Happy Halloween! Why not celebrate with a brand new game or two (or three) courtesy of Steam. If the game is scary, features zombies, or ghosts, it’s probably on sale. I mean, what are you going to do this weekend? Go to lame party party filled with a bunch of neckbeards and trashy girls? Forget that, turn off you lights, put your candy on a chair with a sign politely asking people to only take one piece and load up L4D2. → Read More
In case you were wondering what’s powering Barnes & Noble’s new Nook Color (or NOOKcolor, as they’d have us write it) e-reader, wonder no longer. It’s an e-book platform introduced by Texas Instruments at CES, with an ARM Cortex A8 processor at its center. There are some superficial similarities to the A4 system used by Apple, but really, the processor line is the only for-sure overlap. We also don’t know the megahertz count of the chip just yet. → Read More
Okay okay, maybe “nerds” is a strong word to use in the headline here because the above Android fanboy Jack O’ Lantern is actually kind of awesome. There is something so heartwarming about the “Android Peeing On Apple” icon carved into TechCrunch reader Lee Arnold’s family (!) pumpkin. → Read More
Almost a year ago Sellaband, the number one crowd-funding website for musicians went bankrupt. The website was then acquired by a German company and now Public Enemy managed to raise $75,000 despite all the problems of the past. Is this the future of music business? It very well may be. → Read More
On the other side of the Atlantic, TechCrunch events have been causing all kinds of disruption (yes, lame joke, I know) this year. Back in May, Disrupt unleashed the infamous linguistic talent of Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz and just last month, the Bin 38 crew and MC Hammer rocked the show just prior to the announcement of our acquisition by AOL. From New York to San Francisco, Disrupt has definitely proved to be one tech’s hottest events…but now what about in Europe ?
Europe definitely counts a number of absolutely fantastic tech events – with one of my all-time favorites, LeWeb, coming-up right before the holidays. But this year, both TechCrunch France and TechCrunch Europe are also puting a little startup kick in pre-holiday events with the Europas and Remix. → Read More
You can now pre-order the digital download edition of World of Warcraft: Cataclysm from Blizzard. Buying this particular edition ensures that you’ll be able to play the game the minute Blizzard turns on the Cataclysm servers, which, incidentally, happens at 12:01am PST on December 7. → Read More
It’s very rare to find a game that is 100% acceptable for my 5-year-old. Many games are just a bit too violent – Super Smash Brothers was pretty rough and Super Paper Mario encouraged self-mutilation – and others, like Mario Kart Wii, are so boring at this point as to induce coma in a healthy 35-year-old. That’s why I was excited to play Kirby’s Epic Yarn. This game isn’t as hard as the SMB franchise (in fact it’s dead simple and does not actually require you to play it at all) and it’s great for kids because of the “yarn shaded” animation and the primitive storyline. Best of all it allows beleaguered dads to finally have a little fun while playing a kid’s game. → Read More
Batman fans reacted with anger on Thursday upon learning that director Christopher Nolan has ruled out using The Riddle in the upcoming movie The Dark Knight Rises. The movie, the third Batman under Nolan and currently scheduled to be released on July 20, 2012, will instead “introduce some new [characters]” as well as use some of the existing ones. → Read More
Given Paul’s ability to get into fights even in sleepy towns like Camden, Maine, it’s lucky Sarah does the lion’s share of the travelling.
This week, she’s in Singapore – on a week-long trip to take the island’s entrepreneurial pulse and next week she’ll be returning to Jakarta to do similar there (hopefully, you’ve already sent in your questions for her special South-East Asia editions of Ask A VC).
You can read more about Sarah’s trip in a series of posts coming over the next few days, but first, with Paul safely back in the studio, we caught up via Skype to discuss some of the interesting startups she’s found so far – and also how Singapore’s colonial past and uber-efficient present has affected its entrepreneurial outlook.
Video below. → Read More
Some of the most common complaints about Android are related to Android Market, the official Google storefront through which the vast majority of Android users get their Apps (yes, you can download from other sources, but most people don’t). Most of the problems have revolved around international support (which the Android team has recently improved) but now there’s another issue that’s becoming a problem: downtime.
For the last hour or so I haven’t been able to download apps or updates from Android Market — every time I try I get a “Download Unsuccessful” error. Many other Twitter users are reporting similar problems. → Read More
News Corp is on the verge of unloading another one of its digital businesses under Fox Interactive Media, the Fox Audience Network (FAN), to Los Angeles-based ad-optimization startup The Rubicon Project. The deal has not been signed yet and may still fall apart, but the two companies are in the final stages of negotiation, according to sources with direct knowledge of the deal. (Talks have been heating up over the past month). In preparation for the sale, or continuation as a standalone business, about half of its 300 employees were let go yesterday, most of them sales people. Rubicon is more interested in the ad technology.
