In the deep and rich world of self-generated Internet content, there are few things as stark – and as starkly polarizing – as text on a colored background. Is it meme-cheating? Is it boring? Is writing “i hate mondays” in Helvetica over a field of taupe better than posting a picture of a cat hanging off of a tree limb with the same aphorism under her? Now we can find out definitively with … → Read More
Meet Sunrise, the calendar app that will replace every calendar app that you’ve tried so far. It’s the best calendar you’ll ever use. Behind its apparent simplicity, there’s a server component (like Mailbox), making it significantly smarter with data from Google Calendar, Facebook, LinkedIn and others. The app was made by ex-Foursquare designers who believe they may have finally figured out how to… → Read More
A new study from video monetization company FreeWheel today reveals that the mobile video market grew from 2 percent in 2011, to 12 percent of overall online videos watched in 2012. That’s a huge increase, and the main benefactor of that jump is Apple, whose iOS mobile OS grew its share of total mobile video views to 60 percent, compared to Android’s 32 percent take of all mobile views. → Read More
Apple and Google are enemies and partners at the same time due to asymmetric competition. According to a report from Morgan Stanley, Google could pay more than $1 billion in 2014 to remain the default search engine on iOS. In 2009, Google paid only $82 million for the privilege. Analyst Scott Devitt believes that it is a per-device deal growing every year. → Read More
Fishlabs, the German studio behind popular space trading and combat sim Galaxy On Fire games for iOS devices, today announced that it is currently developing a massively multiplayer online game called Galaxy On Fire – Alliances, with real-time strategy components, aiming for a release later this year. The spin-off project is designed to capitalize on the success of the original GOF and GOF 2… → Read More
Basecamp, the project management platform developed by 37 Signals that launched in 2004, is still alive and kicking, which is something of a feat considering how many companies have come and gone in this space over the years. Plus, more recently, a slew of promising new players have entered the market, including Dustin Moskovitz and Justin Rosenstein’s Asana, Joel Spolsky’s Trello, Siasto and … → Read More
Fans of entertainment social network GetGlue have been subjected to a bumpy ride over the last few months. In November, the startup announced that it had agreed to merge with TV loyalty service, Viggle in a deal worth as much as $70 million. But the numbers didn’t look too good, and the merger was delayed again and again. Finally, last month, the deal was called off and, in spite of the botched… → Read More
The Android + iPhone duopoly in the smartphone space will ease up slightly this year, according to a marketshare forecast by ABI Research — albeit Google’s platform is still predicted to take a 57 per cent share of the global smartphone pie, while Apple’s iOS will cut itself about a fifth (21 per cent), giving the two rival platforms a 78 per cent chunk of the global market. → Read More
Twitter has announced a much-needed update to its search product today, which will be available on all mobile devices: iOS, Android and mobile web. The company boasts that the update will help you find relevant tweets, trends and people to follow in a single stream. This is very similar to the experience that we’re starting to see make its way to the website. The update allows you to search… → Read More
With the debut of BlackBerry’s new BB10 OS and its accompanying handsets, many have questioned whether the revamp is enough to pull iPhone and Android enthusiasts into the BlackBerry fold. But a new research note from CIBC analyst Todd Coupland suggests that BlackBerry may be appealing to users on other platforms just as much as it’s exciting loyal BlackBerry customers.
“In Canada 50% of… → Read More
ABI Research has put out its latest projections on the lay of the land for smartphones and tablets worldwide in 2013: it says that there will be 1.4 billion smartphones, and 268 million tablets in active use this year, with Android keeping its lead in handsets and iOS continuing to dominate in tablets. Microsoft and BlackBerry will continue to remain in the game in smartphones with small shares of… → Read More
iOS 6.1 arrived just a couple of days ago, bringing little beyond support for new international LTE carriers and movie ticket purchasing via Siri in the U.S., but it’s already been installed on a significant percentage of active iPhones, iPads and iPod touches out there. Onswipe, creators of touch templates for web-based content, have seen adoption of iOS 6.1 rise quickly, from 11.35 percent… → Read More
Chegg has long been known as a textbook company, becoming one of the first companies to bring textbook rental online and reach widespread adoption. But with Amazon, Apple and others moving aggressively into the textbook market — and the market and textbooks themselves increasingly going digital — Chegg has been re-positioning. Today, the textbook company is eying EdTech’s Holy Grail of becoming… → Read More
Microsoft is pinching CIOs by not providing an easy way to run the just released Microsoft Office 2013 on anything except Windows RT. With little cross-platform integration, Microsoft is creating an opening for vendors that have a more clear path for accessing documents on a mobile device. → Read More
Toronto’s 500px got its popular photo sharing iPhone app back on the iTunes App Store today, following a takedown that Apple said stemmed from multiple user complaints about pornographic material. The app returns with an age-gate warning, advising that the content in the app is for 17+ audiences, and also adds a new “Report Photo” button to help users quickly tag things they find offensive for… → Read More
Facebook yesterday updated its iOS app to version 5.4, giving users a few new features in what could be one of the world’s most complex and layered mobile apps.
