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Microsoft Says It Isn’t Abandoning Xbox Music, Promises It Will Suck Less Shortly | Alex Wilhelm | 2,014 | 7 | 23 | During , CEO indicated that his company would “streamline” its work in music and video. That was in some cases to imply that was walking away from Xbox Music, its beleaguered competitor. Not so, it turns out. Today Microsoft’s tweeted that Xbox Music was not dead, and that the company will release an update to the service soon: Don’t worry, no plan to drop Xbox Music/Video– my team builds these key scenarios for tablets, phones, PCs! And Xbox team does on console. — Joe Belfiore (@joebelfiore) In fact, we have one of our bigger/stronger Xbox Music updates just a couple weeks away…you're gonna like it. Perf, fixes and some features! — Joe Belfiore (@joebelfiore) Xbox Music has had a . In fact, on the , there is a for issues with the service. I’ve never had much of a good experience with the product. Microsoft recently killed off its premium content for Xbox. That was pretty non-core to its business model. But offering music to consumers who buy into your platform is pretty par for the course in the current tech scene. So Microsoft has two options: Buy Spotify or make Xbox Music workable. It appears to have chosen the latter. |
The Server Needs To Die To Save The Internet | Natasha Lomas | 2,014 | 7 | 23 | the Internet we deserve? There’s an argument to say that yes, we absolutely do. Given web users’ general reluctance to pay for content. We are of course, . Just not with cold hard cash, but with our privacy — as digital business models rely on gathering and selling intel on their users to make the money to pay (the investors who paid) for the free service. Users are also increasingly paying with time and attention, as more ad content — and more adverts masquerading as, infiltrating and degrading content — thrusts its way in front of our eyeballs in ever more insidious ways. Whether it’s repurposing our friends’ photos and endorsements to socially engineer selling us stuff, or resorting to other background tracking and targeting tricks to divert our attention from whatever it was we were actually trying to do online. The commercialization of the web is the ugly reality of the hidden cost of all the datacenters and servers required to power the Internet. And that commercialization is compounded by the power of the big digital platforms that dominate the web we have today: Google, Facebook, Amazon. Increasingly we’re forced to play by their rules if we want to participate in the digital space where most of our friends are. But perhaps there is another, far better way — that benefits individual web users and startup developers alike. A UK startup called , based in the small town of in Scotland, reckons the myriad problems with today’s Internet can be linked to a design quirk of its underlying architecture. And that the answer to solving the web’s most perennial issues, such as finding sustainable digital business models for content, safeguarding user data and privacy, and thwarting hacking, malware and overreaching surveillance, is to begin again — with a whole new re-architected Internet. No one said this was a small problem with an easy fix. has actually been working on its new network since 2006, finally to begin detailing its grand plan. It’s now rolling out the first of three test networks, to test the underlying network without any apps on it as yet, ahead of a full beta launch in Q4. The initial test network comprises 180 nodes, located in Singapore, San Francisco, Amsterdam and New York. So what exactly is this startup building? MaidSafe’s Nick Lambert summarizes the product as “a fully cross-platform, fully decentralized autonomous data and communications network”. What that means in practice is a network that does away with an intermediary layer of servers and datacenters — replacing that with peer-to-peer infrastructure. (No surprise then that MaidSafe counts Michael Jackson, the former COO of P2P pioneer Skype, as an advisor.) Basically, the users of the network are also acting as the network infrastructure by donating a portion of their spare hard drive capacity — with built in incentives for them to do so in the form of a network specific cryptocurrency (called SafeCoin).
“What we’re building is software that connects together all the computers on the network to form — think of it as one giant computer, or effectively one giant cyber brain. So it really connects together all the nodes on the network and allows them to effectively become a very large datacenter, without of course the datacenter,” explains Lambert. “It’s a network infrastructure that will replace datacenters — and hopefully large technology companies.” That’s right. This startup wants to reconfigure the current Internet hierarchy too — pulling the power and centre of gravity away from the owners of the biggest datacenters and platforms, and putting it back in the hands of individual users. And individual developers too. Development costs for building an app on the MaidSafe network would be lower than via today’s hosted model — being as a startup wouldn’t need to pay for any hosting costs. AWS, Rackspace — not required! There’s also no upfront fee required for the privilege of developing on this network (it’s no Apple App Store). And the is free. Users of MaidSafe’s network contribute unused hard drive space, becoming the network’s nodes. It’s that pooling — or, hey, crowdsourcing — of many users’ spare computing resource that yields a connected storage layer that doesn’t need to centralize around dedicated datacenters. And so doesn’t need any middlemen serving data. The user directly accesses the network, and the network directly accesses the users’ computers. And that’s it. “This is, we believe, to be the world’s first operating autonomous and serverless network that enables self authentication,” says Lambert. “It’s self managing and self healing… If data is lost through nodes going offline it recreates them. It’s able to be resistant to viruses as well… It’s utterly serverless. There are no other networks that combine being autonomous and serverless. “There are other peer to peer networks that you could argue don’t require servers but if you want to join some of these programs at the end of the day you have to create an account to a lot of these services. And in order to create these accounts you have to go to a server and someone has to authenticate you onto the network… With this network self authentication is enabling the user to authenticate themselves onto the network.” So, instead of paying for digital services with privacy, users on MaidSafe’s network pay with hard drive capacity they’re not even using. Which — frankly — sounds like a far fairer, more egalitarian ‘client/server’ relationship than the one we have now. Meanwhile, data being transmitted over MaidSafe’s network is encrypted locally then broken into fragments by its software and distributed randomly across the nodes so it’s stored in a massively decentralized way, thus — so the claim goes — thwarting hacking and snooping. The problem with centralising data storage and transmission by using servers and datacenters is that data becomes inherently vulnerable, argues Lambert. Vulnerable to theft by hackers or other prying eyes — whether that’s corporates tracking us or governments snooping on us. Or regimes trying to control what we have access to. Ergo, all the more reason to throw the middleman away. “MaidSafe doesn’t use DNS. Everything goes through routers in a thing called encrypted RUDP packets, so basically the packets go through the router but nothing can tell what’s inside it. And it doesn’t use DNS so they don’t know that it’s traffic for the MaidSafe network. So countries can’t shut MaidSafe down. So China couldn’t shut off the Safe network the way they could now, or Turkey couldn’t shut it off the way they shut off Twitter. So the only way they can actually stop the Safe network in a country is to shut off the whole Internet. It just can’t be shut down,” he says. “The other interesting thing is the NSA could train all their resources on one router and they still wouldn’t be able to stop and detect MaidSafe network traffic.” Lambert adds that the Internet we have today was also never designed to support so many users — making another argument for overhauling the underlying structure, on network resilience grounds. “As it was originally designed the Internet was never meant to have 2.5 billion people on it. And that’s why it creaks at the seams sometimes. So I think what we’re doing is a kind of evolution — decentralization is a much more efficient way of doing this. And I think whether it’s MaidSafe or somebody else… someone will do it. I think it’s just an evolutionary step.” “A lot of these large [digital technology] incumbents will not be overly happy with us but I think what we’re doing is natural evolution,” he adds. How does MaidSafe ensure resilience with such a massively distributed infrastructure that it has no direct control over? “We keep a minimum of four copies of every chunk of data at all times. And the reason we do that is obviously people will turn their computers off and on, and people will have hard drive failures so what the network needs to know fairly quickly is does that piece of data still exist?” notes Lambert, likening the technology MaidSafe has built for this portion of the network to systems used by file-sharing sites like eMule — except, he says, it’s far, far faster. Because it has to be to make a viable network. “Our network knows within 20 milliseconds if the status of a piece of data or a node has changed. It has to happen that fast because if you turn your computer off the network has to recreate that chunk on another node on the network to maintain four copies at all time.” “We’re often maybe confused with a decentralized Dropbox,” he adds. “And that is maybe one very good use for our network… [because] it’s completely private, we don’t know who our users are, we don’t hold your cryptographic keys so we can’t access your data… But effectively MaidSafe is a data and communications network so you could put any service that you get on the Internet today onto the network — absolutely anything, YouTube, Facebook, Dropbox, basically everything.” MaidSafe calls its network the Safe network — aka Secure Access For Everyone. (The MaidSafe name itself is short for ‘Massive Array Of Internet Disks — Safe Access For Everyone’. It’s also, according to Lambert, a play on RaidSafe — and indeed ‘Made Safe’.) Lambert says the network needs an absolute minimum of 60 nodes to be viable, and likely a couple of thousand to “make it much more established”. “Which I don’t think is really too much when you consider there is 2.5 billion regular Internet users,” he adds. So how is MaidSafe going to incentivize developers to build apps for the Safe network? That’s also built in to the design, via the SafeCoin cryptocurrency. Developers will be able to hardcode their SafeCoin wallet address into their applications — setting their own usage price (which can also be free if they like) — and then the network will pay them based on their app’s usage. “There’s a built in revenue stream for them already. They don’t have to go down the advertizing route, or the support route if they don’t want to,” says Lambert. MaidSafe has already had more than 650 developers registering their interest in the network — and it isn’t even beta launched yet. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rlj0DCa7LyU&w=640&h=360] With SafeCoins being distributed based on app usage, that allows for a network that rewards developers for building services that people actually use. Now just think about that for a minute. Apps that people love and use could receive payment just for being loved and used on this network — rather than their founders having to resort to stuffing ads in front of eyeballs, or selling user data off to marketing entities. That’s potentially a sea change in the kind of digital services that are possible. Consider the problem content producers such as publishers have in getting people to pay for accessing their information. Again, this network could offer a way to earn money from readers without having to rely upon — or resort to — advertizing. This could very well be the micropayments dream that’s long been talked about and hoped for, but not yet executed effectively in practice. From the user perspective, although there can technically be a cost for accessing the digital services on MaidSafe, if you’re acting as a node for the network then the money you’re using to pay for those services is money you’ve earned by being part of the network (i.e. SafeCoin). So there is effectively zero cost involved. “The concept of free is an interesting one, if you have earned SafeCoins by using and providing space to the network then these SafeCoins are used on other services, no money (digital or otherwise) has left your pocket,” notes Lambert. The user also has the option of donating storage space and just converting the SafeCoin they earn straight to fiat through an exchange. In other words they could put MaidSafe’s software on their computer purely to generate a revenue stream from being part of its crowdsourced, distributed datacenter-in-the-cloud. SafeCoin is earned by Safe network users above what they are using on the network so spare capacity is a requirement. Users will also be able to access and use the network for free up to a certain capacity, according to Lambert — which will open it up to mobile users and mobile usage. (And for cryptocurrency nerds, there is a finite number of SafeCoin that can be farmed, circa 4.3 billion, because of a technical limitation, however Lambert says MaidSafe may end up recycling a small percentage, say 2% to 3% per year, to avoid reaching a hard stop — in the ten or so years it takes for all the SafeCoin to be farmed.) Despite open sourcing the network technology itself, MaidSafe is also a startup business — and has raised some $6 million over the years from private investors (including a big chunk from a crowdfunding sale in April) to fund development of the project — so it needs its own business model here too. It’s looking at three areas for that. Firstly it takes a 5% cut of all SafeCoin generated on the network in order to maintain the core code. As the network scales up, that 5% cut scales with it. And if the value of SafeCoin rises it’s also earning a larger sized slice, since 5% of a bigger pie amounts to more pie. MaidSafe’s team also plans to make apps itself to earn money on the network — it now has a team of around 16, skewed towards developers (C++ is the dev language for building on the Safe network). “We’ll be well placed to capitalize on the network because we know it better than anyone else,” says Lambert. “We will create money by making applications that are well used.” In addition, MaidSafe has filed multiple patents — and will be looking at opportunities to license its technologies for use outside the Safe network. “We’ve got about ten granted patents, about 22 pending just now and more on the way. And some of these libraries and technologies that we’ve created can be used outside the network. So, for example, an existing Content Delivery Network… like Akamai they could use our routing and libraries to basically make their distributed servers run much more efficiently and much faster,” he says. “Anyone using our patents within the network is absolutely welcome to do so. The patents, just to point out, are purely defensive.” Although MaidSafe is a for-profit startup business, there’s also clearly a huge determination to see the vision — the concept of a truly decentralized Internet — succeed and “change the world”, as Lambert frequently puts it. So it has set up a not-for-profit foundation that is the largest shareholder in its company. The crowdfunding raise — selling SafeCoin that will be redeemable when the network launches — was also a way to incentivize success across a wider group of supporters. Plus, it’s working on decentralizing its own network knowledge (its own ‘corporate IP’ if you will) — and ultimately diluting its own paycheck by sharing that 5% cut with others — in order to increase the resilience of the network and boost the overall chances of success. “We’re trying to decentralize the Internet, we’re also trying to decentralize the knowledge of the safe network so we’re trying to create global development pods which are not part of the company — these are little separate groups of people that exist in different parts of the world that will effectively start to contribute to the MaidSafe core codebase, and start to take some of that 5%,” he says. “Our intention is to try and create these competing pods. And what that will mean is there’s no central point of weakness to the technology. And it will also make the network much better and much faster. These pods will hopefully start to become self sustaining. As they start to earn SafeCoins for their contributions to the underlying code and taking a portion of that 5% total. They’ll be able to start having a fund and potentially become a legal entity themselves if they choose to do so.” Pods have been set up in San Francisco and Montreal so far, with Washington DC next in line. Talk of pods