One of the main limitations on touchscreen interfaces these days is that all you can do is poke at them. We do all kinds of things with our hands, but when it comes to screens, we just poke at them all day. UIs are doing all right, since our phone OSes still mimic mouse-based desktop OSes to some extent, but Microsoft is looking to ways to integrate more natural hand gestures incorporating more… → Read More
When people talk about near-field communications (NFC) chips in phones, they usually bring up mobile payments. But NFC chips, which are already in some Android phones, can be used by other apps besides payments (which won’t take off as quickly as people expect anyway).
At Google I/O this week, NFC apps will be highlighted. Foursquare will allow Android users to check in by swiping their phones… → Read More
Google’s annual I/O conference kicks off tomorrow and it will likely bring a range of big announcements. But one of the cooler things that will be on display at the event was actually pre-announced today by Foursquare: NFC-based check-ins at the event.
Google and Foursquare are teaming up to make this a reality at the conference over the next few days. Around the conference center, you’ll see… → Read More
Six years ago when Twitter was just a side project by a podcasting startup called Odeo, there was one member of the early team that wasn’t American. In fact, he wasn’t even based in the U.S., and for two years worked remotely and unknown to the world from an apartment block in Hamburg, Germany.
This is the story of the almost forgotten founding member of Twitter’s earliest crew, a typically… → Read More
In January of this year, DreamIt Ventures, a Philadelphia-based VC firm and startup accelerator, announced that it would be expanding to the Big Apple, creating a startup accelerator program based in New York City.
The program offers $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… → Read More
You knew this was going to happen. Someone out there was bound to turn Bin Laden’s Abbottabad hideout into a multiplayer map for virtual commandos to relive the event countless times. Download the free CS:S map here. [via Kotaku] → Read More
CrowdEngineering, which is based in Southern Italy and the U.S. and provides “enterprise-class crowdsourcing solutions”, has announced that it has closed a $4 million Series A round co-led by Quantica SGR and Digital Investments SCA SICAR, the latter of which was already a seed investor.
The new funds will be used to consolidate the company’s position in the markets that it already operates and… → Read More
Google confirmed the existence of its YouTube Movies service earlier today and has just released more details on which studios and movies will provide the 3,000 titles in its repertoire. YouTube has partnered up with Universal, Sony Pictures and Warner Bros and others to offer full length feature films on YouTube.com/movies. → Read More
Last Friday, we posted about the negotiations between Apple and voice recognition company Nuance. While these talks have been going on for months, sources told us that it wasn’t yet entirely clear what the outcome would be — either a broad strategic partnership or, less likely, an acquisition. Things are looking a bit more clear now.
In digging into the information about the relationship… → Read More
If you have been watching TechCrunch TV interviews lately, you may have noticed the videos are much sharper, crisper and much higher quality. The reason: we’ve gone HD. We are now using a new workflow with HD cameras and HD video switcher. Our shows from New York (Fly or Die and Founder Stories) have always been produced in HD at AOL Studios. But, now our San Francisco studio has gotten the… → Read More
If smartphone app sales (namely iPhone app sales) have taught manufacturers anything it’s that there’s ready money to be made in the parting of the people from their pennies. For the past few years we’ve seen very little uptake in the general, non-mobile app sales market as Apple – and now, to a lesser degree – Android had that world sewn up. Now, however, I fear that… → Read More
Need a tiny USB 3.0 flash drive? Who doesn’t, right? Well PQI’s latest is the smallest USB 3.0 yet. The Traveling Disk intelligent Drive U819V –lovely name — is fully backwards compatible with USB 2.0, but when plugged into a lovely blue USB 3.0 slot can transfer data at 5Gbps. Pricing wasn’t announced, but it will likely only cost slightly more than its lazy USB 2.0… → Read More
YouTube chief Salar Kamangar has just written a post on the YouTube blog titled “Welcome to the future of video. Please stay a while” , in which he hints at some major announcements that will be coming later today. The gist of the post: users are now racking up 2 billion views on YouTube per day, but they’re spending just 15 minutes a day on YouTube — compared to five hours a day watching TV… → Read More
Adconion Media Group, the online advertising and content syndication network, today has secured nearly £21 million in financing from Silicon Valley Bank, which provides loans to UK- and European-based technology companies at various stages of their development.
The newly secured funds will be used to support both acquisition and “working capital requirements” to continue growing the… → Read More
As a fan of hard drives, I’m quite enthused by this bit of news. The Seagate GoFlex Home was one of the first easy-to-use cloud storage systems and for about a year access was limited to desktops and laptops. Now, however, you can access your files directly using a free iOS app for iPads, iPhones, and iPods Touch.
The GoFlex Home costs $159.99 for 1TB, $209.99 for 2TB, and $269.99 for 3TB and… → Read More
Following in the footsteps of Facebook, Twitter, Digg and even Google, blogging platform Tumblr has released its ‘Share On Tumblr’ button, which allows publishers to add a button encouraging users to share their content on Tumblr (just paste the javascript tag into your source code).