If the proposed deal with Rubicon goes through, it will get certain assets including FAN’s ad server technology, its self-serve banner advertising platform called MyAds, and about 100 employees to help run those parts of the business. In return, News Corp will get about 20 percent of Rubicon’s shares. (When Fox Interactive Media disposed of Rotten Tomatoes, it structured a similar asset-for-equity swap with Flixster). The fact that the ad server technology is one of the key assets here is particularly noteworthy, given that Rubicon’s public posturing in the past was that the ad server is dead. → Read More
Last month, we’ve blogged about the DLA-HD250/250Pro high-end projectors JVC introduced on the American market. In Japan, home theater freaks will soon [JP] be able to lay their hands on two D-ILA branded projectors that both can produce 3D images and feature full HD resolution, the DLA-X7 (in black) and the DLA-X3 (in black or white). → Read More
When Apple passed Microsoft in market cap this past May, the Microsoft fanboys were out in full force. “This means nothing.” “Microsoft still makes so much more money than Apple.” “Look at the revenues.” Okay, let’s look at the revenues.
Microsoft just posted their earnings for last quarter. The result? $16.2 billion in revenue. A very strong number, easily beating what the Street was projecting. But just 10 days ago, Apple posted their revenues for this past quarter. The result there? $20.34 billion. Yep. → Read More
California politics blog Calitics has unearthed some interesting data about the $1 million in funding behind the recent round of television ads against Democratic attorney general candidate Kamala Harris. Digging deeper into the contribution history of the Republican State Leadership committee, the Karl Rove-backed group behind the ad campaign, reveals contributions from four top Silicon Valley tech firms. → Read More
Got Angry Birds Fever (I guess calling it “Angry Bird Flu” might be a bad idea), but can’t muster up the energy to build a man-sized Angry Birds costume? Want something a bit more portable? Don’t fret. We’ve known for a while now that Rovio Mobile was working on a line of plush toys based on their ever-frustrated Birds. Hell, we’ve seen the things a bunch of times. Unfortunately, the company has stayed pretty much mum on the matter of pricing and availability, leaving would-be buyers in the dark with Christmas fast approaching. A tipster has just come forward with some details on the launch. According to them, Rovio has plans to make their official unveiling tomorrow.. but that hasn’t stopped at least one toy store from putting it up early. → Read More
Microsoft just released better than expected Q1 earnings, posting first-quarter revenue of $16.2 billion, an 25% increase from the same period of the prior year. Analysts expected revenue to come in at $15.8 billion. Operating income, net income and diluted earnings per share for the quarter were $7.12 billion, $5.41 billion and $0.62 per share, which represented increases of 59%, 51% and 55%, respectively, when compared with the prior year period. Analysts were expecting diluted earnings per share of $0.55.
Microsoft said that the company saw year-over-year growth across all business segments. Revenue from Office 2010 grew over 15% in its first full quarter in market. The entertainment division saw strong growth as Xbox 360 console sales increased by 38%. The biggest growth came from Windows, with revenue up 66% to $4.8 billion. Windows operating profits up 124% to $3.2 billion (from $1.5 billion last year) and Windows Azure subscriptions grew by 40%. → Read More
Google has just released a series of updates for their Google Maps Android application. Two of these updates are useful: Place page reviews and the ability to filter search results. But one of them is really interesting: real-time location updating in Google Latitude.
To be clear, this feature is an experimental one that Google is trying out. But if you enable it, your friends on the service will be able to see where you are in real-time (and vice versa, if they enable it too). Previously, location updates through Latitude would occur regularly, but not in real-time. The reason is that this constant sending of location data can wear down mobile phone batteries much quicker. Many service that update location in the background instead tend to ping towers to see if you’ve moved periodically. → Read More
Ready for this? Unisex Gucci glasses optimized for RealD 3D productions. They’re stylish (so they say), coated with a high-tech multi-layered mirrored coating and are optically correct with a 6-base curved lense complete with circular polarization. $225 and available this holiday season. Because, you know, going to the movies isn’t expensive enough. → Read More
YouTube has just announced that it has served its 500 millionth promoted video view. The video ad format, which the company launched a few years ago, essentially allows advertisers pay to promote videos in search results and on the YouTube home page.
The product is similar to an AdWords for YouTube. So advertisers buy a keyword, and when someone did a search for that term, the advertiser’s video will show up as a promoted result. Last year, YouTube also started to place Promoted Videos on the ‘Watch’ pages, where videos are actually shown alongside comments and related other content, replicating AdSense in some ways. → Read More
