Over the past year, the support system for New York City entrepreneurs and tech startups has grown significantly including the addition of: TechStars NYC mentoring and seed funding program, a new Manhattan branch of Accel Partners, and the opening of a startup academy and co-work space for startups and serial entrepreneurs, General Assemb.ly.
Today, DreamIt Ventures announced its expansion to the Big Apple, just one hour or so away from its original Philadelphia startup accelerator.
DreamIt Ventures provides up to $25,000 in seed funding to its portfolio companies, along with coaching, exclusive speaking engagements, a chance to pitch at a Demo Day to affiliated angel and venture investors, and a collaborative workspace. The organization has yet to sign a lease on (or reveal the address of) its Manhattan location, but has confirmed that the following entrepreneurs will serve as advisors to companies accepted into its NYC program this spring: → Read More
After the news that Facebook Credits would become mandatory in five months was broken yesterday, Facebook Head of Product Marketing Deb Liu addressed developer concerns today at the Inside Social Apps conference.
When moderator Eric Eldon alluded to fears that mandatory Facebook Credits would put some developers out of business, Liu said, “Every single day we know developers get to choose between our platforms and another platform” a statement which was met with laughter from the audience, as Facebook is the most dominant player in the space and for some the only option for such large scale distribution. Liu recomposed, “We want to make Facebook the most attractive place to invest, and keep users with credits in their pockets.” → Read More
Hey, you! Owner of a BlackBerry Bold 9650 or Curve 3G on Verizon! Are you ready to join an exclusive group of energetic and intelligent individuals looking to explore the furthest reaches of the Galaxy?
That’s cool, but you’re going to have to settle for an operating system update. → Read More
A good pair of portable speakers is hard to find. Well, not that hard, but non-powered speakers that produce good sound and yet fit comfortably in a bag aren’t exactly littering the ground. Razer looks to remedy this with their Ferox sound system, a pair of egg-shaped speakers that open up at the top and provide “360 degree omni-directional acoustics.”
We’ll forgive them for using that phrase. They have acknowledged they have an overstatement problem, and they are going to see someone about it. → Read More
It was only this past October that Hipmunk closed a “hyper-competitive” from many of the usual angel suspects. But Hipmunk obviously has lofty goals to disrupt the airline travel industry. So they’re probably going to need more than $1 million to do that. And now they’re getting more — they’re in the process of closing a new $6 million round of funding, we’ve learned.
The company has confirmed the new round, but has declined to offer up any further details just yet. We’re still digging — the current SEC document on the funding suggests that they’ve only secured $4.6 millon of the round, so far. The Y Combinator company also previously took a very small seed from the incubator back in mid 2010. → Read More
Play.fm, the cloud music platform for DJ mixes and other live recordings, has got pretty serious about mobile today by launching simultaneously on Android, iOS and Windows phone 7. However, this is about consumption of Play.fm’s 30,000 strong library of DJ sets not an app to actually make recordings, so in that sense we’re not talking about a SoundCloud competitor and the like.
Available for 2.99 Euros from all of the respective app stores (iTunes App Store, Android Market, and Microsoft zune Marketplace), the basic app provides the user with 90 days of unrestricted access to Play.fm audio streams, after which they’re limited to five hours listening per month. Alternatively, there’s a Premium model that grants continuous unlimited use of Play.fm on-the-go. → Read More
1. Buy the enclosure in black, white, or blue. 2. Connect to PS3 or PC. 3. ???? 4. Profit! → Read More
It’s funny. When I tell my ‘normal’ friends that I’ve just come from Facebook’s office or need to head down to Google’s campus in Mountain View, they often give me a strange look, as if I’ve just told them I’m about to make a house call to the Easter Bunny. These companies aren’t places inhabited by actual people — they’re nebulous things coursing through the Internet’s series of tubes.
But I can’t blame them. Most of the startup profiles we see in magazines feature a portrait of the founders solemnly gazing into the distance as they plot to change the world with their revolutionary new sharing widget. Sometimes there’s a snapshot of a few desks, each of which is far too neat for anyone to actually have done any work on. There’s got to be a better way. → Read More
I have a confession to make: I’m completely and utterly addicted to browser tabs. It’s a sickness. I might have 15 or 20 or more open in each window at any given time. That’s why I love Chrome. The ability to pin tabs is a life-saver by way of being a space-saver. But there’s always been one big downside.
When you pin a tab in Chrome, all you see is the favion. That means you lose the title of the tab itself. Normally, this isn’t a big deal, but for apps like Gmail, Twitter, and Tumblr that show unread counts in this area, it’s actually an annoyance. As a result, I’ve had to install extensions just to be able to see when I have new messages. Not anymore. → Read More
Earlier today, a strange message appeared on Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s fan page. It read as follows:
Let the hacking begin: If facebook needs money, instead of going to the banks, why doesn’t Facebook let its users invest in Facebook in a social way? Why not transform Facebook into a ‘social business’ the way Nobel Price winner Muhammad Yunus described it? http://bit.ly/fs6rT3 What do you think? #hackercup2011
Who wrote such an odd and seemingly drunken message? Well, if you believe the page, Zuckerberg himself did. Shortly after posting, the post had over 1,800 likes and nearly 500 comments.