sounds rather organic and that’s unlikely to be an accident given that the original inspiration for the Safe network came in part from one of the founders, David Irvine, being a fan of physicist Richard Feynman, and drawing on his advice to focus on the natural world when trying to solve a problem. That led Irvine to spend time studying ant colonies — as a model for an alternative, serverless connectivity topology. “Ants are interesting because if you think of them like nodes on our network… they perform pretty much one function — but when you bring them all together they become this great powerful colony,” says Lambert. “So if you think about the nodes being ants, and each of those little nodes performing one function pretty well, actually when they come together you’ve got this amazing, powerful, safe and secure network that will — when it reaches critical mass — be more powerful than any supercomputer.” So, while this small town startup has (mostly) been sequestered a world away from the big digital technology hubs where Internet giants are forged in bubbling development cauldrons liberally fed with VC-cash, you’d never guess that from the scale of its ambition. “Hopefully the network will replace the entire Internet” is a phrase that rolls off Lambert’s tongue more than once during our conversation. And while it may not have big VC backing, given its radical vision and open ethos — the network is being “given away” for free, as Lambert puts it, and once it’s up and running won’t be something MaidSafe has the ability to shut down — it’s not a startup that’s easy to ignore. This idea has the potential to turn the Internet as we know it on its head — for the better. “The network is open source. People can fork it. If we start doing stupid things that people don’t like they can just fork the and just create their own. We’re very respectful that we’re kind of custodians of this network now, which is a fairly risky strategy given how much money and effort has gone into the network thus far, just to give it away — but I think it’s the only way that it will work,” he says. Lambert jokingly refers to the company as the “oldest startup in history”, given its eight+ years of development, most of which were spent in stealth mode. So why has it taken so long to re-architect the entire Internet? When phrased like that it’s not really much of a question… “Doing what we’re doing is exceedingly hard. Which is why it’s not really been done before. We’re different because we’ve set out to decentralize the Internet. And we’re also different because nothing like MaidSafe does exist. People will say that’s just like that or that but there is no other network in the world where you can privately log in to your own data, without anyone else knowing. And store data and share data — without the use of an intermediary, I’m just not aware of any network that you can do that on,” says Lambert. “It probably requires different thought,” he adds. “Developers are trained from a very early stage that the infrastructure is: there is a server, there is a client, the client logs into the server and so on. And I think that has become utterly pervasive throughout the programming community. And I think why it’s not been done before is MaidSafe is such a different mindset.” When Irvine was designing the Safe network he began by trying to figure out what the problem was with servers — and ended up with the realization that servers the problem. “The mindset has been how do we make servers better. Instead of saying servers are the problem let’s try and remove them.” Now there is a thought. [ by ] |
Microsoft Parodies “I’m Sexy And I Know It” And It’s The Worst | Alex Wilhelm | 2,014 | 7 | 23 | The OneNote team has been active lately, across all platforms, and hosting a that included an . Then they decided to reach. Small tip: If you are technology team in any capacity, either a , , or a software development team, leave the and the . Otherwise you end up with this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lf-XI-gihN8 The line between adorkable and just plain awkward is paper thin. Not to be unkind, but no. And, again, no. Not that OneNote isn’t an interesting product. It might suit your needs. But this video helps precisely no one. |
Twitter’s Diversity Report Is More Of The Same | Cat Zakrzewski | 2,014 | 7 | 23 | on Wednesday afternoon after mounting pressure from civil rights groups — and they’re pretty bad if you’re not a white or Asian guy. Overall, Twitter’s employees are 70 percent male and 30 percent female. However when you look specifically at employees in tech, the gender gap grows, and 90 percent are male. (Source: ) Looking at ethnic diversity, 59 percent of employees are white, and 29 percent are Asian. Only 2 percent of employees self-reporting as Black or African-American and 3 percent Hispanic or Latino. This is a stark contrast from the company’s user base, which has had a . (Source: ) Twitter released the report after a and called for more transparency about diversity from Silicon Valley companies. Unfortunately this breakdown isn’t a surprise if you’ve been following our coverage of similar Silicon Valley companies. Twitter’s numbers seem to be on par with those at and , who reported about 70 percent of their employees were male. Both also said about 60 percent of their employees are white. and ’s were slightly better. Both reported gender breakdowns of about 60 percent male and 40 percent female, and about 50 percent of employees at both companies reported they are white. has yet to issue its own report, but CEO . “To that end, we are joining some peer companies by sharing our ethnic and gender diversity data,” , Twitter’s vice president for diversity and inclusion, wrote . “And like our peers, we have a lot of work to do.” In the post, Van Huysse outlined the steps Twitter is taking to make the company more inclusive. They have employee-led groups like a and , “a group for Tweeps of color.” She says the company is also actively taking steps to recruit from underrepresented groups at women’s colleges and historically black universities. They invested in during its seed funding round, and have a partnership with , an internship program for low-income students. The company just hosted Hillary Rodham Clinton on Monday . Clinton spent a good portion of the beginning of her Q&A fielding questions about female empowerment from the likes of Kerry Washington, Amy Poehler and Melinda Gates. It’s good that Twitter and companies like Google are aware of this problem and are acting now, but it’s clear that this is a problem for most companies in Silicon Valley, not just a few. Last night I . About 2,000 interns registered for the event online, and only about one-third were women. Of those I spoke to, about half were interested in pursuing tech jobs specifically. This problem isn’t going away anytime soon. Although the numbers are discouraging, at least more companies are following suit and releasing them. If companies with resources like Twitter and Google can’t recruit a diverse set of employees, which ones can? |
Facebook Share Price Hits All-Time High Of $75 After Hours Thanks To Strong Q2 Numbers | Ingrid Lunden | 2,014 | 7 | 23 | stock infamously took a in the months following its public debut after analysts wondered if the social network was too overhyped in its IPO and employee share lockups expired. But those days now seem a distant memory. On the back of a strong Q2 report, Facebook stock is at an all-time high in after-hours trading. It’s been creeping up for the last hour and is currently at . Its close today at $71.29 is $1.30 shy of Facebook’s 52-week high, and values the company at just under $183 billion. The company today presented , beating analyst estimates on revenues of $2.91 billion and over 1.3 billion users. But just as its , importantly, so are the company’s usage numbers. During the call, CEO noted that on average, a Facebook user in the U.S. in the app. As a point of comparison, just over a year ago, usage by the average person in the U.S. totalled 16 minutes per day. The U.S. is Facebook’s most loyal and valuable market at the moment, so this not only is a sign to investors that it’s still doing well at home, but is also a potential signal of things to come in regions where Facebook usage is still less developed. There is “still so much room to grow,” as Zuckerberg noted today. Interestingly, the strength of the existing business is also giving the company some breathing room in how it implements new monetization features elsewhere, such as messaging. Today Zuckerberg admitted that payments will eventually “overlap” with messaging (something many suspected, especially since Facebook’s key messaging acquisition has sworn off all advertising on its platform), but as Josh earlier, don’t hold your breath. |
Facebook Says Messenger And Payments Will Eventually “Overlap” But Don’t Hold Your Breath | Josh Constine | 2,014 | 7 | 23 | Facebook does plan to , but it’s going to take its time to do it right. Regarding Messenger, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said on that “over time there will be some overlap between that and payments”. He stressed that “The payments piece will be a part of what will help drive the overall success and help people share with each other and interact with businesses.” We shouldn’t expect this to happen too soon, though. Zuckerberg explained that “there’s so much groundwork for us to do.” He continued, “we could take the cheap and easy approach and put ads in and do payments and make money in the short-term, but we’re not going to do that.” He urged analysts and investors to revise their estimates of Facebook’s revenue if they expected this to come quickly. “To the extent that your models or anything reflect that we might be doing that, I strongly encourage you to adjust that, because we’re not going to. We’re going to take the time to do this in the way that is going to be right over multiple years” Zuckerberg concluded. Messenger hit 200 million active users in Q1 2014, and people now send 12 billion messages per day on Facebook. The question on the earnings call about how it would make money from the product was prompted by to run its messaging unit. If Facebook allowed peer-to-peer payments or payments to businesses via Messenger, it could earn serious revenue by taking a cut. Facebook’s international footprint could allow it to disrupt the greedy remittance industry, which often charges migrant workers exorbitant fees to send money home. Facebook could engender good will and save families money while still turning a tidy profit by undercutting traditional remittance players like Western Union, MoneyGram, Remit2India, and more. Along with a strong performance in Q2 in terms of user growth and revenue, this news as has pushed Facebook’s share price to an all-time high of $75 in after-hours trading. |
American Users Spend An Average Of 40 Minutes Per Day On Facebook | Josh Constine | 2,014 | 7 | 23 | American users spend way more time on the social network than exercising. Mark Zuckerberg said today on call that “people on Facebook in the US spend around 40 minutes each day using our service”, while the CDC recommends Americans exercise 21 minutes a day but only 20% of people meet that goal. Zuckerberg said that the 40 minutes a day on Facebook account for one in five minutes spent on mobile in the US. Yet Facebook’s CEO sees plenty of room to grow, as he said “overall people in the US spend nine hours per day engaging with digital media with TV, phones and computers” and called this a “Big opportunity to improve the way people can share”. With 204 million monthly users on Facebook in the US and Canada, it could earn a lot of money by inching up that engagement time per day. Some other interesting stats include that Zuckerberg said hundreds of apps are now using Facebook’s deep-linking standard App Links, and they link to over 1 billion destinations in mobile apps. Facebook now hosts Pages for 30 million businesses, and has 1.5 million total advertisers. COO Sheryl Sandberg downplayed the impact of mobile app install ads to the 62% of Facebook’s ad revenue that comes from mobile and its total $1.66 billion it made this quarter from mobile ads. Her goal was likely to show Facebook’s mobile advertising offering is diverse, and its mobile ad revenue is not subject to instant disruption if, say, Apple and Google started offering app install ads on the app stores themselves. |
Hands On With The Production Version Of The Myo Gesture Control Armband | Darrell Etherington | 2,014 | 7 | 23 | is a Waterloo-based startup with a very ambitious goal – to change the way we interact with our everyday computing devices. To that end, they’ve developed the , a gesture control device that fits around the meaty part of your forearm and detects slight muscle movements, arm rotations and even electrical impulses as you gesture, translating all that information into real-time input. We were lucky enough to get one of the first hands-on demos of the new version of the , which is set to begin to start shipping to developers shortly, and to pre-order customers this fall. Thalmic CEO and co-founder Stephen Lake also takes us through the process of building a hardware startup, and shipping that startup’s crucial first product. The hardware design is final, and though there are a few bugs still be worked out (you can see a couple in the video above), the Myo is just about ready for prime time. [gallery ids="1034133,1034134,1034135,1034136"] What’s interesting about Myo and Thalmic is how much talent they’ve brought in-house to tackle building and distributing their device – their expansive Waterloo office is nearly full and already expanding to a second level, and they house everyone from machine learning engineers to execs to logistics personnel in the same open floor plan, with only free-form breakout rooms offering any doors or walls. Thalmic believes in doing everything as a team, clearly, and that includes doing its own sourcing of component suppliers and assembly partners, and even doing final assembly for the developer pre-order units in-house on site, with consumer launch being handled by a company in nearby Ottawa. As production volume increases, Lake says they’ll consider adding oversees partners, but for now this is very much a homegrown affair. Hopefully the final product reflects the consideration put into its design and construction. |
Tech Leaders Tell Interns What They Wish They Knew At Age 20 | Cat Zakrzewski | 2,014 | 7 | 23 | Hundreds of Bay Area interns lined up on Tuesday to hear some of the biggest names in Silicon Valley share what they wished they knew when they were 20 at a recruiting event called . co-founder , co-founder , co-founder , early PayPal and investor , co-founder , VP of Engineering and founder were among the 11 speakers whose advice ranged from whether or not you should drop out of school to launch a startup to how to network. The event was organized by , who at 19 co-founded , a mobile app that connects you to others with similar interests. shared a story about a PayPal intern who helped develop an anti-theft system called that saved the company when they were about to go under because they were losing millions of dollars due to high rates of credit card fraud. The intern died soon after due to a diabetes complication, and Levchin said PayPal may not exist today without him. “If you’re going to be an intern somewhere, you can and you should try to pick a place where you can make an impact there,” Levchin said. Taking a lighter tone and sealing her place as the favorite speaker of many of the interns I spoke to after the event, Swisher based her advice on five posts you can find on . “Have fun, home is where the pants aren’t,” she said quoting at the beginning of her presentation. She told the interns who she described as “probably hyper about their careers right now,” to go out and have fun and “never turn down an opportunity to have sex or go on television.” Levy tells me about 2,000 interns signed up for the free event, and the line winded down the block from Broadway Studios, which had a capacity of about 500. He said no interns were turned away, and they let about 600 in “night club style,” allowing one to leave when one entered. I’m an intern myself in San Francisco, and this was only my second intern networking event. There’s an immediate awkwardness when you first walk into these events, and at first this one did feel like a crowded night club — with fewer beers and more and t-shirts. It was impossible to navigate the room where recruiters from Eventbrite, Indiegogo and other event sponsors schmoozed with interns and hungry college students lined up for free hot dogs and pasta. At age 20 I was on the older end of the guests — another intern pointed out a boy who was around 15 interning at Google, and a 15-year-old asked a question about a startup he has already launched during the Q&A. When registering for the event, interns filled out an extensive survey. Only 40 percent of those surveyed said they wouldn’t drop out of school to work on a startup, 40 percent said they would consider it and 20 percent said maybe. More than half of the interns at the event were CS majors, and about 80 percent studied something engineering related. About 1/3 of those who registered were female. During a Q&A with the speakers, one young woman stepped up to the mic and asked the panel for any advice they would give a woman looking to break into the industry. Only two of the speakers at the event were female, and Swisher was the only woman on this Q&A panel. “It’s a sausage fest out there ladies, and not in a good way,” said. This became abundantly clear a few minutes later when the panel moved to Michael Callahan, Levy’s co-founder at One, who said evolutionarily, we tend to encourage boys and discourage girls. “I think all we have to do to change the industry as a whole is to just be sexless, just absolutely ignore the fact that you’re a woman and compete just as hard as the men,” Callahan said. Swisher was quick to reply, sarcastically apologizing that women couldn’t vote until a century ago, and saying it’s not just “up to the women to lean in or whatever the fuck they’re supposed to do,” calling men to be more aware of the gender disparity. Levchin followed, telling the girls in the audience to “keep kicking ass and focusing on being great.” Even though I have no plans myself to drop out or launch a startup, it was empowering to hear these industry leaders and know they still got where they are today, despite a few mistakes. |
