By night, Jay writes for TechCrunch and has been contributing to the blog since 2009.
By day, he manages Digital Strategy for Alliance Data. Prior to that, he held Art Director and Designer jobs at GSW Worldwide and Resource Interactive leading interaction design and mobile prototype projects.
You can reach reach him at jaydonovan at crunchgear dot com.
Indoor mapping software startup Meridian, continues to evolve their product strategy with a recent update to their offering.
Called Zones, the company’s newest update to their indoor mapping platform — and indoor is the key word here — allows geo-fence style app push notifications to be scheduled, by drawing polygons on location maps. → Read More
I don’t want to awaken the ire of any committed pet owners but I would be lying if I said I didn’t cringe a little bit when I hear about extreme pet products and services like doggie treadmills, pet psychiatrists or pet fitness centers.
Still, I came across FitBark on the floor at TechCrunch Disrupt and while it could, at first, seem “extreme” I found that after hearing the creators’… → Read More
The team at Siminars has developed what they call an “online platform with all the tools you need to build, publish and distribute highly effective courses.”
It means that rather than just using a written text to teach a concept, Siminars’ web platform lets a teacher of a subject tie together many different media types into one unified experience that steps a learner through the learning of a… → Read More
While you are riding into work on your bike commute, why not charge your phone? There’s a bit more to it than that, but ultimately that is exactly what the Siva Cycle Atom does. A brilliant idea.
Reaching their KickStarter goal of $85,000 after only a week, the newly funded Atom is on display on the floor of Hardware Alley at TechCrunch Disrupt NY 2013. → Read More
If Skit had existed in the early 1970s, there is a chance that the career of Monty Python’s Terry Gilliam could have been stunted because Skit can produce videos reminiscent of the aforementioned great one’s seminal work. And that example is what comes to mind as the easiest way to describe how this TechCrunch Disrupt NY Startup Alley participant’s new app works and looks. → Read More
Crowdfynd is a Startup Alley participant at TechCrunch Disrupt NY 2013 that is taking a crack at the age-old problem of managing lost and found items.
How does it work?
If you lose an item, you can use either Crowdfynd.com or their iOS mobile app to post info about that lost item (last location, descriptions) as well as post a monetary reward amount that is held in escrow. → Read More
TicketFire is an app that allows ticket holders to scan the their paper event tickets, and then share, sell or transfer those tickets to other people also using the TicketFire app.
It’s an interesting idea and it offers several benefits and improvements over the current process. The coolest feature in my mind is the ability to buy or sell a ticket after an event has already started. → Read More
With a plan of making product ratings social, Greentape is launching a new app that they hope will bring in-store product reviews to consumers while (hopefully) spawning more product purchases for merchants. The team is demoing this new app at TechCrunch Disrupt NY 2013. → Read More
Purchext, a new app/service that increases communication between parents, their youngsters and the purchases their youngsters make, is on display at TechCrunch Disrupt NY 2013. The concept behind the startup is a way for parents to approve purchases their kids are making. In reality, it works more like a way for kids to submit expense reports to their parents. For each purchase a dependent minor… → Read More
The tale of this backpack review is one of love and regret; I love how this backpack works and I regret that I did not take it on my last trip. In short, it’s a good pack, generally does what it is designed for and does it well. As I know a lot of you are photographers (or at least enjoy carrying around thermos-shaped objects from place to place), I thought I’d talk a bit about what this bag can… → Read More
Julie Uhrman, the CEO/Founder of the smash Kickstarter-project-turned-gaming-console known as OUYA, was the third keynote speaker at SXSW Interactive 2013. Interviewed by The Verge’s Joshua Topolsky, the two dove in the intricacies and challenges of crowd funding and creating a new hardware startup. → Read More
The idea for Jifiti came about because Shaul Weisband — one of the creators of the app and company behind it — wanted to “teleport” gifts to friends. While teleportation is still not really possible, the team at Jifiti has done the next best thing and is aiming to incorporate this into a new way of shopping. And I think retailers are going to like it. → Read More
Wired’s Chris Anderson interviewed Mega-Entrepreneur Elon Musk about hs many projects, which include SpaceX AND Tesla Motors. Throughout their fairly technical and detailed conversation, Elon when into detail about the rigors of launching rockets and dealing with bad press about cars. → Read More
Cable TV channel Bravo is extending their acceptably popular Play Live interactive/voting platform so that it can now be used for pre-recorded television shows broadcast on the network, allowing you to interact with programs in real-time. Before you yawn and click over to The Oatmeal, hear me out. This is interesting. → Read More
Up a steep hill, far away from the hustle and bustle of the Plaça d’Espanya in Barcelona is a small Luthier shop called Jerzy Drozd Basses.
