Amazon Is Only Launching A 7″ Tablet? Genius. (Plus A Mockup!)
The Amazon Kindle tablet is real. Very much real. As in, MG has held it in his very own hands. I threw together the mockup above based on what he shared with me.
As MG explained, we now know that the Kindle tablet won’t initially ship in both 7-inch and 10-inch variants, contrary to previous rumors. After a change in plans earlier this summer, Amazon only intends to launch with a 7-inch model.
That decision might just be the best one that Amazon could have possibly made — and it ought to have Samsung and all of the other Android tablet manufacturers shaking in their boots. → Read More
Call Of Duty’s $50 Per Year Subscription Service Heralds An Expensive Future For Gaming
The world’s largest game franchises have become industries unto themselves. World of Warcraft supports a huge halo industry of gold farmers and grey markets. Farmville and its ilk have turned microtransactions into millions. The teams developing individual games like the next Assassin’s Creed or Gears of War are larger than many entire businesses. So it’s not surprising that the stakes keep getting raised.
Call of Duty is among the most popular games in the world, and although selling millions of copies of the game at $40-60 is a real source of revenue, Activision is hoping that their new Call of Duty Elite service will bring in recurring revenue and rally the fanbase. But will that fanbase accept a yearly $50 fee on top of the game itself? → Read More
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Google Acquires Digital Coupons/Incentives Platform Zave Networks To Bulk Up Commerce
Since 2006, Zave Networks has been working on digitizing coupons and loyalty rewards programs with products like Zavers. With the rise of smartphones, the market has been exploding. Today, Zave Networks takes their cause to a much bigger potential audience: Google has just acquired them.
As they have announced on their site, “When we had the opportunity to join Google, we felt it was the perfect fit for our company and the perfect opportunity to rapidly drive the deployment and use of our platform to the next level.” → Read More
Baidu Looks To Leapfrog Google With Cloud-Based Mobile OS (Update)
Chinese search giant Baidu is reportedly developing a cloud-based smartphone platform in attempt to dip its toes into the mobile pool. Mobile internet users in China totaled 233 million in 2010, projected to reach 957 million by 2014. For some perspective, the total population of both the European Union and the United States was approximately 800 million last year. So in China, mobile is less of a pool and more of a vast ocean.
This should be interesting. → Read More
Google Does A Full House Cleaning: Sunsets Desktop, Notebook, Fast Flip And More
Well, it looks like the brooms and axes are out at Google today, for a little late-summer cleaning. The company announced via its blog today that some of its products and features will be riding into the sunset in the very near future. This news was previewed by CEO Larry Page on Google’s quarterly earnings call in July, who said at the time that the search giant would be doing a wee bit of spring, er, early fall cleaning. → Read More
Amazon’s Kindle Tablet Is Very Real. I’ve Seen It, Played With It.
It’s called simply the “Amazon Kindle”. But it’s not like any Kindle you’ve seen before. It displays content in full color. It has a 7-inch capacitive touch screen. And it runs Android.
Rumors of Amazon making a full-fledged tablet device have persisted for a while. I believe we were one of the first to report on the possibility from a credible source — the same person who accurately called Amazon’s Android Appstore. That source was dead-on again, it just took Amazon longer than anticipated to get the device ready to go. They’re now close.
How do I know all of this? Well, not only have I heard about the device, I’ve seen it and used it. And I’m happy to report that it’s going to be a big deal. Huge, potentially. → Read More
Samsung’s New Android UI Is Ambitious But Flawed
One of the beautiful things about Android is how extensively you can customize things, if you so chose. A quick peek in the Android Market reveals tons of widgets, skins, and launcher replacements, all ready to give the Android device in your life a fresh new look. Shockingly, Samsung has decided to throw their hat into the customization ring with its own launcher replacement called Pure Breeze, developed by their San Jose Mobile Lab. → Read More
Instagram Adds 50 Million Photos In August, Now Over 200 Million Total
Instagram is growing like crazy. In June, we noted when the service hit the 5 million user milestone, with 95 million photos uploaded. At the beginning of August, Instagram hit 150 million photos. And now the service has surpassed yet another milestone: 200 million photos.
Given that our last measurement was at the beginning of August, and the site is now well beyond 200M, that means that Instagram added some 50 million photos in August alone. → Read More
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The Killings Continue At Google: Aardvark Put Down
Google is working fast and furious to streamline their product offerings. Just a couple weeks after killing off all but one of the projects in their Slide division, today comes another death: Aardvark.
Co-founder Max Ventilla says the service will shut down at the end of this month. We broke the news of Google and Aardvark talking in late 2009. By February 2010, they had a deal: Google bought Aardvark for $50 million. → Read More
Google+ To Roll Out A Twitter-Like Suggested User List
Google’s Bradley Horowitz just Tweeted out a note indicating that Google is about to add a Twitter-like Suggested User list to Google+. From the Tweet: We’re about to pilot a ‘suggested user’-like mechanism on Google+. If you’ve got more than 100k followers on Twitter, DM me – lets talk! As stated in the message, Horowitz is looking for users who have more than a 100,000 followers on Twitter.
Besides what Horowitz wrote, there aren’t too many details on how Google+ will decide who will be on the list. Twitter’s suggested user list has been controversial because those on it were assured to gain thousands of followers a day, and those who are left off thought this was unfair. Twitter then revamped the list last year, and now also allows users to create personalized suggested user lists.
