date. The speculation will end on September 29, though, when Nintendo finally comes clean with at least the release date. → Read More
App store analytics provider Distimo in its latest report once again focuses on in-app purchases across a variety of mobile application stores, Apple’s App Store in particular.
According to Distimo, the percentage of applications with in-app purchases is significantly higher in the App Store for iPad (10%) compared to that for the iPhone (2%). → Read More
App store analytics provider Distimo in its latest report once again focuses on in-app purchases across a variety of mobile application stores, Apple’s App Store in particular.
According to Distimo, the percentage of applications with in-app purchases is significantly higher in the App Store for iPad (10%) compared to that for the iPhone (2%). → Read More
We gave you a first picture back in April, and now we can show you the full Comic Con trailer for the new Thor movie, which just leaked online. It’s in good quality, but be warned. It’s awesome, but very long (about 5 minutes) and contains a lot of footage/possible spoilers. → Read More
Some sassenbergers at Driphter.com posted some images and video of the upcoming 9780 running RIM OS6 on GSM networks. They’re reporting that the new OS is quite smooth with an updated browser and better UI and it’s quite exciting for all those involved. → Read More
According to GetJar, its eponymous mobile app store is now seeing three million downloads per day. GetJar reiterated that its stats put it second only to Apple iTunes, with over 1 billion total downloads to date.
At current (self-reported) growth rate, the company should hit 2 billion downloads in about a year, if calculated on the back of a virtual envelope. → Read More
As if the eight 3D LCD TVs Toshiba yesterday announced for the Japanese market weren’t enough (three CELL Regza and five conventional REGZA models), the company also showed [JP] a 3D powered and Blu-ray recorder and another three that can be upgraded to 3D via a “3D upgrade kit”. All devices have an additional HDD on board. → Read More
Lovefilm, the Netflix-of-Europe, looks set to beef up its multi-platform play via a newly signed agreement with DRM and adaptive streaming technology provider Widevine.
The deal will see the US-based company become Lovefilm’s “preferred provider of digital rights management and video optimisation solutions”, enabling the video subscription service to continue to break out from its ‘DVDs by post’ legacy into the video-on-demand market, ensuring that its digital content is “playable on many new devices.” → Read More
Motorola has just announced its financial results for Q2 2010, reporting total sales of $5.4 billion, which is slightly below what it recorded in the same period last year. Earnings came in at $162 million or $0.07 per share, compared to GAAP earnings of $26 million or $0.01 per share in Q2 2009.
Zooming in on its Mobile Devices unit, Motorola reported sales of $1.7 billion, down 6 percent compared with the year-ago quarter.
The company shipped a total of 8.3 million handsets last quarter, 2.7 million if which were smartphones – its line-up consists of 12 such devices, including the Droid and Droid X. → Read More
Double rainbow awesome. There’s no other modern way to describe this.
I won’t spoil it too much, but whatever you do today, visit this website and select some of your closest friends from your Facebook graph when prompted. You won’t be disappointed. → Read More
Amazon Reveals New Kindle: $139 For Wi-Fi Version, $189 For 3G R/C Millennium Falcon Lets You Play Out Your Han Solo Fantasies Tandem USB Connector: Good Idea, Bad Idea Will the asteroid known as 1999 RQ36 destroy all life on the planet, thereby preventing you from dinging 80? Jetpens: Japanese pens for fun and profit → Read More
Music is like little parts of music put together, right? Now you can sell these little parts – Scratchpacks – on ItchyClips, a brand new site dedicated to sell music to musicians. I bet there are other services like this out there. This one however looks quite capable because you can sell your Ableton Live packs. Maybe one day there will be a website to sell snippets for bloggers. You know, little building blocks of posts. → Read More