The basic behavior of the button is simple enough, but the advanced features are where the ‘Share on Tumblr’ … → Read More
TNG Pharmaceuticals, developers of a vaccine to keep cattle free of blood-sucking horn flies, took top prize at the “Moot Corp.” business competition this weekend.
Formally renamed the Venture Labs Investment Competition(VLIC) in 2010, but still widely referred to as “Moot Corp.,” the annual event began in 1984 at the McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas, Austin.
TNG… → Read More
Zynga has made yet another ‘acqhire’ today. The company is announcing that Ricardo Quesada and Rolando Abarca, key contributors to the cocos2d for iPhone open source project, are joining the gaming giant. This is Zynga’s 13th announced acquisition in 12 months
The cocos2d for iPhone open source project is widely used by developers globally, including large players like Atari, ngmoco, Gamevil… → Read More
Ze Frank thinks that the future of play is a “hot thing.” That’s why he founded Star.me, his soon-to-be fully public startup. And that’s why he’s shifted his focus from stand-up entertainment to stand-up entrepreneurialism.
But why has he gone from being one of the web’s top entertainment stars to yet another star-struck startup guy? As he told me last week when he came into the… → Read More
Anybody who has had to sift through hundreds of resumes at a time or placed a job advert that’s gone unfilled for months will know that the recruitment process isn’t always as efficient as it could be. It’s not surprising then that many startups have tried to bring recruitment kicking and screaming into the Internet age – from various job sites to the professional social networking giant… → Read More
Ever wonder what sort of space age technology the FBI tracks people with? Well, as iFixit found during a special teardown, space age sort of properly describes the equipment if the term space age refers to 1990-ish equipment. I won’t spoil all the fun (like the 20 year battery life) partly because I wanna get this story posted quickly and go give my car a thorough pat down for any such… → Read More
This invite just hit our inbox — and, well, now you know about as much as we do. Come May 24th at 10 AM, Microsoft will be previewing “the next major release of Windows Phone.” Mark your calendars, folks — as we are with just about every event, we’ll be there bringin’ back all the news at a breakneck pace. What do you think: does “next major release of Windows… → Read More
Whoa, so Alven Capital has been a pretty busy bee this year – especially for a French fund. This is something like the 5th investment that the fund has announced since January, totalling over €8.5 million ($12.25 million) invested in companies like Entropysoft, HappyView, MobPartner and QuelleEnergie. Today’s investment of €1 million ($1.4 million) goes to custom travel site, Planetveo. → Read More
Let’s ignore that 2010 was the 25th anniversary of Super Mario Bros. because these are pretty sweet Wii Decals. They’re only $7.99 and come in black, red, gold, or white for those non-standard Wiis. Shipping is only $1 for within the states and $2 everywhere else. If SMB isn’t your thing, the Etsy store is loaded with other decals for gaming systems, computers and toilets. [Etsy… → Read More
There’s no denying that startup accelerators are now officially in vogue. Whether that is a sign of a bubble (or even a Blubble) or not I will leave to you.
However, today the movement is joined by the Oxygen Accelerator a UK-based investment programme designed to intensively mentor super-early stage startups. The 13-week programme will take applications from around the world, so long as the… → Read More
If you’ve ever done an image search on Google, you’ve probably gotten back a page filled with the same or similar images as the top result. If that is what you are looking for, then that’s great. If it’s not, then you have to keep clicking through until you find a decent image, and it can be a real chore.
Google lets you sort by image size, type (face, photo, clip art, drawing), and color… → Read More
The end times must be upon us because I never thought I would see Comcast allowing 3rd party set-top boxes to access On Demand. But that’s exactly what’s happening. TiVo and Comcast just announced Xfinity On Demand will soon be available on TiVo Premiere DVRs. The San Francisco Bay Area expected to be the first market with access, but others will follow as the service rolls through Comcast’s… → Read More
Newer watch brand ELYSEE offers a range of styles and values with most of their products being under $1,000. My primary interest is in their Swiss mechanical watches which includes this ref. 71003N (71003) Classic Aviator Automatic. It isn’t a complicated design, but rather, is intent on featuring a classic look in an easy to read and wear package. → Read More
Exclusive – Ustream is today launching a new and improved Facebook application that it says will take live streaming within the hugely popular social networking site “to another level”.
The app, which is currently available to anyone with a Facebook fan page, be they businesses, artists or general user communities, enables users to opt-in for reminders for upcoming streaming events using Facebook… → Read More
As we wrote last week, Yandex, one of the leading Internet companies in Russia, filed for a public offering on NASDAQ under the symbol “YNDX”. Today, the company is announcing price range of the offering, which will be $20.00 to $22.00 per share. The company aims to raise as much as $1.2 billion from the sales of its shares, according to the filing.
Yandex proposes to sell 15,400,000 shares in… → Read More
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