Twitter just crossed another huge milestone. People are now sending 200 million tweets per day across the service. This is up from 65 million tweets per day a year ago, or about 200 percent growth in a year. Last March, Twitter reported 140 million tweets per day last March. Way back in January, 2009 people were only sending 2 million tweets per day.
Well, “people” is perhaps a generous term. Twitter is filled with automated bots Tweeting out, as well as feeds from publishers. It is not clear how many of those 200 million Tweets a day are automated versus individually hand-crafted. Well, “people” is perhaps a generous term. Twitter is filled with automated bots Tweeting out, as well as feeds from publishers. It is not clear how many of those 200 million Tweets a day are automated versus individually hand-crafted. → Read More
NMA continues in its tech blog baiting campaign, this time capturing Google’s multiple attempts to crack the nut of social in subtitled CGI format. Our ingenious Taiwanese friends have chose to represent the Buzz debacle as a guy who conspicuously resembles Mark Zuckerberg spying on a woman in the shower and Google Wave as a group of people trying and failing to surf.
Google+, in contrast, is depicted as a Pandora’s Box, which ultimately contains only hope in the form of the product’s true innovation, Social Circles. It’s perfect. → Read More
In response to this morning’s Open Letter from a purportedly “high level” RIM employee to the CEOs of the company, RIM sent over the following statement: → Read More
We already know that Nokia has started shutting down some of its online stores, such as those in Spain, France, and Finland, but we didn’t expect to see the U.S. and U.K. web outlets close so soon after.
That’s right folks, Nokia online is gone. Forever. In fact, the only online stores Nokia has left are in China, Portugal and a few South American countries. Luckily for the end user, Nokia phones are still available across a number of different online retailers including Amazon. → Read More
Lost in all the buzz around Google+ is an important new feature rolled out alongside it that makes it way easier to take all your data out of Google. It is called, appropriately enough, Google Takeout. It’s got it’s own separate site and is also part of settings within Google+. In settings, you click on “Data Liberation” and then you are given the option to download all of your profile data, stream data, photos from Picassa, Buzz data, Circles and Contacts.
The Data Liberation group inside Google has long been making personal data portable, but up until now it’s been a clunky process involving APIs and going to each Google service separately to get it. With Takeout, all your Google data across its services is available in one place. → Read More
Oh, how great it is to live in the future. Sure, we may never explore the galaxy in our personal space cruisers (single tear.), but we can buy our friends coffee without even being at a coffee shop. From our phones! → Read More
Andreessen-Horowitz, the prestigious VC firm started by Silicon Valley veterans Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz, has just announced that it’s added a new general partner: Jeff Jordan, the former CEO of OpenTable and former executive at PayPal and eBay.
In conjunction with the news, A-H is also announcing Jordan’s first investment: a Series A funding round in hot Palo-Alto based startup LAL (also known as LikeALittle). When it’s completed, the round will total over $5 million in new funding for the company. Also contributing to the round are notable angel investors who include TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington (see below).
Oh, and we hear that LAL landed a valuation of over $35 million. Not bad for a startup that got its start last fall as a college flirting site. → Read More
Oh man! That girl you met in the hostel in Prague wants to video chat. It’s like 2 a.m there! This can only be good! HIGH FIVE! Wait. No. No high-five. I TAKE MY HIGH FIVE BACK. You’ve only got a Windows Phone 7 handset. They don’t having front-facing camera support, much less video chat support. Sad trombone. Fortunately, it looks like a fix is on the way. Well, sort of. Anyone who already has a Windows Phone 7 handset won’t benefit much from this (for obvious, lacking-a-camera-on-the-front reasons), but a few developers have dug through the most recent build of the WP7 Mango update and have found all sorts of evidence that Microsoft’s up-and-coming update might natively support front-facing cameras. The most damning evidence: that circled icon above lurking about in the camera app. [Via WPCentral] → Read More
I am not always sure what Jean-Claude Biver is thinking. The machine-gun minded Swiss CEO covers so many bases when deciding what new Hublot watches are made that it can be almost impossible to predict what will come next. However, I do know one thing: Mr. Biver is watch lover. It might sound ironic, or silly, but when a watch lover runs a watch brand, it is a good thing. And trust me, not all watch brand CEOs are watch lovers. → Read More
When it comes to doin’ video stuff on Android, things can get a bit.. complicated — especially when that video is streamed. That’s why just about every video app to launch on Android is launching on but a handful of handsets at a time. Netflix initially launched on five. Hulu launched on six. This morning’s somewhat-limited-launch? Skype 2.0 for Android. Though it’s not streaming video in the same sense as the rest, two-way video chattin’ is just as — if not way more — complex. The first batch of supported devices is made up of just four handsets: HTC Desire S, Sony Ericsson Xperia neo, Sony Ericsson Xperia pro and the Google Nexus S. Kind of a weird selection (No DROIDs? No Thunderbolts? No EVOs?)… but hey, gotta start somewhere, right? → Read More
Summer is here and our 6th annual August Capital Party is just around the corner. Last week we released 100 tickets, all of which sold out in under an hour. Today we are releasing our next set of 100 tickets. The August Capital Party will be held on the gorgeous Sand Hill Road in Menlo Park on July 29th from 5:30 – 10:00pm, preceding our Mobile First CrunchUp. This party is a great way to see an amazing mix of startup demos, network, enter into giveaways, have some drinks and some fun in the sun. Tickets are $40 and tend to sell out very quickly. If you would like to come, please act fast. If you aren’t able to purchase tickets today, stay tuned – we will have a ticket giveaway this Friday and will release more tickets next week.