→ Read More
Amazon.com’s Big Redesign Is Arriving Soon For All
For days, our inboxes have been filled with tips and screenshots about Amazon.com’s redesign, which offers a cleaned up Amazon homepage, without the old site’s iconic blue and orange navigation. Instead, the new site features a much bigger search bar, bigger buttons, and less clutter – all changes that practically scream “tablet-optimized!”
The changes, of course, hint that Amazon’s long-rumored Android tablet is right around the corner. The site overhaul is being rolled out just prior to the tablet’s launch, or goes the current speculation. → Read More
Keen On… It Will Be Really, Really Difficult for Tim Cook to Screw Up Apple (TCTV)
If you are sick of Steve Jobs stories, then this interview isn’t for you. But, of course, you probably aren’t. On one hand, even though Jobs resigned from Apple more than a week ago, there appears to be no let up in the flood of anecdotes about The Great Leader. On the other, we are now seeing the first significant executive reshuffles reshuffles in the Tim Cook era.
But now that the dust is beginning to settle just a little on the Jobs epoch, what exactly is his legacy and what are the principle challenges and opportunities facing Tim Cook? To answer these questions and more, I went to one of the most reliable sources of Apple intelligence, TUAW.com editor-in-chief Victor Agreda, Jr., a guy who spends his whole day making sense of Cupertino’s alternative reality. → Read More
Will The Next iPhone Be Thinner And Wider? A Gazillion Leaked Cases Say Yes
The Internet is awash in purported iPhone 5 cases. Like most iPhone related rumors, it’s hard to decipher fact from fantasy, but the sheer amount of nearly identical cases seem to state that at least several manufacturing houses have the same iPhone dimensions. The image above is a iPhone 4 in one of these many cases. Look different? Yep, this case, and the many like it, are clearly for a phone that’s both thinner and wider. → Read More
Google Abandons “Maps API For Flash”
In more news of Flash’s impending decline, Google is announcing that it’s “deprecating” the Google Maps API (application programming interface) for Flash. This API previously allowed developers to add Google Maps functionality within their Flash-based applications.
However, as of today, use of the API is limited, says Google, with only a small number of applications taking advantage of features unique to the Maps API for Flash alone. → Read More
TechCrunch Giveaway: Tickets To BoxWorks Featuring Third Eye Blind #TechCrunch
Want to attend an enterprise software conference after party with Third Eye Blind?
Cloud content management startup Box.net is holding its first-ever customer conference, BoxWorks, on September 28th in San Francisco. To celebrate, they’re throwing a big after party featuring Third Eye Blind. The party gets started at 6pm at the Bently Reserve, and runs until 11pm. There will be an open bar, heavy appetizers, and lots of dance floor action.
→ Read More
Full Video: Salesforce’s Marc Benioff Interviews Google Chairman Eric Schmidt
Salesforce CEO and founder Marc Benioff sat down for an hour-long interview with Google’s Chairman and former CEO Eric Schmidt last night at Dreamforce, and here’s the full video of the interview. We’ve embedded it into the post as well.
→ Read More
The CrunchFund: Actually, Tim, We Don’t All Have “Different” Standards
Yesterday afternoon, Mike Arrington and AOL CEO Tim Armstrong announced the launch of “the CrunchFund”, a venture fund that will — according to the New York Times — “invest in start-ups, including some that [Arrington] and his staff write about”.
Oh boy.
But it gets better. Apparently keen to pour iced water on the burning oil of controversy, Armstrong responded to those who feared that TechCrunch’s journalistic integrity might be affected by a perceived financial relationship between the publication and its subjects.
What he could have said was this:
“Despite the name — which in hindsight was a bone-headed choice — it’s important to understand that ‘the CrunchFund’ is a simply an extension of Mike Arrington’s existing angel investing activities. None of the writers and editors of TechCrunch has any influence over, or stake in, the fund and hopefully it goes without saying that it will have absolutely no impact on the day to day editorial independence of TechCrunch.”
That’s what he could have said. What he actually said was this:
“TechCrunch is a different property and they have different standards… we have a traditional understanding of journalism with the exception of TechCrunch.”
For. Fuck’s. Sake. → Read More
Gartner, IDC: Windows Phone To Steal Second Place From iOS By 2015
Based on its history, you probably wouldn’t expect to see Windows Phone take off like a rocket. But apparently that’s what it’s going to do. Research out of Gartner and IDC says that Microsoft’s platform may grab a whopping 20 percent of the market by 2015, with the help of hardware partners like HTC and a little extra effort in the marketing department. → Read More
PhotoAppLink Ties iPhone Photo Apps Together, Makes Multi-App Editing Simple
Several iPhone app developers have teamed up to launch PhotoAppLink, a new open source initiative that aims to simplify photo editing by tying multiple photo-editing apps together.
As you know, there are an incredible number of photo editing apps in iTunes today, and often, each especially excels in one particular area. For example, converting photos to black and white, cropping, compositing or writing on top of photos are all features of popular standalone apps.
But what about when you want to make multiple edits using multiple apps? That’s a far more complicated process. And it’s the very problem PhotoAppLink aims to solve. → Read More
Nike Apologizes For Nike+ Issues, Promises Fixes, New Platform Soon
Jayme Martin, VP and GM of Nike Running, has emailed a letter to Nike+ users, apologizing for the platform’s performance over the past few months. He says that Nike is aware of a number of issues that have been affecting its users, including problems logging in, syncing devices, sharing runs and editing profiles.
“Just like you, we hold ourselves to incredibly high standards,” writes Martin, “and right now Nike+ isn’t living up to them.”
The letter also revealed Nike’s plans for a new Nike Plus platform that will resolve these issues as well as add more features. → Read More
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