Facebook Sets Revenue Per User Records Around The World In Q2 | Alex Wilhelm | 2,014 | 7 | 23 | just turned in a , with its revenue and earnings per share both beating analyst expectations. The company reported sequential-quarter user figures that were soft, but Facebook’s stock is now in the green after-hours. Driving its strong financial performance in the period was high average revenue per user, or ARPU. Facebook set records around the world for how much revenue it generated from its users on average around the world. Here’s the chart: The charts imply that Facebook is able to pick up more cash per user, even as it expands its user base. That’s good news for the company, as it infers, I think, that regions that perform less strongly than North America have a shot at growing their per-user top line, and thus provide Facebook with revenue potential for some time to come. Of course, Facebook has also placed bets on and , applications that it views differently, from a revenue-potential perspective. |
New Infosys CEO Vishal Sikka Prepares To Take The Helm | Ron Miller | 2,014 | 7 | 23 | It’s been a whirlwind few months for . It began as executive and head of products at SAP at the beginning of May and it has continued as he prepares to take the helm at on August 1st. When I spoke to him at the end of May, , he seemed at peace with his decision to leave in spite of the abrupt way that it happened, and ready to move on to whatever came next. He said he was considering a number of options, but was prepared to take the summer off and consider his next move. As I wrote at the time, he left the door open though for something big, saying “if a great offer came along, one he couldn’t refuse, he would take it –and he hinted there were some possibilities moving so quickly it might happen.” As it turned out, that offer did come along , a global consulting firm based in India with over 160,000 employees worldwide. It’s worth noting from a financial standpoint, that offer was a doozy. In fact his reported salary of $5M a year with a total package value of over $7M annually makes him in India. It’s far less than U.S. and European CEOs with similar responsibilities get, but it appears to be a huge sum by India’s usual standards. Sikka that attempted to summarize his abrupt transitions that his personal disruption mirrored the struggles that large organizations go through all the time, suggesting perhaps that his experience of moving from head of products at SAP to unemployed to CEO at , all in a matter of months, prepared him in unique ways to run a big company like Infosys. After all, he has experienced disruption first hand. As we’ve talked over the course of the summer since he left SAP he said he looked forward to his time off and spending time with family, but his summer plans changed dramatically after he accepted the job at Infosys. He admitted that when he was first approached by Infosys, he had little familiarity with company, but he was immediately struck by the positive energy inside the organization. He told me he can categorically say he is happy with the founders, board members, employees he has met to this point, and he told me the reception he has received has been “unbelievable.” Sikka sees software as a way to change the world and he says as an optimist he believes it has the potential to improve the world. Further, he believes a company like Infosys is well-suited to enable that change and help make that happen. “I see all the signs that is going to happen,” he said. He believes Infosys’s presence across industry verticals provides it with multiple opportunities to innovate and help transform the services it provides beyond simple, mundane changes. Sikka also told me he sees software as a way to expand human abilities. In fact, he said that he is bothered by the word augmentation as it relates to software, which in his view is just about doing the same thing except bigger. Instead he believes solutions should be about amplification and expanding reach and knowledge and capability of an organization. Sikka realizes his life is about to change in a fairly dramatic way and he has no illusions that the job ahead of him will be easy, but he sounded like he was looking forward to the challenge. He said he would use the rest of the summer before his August 1st start date to understand the company better, familiarize himself with its challenges and he hopes hit the ground running when he takes over in August. He acknowledges that it will take time to understand the nature of the problems Infosys is currently facing, and stabilize things before moving forward, and he was not ready to share specifics in my conversations with him just yet. He only said, he is taking the time to learn about the company he will be running, so he can use his leadership position to affect constructive change. Sikka told me in one of our early conversations that he hoped to surf this summer, something he stopped doing after joining SAP 12 years ago, and he was actually able to do that again. Now it’s time to get back to work and catch the wave to his next challenge. As he said as we closed our recent conversation, “A great change is coming.” There is little doubt he will be under intense scrutiny, but he sounded like he was looking forward to facing the changes and challenges associated with that. |
null | Darrell Etherington | 2,014 | 7 | 24 | null |
Facebook Beats In Q2 With $2.91 Billion In Revenue, 62% Of Ad Revenue From Mobile, 1.32B Users | Josh Constine | 2,014 | 7 | 23 | earnings beat projections for the 8th quarter straight with $2.91B in revenue and $0.42EPS . The service is growing about twice as fast on mobile compared to its services as a whole. Facebook now has 1.07 billion mobile monthly users, and 654 million daily mobile users. That helped it bring in 62% of its ad revenue from mobile. In total, Facebook now has 1.32 billion monthly users and 829 million daily users, or 63% of users returning each day. It beat Wall Street’s estimates of $2.81 billion in revenue and $0.32 EPS. Wall Street responded positively to the earnings release, pushing $FB up 5.25% in after-hours trading to what would be an . Compared to Q1 2014, Facebook’s total user count is up 3.125% from 1.28 billion total monthly users to 1.32 billion, and total daily user count is up 3.36% from 802 million to 829 million. Monthly mobile user count is up 5.9% from 1.01 billion to 1.07 billion, and daily mobile user count is up 7.4% from 609 million to 654 million.
Facebook picked up a little steam in terms of growth in its home market, with the USA and Canada region growing by 2 million monthly users, opposed to 1 million users in Q1. That could quiet critics saying Facebook is falling out of favor with Western users. It now has 391 million mobile-only users, which dwarfs its 240 million desktop-only users, showing Facebook is transitioning well into the mobile age and has its teeth sunk into mobile-first emerging markets around the world. Facebook hit an this quarter. Ad revenue per user was up in all geographies too, which is strong considering the US and Canada market saw from Q4 2012 to Q1 2013. Meanwhile, one dark corner of its earnings report was payments revenue, which is largely derived from its web games platform where it earns a 30% tax on in-app purchases. Total payments revenue was down slightly to $234 million from $237 million in Q1, though it’s still up 9% compared to Q2 2013. The fall was largely driven by reduced payments in the US and Canada region, where smartphone users have largely moved their casual and mid-core gaming to mobile platforms like iOS and where Facebook doesn’t get a cut. CEO dryly remarked in the earnings release that “We had a good second quarter. Our community has continued to grow, and we see a lot of opportunity ahead as we connect the rest of the world.” Facebook’s share price came into earnings today just $1.30 share its all-time high. This quarter has seen a lot of Facebook news on the business front, in particular the launch of , its mobile ad network that will let it earn money by applying its targeting to ads in other companies’ apps. However, that product is still spinning up and probably didn’t contribute meaningful revenue this quarter. Facebook also gave another shot at competing with Snapchat with the launch of , a photo and video messaging app where to unlock and see shots sent to you by friends, you have to reply with your own content first. In the earnings call this afternoon, I hope to see Facebook voluntarily discuss teen engagement levels, or at least hear an analyst ask about them. Last time Facebook mentioned a slight dip amongst young US teenagers, its share price plummeted. [ : During the earnings call today, Zuckerberg said that , but that Facebook will take its time with monetizing its standalone chat app. Zuckerberg also noted that on the service, but the company has plenty of room to grow that since Americans spend 9 hours per day on digital media.] |
Uber Releases Windows Phone App, Dozens Of Seattle Users Rejoice | Ryan Lawler | 2,014 | 7 | 23 | is pretty much everywhere these days, as its on-demand ride service is available in more than 150 cities in 40 countries around the world. But until today, there was one place you couldn’t find Uber — in the . The four-year old startup has , succumbing to the platform boredom that comes when you’re already on devices that make up about in the world. Today it’s reaching for that incremental last 5 percent, with a native app available on the Windows Phone Store. Windows Phone users could previously access Uber through a mobile web site, but the new app will give them the same type of native access that everyone else in the world already enjoys. Sources say people in the Redmond area are dancing in the streets. Next up, ! |
The Amazon Fire Phone Is A Shopper’s Delight But Not Much Else | Kyle Russell | 2,014 | 7 | 23 | For the better part of a decade, Amazon has been rolling out e-readers, tablets, and a box that you hook up to your TV while building up a library of content available on all of them. Now they’re hoping they can replace the device you always have on you and spend the most time on: your smartphone. It’s a bold move. At this point, most people have already decided where their smartphone loyalties lie. Some people are in love with , while others like and either have a preferred brand or bounce around between manufacturers based on price, specs, design, or a number of other factors. While it costs the same $199 on contract at AT&T (or somewhere in the $20-25 per month range, if you want to pay the full $650 over time) as other flagship devices from its competitors, the Amazon Fire Phone packs in 32 GB of storage standard, gives you a free year of Amazon Prime, and throws in unlimited photo storage in Amazon’s cloud to boot. Those who pick their smartphones upgrades by focusing on bang for your buck might be won over by the included goodies alone. Most people will find their basic smartphone needs met by the . There’s email, texting, a basic note-taking app, and so on. The screen is 4.7 inches, the same size as rumored for the new iPhone coming this fall. At 720p, it isn’t the highest resolution screen on the market, but most people probably won’t notice — video still looks gorgeous. The camera is fine — at this point, I think most people can’t really tell the difference between photos taken on most high-end smartphones anyway. Inside, the Fire Phone is packing a Snapdragon 800, 2 GB of RAM, and an Adreno 330 GPU. In practical terms, that means it won’t have trouble keeping up with whatever apps or games you throw at it. In several days of use, the Amazon Fire Phone only stuttered for more than a few seconds one time, an issue that was cleared with a restart. Basically, it’s about as fast and reliable as you could hope for. Now that phones are getting bigger, manufacturers have to put more thought into where they put the physical buttons for volume, power, and accessing the camera. Most big Android devices put the power button on the side, where it’s easier to reach one-handed, but Amazon instead put the camera button in that spot and the power on top. I think these should be swappable in software — personally, I turn the screen off more often than I take photos, and reaching the top of the Fire Phone is a stretch for most common hand positions. Amazon’s app store has of what you expect, like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and the most popular games in Apple’s App Store or the Google Play Store. But once you get past the apps that should obviously be on any modern platform, the pickings are rather slim. And because most apps are simply straight ports from Android, many app store pages show images that were clearly taken from a standard Android device, as the navigation controls and status bar are still present. It doesn’t hurt the experience, but it also doesn’t give the impression that you’re using apps built to take advantage of what Amazon is providing. What hurt the experience is that the device asked for my Twitter and Facebook account info at setup, but didn’t use that data to log into these apps when I downloaded them from the app store. I don’t like giving out my data without good reason, thank you very much. [gallery ids="1033530,1033534,1033533"] Amazon took great strides to make using the Fire Phone feel different from what you get on iOS or in “regular” Android. It’s running a fork of Google’s operating system, with a completely different look and feel from what you get in the “stock” version. Those who have used Amazon’s Kindle Fire tablets will recognize the Carousel interface on the home screen, which shows the most recent apps used. Below each app on the Carousel is a stationary widget showing relevant notifications. The mail app might show a message from your inbox, or the Fandango app will show nearby movie times. Apps not built specifically for the Fire Phone instead show links to similar apps in the app store, a feature that’s useful while you’re just getting everything set up on the device but disappointing once you’ve been using it for a while. Things that should be there just aren’t: Twitter doesn’t show recent mentions or retweets, Facebook Messenger doesn’t show recent conversations. Besides the Carousel, Amazon breaks from the stock Android mold by introducing a three-panel interface across its home screen and apps. Accessible via a flick of the wrist or a swipe from the edge of the screen, the left panel is used to give quick access to menus and settings while the right panel shows nifty shortcuts, like attachments you’ve recently received in the email app or your recently taken photos in messages. It’s supposed to make one-handed use easier, but the motion detection isn’t as reliable or quick as using an old-fashioned swipe. The most flashy gimmick on the Amazon Fire Phone is Dynamic Perspective, which uses four infrared cameras to track your face, instantly redrawing things on screen at new angles to give the illusion of depth. It’s really cool looking the first time you see it, but outside of making the lock screen more enjoyable to look at it doesn’t add much to the experience. I can see how it would work well in games, as moving camera controls to a combination of tilt and head movement makes it easier to map other buttons onto the limited screen space available. The Fire Phone’s other standout feature is Firefly, which lets you point the camera at physical products with a label in your environment and find them on Amazon (or in other databases of products, once outside retailers start taking advantage of the tools to build on top of Firefly that Amazon has given to developers). Firefly can also identify music, television, and movies, useful for those with friends who watch. It also lets you pick out email addresses, phone numbers, and other info, making it a decent app for keeping notes as well. Amazon that offers similar functionality for some time, so it will be interesting to see if Firefly makes it over to other platforms or if Amazon decides to keep this more advanced version on its own device. Speaking of things you only get on Amazon’s devices, consuming media on the Fire Phone is a better experience than what you get on other platforms. Movies and books are treated like apps in the home screen interface and Carousel, so if you don’t want to open the Kindle or Instant Video apps, you can simply pin whatever you’re reading lately to the front and have immediate access. If you have a commute that puts you outside of cell range regularly, you can also download TV episodes available on Amazon’s subscription service for no extra cost — on the iPhone or iPad apps, you still have to pay separately for each episode before you can download. Avid readers will enjoy the auto-scroll feature that takes advantage of the cameras used for Dynamic Perspective to move down a page of content while you’re looking at the phone. It works well in the Silk web browser, but it wasn’t available in the Kindle app in the build given out to reviewers. I also wasn’t able to buy a book from the Kindle app and had to jump over to the web browser, which I found kind of hilarious given the Even for those who only care about consuming content, the fact that you can only use the Fire Phone on AT&T might be a deal breaker. People can be as die-hard about their choice of cell carrier as their choice in operating system, and many simply won’t want to give up the reliability of Verizon or the low prices on T-Mobile. Still, I think there’s a market for the Fire Phone. Some people really don’t care about Google Now or having access to the latest app fads. Those who have fallen in love with Kindle Fire tablets and buy all of their content through Amazon — or don’t pay for any content at all thanks to Amazon Prime — might find that the Fire Phone is perfectly capable of meeting all of their needs. [tc_5min code=” “ |
