February 2011

Though you’re probably hearing about it for the first time now, Intel’s been working on a new interconnection technology for the last few years. “Light Peak”, as it was called…

Outdoor Technology has just come out with some dog-tag-like Bluetooth headphones called OT Tags. You can get them in either black or red and when not in use they hang…

Glam Media, one of the largest publishing and advertising networks on the Web, is revealing its third branded content channel today: health-focused Bliss. Bliss, which will be a content hub…

It really is kind of amazing that Instagram has shot past two million users in just a few months with only an iPhone app. No Android app, no website, no…

Instagram Unveils Realtime API With Foodspotting, Fancy, Momento, Flipboard, About.me And Others

Launching today is 140Fire.com, a Y Combinator-backed platform that allows advertisers, publishers, and media buyers to create interactive ad content and polls to overlay on streaming or pre-recorded video. What…

A London court has ruled that Wikileaks founder Julian Assange should to be extradited to Sweden to face further questioning on allegations of sexual offences. He has seven days to…

This year marks SteelSeries 10th anniversary, and the accessory maker has decided to celebrate by giving away a fair number of prizes. It is, in fact, the largest such giveaway…

Last time we checked in with PayPal, it, along with MasterCard, Visa and others had blocked its services with regards to donations to WikiLeaks foundation. Today it is being reported…

CrunchBoard Jobs: TechCrunch Is Hiring

12:01 pm PST • February 24, 2011

Would you like to be a Product Lead for TechCrunch? How about a Sales Marketing Manager? Maybe an Executive Assistant? We have positions open and we are currently looking for…

Vizio has been one of the top selling LCD brands the last few years. It seems Vizio and Samsung are constantly leap-frogging one another as the top dog. Well, Vizio’s…

Samsung just can’t catch a break this week when it comes to updates. First the Windows Phone 7 update mysteriously bricks a bunch of Samsung handsets, and Microsoft pretty much…

Sony is said to be working on a “hack-proof” PS3. So saysa rumor attributed to an anonymous source—the best kind of rumor, of course. The new PS3 would replace all…

Today, social fundraising platform Fundly announced that it had closed a $2 million seed funding round led by a group of Silicon Valley investors. Using AngelList, a marketplace that makes…

Android Market's Web Store Gets Bookish

10:59 am PST • February 24, 2011

Earlier this month Google launched the web version of Android Market, which lets you purchase applications from your web browser and have them beamed directly to your phone or tablet…

We expect perfection from companies in Silicon Valley. The general consensus is that Yahoo is one of the worst run tech companies in the world, never mind it’s still profitable,…

Can America Function More Like a Fiscally Responsible Company? It's up to Us, the Shareholders

NEC today announced it has developed the industry’s first contact-less biometric authentication system that can read both fingerprints and finger veins. According to the company, the “HS100-10 Contactless Hybrid Finger…

Oh, rumor mill — how you tug at our heart strings. Early this month, the ol’ mill was promising that iOS 4.3 would be hitting our iPhones and iPads on…

A new DSiWare title gives users the ability to create computer programs using the BASIC programming language. Not only can users create their own programs, but it also comes pre-loaded…

Hardware

Video: Old Men Lightsaber Duel

9:58 am PST • February 24, 2011

Nothing to see here. Just some old French men going at it with lightsabers. That’s all. [via Reddit]

Earlier this morning AOL President Media David Eun resigned, leaving us wondering who we at TechCrunch work for now (I mean besides you, dear readers). Now we know. In an…

When researching hotels for a vacation or business trip, a visit to TripAdvisor to check out reviews of a resort are a must. Pictures of rooms on hotel websites often…

Two days ago, we first reported that Apple was likely to release a developer beta of OS X Lion “soon”. Well, how’s this for soon? This morning, alongside their new…

Happy Birthday, Steve! Just like the rumors stated, Apple refreshed the entire line of MacBook Pros today, which just so happened to be Steve Jobs’ birthday. These new models aren’t…

If we were going by Verizon’s own announcements, the HTC Thunderbolt and it’s big ol’ Android-powered screen would have hit the shelves by mid-February. And yet, nothing; a quick glance…

David Eun, my boss’s (Heather) boss since the acquisition, will shortly be leaving AOL. As President of AOL Media and Studios he oversaw the AOL homepage as well as all…

Some Internet wunderkinds don’t bother to finish college. Tumblr founder David Karp dropped out of high school, and now runs one of the fastest growing publishing platforms on the Web.…

Us gadget-lovin’ folks are a weird lot. As much as we love shiny new toys, we also love to see shiny new toys get torn apart. We also, as I’ve…

The Interweb’s been abuzz lately with talk of new MacBook Pros. All signs point to slightly refreshed models loaded with newer Intel CPUs and Apple’s implimentation of Intel’s high-speed Interconnect,…

Storific, the French startup that lets customers place orders in restaurants, bars and hotels via an iPhone, has raised $200k in a seed round financed by Kima Ventures. The company…

It appears that LinkedIn has been blocked in China, after the professional social network became a platform for organizing anti-government protests. The report was first noted by Renmedia. According to…