This past June, we noted that Twitter had zoomed past 200 employees — basically doubling in just six months. The rapid hiring pace continues at the startup, though not quite as quickly. The company has just hired their 300th employee a tweet confirms today.
And with that growth comes the need to expand. As we noted back in September, Twitter confirmed that at some point relatively soon they’d likely have to look at new office options. That search is getting close to coming up with a new place, we’ve heard. And they’re very likely to stay in the SoMa district of San Francisco. For their part, Twitter will only say they have “no updates on this right now“. → Read More
Last week San Francisco car matching startup UberCab was served a cease and desist order by the city of San Francisco because it did not have taxi licenses or taxi insurance and goes beyond the normal duties of a limo service by picking people up right away.
As UberCab (which has now changed its name to Uber) served primarily Silicon Valley elite, there is much Internet debate over whether this is another case of “Innovation vs. Establishment” or a startup just straight up breaking the law. → Read More
Sennheiser has a few new gaming headsets that may interest you. Of course, they’re not up on their Web site yet, so give it a minute. You’ve got the PC 360 (“designed for pro gamers,” $299), the PC 163D (“a new dimension in 3D gaming at home,” $209), the PC 333D (“the new dimension in 3D tournament gaming,” $239), and the PC 330 G4ME (“a high-performance headset designed for your G4ME,” $169). I see 1337 speak is fashionable again. News to me. → Read More
If it were December, I’d call this a Christmas miracle. As it’s October, we’re just going to have to pretend that “Halloween Miracles” are a thing. IT’S A HALLOWEEN MIRACLE! A few hours ago, something awesome managed to find its way into the App Store. Something which I never imagined Apple would approve. No, not another baby shaking app. Something wonderful: a DOS emulator. → Read More
Blekko, the shiny new search engine that we first started covering way back in 2008 when they had a hand puppet as their mascot, is preparing to launch. Next Monday, November 1, they’ll turn the lights on and let anyone in.
If you’re really raring to get in at the first possible moment, the site will technically go live at 9 pm California time on Sunday evening.
We’ve been testing it since July, along with 8,000 other people in the private beta (our beta review is here). Unlike the massive failure that was known as Cuil, the Blekko team isn’t out hyping the site as a Google-killer. Rather, Blekko is being positioned as a place for people to create and share their own search engines based on trusted websites, and to get deep insights into SEO via a very transparent ranking system. → Read More
Ray Ozzie stepped down as Microsoft’s chief software architect last week. He’s written a memo on his site telling Microsoft, in so many words, to get with the program. If it doesn’t, well, then the next five or so years will be difficult ones for Redmond. → Read More
Mertado, a social shopping site that launched in April, wants to give social game developers a new way to make money: by incorporating a virtual storefront into their games. Today the startup is launching a new widget that developers on Facebook can integrate directly into their apps, and it’s also offering support for embedding the storefront on publisher sites across the web.
Mertado is a bit like a Groupon for retail goods — every day it presents you with a handful of items available at a discount price, with deals on things like digital picture frames, tote bags, and those As-Seen-On-TV gadgets that you’d never think of buying on your own but are actually pretty useful. The service has been available via a Facebook application and a Facebook Connect-enabled website (the company says its users are split around half and half between the two) and now it’s looking to increase distribution with the new widget. → Read More
Take the Sprint Evo 4G, slap a Verizon logo on it, and you’ve got an HTC Incredible HD.
Now, we’re not usually ones to take anonymous Internet forum posts as truth — but when the guy who previously nailed the original HTC Incredible’s launch date comes out saying they’ve got the launch date for the HTC Incredible HD, we’ll give him the listen he deserves. → Read More
Google’s proposed $700 million acquisition of flight data powerhouse ITA Software is running into some serious resistance from the online travel industry. A group of online travel companies including Expedia, Kayak, Travelocity, and TripAdvisor are lobbying the Justice Department to block the deal on antitrust grounds through an organization called FairSearch. Some of these companies were also behind competing bids for ITA Software which failed. Microsoft separately opposes the deal as well.
ITA provides flight data, schedules, fares, and availability to many of these travel sites, airline sites and Microsoft’s Bing search engine. The FairSearch coalition argues that allowing “Google could use ITA to try to marginalize competitors in ways that raise prices for consumers and limit innovation.” They fear that Google will use its search dominance to steer traffic away from their own sites and favor flight search on Google itself. These fears are not completely unfounded. → Read More
EA Sports MMA went on sale last week. The first week’s sales? Not too good, which furthers the idea that it’s not mixed martial arts (MMA) that’s hot right not, but rather it’s UFC that’s hot right now. A Cowen & Company analyst has called the game’s sales “more or less DOA at retail.” Ouch. → Read More
Have you ever wanted to control your iMac with a laptop keyboard and trackpad? Sure you have. Thanks to BulletTrain, you can! Basically this company selling a big hunk of aluminum shaped like a laptop keyboard without the keyboard or trackpad. Your Apple Bluetooth keyboard fits into a slot at the top and the Magic Trackpad fits into a hole underneath. Once everything is connected, you basically have a laptop keyboard and trackpad for your desk. → Read More
Want to declare your love and affection for all time on the back of an iPad? Fine by Apple. They’ll do it for free, but the process delays the shipping by a couple of days so plan accordingly. → Read More
First, call me a negative Nancy but the rumors that Apple could buy Sony – Lord knows Sony needs some better management – but this sort of thing seems more like a solo Steve Jobs move than a move by Apple proper. Now that that’s out of the way, let’s take a look at where all this speculation comes from.