Obviously, Zuckerberg didn’t actually write it. Or at least, we’re pretty sure he didn’t. Instead, it would appear that his fan page was hacked. Facebook has now taken down the page — but not before we grabbed a screenshot. → Read More
With billions of dollars flowing into today’s social economy, betaworks CEO John Borthwick sees the social economy radically changing not only media, but all 21st century industries. It’s 1998 all over again, he told me when we met last week in New York City – thus arguing that today’s social boom still has at least a couple of years of innovation left in it.
But while Borthwick – whose betaworks portfolio includes bit.ly, TweetDeck, SocialFlow and Chartbeat – is bullish about the future of social media, he isn’t quite as bullish about Google. Suggesting that social isn’t in Google’s DNA, Borthwick, who used to run technology strategy at Time Warner, believes that the web now not only needs social search but that today’s social media companies – Twitter, Facebook et al – are much more strategically positioned to build a social search engine than Google.
Video ahead. → Read More
Very clever, this. It’s a t-shirt that “detects” pollution by way of changing color when it comes into contact with high carbon monoxide levels. It was designed by two NYU graduate students, who are now famous forever. → Read More
Ben Heck, the engineering whiz who makes genuinely useful stuff for the lot of us, has a new device that may interest you Android fans in the crowd. It’s a mobile phone charger that works using the mighty power of kinetic energy, the energy of motion. What a pleasant man this Ben Heck is. → Read More
Today at the Inside Social Apps conference in San Francisco, Inside Network’s Justin Smith sat down for a discussion with Facebook CTO Bret Taylor. The two talked about a wide range of issues including the company’s 2010 (when they cut spam by 95 percent, Taylor said). But there was a particular focus on 2011 and the ecosystem. So what’s next for Facebook’s Platform?
Taylor made it very clear that mobile was the big area of focus for the Platform in 2011. But at a higher level Taylor talked a bit about “streamlining things” with regard to all the different ways Facebook is used. → Read More
Audi was once known as the German car that came with all-wheel-drive. That notoriety is changing and Audi is becoming a huge player in the tech game; their interfaces are fantastic and run with exceptional speed and style. And now, they are bringing the internet to their navigations systems: the Google maps of navs, if you will. → Read More
What’ll it be, then? TouchSlate? TouchCanvas? DuoPad? That’s what HP is thinking about calling its new slate line. They’re probably reserving those names for their best and brightest WebOS and Win7 devices. → Read More
Rumors have been flying around for the last week about a possible acquisition of DailyMotion, the French-born equivalent of YouTube. And the first half of the 2-part transaction has just been confirmed; Orange will acquire roughly 49% of the company for approximately €59 million (€58.8 million) with the rest to follow shortly.
Advent Venture Partners, an investor in DailyMotion since 2007, said that investors were actually not seeking to sell the company, which has apprently been profitable since the latter half of 2010. However, the company did seem to be burning cash prior to that point; over $68.5 million had been raised with some of Europe’s top tier VCs in 3 different rounds of funding. → Read More
As Yahoo announces its second round of layoffs in two months, Google is announcing that it will be embarking on a hiring spree this year. We first heard this morning from soon to be former CEO Eric Schmidt that the company will be adding 1,000 new employees in Europe. And Google’s SVP Engineering and Research Alan Eustace just published a post on the company’s website announcing that the search giant will ramp up hiring to record levels in 2011.
Eustace writes “I love Google because of our people. It’s inspiring to be part of the team. And that’s why I am excited about 2011—because it will be our biggest hiring year in company history. We’re looking for top talent—across the board and around the globe—and we’ll hire as many smart, creative people as we can to tackle some of the toughest challenges in computer science: like building a web-based operating system from scratch, instantly searching an index of more than 100 million gigabytes and even developing cars that drive themselves.” → Read More
Here at Inside Mobile Apps conference, Facebook CTO Bret Taylor talked about how mobile will be Facebook’s primary focus in 2011, mainly because “mobile devices are inherently social,” he said. Currently Facebook has 1/3 of its almost 600M user base (200M) on mobile devices and Taylor says that Facebook mobile users are 2x as active as Facebook web users.
Taylor thinks of Facebook as a horizontal platform (easily accessible) and revealed that a huge goal for Facebook was reducing friction on mobile and extending Facebook engagement to all devices, mentioning the PS3, the iPhone and customized devices as examples. As an example of a frictionless solution, Taylor brought up Facebook Single Sign On and mentioned that social movie site Flixster had a 300% increase in usage after it implemented the feature. → Read More
In honor of the excellent new program, Portlandia, I present to you this special, sustainable, Vegan-grown, humane leather bike-mounted can cage, a mere $45 from Etsy. → Read More
San Francisco, CA