Last year in February of 2012, as my travels to Barcelona approached for the Mobile World Congress, I realized that Jerzy Drodz was actually based in Barcelona. What luck and what a shame it would be to travel 8000 round-trip miles and not see the shop… → Read More
The backpack arrived in the mail about 3 days ago — perfect timing for a business day trip I needed to make and a great test of this backpack’s capability.
How did it work for me? Great. I love it. But why? → Read More
With tablets and smartphones consuming more and more video content, a new app for Android simply called “PAUL” aims to ease that ever-increasing network strain by using a predictive cache/download algorithm.
Similar to peak-shaving in electrical grids, PAUL begins to predict your video consumption habits and downloads videos that it thinks you’ll like, whenever you’re logged into a WiFi… → Read More
ChoreMonster launched an update to their app a few days ago which includes: a parents section, a redesign of the kids section, a new Monster Carnival and yes…even a new character named TeeCee exclusively for all the TechCrunch readers out there. We never asked for this, but I have to say… “Damn it feels good to be a Monster.” → Read More
I spent a lot of time at CES 2013 searching for new audio goodness and one of the cool things I found was IK Multimedia’s latest product called the iRig HD. Not “officially” announced yet and missing a release date, there were still a few demo units at their booth in the South Hall. → Read More
When peak performance is your goal, every second counts. I guess milliseconds count too. Product development consultancy Cambridge Consultants had this in mind when they developed their new automatic gear-shifting system for performance bicycles called The Connected Bike. The idea is to shave off those precious seconds of time you use both considering and shifting gears while riding. We took an… → Read More
I can tell you that the very, very last place I expected to see Lemmy Kilmister, from the band Motorhead, was at CES 2013. However, the metal pioneer emerged from the chaos with his new line of headphones — Motorheadphones, that is — to sell to the masses. → Read More
Last week, TYLT sent out a press release touting their new lineup of products, including several 3D renderings. I have to say that after getting a chance to look at a few of the actual products here at CES, the lineup looks impressive and the renderings seemed accurate. → Read More
The new line of TYLT device charging accessories will be officially released at CES in January. However, these makers of so many bright and colorful smartphone battery extending concepts still released some details about their upcoming vendibles a bit early…and they look pretty great. I will be interested to check these out in person in a couple of weeks at the massive tradeshow. → Read More
My first encounter with Golla bags happened at the Mobile World Congress in 2012. Their vibrant display at the event was hard to ignore. Even now, it’s hard to ignore the breadth of designs and options they give you for protecting and toting your personal gear.
They sent over their Carter Large Pro Sling Camera Bag for review and I must say there is a lot to like about it. → Read More
LaunchGram is an alert service that allows consumers to subscribe to news about imminently launching products. After doing so, they receive email alerts and breaking news about those products.
We first told you about the service back in April. At the time they only let you subscribe to breaking news about video games, electronics, cars and movies but now TV shows are on their list of… → Read More
Santa Monica company PaeDae launches its new prize network for online and mobile game developers today. The best way to describe how the network works is: “It’s like a white-labeled version of Kiip, but it also includes virtual rewards too.”
So this means that, like Kiip, gamers are rewarded for successful game play and are given offers for items when they complete certain gaming tasks — like… → Read More
What is OffersBy.me? It’s a new website/app offering discounts for goods and services. And although it is currently only serving up offers in the company’s hometown of Columbus, OH (expansion is planned) it has some cool features that set it apart from behemoths like Groupon or LivingSocial.
OffersBy.me lets customers offer up how much they are willing to spend for a particular good or service… → Read More
Munich-based augmented reality pioneers Metaio announce today a whole slew of new products. These include:
• A new SDK - powered by a new Augmented Reality Experience Language (AREL)
• An update to Metaio Creator (their AR desktop publishing tool for non-technical users)
• Advanced camera technologies like continuous visual search and SLAM (Simultaneous Localization and… → Read More
I’ll stop by any startup showcase I can, but it’s always a bonus when it happens to be local. Last week’s TechTomorrow showcase, sponsored by TechColumbus saw nearly 50 regional startups show off the results of their hard work – here are just a few ideas and demos present at the event worth mentioning. → Read More
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