Kumo Is Raising $50 Million To Break The TV Bundle | Alexia Tsotsis | 2,014 | 7 | 23 | Despite , the hope of disrupting the TV industry is still alive in the tech world. A new startup led by is in the process of raising $50 million to fill that void. The startup is called , and it’s still in stealth, so details are limited. However, a source very close to the matter told TechCrunch that Kumo hopes to provide television content to users. That would give viewers the opportunity to purchase access to specific channels as opposed to buying them bundled from cable companies, or getting access to an incomplete library of content long after it’s released through or . Of course, this is a notable task considering that the oligopoly of content creators and owners profit wildly from the bundling of their channels, as opposed to asking people to pay for just what they watch. But founder has the experience to navigate these turbulent waters. Davis was an early Aoler, spending time there as a Senior Vice President of Strategic Development during the course of the / merger. After that, he spent five years as the head of corporate and digital development at Dish Digital. Historically, the smaller Dish empire has attempted to differentiate from its cable competitors by offering streaming options. This makes sense considering that Dish doesn’t have the same leverage as a player like Comcast, which owns the pipes. Davis was part of that at Dish, as he was there during the , the (which put Dish even further into the digital streaming world), as well as the launch of Dish World, which provides complementary streaming of international programming to users. Unlike , which paired a remote antenna service with a cloud storage service, offering nearly live television access and DVR for 30 different broadcast channels, Kumo is taking a different approach. Sources claim that Kumo is working to license content, which would mean that at least one media company will be agreeing to break the bundle, though it’s unclear who that seller will be. The golden goose would be Time Warner’s HBO, widely considered to be one of the most valuable products in television with the most leverage to go over the top. Time Warner/HBO is currently being , which is reportedly considering a buyout of Time Warner. However, Time Warner rejected the initial bid, and CEO Jeffrey L. Bewkes said in a video to employees that Time Warner’s “business plans will create significantly more value for the company and our shareholders, and that’s superior to any proposal that Fox is in a position to offer.” Many have predicted (or maybe wished, depending on your perspective) that HBO will eventually go over the top, as its consumers are the hungriest for its product. After all, hardcore law-abiding HBO fans are essentially forced to pay for as many as 500 channels (around $100) before they even have an opportunity to pay the extra $15 for HBO access. Putting aside bundle wholesaling for properties like ESPN and big broadcast networks, HBO alone likely keeps a good chunk of smaller television channels alive and on the air, all based on the fact that they’re subsidized by hungry HBO fans. For all intents and purposes, if the bundle is going to break, HBO currently has the most leverage to do it. Of course, that doesn’t mean there are no obstacles there. Infrastructure, support, and most importantly marketing channels through cable providers would be lost as soon as HBO goes over the top. But that hasn’t stopped HBO from about the idea. Historically, big players who have approached the idea of breaking the bundle haven’t succeeded, based mostly on the fact that the cost of an individual channel vs. the bundled option media companies provide is so high that the margin disappears. Kumo is obviously venturing into dangerous territory with fewer resources than those who have tried before them, but perhaps time will be on the startups’ side. We have also heard from another source that Epix was shopping around an deal for its original content (movies and TV shows) for around $35 million earlier this summer, though a deal with a smaller player like that wouldn’t likely have the same domino effect as a player with the stature of Time Warner/HBO. Still, we can’t know for sure which media player(s) are open to a deal with Kumo until the service launches. We do, however, know that $50 million in financing will pay for a lot more than UX, engineering, and other technical costs. In terms of the funding itself, it’s unclear who’s in on the round. One source close to the deal says that it’s mostly private investors, and confirmed that is involved in the round, but also said that the deal hasn’t closed yet, which could leave that $50 million figure open to some change. Cuban, longtime serial entrepreneur, investor, and owner of the Dallas Mavericks, has been publicly interested in a project like this ever since he built Broadcast.com, and even recently showing how he had tried something similar in 2000. It’s possible that Revolution, Aol co-founder Steve Case’s investment firm, could be involved in the deal, given previous ties that Davis has to Aol and the fact that Revolution is prepared to lead a round so large. Still, Revolution’s involvement is just speculation and not confirmed. Other potential institutional investors include , the , and , all of whom are capable of writing these type of checks and all of whom have had an eye on media-focused companies. We’ve reached out to Neil Davis (and, just in case, Revolution Ventures), but did not receive a response with comment. (Update: Revolution responded and said that they are not involved in any financing with Kumo.) |
Thiel Fellow’s Elegant Sleep Tracker, Sense, Crushes Kickstarter With $120K In A Few Hours | Kim-Mai Cutler | 2,014 | 7 | 23 | James Proud, a former Thiel fellow, who co-founded the company behind The Sense at his Potrero Hill headquarters. When I first took a look at Sense, a smart sleep sensor , it reminded me of two things. and Google’s old, discontinued Nexus Q product. “Those are two of my favorite things,” said , a former who went on to found a startup behind the device called . “I wanted to create something that didn’t feel like a piece of electronics that you don’t want, like an Apple TV sitting beside your bed. It had to be something that you’d be happy with having there even if it wasn’t doing anything.” So Sense is like the spherical Nexus Q enmeshed in a geometric pattern like what Swiss architecture firm Herzog & de Meuron designed for 2008 Beijing Olympics. is a sleep tracking device that measures temperature, humidity and ambient light. , but pre-orders will start at $129. . He hasn’t disclosed external venture funding, but you could assume there’s probably some significant round given that they’ve been working secretly on the product for about a year. found . Investors are undisclosed. Why sleep tracking? Proud pointed out that people spend one-third of their lives sleeping. “No one’s even looking at the most important room in your life,” he said. In addition to tracking temperature and light, his device has a particulate sensor that can detect small particles like pollen that can disrupt sleep for people with allergies. A “smart alarm” can wake a person up at the right time in their sleep cycle, like early forerunners in the space from several years ago like the Zeo. The whole package contains three components. There’s the beautiful spherical sensor, and then a small clip-on called the “Sleep Pill,” that attaches to a person’s pillow and contains a six-axis accelerometer and gyroscope to track tossing and turning. It communicates with the sphere through Bluetooth Low Energy and ANT. There is no pairing or syncing necessary like there is with other wearables like the , another great product that tracks physical activity on top of sleep. The last component is a mobile app, of course. It awards a sleep score out of 100 based on the sensor data tracking night time disturbances and ambient light. Sense will give a breakdown of your score and help you start to notice patterns that might be interfering with your sleep. Other moments include a proximity sensor that lets you wave your hand over Sense to stop your alarm. You can also wave your hand above the device to light up a ring of LEDs at the base to get feedback on your environment. (Check out the video below.)
Sense enters a fast-emerging space of smart hardware companies like pioneer Nest, . There are scores of smaller companies like the and , along with wearables companies like Misfit and FitBit. Proud said that the company is almost entirely focused on Sense, but they haven’t ruled out working on other devices in the future. The team he recruited comes out of companies like Garmin and Foxconn. “Doing either hardware and software on their own is pretty complex,” he said. “But to do them together is pretty insane.” |
There’s No Crying In Inside Baseball | Alexia Tsotsis | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | Many of you have likely read in a series of profiles of Kara Swisher, the grizzled WSJ reporter who struck out with Walt Mossberg to found . If you haven’t, you should, because it’s pretty good. Swisher is an amazing reporter, and someone who I personally respect a great deal. Featured in the story is a panel from the South By Southwest Interactive conference this past March, in which Swisher, from , and from the Guardian discuss why a tech blog did not break the Snowden leak. In fact, the panel’s title was For my part, I participated in this panel because I retain the hope that the publication I help run will, indeed, break the next PRISM story. It would be great if we could nurture our young reporters to be as hard-hitting as a or a or a even. I hoped that dialogue with my fellow reporters at this panel would help us all confront some of the problems in tech media, including the fact that it is sometimes very PR-driven, and sometimes very conflicted. I’ve written and have been very clear and about my views. At one point during the panel, The Guardian’s tech director recounted a story where GCHQ (the British equivalent of the NSA) showed up at her offices and demanded that they destroy the Snowden hard drives, which they did knowing there were copies. I was impressed, and mentioned that since Aol — our parent company — was a participant in PRISM, I was not sure if we would have had the ability to fend off the same attack. “I wish we could,” I said. TechCrunch is basically a cheerleader. We need to step back from role as cheerleader and have a more critical eye. — Ron Miller (@ron_miller) This context led into the next quote, which has been frequently cited since it was highlighted by New York Magazine: “[I] would have succumbed to the pressure of the Obama administration now.” There is an “I’m not sure if I …” left out there. From what I recall, during the conversation at SXSW, Kara and I both held that, compared to our esteemed peers at the Guardian, we in the Silicon Valley tech media ecosystem are embedded deeply in what we cover. Here is the quote attributed to me, published by New York Magazine: “Techcrunch “is just a cheerleader,” she said, and “a lot of tech media is sort of in the pockets of the people we cover … We’re inviting them to our parties. We might be dating some of them. We are right in the middle, in the thick, of the tech industry.” I do not remember my exact words above, but then again, I did not know that my inside baseball panel dissecting problems in tech journalism would be used to make me look like I’m happy about the above situation. If I had known, I would have tried to be more concise. Or seem less complacent. So if I may, I’d like to set the record straight here. I’m not happy or cheerful about tech media’s flaws. I think they are an obstacle to the truth. And yes, I worry about my sources getting fired. I don’t think that it makes Kara Swisher better that she “doesn’t” (If she, in fact, doesn’t. I personally believe that she cares about the fates of her sources as much as I do). My “That’s why you’re better than us” response was tongue-in-cheek. Self-awareness is a gift and TechCrunch is better off understanding, and willing to be transparent about, the current state of tech media. Even if it means risking being taken out of context to fit someone else’s competitive agenda. We are not afraid to piss people off here, but if we do, we do it with purpose. I could link to specimens of our more critical coverage to prove my point, but that would be cheap. Instead, I’ll just ask that you please keep reading. |
Sean Parker Provides Bulk of Funding To Pro-Parking, Pro-Car Ballot Initiative in SF | Kim-Mai Cutler | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | The tech industry’s political orientation around transit is decidedly incoherent. On the one hand, you have that could in dense, urban environments. Then you have scores of small startups like , , , and that are creating for-profit routes or shared rides around the Bay Area at hours when local public train systems are either at capacity or not running. Then there’s . He’s the major source of funding for a pro-parking and pro-car ballot initiative called that will appear on the San Francisco ballot in November. Parker did not reply to requests for comment. 1. Parking meters should not operate on any City and County holiday listed sfgov.org, on Sundays, or outside the hours of 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. Commencing July 1, 2015, fees for parking garages, meters, parking tickets, and neighborhood parking permits should be frozen for five years, allowing the City to annually adjust thereafter only for Consumer Price Index (CPI) increases. 2. The introduction of parking meters or variable meter pricing into neighborhoods where they currently do not exist should be allowed only upon petition by the majority of the affected households and merchants. 3. A portion of any additional parking or motorists’ fees and new bond monies earmarked for the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) should go to the construction and operation of neighborhood parking garages. There’s a long list of reasons why free parking is bad policy, Free parking subsidizes driving and is . The 300 square feet or so that is often required to house a single car costs significantly less than other uses of that space, be it for housing, retail or commercial office space. Parking spaces also eat into tax revenue if the same space was used instead for small businesses or residential property. Bay Area transportation planner Jeffrey Tumlin posted this provocative tweet the other month: Avg monthly housing rent for 1 SF human: $2,450 For 1 SF car: $26 Studio: 225-490 sq ft Pkg: 160-300 sq ft , sfcurbed — Jeffrey Tumlin (@jeffreytumlin) (I think his numbers are off on parking costs, as parking spots in many of the city’s eastern neighborhoods already rent for between $200-350 per month. But you get the picture.) Free parking and the cruising it instigates also created the perverse incentives that gave rise to . When and other startups cropped up to let users sell information about the availability of free parking spaces to others, the city government had already been building dynamic pricing into parking . But this proposition would could make this pilot DOA, if not hampered by neighborhood review. The San Francisco city government recently caved to car owners by making Sunday parking free and Merchants and car owners demanding parking that could in theory be precursors to subway lines on Geary and Van Ness. (Again, creating another market opportunity for private bus startups like Chariot and Leap Transit.) So before you go on about services like and or these private bus lines creating disinvestment in public transit, keep in mind that the car (and the highway infrastructure and parking spots it needed) was the ultimate instrument of disinvestment in urban mass transit in the first half of the 20th century. As , “The 1950s are calling and they want their parking spot back!” |