Tickets are on sale here. → Read More
Erick is a cruel man. Known throughout TC HQ as the “Iron Stampede,” his rages against technology products are epic and legendary. You should have heard him go off on Google+ yesterday. He was livid.
That’s why it’s interesting to see him calmly dismantle the TouchPad in this episode of Fly or Die. Gone is the red faced anger, the spittle, the curses. Instead, he tries it out and comes away disappointed and nonplussed. → Read More
The online music race is now an all-out sprint: Amazon, Google, and Apple are now all offering (or preparing to launch) services that let you upload your music collection to the cloud, letting you listen to the music you own wherever you are. But they aren’t just competing with each other — another group of services that includes MOG, Rdio, and (eventually) Spotify lets users stream any song as often as they’d like for a reasonable monthly rate of around $10 a month.
It’s getting fun. And today, MOG is making the race all that much closer.
The service has just rolled out a new Beta player to users that streamlines the MOG experience, putting a much heavier emphasis on building out playlists and recommendations than its predecessor did. → Read More
Microsoft is on a roll. Onkyo is the latest company to trade Android tablet royalties for access to Microsoft’s patent licensing program. The details of the agreement wasn’t released. This makes Onkyo the third company this week that has signed such an agreement. Velocity Micro and General Dynamic’s Itronix brand joined the club just days ago.
“We are pleased that Onkyo has taken advantage of our patent licensing program for Android devices and has signed this agreement,” said Horacio Gutierrez, corporate vice president and deputy general counsel of Intellectual Property and Licensing at Microsoft. “This agreement and similar agreements recently announced evidence the momentum and success of our licensing program.” → Read More
Google just announced that it is teaming up with Virgin America to allow passengers to “test-fly” the search giant’s new Chromebook computers for free. Virgin passengers will be able to use the computers onboard their flight and at select airport gates from July 1 through September 30, 2011.
As an incentive, flyers who check out a Chromebook will receive a free WiFi session onboard Virgin America. Virgin says that at airport gates in San Francisco, Chicago O’Hare, Boston and in Dallas-Fort Worth will include Google “Chrome Zone” lounges starting this week, where passengers can learn more about the Chromebook and check one out for their flight. Google is also partnering with the Ace Hotel in New York to offer Chromebooks in hotel guests’ rooms. → Read More
PayPal is shutting down its Money Market Fund, notifying participants that the fund will be closing as of July 29 of this year.
PayPal users could previously put the money they earned from PayPal transactions in a Money Market Fund to accrue interest. PayPal customers could choose have their free cash balances swept into the Fund in order to earn income until the cash is used. Shares of the Fund will could be redeemed to pay for transactions such as payments, purchases and other electronic money transfers from PayPal customer accounts. → Read More
In this episode of Founder Stories, host Chris Dixon takes a look at a 3D printer while talking to the maker behind the MakerBot, Bre Pettis.
If printing 3D objects sounds impressive, think about this. Pettis thinks “it’s early days”—drawing comparisons to early PC’s like the Altair. About the size of a mini-fridge, the Makerbot ships for $1,299 and allows users to create their own objects via CAD software (or users can select from “more than 10,000 things” on Thingiverse says Pettis) and print them out in a matter of minutes. → Read More
In John’s review of the new HP TouchPad, he claimed that “WebOS is the real star of this show. The OS offers true multi-tasking and uses a system of “cards” and “stacks” to display active applications.” I think it’s worthwhile to remind everyone that WebOS is built atop the Linux kernel, and that has several interesting ramifications. HP has continued Palm’s dedication to user experience, and WebOS should make it abundantly clear that “Linux” need not be synonymous with “complex and arcane”. But there’s a lot more than just superficial window dressing to consider.
Read on for more. → Read More
You look for a case for your iPhone 4 but those Hello Kitty ones we showed earlier this week are too girly-girly for you? Then here’s a (quite nasty) alternative: a case with a plastic Dokkiri, a Japanese beetle, glued to it. → Read More
Today a letter slipped out addressed to RIM’s co-CEOs Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis. It was written by a “high-level” employee, who BGR claims to have identified and confirmed as the author. The letter is not angry, disgruntled, nor does it cross the line. It is a simple, heartfelt plea to get RIM back in the game. → Read More