The update brings with it the ability to share voice messages, much like iOS’s Voice Memos, letting users record a cute little message and send it through the app to friends. The update also lets users record and share video from right… → Read More
Heads-up, Apple fanatics: in case bog-standard iOS 6 is starting to feel a bit long in the tooth, Apple has just released its iOS 6.1 update out into the wild for the iPhones, iPads, and iPod Touches in your life. Granted, the changelog here is rather brief — the big draw is that the update brings support for a slew of new LTE carriers to the iPhone 5, a move that CEO Tim Cook pointed out during… → Read More
Video sharing app Vine came under fire this past weekend for having a bit of a porn problem. That it has adult content on the network shouldn’t surprise anyone, and as long as it’s something you have to look for, I think criticizing them for it is as sensible as criticizing Google. But today (right now, as of this writing) the top featured pick on my home feed, and on the feed of many users… → Read More
They’d make unhappy bedfellows but — taken together — Google’s Android platform and Apple’s iOS accounted for a record 92 per cent of global smartphone shipments in Q4 last year, according to new figures from analyst Strategy Analytics. The analyst estimates that 152.1 million Android smartphones were shipped globally in the quarter, nearly double the amount shipped in the year ago quarter. → Read More
When it comes to developing for mobile platforms, Android and iOS — the top two mobile platforms by device sales worldwide — are also first in the mind of app makers. But surprisingly, beleaguered BlackBerry isn’t so far behind: an indication that, if RIM really connects on BB10, it could have a shot at some kind of comeback, or at least the support of developers to make sure it has the content… → Read More
Founded in late 2011, 100Plus set out to tap into the growing popularity of the Quantified Self movement to create a personalized, mobile health prediction platform to help Average Joes like you and me stay active and get healthy. Like some of today’s better known activity and health trackers, like Fitbit, Jawbone’s Up and RunKeeper, 100Plus wants to leverage our ever-present mobile devices to… → Read More
Smartphones are the single-fastest-growing consumer electronics segment in the world, and Google and Apple are the most formidable players in the arena. iOS and Android together hold a vast majority of the global market, and both Apple and Google have their own hardware ventures (the iPhone/iPad and the Nexus tablet/smartphone family).
But once we move past the battle for mobile souls, there is… → Read More
When Android first appeared I had an inkling that it would be a hit. I didn’t enjoy the early incarnations of the software – the G1 was like a Sidekick on steroids – but generally I expected Android devices to blanket the world for one simple reason: it was free and carriers no longer had to worry about Java stacks and wonky, homebrew OSes. Instead they could sell phones that worked… → Read More
Opera unveiled a major new mobile browser initiative called Opera Ice today via Pocket-lint, coming in February and based on the same WebKit rendering engine used by Apple’s Safari and Google Chrome, rather than Presto, which has powered Opera since 2003 (including server-side compression on the iOS side of things). The browser engine change signals Opera’s intent to remain relevant in a changing… → Read More
As Peter Csathy wrote recently, mobile video does indeed present a huge market opportunity, but it’s one that few (if any) startups have gotten right, and it’s a much harder nut to crack than many seem to realize. Streamweaver, a Nashville-based startup that launched back in September, hopes to stand out from the crowd by making the whole mobile video experience more social and collaborative. For… → Read More
It happens to the best of entrepreneurs: That service, app, or site that you set up finds an audience that totally blows your mind. You thought that a certain set of people would flock to your app like crazy, and you’re surprised by those who actually use it. If you have this “problem,” it’s important to recognize that it’s not a problem at all. → Read More
The Gillmor Gang — John Taschek, Robert Scoble, Keith Teare, Kevin Marks, and Steve Gillmor — made it past the Fiscal Cliff in good order and got back to the day job: buying stuff. With CES on the horizon, the talk quickly got down to screens big and small. Passive TV vs. transactional mobile devices, the differences between the platforms are being absorbed by the big players as they rush to… → Read More
App analytics platform Flurry has released its annual look at how many new mobile devices came online during the holiday season, and the results show a dramatic change from the situation a year ago. Over 50 million iOS and Android devices were activated during the period between December 25 to December 31, versus just over 20 million devices last year. → Read More
There can be little doubt Nokia’s mobile glory days are behind it. Samsung now occupies its former throne at the top of the global mobile tree and Google’s Android is the dominant smartphone platform, while Windows Phone still lags Nokia’s legacy OS Symbian. So where did it all go wrong for Nokia? What were its big missteps and how could the 147-year-old firm have stayed in the smartphone… → Read More
A kind reader woke us up this morning with a missive that made my blood boil: another scam iOS maker was, in an insult to the great Mojang itself, selling a scam version of Minecraft. The company, Installous is selling something called Minecraft Mobile, a $2.99 app that actually produces a bunch of lines on the screen that flock around finger taps. → Read More
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