Samsung In Talks To Scoop Up SmartThings For Around $200 Million | Alexia Tsotsis | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | Google has , Apple has HomeKit and Samsung has… , we’re hearing. The deal was completed for around $200 million dollars, though it might have been less according to one source. (Update: The deal is not done yet, says another.) : SmartThings has been . is in the , and allows you to connect devices like lights and doorlocks to a system controlled by your mobile phone. It has from investors including Greylock, Highland Capital, First Round Capital, SV Angel, Lerer Ventures, Yuri Milner’s Start Fund, David Tisch, A-Grade Investments, CrunchFund* and Box Group. Samsung most likely bought the startup to get out ahead of Google’s Nest efforts. With this buy, Samsung obtains a mature home automation platform that just needs some marketing help. And Samsung has a . The larger arena at work here is the millions of connected devices that will populate our world — commonly referred to as the internet of things. In a nearly inevitable future where every device in our home has a live connection to the web, and can be controlled by our devices, device manufacturers are the ones most uniquely poised to offer holistic solutions to consumers. At least, that’s the marketing line. In reality, this is a sort of protocol pissing contest, with all of the majors duking it out to be the first to own your home and data. What they do with that data will depend on the player. Google might (and web advertising); Amazon will try to , more accurately; Apple will likely continue to utilize privacy as a differentiation, pointing out that it has no interest in your information as long as you keep buying its hardware. What Samsung has to gain here is a tad more nebulous, though hardware sales of its Android handsets will likely be a big portion of it. smartphone sales continue to fall, and it’s in smartphone profits year over year. Now, the Korean megalith may be looking for areas of expansion that will drive its high-end phones, where most of its cash is coming from. SmartThings had no comment on this story. |
Tesla’s $35,000 Car Will Be Called The Model 3 | Greg Kumparak | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | At one point, third car — the one they’re trying to get to the market for around $35,000 — was called the Model E. Then Ford , given that they’ve got (and a trademark or two) for cars with a similar name. So Tesla is changing it up. Their third generation car will be called, appropriately, the Model 3. (Which, if you ask me, is even similar to Model T phonetically. Oh, and it’s also not to be confused with the BMW 3 Series.) Tesla on Twitter this afternoon, after details trickled out in . According to the same article, the Model 3 should have a range upwards of 200 miles per charge. Tesla says the Model 3 will come sometime after their SUV, the Model X, which should ship sometime in 2015. Alas, there’s still no concrete evidence as to what the Model 3 will look like, though it’s said to look like a smaller version of their somewhat wide-bodied |
Sling Media Introduces $150 Slingbox M1 Box, Upgraded SlingTV UI, And A Desktop App | Ryan Lawler | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | is one of those companies that every now and then you forget about, but they just keep chugging along and occasionally putting out new products. Founded a full decade ago, the company is now a wholly-owned subsidiary of cable and satellite vendor , and yet it’s still building new stuff to get its user base excited. Today Sling is introducing a couple of products — the M1 and the SlingTV. The latest additions to the Sling product family are reiterations and upgrades to its most recent new hardware, the . Launched 18 months ago, those boxes were Sling’s first new pieces of hardware in years. The $150 Slingbox M1, which is $30 cheaper than the Slingbox 350, was designed as a pure streaming device. It captures your video feed and sends it out into the Internet, where you can access it through a number of mobile, tablet, and connected TV devices, as well as through your web browser. Unlike the 350, it has WiFi for easy setup, and integrates with a couple of new apps built for the desktop, as well as its mobile apps. (More on that later.) In addition to watching live TV remotely, which was Sling’s original , users can also play and schedule DVR recordings through the new box. The new SlingTV is basically just an updated version of the old Slingbox 500 with a spiffy new user interface. Like the M1, the $300 SlingTV box lets people stream their favorite live and pre-recorded TV shows on other devices. But with the latest update, Sling Media is looking to improve the experience for browsing, discovering, and navigating content in their living rooms. For customers who don’t have a smart TV and aren’t planning on buying one anytime soon, the SlingTV interface will likely provide an upgrade over their existing grid channel guide. The new electronic program guide incorporates cover art tiles displaying information about programming and also provides personalized recommendations based on reviews, program popularity, and social activity. In addition to providing a more visual experience, the new visual interface allows users to filter by popularity, favorites, and various different genres of programming. For movies, the UI adds Rotten Tomatoes ratings, and for sports the UI instantly highlights scores, stats and other information. Singbox 500 owners will also get the new user interface automatically updated when SlingTV becomes available for sale. In addition to the new hardware, Sling is introducing new clients for and computers. By doing so, Sling is bringing the streaming service out of the browser and making it easier and more responsive to use. : Sling to TechCrunch that the apps for PC and Mac will be native, and will launch alongside the M1 this weekend. It’s also supposed to make the hardware easier to set up, by enabling users to wirelessly connect directly to the devices and enter in their WiFi and account information. (In practice, the implementation doesn’t seem to be as drop-dead simple as they promise — it took three phone calls and multiple hours for me to walk my family through setup remotely.) For those who already know and love Sling products, the latest hardware is a step up over what’s out already. The M1 goes on sale on Sling.com and with select partners on July 20, while SlingTV hardware will become available in late August. |
The $5 Million Cooler | Matt Burns | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | Forget potato salads. There’s a new Kickstarter superstar: . It’s just a cooler yet so much more. It already has over $5 million in funding on Kickstarter with 45 days left on its campaign and is about to break into top 5 most-funded projects. It’s just the coolest! Excuse the infomercial talk, but this thing has everything: a blender, a speaker, big wheels, USB power, lights, and more. There’s even a bottle opener secured to the front. Disruption! The Kickstarter page states that The Coolest will retail for $299. That’s a lot of beer money. But if you order it through the Kickstarter campaign, it only costs $185. And over 23,000 people have already pledged enough money to buy one. Clearly Coleman, Igloo and all the rest of the cooler establishment missed the mark on this one. With just over $5,000,000 in funding and 45 days left, the is about to eclipse Reading Rainbow’s funding level and is closing in on the Veronica Mars movie and Neil Young’s Pono Music player. Does the world need a $300 smart cooler? Of course! |
Reddit, Privacy Groups Call On Obama To Reject Cybersecurity Bill | Cat Zakrzewski | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | A coalition of 30 companies and privacy groups, including and search engine , on Tuesday demanded that . The bill has come under fire for its loose limits on sharing information about cyber threats without properly filtering personal information from it among government agencies, including the (NSA). The controversial bill, the , was in a closed Senate Intelligence Committee session on July 8, and it is expected to see a full Senate vote some time this year. The bill would encourage companies to share information about cyber threats with each other and with the federal government, but the letter from the coalition to the president said the bill failed to “provide a comprehensive solution” to cyber threats because it, among other complaints, only addresses information sharing. The bill sets few limits on how the government implements and shares the data once it receives it. If CISA becomes law, the data could be used for prosecution of a wide range of crimes not directly related to cybersecurity, including violations of the Espionage Act. In the letter, the privacy groups and tech companies stressed that the government could abuse this information to go after whistleblowers and journalists. The letters lays out a detailed list of reforms that a more “comprehensive” bill would include, such as an incentive process to encourage companies to remove vulnerabilities more quickly. The coalition raises questions about the current transparency requirements for the government, calling the exemption the bill gives for information from Freedom of Information Act requests too broad. The letter also says the NSA or any military agency should not be allowed to have a central role in civilian cybersecurity practices. As Alex Wilhelm and I noted in , CISA is currently a “toxic mix” that has few provisions in place to make sure that personally identifying information is taken out of threat information that companies decide to share with the government. Obama threatened to veto legislation similar to CISA, the , better known as CISPA, when it passed through the House . In the wake of revelations in June that year by former NSA contractor , the president has even more of an incentive to reject this legislation now, as concerns about privacy and the overreaching power of the nation’s intelligence apparatus have grown. the bill’s supporters are pushing for the bill to reach the floor next month. have shown cybersecurity is an area where reform is needed, but simply making it easier to allow companies to share threat information won’t go far enough. The coalition is right to hold out for a more comprehensive reform with fewer privacy implications. |
Yahoo’s Marissa Mayer Says Disappointing Earnings Were Just A “Short-Term Setback” | Anthony Ha | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | After , CEO spent a good portion of today’s analyst call making the case that she can still turn the company around. Mayer said that Yahoo was “not satisfied with our results this quarter.” However, she also argued that “a transformation of this size and scale will take multiple years,” and that this was just “a short-term setback in our pursuit of growth.” A big part of the call involved contrasting Yahoo today with where it was two years ago — to the point where Mayer was actually showed before-and-after screenshots of products like Yahoo Mail. She said that when she joined, the company “lacked a clear vision for the future,” which it now has. Among many other things, she said that more than 60 different Yahoo products and services have been shut down during that time, with the resources redirected “to products that are fundamental to our vision for growth.” And she repeatedly trotted out the fact that Yahoo is seeing more than 450 million monthly active users for the first time. “Speed as a strategy has worked for us,” she added, claiming that that’s been particularly true on the ad side. She also suggested that Yahoo can provide a “unified approach” to advertising: “We are the one place where you can buy search, dispaly, native, mobile, video, all in one place — audiences, also.” If that’s all true, then what happened in the most recent quarter? Mayer said Yahoo faced “two key issues specific to our business,” unrelated to broader trends in online advertising. First, she said the transition to (which the team ) was delayed, while ad-buying on the old platform slowed. Second, she said that premium advertising didn’t contribute as much to revenue as the company had hoped. Both issues, she argued, can be fixed in the next “one or two quarters.” Oh, and just in case you were wondering: Nope, no one asked Mayer . |
It’s Hardware Alley Time! | John Biggs | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | It’s Hardware Alleyin’ time and we want to see you in San Francisco for Disrupt SF 2014, our annual celebration of all things startup. It’s a great time. You get to meet great funders and VCs, and I’d love to meet you. Hardware is my favorite thing in the world and you’re some of my favorite people. What is ? It’s a celebration of hardware startups (and other cool gear makers) that features everything from robotic drones to 3D printers. We try to bring in an eclectic mix of amazing exhibitors and I think you’ll agree that our previous We’d like you to register as a Hardware Alley exhibitor. You’ll get to exhibit on the last day of Disrupt SF, September 10 (or take a full, three-day package), to show off your goods and get access to some of the most interesting people (and most interesting VCs) in the world. All you need to demo is a laptop. TechCrunch provides you with: 30″ round cocktail table, linens, table-top sign, inclusion in program agenda and website, exhibitor WiFi, and press list. You can reserve your spot by purchasing a . If you are Kickstarting your project now or bootstrapping, please contact me at john@beta.techcrunch.com with the subject line “HARDWARE ALLEY.” I will do my best to accommodate you. Hope to see you in SF! |
3 Years Later, Google+ Drops Its Dumb Real Name Rule And Apologizes | Greg Kumparak | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | Since launched, many have complained about the service’s requirement that users use their real names. Complaints grew ever louder once started pushing users to use Google+ for YouTube comments. Don’t like your legal name? Using another name for safety or personal reasons? Just don’t want the Internet at large knowing your name but still want to amaze the world with your YouTube wit? TOO BAD. If using your real name wasn’t an option, reportedly suggested . The idea was that people would be less willing to leave awful comments under their real name. Instead, many legit commenters stopped commenting while many jerks just carried under their real name (or whatever Google was their real name.) Three years later, Google is giving up on this battle. You can now use just about any name you please. They’ll presumably have some issue if you use something like “Assface Mcgee,” but Google’s official word is that “there are no more restrictions on what name you can use.” Google first started rolling back on the whole real name thing in January of 2012, opening up the rules to include maiden names and select nicknames. But even then, your original real name was displayed alongside your chosen name – and if you tried to pick something Google didn’t like, they’d roll it right back. Google announced today’s change via (where else?) their , and apologized that it took so long for them to make this decision. To quote’m directly: We know you’ve been calling for this change for a while. We know that our names policy has been unclear, and this has led to some unnecessarily difficult experiences for some of our users. For this we apologize, and we hope that today’s change is a step toward making Google+ the welcoming and inclusive place that we want it to be. |