In his earnings call, Jobs said, when asked what they would do with the $51 billion in cash it has lying around:
“We would like to continue to keep our powder dry, because we do feel that there are one or more strategic opportunities in the future.”
My son has it tough. He comes home from school now and asks if “Anything came from UPS” and most of the time he’s disappointed – just some dumb phone or something. But a few days ago he was pleasantly surprised. Inside a big old box was a Tonka Ricochet RC Car, a remote control car with a few crazy tricks up its sleeve.
The car runs on a rechargeable 9.6 volt battery and lasts about fifteen minutes on one charge – something easily flustered parents should consider. To remove or insert the battery you have to unscrew two small screws on the top of the car, a chore that could soon become onerous. However, all that power is necessary. This little car goes from zero to “Let’s make it drive again, Daddy/Mommy!” in 5.4 seconds. → Read More
Today, at the company’s developer conference in San Francisco, PayPal is releasing an embedded apps platform that will give PayPal developers a fully integrated set of small business, and buyer and seller tools that enhance PayPal’s payments platform.
PayPal Apps allows developers to embed applications directly on the PayPal website and offer SaaS apps which enhance PayPal’s services. It’s similar in theory to eBay’s apps for Sellers. The new platform, which is launching with a number of pilot partners today, will be released to the public next year. → Read More
If you’re headed to PayPal’s big developer conference in San Francisco today, you may spot an unusual landmark sitting in front of the Moscone Center: a massive, 600 pound block of ice with hundreds of dollars locked beneath the surface. The frigid booty comes compliments of the WePay team, and they’re trolling PayPal’s conference in an effort to tell everyone in attendance that “PayPal freezes your accounts” and that you should “unfreeze your money”… by switching to WePay, of course.
It’s still early in the day, but the block of ice has already led to quite a bit of drama, including a moderate-speed chase involving a pallet mover. According to WePay cofounder Rich Aberman, the WePay squad wheeled the ice block over to the Moscone Center on a pallet mover and dropped off the cargo without issue. Aberman then quickly dashed away with the pallet mover in tow, which he planned to hide nearby (Moscone security wouldn’t be able to remove the ice block without it). → Read More
At the company’s annual developer conference today, PayPal debuted its much awaited micropayments product. According to a release issued by the company, the new product is an “in-context, frictionless payment solution that lets consumers pay for digital goods and content in as little as two clicks, without ever having to leave a publisher’s game, news, music, video or media site.”
PayPal equates the product as the online equivalent of dropping a quarter into a game machine. Pricing is set at 5 percent plus 5 cents for purchases under $12, which PayPal says is lower than the fees typically charged by payment processors. For example, under standard PayPal pricing, a $1.00 transaction would incur a fee of $0.33. Osama Bedier, VP of platform, mobile and new ventures for PayPal says the product allows developers and merchants to get the revenue right away.With micropayment pricing, it would cost $0.10. While PayPal for digital goods will be available late fall this year, Facebook will soon integrate the new digital goods payment product. → Read More
If Google Street View and Chatroulette mated and gave birth to a lovechild, it’d look a lot like MapCrunch. For the record, this is not a TechCrunch network site, and would have probably been better off with a name like MapRoulette or StreetviewRoulette or something.
Either way, if you want to be taken to a random location on Google Street View (in North America, Europe, Asia or Australasia), either by clicking a button or automagically after a couple of seconds, MapCrunch is the mash-up place to be. → Read More
The WD TV has long been atop the enthusiast’s list of favorite media streamers thanks to its low price and robust media format support. But the just-announced WD TV Live Hub does things a bit different. While it still dances with local networks and USB drives, the Live Hub packs a 1TB hard drive for local storage. Nearly anything can be stored on this drive and triggers can be set up to automagically sync content from certain folders across your network to this drive for easier playback.
So now with the WD TV Live Hub, the media stream race just got a bit more interesting. There’s the updated Apple TV, Roku, this Western Digital option, and soon the Boxee box. You know what? Everyone is going to get at least a participation ribbon in this race. There’s more than enough of marketshare pie for everyone to get a healthy helping. → Read More
http://o.aolcdn.com/videoplayer/AOL_PlayerLoader.swf I haven’t been a big supporter of the One Laptop Per Child project but the goal – to offer children in horrible situations a window on the world and a tool that the average first world kid takes for granted – is a noble one. Besides, who couldn’t love it when the founder, Nicholas Negroponte, makes such a cogent argument for the rise of the robots. All hail our metal overlords! via TVSquad → Read More