Adobe Partners With Google To Release Open-Source Font For Chinese, Japanese And Korean Languages | Frederic Lardinois | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | and today announced the launch of a new open-source font for Chinese, Japanese and Korean (CJK) languages that covers 65,535 glyphs, making it one — if not — largest font to cover these languages. The font, which was optimized for both print and screen, is now available for free through Google Fonts and through Adobe’s Typekit, where it is included in the free tier. For reasons surely only the respective companies’ marketing departments understand, will call the font while Google will release its own version of the font under the name . It will also be available through Adobe’s and repositories and the company will make subsets of the font available to those who only need support for a specific language. By default, the font supports Japanese, Traditional Chinese (including Taiwan and Hong Kong SAR), Simplified Chinese and Korean (with hangul syllables), as well as Greek, Latin and Cyrillic alphabets. Having Adobe and Google work together on an open-source font may seem somewhat unusual. Adobe’s principal product manager for type Caleb Belohlavek told me last week that the two companies actually started talking about this project about four years ago. Building a pan-CJK font was something Adobe had been wanting to do for a while and something Google thought would be useful for its own products and its developer community. For Google, this had to be an open-source project, and while that wasn’t always in the nature of Adobe, the company had already started working on its open source font at the time. Eventually, the two companies decided to pool their resources to get this project off the ground. Belohlavek tells me that once the project got off the ground, Adobe’s Tokyo-based Senior Designer Ryoko Nishizuka started working on the overall design of the font, which Belohlavek described to me as “simple in style will retain the elegance of a traditional sans design for Asian characters.” This, apparently, was quite a daunting task, given that many of these glyphs may have up to four different regional variations. Adobe tells me that the other issues the designers faced was to ensure that the font will harmonize well with existing Roboto and Noto Sans families and Adobe’s own Source Sans Latin glyphs. Adobe handled most of the initial design, and Google contributed to the project’s direction and provided the funding for much of the second part of the project, which involved shipping the initial design to partners in Japan, China and Korea to finalize the fonts. While each of these languages is based on historical Chinese forms, they have all morphed into different systems over time, with additional (often subtle) regional variants, all of which have to be accounted for in a font like this. In total, about 100 people worked on this project according to Adobe. The full font weighs in at 19 megabytes and offers seven weights. |
Intel Rises 4% After Reporting Q2 Results, Including Better-Than-Expected Revenue Of $13.8B | Alex Wilhelm | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | Intel’s came in above , with the chip company reporting revenue of $13.8 billion, and earnings per share of $0.55. The street had expected to earn $.52 on revenue of $13.69 billion. Intel had previously to $13.7 billion, with a margin of error of up to $300 million. It met that mark. What drove the quarter for the technology giant? Metal. Its PC division saw its revenue rise 6 percent year-over-year to $8.7 billion, and its Data Center Group grew 19 percent, with top line of $3.5 billion. The company’s smaller Internet of Things group grew 24 percent year-over-year to $539 million in revenue. Its Mobile division saw its revenue decline sharply, however, falling 83 percent on a yearly basis, to a slim $51 million. Intel had a billion dollars more in revenue in the second quarter of 2014 than it did in the second quarter of 2013. Its gross margin improved as well, to 64.5 percent, up from 58.3 percent. For the full year, Intel expects revenue growth of 5 percent, which it states is “slightly higher” than its “prior expectations.” With net income of $2.79 billion, and cash and short-terms of nearly $8 billion, Intel appears to be in decent shape. The company is currently working to expand its mobile chip business, in hopes of growing its share in powering tablets and smartphones, markets where its competitors have so far ruled. Its mobile results this quarter, however, including a sequential-quarter decline of 67 percent, were not strong. The company did affirm in its release that it is still on track to sell 40 million tablet processors this year. Investors, however, appear content with the results, and have bid shares of Intel up more than 4 percent in after-hours trading. |
Tim Draper’s Ballot Initiative To Split California Into Six States Moves Forward With 1.3M Signatures | Kim-Mai Cutler | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | announces the turn-in of 1.3 million signatures. 2016 here we come! — Six Californias (@SixCalifornias) Venture capitalist said he’s submitted the 1.3 million signatures to get an initiative on the ballot in 2016 that would split California into six separate states. Draper’s argument is that California state government needs a reboot and that it needs to be broken into smaller, more responsive political bodies because 38 million people is just too many people to have under a single state government. He and that state’s infrastructure spending has declined dramatically over the last generation. [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkXmQoNHLRw] Well, I don’t really know what to say. But there are two big considerations. Would the U.S. Senate decide that it wanted to add 10 more senators? There’s a that they initiative would have to overcome if it passed here. Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area are net importers of water from more rural regions of the state. Other critics have pointed out that breaking the state apart would increase socioeconomic inequities between the different regions, but Draper says that it’s the poorest states that the initiative seems to poll the best in. Perhaps the other states could charge a whole lot more for water access to fund their infrastructure and schools. This is not to mention how you’d break the state university and prison system apart or how you would fund a proposed high speed rail line from the Bay Area to Los Angeles. Or how you would split the state’s long-term liabilities, You can read the full legislative analyst’s report below here:
That said, could the greater San Francisco Bay Area and Silicon Valley benefit from stronger regional governance? Yes. We have 101 municipalities, nine counties, at least 10 different overlapping public bus and rail systems each making their own decisions, which has led us to the affordability crisis we face today. are the result of exceptionally fragmented governance. Draper also conflates a lot of the factors leading to the state’s poor K-12 performance. For one, , which is a problem that more ethnically homogeneous states don’t face. Furthermore, it’s the very ballot initiative process that Draper is using to push Six Californias, Remember 1978’s Prop. 13, which gutted property tax revenues funding the state school system? Or but didn’t specify where that funding would come from? Here’s a question. Would any of the six proposed Californias inherit the direct democracy system which has so beleaguered their parent state? |
Apple Teams Up With IBM For Huge, Expansive Enterprise Push | Darrell Etherington | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | has announced a strategic partnership with that will see the enterprise giant transfer over 150 of their enterprise and IT apps and tools to Apple platforms natively, and will also have IBM selling Apple iPhones and iPads to its business clients all over the world. In an interview with , Apple CEO and IBM CEO both told the network that Apple and IBM are like “puzzle pieces” that fit perfectly together. “We knew that we needed to have a partner that deeply understood each of the verticals,” Cook told CNBC. “That had scale, that had a lot of dirt under their fingernails so to speak from really understanding each of these verticals and we found a kindred spirit in IBM.” Apple touts the access the partnership gives them to IBM’s big data and analytics capabilities, and talks about how the apps that it produces with IBM will be developed “from the ground up for iPhone and iPad.” These apps will supplement new cloud services aimed at iOS specifically, including security and analytics solutions, and device management tools for large-scale MDM deployments. The so-called solutions will see apps created that are designed to give specific industries solutions tailored to their unique problems – Cook and Rometty described in speaking to CNBC apps tailored to pilots, for example. To do this, the expertise resident in over 100,000 IBM industry and domain consultants as a valuable resource in making apps tailored to different needs. This isn’t about owning the general office; it’s about turning Apple’s software and devices into the core functional software in every vertical possible. Apple has made headway on its own in the enterprise, thanks in , the iPhone and the trend of bring-your-own-devices that we’ve seen arise over the last few years in workforces around the world. And while it has made efforts to highlight the advantages of its platform for business users, this is a very different thing and involves a huge, targeted effort to sell through to enterprise users of all stripes. BlackBerry, in other words, has every reason in the world to be terrified. Industries Apple and IBM look to be tackling first include retail, healthcare, banking, travel, transportation, telecommunications and insurance (among others) per the official press release, with a planned rollout starting this fall and continuing in earnest through 2015. The solution is designed to be end-to-end, covering everything from cloud storage to security and MDM, as well as private app stores and deployments. In many ways, this sounds like what Google is trying to do with Play for Enterprise, but backed by the expertise of a partner that already has extensive expertise identifying and addressing the needs of enterprise customers. AppleCare for Enterprise is also part of the arrangement, and will provide IT customers with 24-hour, all-day support via phone and online, while IBM’s workforce will offer on-site support as well. iPhones and iPads will be sold by IBM to enterprise buyers, too, and those arrangements will include available leasing options. Apple currently offers business and volume sales, but it sounds like under IBM these will be more exhaustive and cover a wider range. Apple incorporated a lot of new features for enterprise and education with changes introduced back in February, and promises additional improvements in iOS 8 via new means of informing users about device configuration, management or restrictions, and new security features and tools. As industry analyst , this is a blow to both Google and Microsoft in terms of the enterprise aspirations of both of their mobile platforms – Apple already managed to disrupt enterprise IT with its devices, and working together with IBM essentially guarantees continued growth in this key market, regardless of any other potential outcomes. Google also announced a key new partnership this year regarding its enterprise mobility efforts – at its I/O developer conference last month it detailed how it would be bringing Knox to all of Android thanks to the help of , to be recast as ‘Android for Work,’ offering a way to partition personal and work data on Android smartphones and tablets in much the same way they’re kept separate on 10 devices using ‘BlackBerry Balance.’ Google Play will be able to offer business-specific approved apps, which can be sold in bulk for enterprise-wide fleet purchasing, Google revealed. At first glance, Apple’s partnership looks to be a more far-reaching overture to enterprise than that Google is making with Android L, but we’ll have to wait and watch how both arrangements shake out when they start to hit the market proper this coming fall. |
Yahoo Gets To Keep More Of Its Stake In Alibaba | Kyle Russell | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | As part of , Yahoo revealed that Alibaba is allowing it to keep a greater portion of its stake when it issues its initial public offering. Yahoo will be required to sell 140 million shares in the Chinese e-commerce company, compared to the That previous deal was already a huge win for Yahoo, as it brought the number of shares it had to sell down by approximately 20 percent from 261.5 million. As , the October agreement left the door open for an amended amount, should Alibaba feel generous: Yahoo owns 523.6 million shares of Alibaba that should hold a value in the tens of billions of dollars after the company’s IPO. Many have speculated about what will do with the capital it would have to work with once it sold those shares, including major acquisitions. By keeping more shares, Yahoo gets less money in the short-term but potentially greater returns from post-IPO growth in Alibaba’s stock. It also gets to maintain a tighter relationship with , one it has been cultivating since Yahoo exec Jacqueline Reses
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Ex-Ford CEO Alan Mulally Joins Google’s Board Of Directors | Matt Burns | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | That didn’t take long. Former President CEO has found a new parking spot at after just retiring from Ford Motor Company earlier this month. Google has just announced the appointment of to its Board of Directors and will serve on Google’s Audit Committee. His appointment was effective July 9, 2014. Mulally joins Google after serving two successful stints at Ford and . Mulally led Ford through the crisis that rocked the U.S. auto industry and propel the car company into the technology age. Mulally even made several appearances at the Consumer Electronics Show, including . Mulally was also long considered to be on Microsoft’s short list to replace Earlier this year, Mulally himself that he was not going to take the job at Microsoft and would stay with Ford at least through 2014. Apparently his plans changed, as he retired from the car company on July 1. “I am honored to serve on the board of a global iconic company that is dedicated to enhancing our lives,” Mulally said in a released statement. “I look forward to working together with the Google board and management team to continue to deliver their compelling vision.” |
VCs Find Fertile Ground In Women’s Health | Christine Magee | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | Silicon Valley entrepreneurs and investors , but they’re fully attuned to the women’s health market. Mobile health apps have become increasingly popular as consumers seek to monitor every aspect of their lives through their mobile devices. In the past few quarters, apps targeting women’s health are topping the charts and capital committed. , women’s health apps raised more money in the past year than all other health-focused apps combined. In the second quarter of 2014 alone, Chinese companies and raised a combined $65 million to support a growing community of female users.
These women’s reproductive health apps, popularly known as “period trackers,” are also two of the most highly funded companies in the consumer-facing mobile health space. In the U.S., companies like and have raised a significant amount of venture funding as well to tackle the fertility and feminine health market. The term “period tracker” has lost some of its initial peculiarity as these fertility (and pregnancy prevention) apps have entered into the tech scene and raised venture capital. For investors, the excitement lies in the user engagement stats. “The great thing about the space is that the engagement is absolutely incredible – people go back on a daily basis and they always want to find out more,” says investor of . Pescatello says he’s seen engagement numbers in Ovuline “almost like Candy Crush in a way- their DAU [Daily Active Users] to MAU [Monthly Active Users] is somewhere over 40%.” For women trying to conceive, Ovuline provides a period and fertility tracking service, and for pregnant women, the app will give daily updates on the baby’s development. High user engagement is essential for apps that rely on user feedback to collect data. Both Ovuline and analyze data provided by users to draw larger conclusions around fertility and alert users when their symptoms might be indicative of a medical problem. Ovuline has seen over 130 million data points entered into its database, with around 20 percent of users answering over 800 questions each. “On a mobile device you get people who answer question after question,” explains, “so you have these users where you know so much about them and there’s a customized experience you can provide.” Collecting user data is the driving force behind Glow’s feedback model, as well. Glow provides women who are trying to conceive with information about when they are most fertile based on the symptoms they enter into the app, aiming to help as many women as possible conceive naturally without resorting to IVF. For women not trying to conceive, Glow provides insights around overall health and will encourage users to consult a doctor if the information they enter into the app aligns with symptoms for diseases or other medical issues. While there are hundreds of period trackers available for free download on the app store (Clue, Period Diary, and P Tracker, to name a few), Glow founder and CEO says that Glow’s emphasis on data is what sets it apart from these “‘rainbows and unicorn’ type of tracking devices.” Fertility is a huge market, as IVF treatments can cost . “The value of a woman trying to conceive and a woman who’s pregnant is pretty massive,” says Pescatello, and “there’s a huge opportunity there, guiding women through all the decisions they need to make.” Once pregnant, women want to know exactly what’s going on with their unborn child and how to do everything possible to prevent complications and ensure a healthy baby. Mountain View-based , for example, recently raised $4.5 million in May to transform the pregnancy experience.
And after birth, “whether it’s storing stem cells or who you’re buying diapers from, there are so many additional consumer purchases,” notes Pescatello. Both Glow and Ovuline, the two major players in the U.S. fertility app market, are providing fertility tracking as a first step in the pursuit of much broader goals. Glow’s founders believe that by providing women with insights about their reproductive health, they can significantly lower the cost of healthcare for individuals and enterprises alike. Pescatello sees Ovuline as the “future of user health” – having the ability to provide users with customized feedback after a short period of time, and using the data collected over time to fine-tune results. And once perfected, this model is applicable to all types of user health, not just fertility. |
Yahoo Misses In Q2 With Revenue Of $1.04B, EPS Of $0.37 | Alex Wilhelm | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | Today after the bell, its second-quarter financial performance, including revenue (excluding traffic acquisition costs, or TAC) of $1.04 billion and non-GAAP earnings per share of $0.37. Revenue including TAC was $1.08. Analysts had expected the company to earn $0.38 on revenue of ex-TAC of $1.08 billion. , which slipped in regular trading in a down market, is up slightly after hours, despite the earnings miss. The company stated in its release that revenue growth is its “top priority,” and that it is “not satisfied with [its] Q2 results” in that context. The company had display revenue of $436 million, down 8 percent compared to the year-ago period. During the quarter Yahoo had search revenue of $428 million, which is 2 percent higher than the year-ago period. Yahoo’s adjusted EBITDA, a non-GAAP financial statistic, totaled $340 million in the quarter, off 8 percent from the year prior. Yahoo sold 24 percent more ads in the quarter than the year prior, which was strong, but saw its price per ad fall by 24 percent, as well. Its ex-TAC revenue fell by 3 percent in the period. Yahoo has a history of slow-to-negative revenue growth. The company had net income of a mere $38 million in the quarter. In the Yahoo had revenue excluding TAC of $1.087 billion. It earned $0.38 on that top line. In short, analysts had predicted that the company would match its last-quarter performance in its most recent three months. Yahoo’s share price is in part determined by its large, and soon to unlock stake in Internet giant . Alibaba has . In its report, Yahoo indicated that it has struck an accord with that will only require Yahoo to sell 140 million of its shares in the Asian company, down from 208 million. That could lower Yahoo’s short-term tax bill, and also allow the company more potential gain, provided that Alibaba’s shares appreciate over time. All told I doubt that the quarter’s results will help Yahoo change the current market perception that it has limited short-term revenue upside. The company remains wealthy, of course, with cash and equivalents on hand of $4.3 billion at the end of its quarter. That figure is down $700 million since the end of 2013. Yahoo, of course, has been on a bit of a buying spree. |
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Harnessing Big Data For Social Good, YC-Backed Nonprofit Bayes Impact Launches | Jonathan Shieber | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | , and , the three founders of latest nonprofit, , aren’t your typical entrepreneurs. The engineer, data scientist, and investor had previously worked on or analyzed investments in some of the toughest problems facing all technology companies in the Internet era — how to get more people to click on more stuff. But in recent years they’d turned their attention away from advertising click-through and to other issues, like criminal justice reform, fraud detection among micro-lending platforms, and better and cheaper research into some of the potential causes of Parkinson’s disease. It was their belief that the data science which allowed them to move more units could be focused on pressing problems facing civil society, and as with click-through rates, someone would hit on a solution. “I was volunteering at homeless shelters for a little while,” says Duan. “I was shocked by the difference between this manual labor, this one-to-one exchange, and the idea that improving the accuracy of a [programming] model by 1% can affect millions of users and bring in hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue.” The ah-ha moment was determining that the same science can be leveraged for social good. “I had been working with the City of New York implementing civic solutions and recognized that the chasm between the technology that industry and tech companies are using and what’s available to civic organizations is huge,” says Jiang. So is looking to cross that chasm. The three co-founders drew together in April through mutual friends and college connections and began recruiting other data scientists with the City of San Francisco to do a few projects. “I worked at a venture capital firm focused a lot on data science,” says Liu. “What’s funny is you’ll talk to these data scientists and they have all their professional experiences and the most interesting part and what gets them most excited is the volunteer interests at the bottom of their resume.” The next step was finding a sponsor, and in San Francisco, the young cohort of data scientists had a more than willing partner. San Francisco had just hired its first chief data officer and it seemed like the perfect opportunity to take the Bayes group and put them at the city’s disposal. “With the first few projects, as soon as we pitched them it made sense to the civic and nonprofit organizations,” says Jiang. “By the time we were interviewing with we had three or four data projects in the pipeline.” Those projects include working with the on Parkinson’s research, working with a microfinance organization on fraud detection, and working with the parole board to develop an algorithm that would help determine recidivism and gauge who should be released from prison on parole and who should not. In addition to the three founders, Bayes is bringing on board a select group of 15 to 20 data scientist superstars to serve as fellows in its fall program who will work on specific projects (probably no fewer than five and no more than 10). “We have a former senior Google software engineer who worked at AdWords and then Google.org,” says Duan. Looking beyond its crack squad of data commandos, Bayes Impact is also recruiting an A-Team of data scientists from top universities around the country, including Duke, UC Berkeley, NYU and USF. Y Combinator is backing the nonprofit with a $50,000 grant, while a Y Combinator alumnus, Teespring, is providing another $50,000 to the company. Data scientists admitted to the program are getting a “living stipend” to work on the projects, says Jiang. “These top-tier data scientists are taking a severe pay cut,” he says. To rack up additional income to sustain itself, the company is also looking to receive modest payments for the social justice organizations it consults with on its data projects, while looking at ways to monetize its research without betraying its mission to remain true to the public good. “We don’t do this as a service for this or that organization,” says Duan. “We focus on one area and come together to say how can we make this issue better as a whole.” |
Software Entrepreneurs Must Go Mobile-First Or Die | Roger Lee | 2,014 | 7 | 12 | Seven years ago when the iPhone was first introduced, smartphones were a novelty. Now they’re the default method of computing for most people. As of late last year, Americans spent 34 hours a month on their mobile devices, compared with just 27 hours accessing the web via a computer, according to Nielsen. This mobile-first mindset has also deeply permeated the enterprise. Some 95 percent of knowledge workers own smartphones, and they reach for them first to do all kinds of tasks – from email and document sharing/management to meeting planning and videoconferencing. Smartphones and tablets are also rapidly entering business sectors such as construction, shipping, manufacturing, healthcare, real estate, education, law enforcement, fleet management and others. Most people have noticed field workers using mobile devices equipped with industry-specific apps (everyone from rental-car agents to home contractors) to complete tasks on the go. As CEO at a technology conference: “Today I run my business from my phone; I could never have imagined that a few years ago.” So for enterprise software entrepreneurs, this platform shift has massive ramifications on product roadmap, product design, hiring, go-to-market strategy and pricing. In other words, it impacts everything. If you’re building an enterprise-software company, mobile must be core to your product strategy; it can’t be an afterthought or add-on. And you must build an elegant, easy-to-use mobile app, because employees and consumers far to mobile websites. U.S. smartphone users spend 86 percent of their time on mobile apps, vs. 14 percent of their time using mobile browsers. One example of an enterprise startup getting it right with mobile is , a CRM software company. At right, a screen shot of the clean, great-looking Clari Daily Brief – perfect for a sales rep on the go whose smartphone is his or her primary computing device. There’s also , a company that alerts IT professionals to potential problems via SMS and email. Also in the market is , a mobile-first messaging system for workplace teams—sort of like WhatsApp for business. These companies and others illustrate a few key precepts that entrepreneurs should keep in mind when trying to build a mobile-first product and mobile-centric company culture. iOS and Android are very different environments and, as a resource-constrained entrepreneur, you need to pick one. Be conscious of the types of devices your end customer will be using and think through the pros and cons of each platform (e.g. Android is easier to release/iterate in the early days as you are searching for product/market fit, while iOS can be easier to monetize). Once you have made your platform decision … You will need a dedicated team of three to four engineers/designers for either iOS or Android. These folks are tough to find, but you don’t have a choice. To build an A+ mobile app, you need a dedicated team that is solely focused on building in iOS or Android. You only have a few minutes to convince users your mobile app is valuable. If they have to spend 2-3 minutes struggling to understand how to use it, you’ve likely lost them for good. A great mobile app is intuitive from the first minute a user taps on it. But designing something so elegant is extremely difficult. and lots of them. Make sure an experienced designer is one of your first few hires, or ideally part of the founding team. Then, aim to hire one designer for every three to five engineers going forward. This is stating the obvious, but the way people use smartphones and tablets is vastly different from the way they manipulate keyboards and mice. Instead of relying on clicks and text entry – the standard for enterprise desktop apps for decades – you’ll need to design mobile workflows based on taps and swipes. Depending on your mindset, this can be either scary or liberating. Embrace this design constraint and you will be surprised at what is possible. Another key to success with mobile apps is to keep it simple. Don’t build in too much functionality, and make sure the user can get real value within three to four swipes/taps. Most incumbent software vendors have not figured this out, as they take their year 2000-era software playbook and cram in too much functionality, yielding a bloated and difficult-to-use product. Don’t fall into that trap. Keep it simple. Just because people vastly prefer to use smartphones over their PCs doesn’t mean there aren’t some work tasks that still require a computer. Startups like are getting this balance right. The company, which makes relationship-management software, can fulfill on-the-go use cases over customers’ mobile devices but accomplish batch-processing type tasks — clearing out your inbox, prepping for the next day full of meetings — on a PC or tablet. After all, programming, graphic design, writing, creating presentations and other jobs are still mostly done using keyboards and large screens. Figure out if your mobile enterprise app is for a task that never, ever needs a computer, or conversely, if it needs to work in conjunction with a desktop application. Everything from how you design the mobile app interface to whether you need mobile-desktop sync will depend on this critical distinction. Even if you didn’t start your company as a mobile-first business, there is still time to make this massive pivot. – moving from a consumer, desktop-based website to a mobile-first app – and changed its entire revenue stream in the process. If a huge company like Facebook can do a mobile about-face, your smaller enterprise software startup can, too. You just have to throw out all your old ideas about how users interact with your software and put all your energy into designing a streamlined, elegant, efficient mobile app. It won’t be easy, but it has to be done. Otherwise, your enterprise software company may slowly fade away as a relic of the bygone desktop era. |
Predicting A Future Free Of Dollar Bills | Simon Black | 2,014 | 7 | 12 | Picture the scene. It’s 2020. You’re at the checkout in a convenience store with a carton of milk. But you’ve got no cash and you’ve left your cards at home. No problem. You scan your right index finger; the green light flashes. Purchase approved and you leave. Easy. Is this a realistic vision of the future, or are we only ever likely to see such scenes in science-fiction movies such as Minority Report? Predicting the future is never easy, but I believe that new technologies will prove the death knell for cash. We’re not there yet, but a cashless society is not as fanciful as it seems. Recent research suggests that many believe we will stop using notes and coins altogether in the not-too-distant future. New payments technologies are rapidly transforming our lives. Today in the U.S., 66 percent of all point-of-sale transactions are done with plastic, while in the U.K. it’s just under half. But while a truly cashless society is some time away yet, there is raft of groundbreaking technologies that will make cash a mere supporting act in the near future. Take contactless cards for instance. They are perfect for those small purchases. Why go to the hassle of carrying loose change when you can swipe a card to make a purchase within seconds? Thirty-one percent of us put an item back on the shelf if we aren’t carrying enough cash. Consumers want the convenience new technologies offer, and retailers are losing billions a year by not offering a range of payment options. Contactless cards help address this problem, and although leading High Street retailers now accept them, many independent retailers don’t yet. But as we become accustomed to the convenience of contactless, we will expect it everywhere we shop. I’ve seen it happening abroad already. In Iceland, the buses don’t take cash; taxis assume you are paying by card; coffee shops expect you to wave the plastic for a simple espresso. Sweden isn’t far behind. It will happen in the U.S. and U.K., too. It’s not just our need for quick, convenient shopping with fewer queues that is driving change. The costs to retailers to process transactions should drop dramatically in the next few years. The comparatively high cost that banks charge retailers for processing credit and debit card payments should come down. The European Union (EU) will soon cap the amount banks can charge retailers to process card payments. This should result in contactless transactions being made in most stores in Europe within the next few years. Making payments with smartphones will also become the norm within a few years. We’ve been talking about using a mobile to make payments for at least a decade, but now the moment has arrived. A U.K. service called allows people to transfer money to retailers or friends by using a mobile banking app on their phone. Since its recent launch, 500,000 phone numbers have been registered. Some 90 percent of U.K. current account holders will be able to use it by the end of the year. There are a number of similar apps provided by mobile phone operators, technology groups and payment specialists like PayPal. According to the Centre for Economic and Business Research, the value of goods and services purchased using a mobile phone will almost triple from £4.8 billion last year to £14.2 billion in 2018. All these developments mean we will use cash less. A further benefit for us is that it will give us peace of mind as there will be less concern over having money stolen. The technology being used to usher in a cashless age offers security benefits to its users, as it’s very easy to shut down a smartphone’s digital wallet remotely if it falls into the wrong hands. By removing cash, you reduce the chances of becoming a target of crime, while using electronic payments can provide a trail of statements that can help to manage your finances. Even cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin are moving in on the mobile payments act. Apple has recently announced that it has updated its App Store guidelines to allow software developers to include virtual currency transactions in apps. Although Apple has not specified which virtual currencies have been approved, it’s likely that bitcoin, as the world’s most widely used virtual currency, will be included. Nevertheless, the public still has to be convinced by bitcoin – 1 percent of people have used it within the last month. Perhaps the most exciting development is the prospect of biometrics technology such as fingerprint, retina scans and voice recognition, being made available by retailers for transactions in the future. This will make it even easier for us to buy products in store and online. Biometrics offers simplicity, convenience and security. Biometrics will also make fraud virtually impossible – identification is yours and yours alone, and therefore very hard to copy. Recent research shows that 47 percent of us think we’ll be using our fingerprints to make purchases within 10 years. So who knows? With such public expectation, perhaps using a fingerprint to buy our groceries won’t be confined to the imaginings of the latest Hollywood blockbuster. |
Curated Food Delivery Startup Caviar In Talks To Be Acquired By Square For $100 Million | Sarah Buhr | 2,014 | 7 | 12 | Curated food delivery startup is in talks to be acquired by in a deal that could be worth at least $100 million, according to several sources. While we’ve heard the deal is slated to take place over the next couple of weeks, these things could always fall apart. is one of many new startups that seeks to enable customers to order meals online and have them delivered in a short period of time. It differentiates by striking exclusive delivery deals with high-quality restaurants, and also by offering a group-ordering feature so that customers can have their family and coworkers add their own meal selections simply by sharing a link. Launching first in San Francisco, the service is now available in other major markets, including New York City, Boston, Chicago, Seattle, and Washington, D.C. We’ve seen a lot of investment go into the food delivery space over the last several months, with Caviar being one of the beneficiaries of that funding. The company raised a $13 million Series A round led by Tiger Global just this April. It had previously secured $2 million in seed funding prior to that, with investors that included Winklevoss Capital and Andreessen Horowitz, among others. But it hasn’t been alone: Investors have poured funding into a wide range of on-demand food delivery services of late. In recent months, we’ve seen Munchery raise $28 million, Postmates raise $16 million, and Spoonrocket and Sprig each raise about $10 million. All that competition could be part of the reason for what seems like an early exit for the company. While it seems strange Caviar would seek to be acquired so soon after raising funding, it’s possible that the competitive environment is just too much for it to handle, and maybe it would do better to be part of a larger company. Payment processing company Square in May to bite into the food delivery service industry. There have been speculations as to whether the technology was built in-house or was part of another acquisition or third party. Currently, offers a mobile app for consumers to order food for takeout. But it requires the consumer to pick up their own order. Caviar, by contrast, handles all pickup and delivery for the restaurants it partners with, lowering the fixed costs associated with delivery and could provide a big value-add to potential Square restaurant partners. |
Humans And Computers Will Come Together For Middle Work | David Greenbaum | 2,014 | 7 | 12 | Jon Evans’ post “ ” on TechCrunch warns of mass penury for this generation and the next as the dual horseman of the techno-apocalypse, robots and software, strip humans of their ability to make a living. Essentially, he predicts machines and algorithms will consume jobs faster than we can create them. Don’t believe this dystopian vision of the future for a second, because both humans and robots will contribute to the economy in generations to come through a concept called “middle work.” Today, non-manufacturing work largely falls into one of two categories: purely human (a judge serving sentences) or purely software (a computer serving search results). However, there’s an emerging category called middle work that is neither purely human, nor purely software. This new labor category combines both algorithms and human thought processes and will be an impactful economic driver in the next decades. Middle work leverages what machines do best – solving low-value, high-volume problems – and combines it with what humans do best – solving high-value, low-volume problems. Middle work is not just “information work” where humans use computers to complete tasks like millions of people do every day in the office. Rather it’s defined as work that wouldn’t be economically viable for a human to do without a workflow platform, yet is too nuanced for software to perform unaided. For example, software is great for spellchecking a marketing email, but only a human can think creatively to write an engaging headline to get consumers to click on that email. Between these two extremes exists a middle-work world where humans use software to make the process of writing ad copy more automated and efficient. In this example, middle work might entail hundreds of copywriters using an online network to contribute potential email headlines, allowing a marketer to choose among dozens of headline options and submit several choices for A/B testing. Contributors whose headlines are chosen would earn money for their work. For marketers, this process is more streamlined and cost-efficient than hiring a stable of copywriters. Of course, over time, software will become more advanced, but it will never be as good as people at jobs that entail creativity, judgment, empathy and a raft of other uniquely human traits. Middle work combines efficient software algorithms with human ingenuity to create a whole new class of jobs – opening up a large swath of economic opportunity. Humans will be able to use software to perform high-value, low-volume tasks with high levels of precision and accuracy. In many ways ’s Mechanical Turk was the first software-based middle work company. Today, people use Mechanical Turk to solve low-value problems such as classifying the subject of a picture. But the emerging trend is for middle-work companies to verticalize and specialize, allowing humans to leverage software platforms to solve higher-value problems. In middle work, a workflow platform creates standardized units of work, while a marketplace of human labor provides pools of workers who bring creativity and judgment to the tasks at hand. To make it clear why middle work will become commonplace, consider the following examples: A non-native English speaker wants to verify whether she is using idioms correctly in professional correspondence. A small business owner wants to file his taxes using QuickBooks but isn’t sure of the correct categorization of a deductible 401k plan. An executive needs an accurate transcription of a meeting, but also to clearly identify each of the speakers and their importance to the group. All of these issues could be solved by web-connected humans using advanced software platforms. Because middle-work participants don’t have to find the work themselves (the network provides the work opportunities), they can work at lower per-unit costs but still make substantial per-hour rates because their time is spent only delivering work – not prospecting, invoicing and managing clients. For many industries, the size of the addressable middle can be larger than the head (top-level salaried positions) or the tail (low-value contract work). A handful of emerging companies are lowering the cost of producing a unit of work by combining software with human labor. By addressing the middle, companies are not taking jobs away from people who were doing them before, but rather are adding jobs by unlocking a category of work that didn’t exist in the purely human or purely software realms. Unlocking the middle is a massive opportunity for entrepreneurs, employees and customers alike in industries as diverse as medicine, accounting, law, and music discovery. |
Hardware Is The New Software | Min-Liang Tan | 2,014 | 7 | 12 | . . . . . All hardware companies and each of them accorded multi-billion-dollar valuations either in private investment transactions or acquisitions by some of the largest technology companies on the planet. When the deals first surfaced, more than a few people were puzzled. Hardware hasn’t exactly been sexy for the past decade or so. Until last year, VC and tech talent have been fawning over software companies, which attracted . And how did consumer electronics makers do with VCs in 2013? A paltry . That’s because software, once expensive and complicated to make, has become relatively easy. Increased access to open-source services and the cloud mean that two guys in a garage can inexpensively create an application for accepting mobile payments at your new pop-up store or for finding a ride downtown. Access to massive global markets can be had almost overnight via iOS or Android app stores. No need for vast distribution networks. No need for a supply chain. Just extremely low overhead and high margins. But there’s just one thing missing from software. Before anyone can get to the bits, they must get through the atoms. Which means they need one thing: And while software is incredibly attractive as a business proposition, there’s something truly special about hardware that software lacks. Hardware ignites intense passion in people – to the point of camping out for days to buy the latest gadget or tattooing logos from their favorite consumer tech brands. So why doesn’t every technology company just dazzle the world with incredible hardware? Because as famed venture capitalist once said: Hardware is . First of all, development times can span at least a year. And we’re not talking about two guys in a garage for that year. We’re talking about large specialist teams – mechanical engineers, electrical engineers, industrial designers, wireless engineers .… The list goes on and on. Unlike software, hardware is incredibly difficult to iterate on. Once you reach a certain point, you need to “go to tool.” This is when you make a mold and begin fabricating tens of thousands of units from a single mold. Going to tool alone may cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, if not millions. Unlike software — where you get the opportunity to iterate if you’ve made a mistake — once you go to tool, you can’t pivot, you can’t change much. In short, if you’ve designed a dud, you’re outta luck. And that’s just the start. Next, you have to figure out how many units to get off the line and how many units to make. After that, you’ve got to move all that product around the world by building global distribution channels. AND….after you’ve done all of that, you still have to do the damn software! Hardware is . But hardware and software do have something in common. Like software, hardware is getting easier. Traditional hardware companies like Dell and HP have paved the way by outsourcing manufacturing to contractors like Foxconn and Quanta. We’re also seeing the rise of multi-function system on chips, which means that we can run complex instruction sets right out of the box. And we have a new age of supply chain providers that will pick your product, pack it, put it in a box, and bring it to the end user in a single step. For distribution, there’s Amazon and other e-commerce channels, all but eliminating the need for retail contracts and allowing direct access to consumers. Recently, we’ve seen the advent of , , and other early stage capital sources greasing the skids for hardware. Smartwatch maker has So, what is the effect of hardware becoming less hard? Nothing less than a revolution in the user experience. Easing some of the more mundane, time-consuming aspects of making hardware is allowing a new breed of hardware to emerge. Cars, industrial equipment, eye glasses – all types of hardware are fast becoming purpose-built machines with software smarts. Tesla fixed its recent problem with battery fires through – drivers didn’t have to lift a finger, let alone hassle with bringing their car into the shop. Xiaomi ships affordable well-designed smartphones but it’s the phone’s regular software updates that have its customers chattering on their forums. In short, hardware is now the new software. Or, what some call . Unlike the traditional hardware companies that focus on shipping boxes, Hardware 2.0 companies have disrupted our notions about the difference between hardware and software with one seamless user experience. The Hardware 2.0 disruption is so profound, tech giants are spending billions to make sure they don’t miss this seismic shift. Apple realized very early on that great design and hardware combined with awesome software could create magic. Then came Google’s acquisitions of and . Amazon got in the game with Kindle, Fire TV and now the Fire Phone. It’s incredibly difficult to build a great hardware company and it’s incredibly difficult to build a great software company. However, it’s insanely difficult to build a hardware software company all in one. And it’s the new Holy Grail that venture capitalists and the largest of tech giants are pursuing with multi-billion-dollar investments and acquisitions worldwide. |
Gillmor Gang: Taming of the Stream | Steve Gillmor | 2,014 | 7 | 12 | The Gillmor Gang – , , , , and – examine the subtle signs of the gathering storm that is the Uber social network. After years of positioning, acquisition, soaring value payouts, and a winner-take-all sensibility in the tech community, now we’re seeing something different emerging. Among the data points discussed: Digg Deeper, , user metrics, and the latest repositioning. The Gang may be split on the import of these events, with some questioning Twitter’s ability to challenge the Facebook scale while others see room for many solutions. Are the record companies forcing Soundcloud to the table with licensing threats, or are they seeing the startup as one final opportunity to avoid the mistakes that lead to the current drought of talent and innovation? Are there real signs that Twitter is working to pivot from shutting down its developer community to letting filters bloom? At least we’re seeing products finally hit the market with some new answers. @stevegillmor, @borthwick, @scobleizer, @kevinmarks, @kteare Produced and directed by Tina Chase Gillmor @tinagillmor |
Screenshot Claims To Show Off The Coming Windows 8.1 Start Menu | Alex Wilhelm | 2,014 | 7 | 13 | Mostly lost in the noise surrounding the World Cup final, floated around the Microsoft-watching community. The image picked up attention because it contains what some claim is an image of the soon-to-return Start Menu in Windows 8.1. promised that the user interface element . In the ensuing few months there hasn’t been much to go on in terms of new hints of what it might look like. Here’s what Microsoft showed off for a flash in April, at its Build developer conference: And, today’s claimed screenshot: A source speaking to ‘s Brad Sams, , “says that [the] image appears to be legitimate.” The Verge’s Tom Warren is more skeptical, the image is “likely to be a giant photoshop.” I don’t like to post ‘leaked’ product images much, given their propensity to be fanboy-sourced fever dreams, but the design similarities to Microsoft’s own mockup are worth noting. The real Start Menu, whatever it will look like, is . Whether the image is real or not, it’s been interesting to gauge reaction by Microsoft fans to its contents. Comment on Sams’ Neowin article ranged broadly — from positive, to dismissive. The overall lilt, if I had to ascribe one to something as chaotic as 140 blog comments, was generally positive. That’s a point for Microsoft. Though, fixing a self-imposed wound is only so impressive. Microsoft has been easing the line between the Metro aspects of Windows 8 and its desktop portion since the operating system first came out. The new Start Menu, likely a fusion of desktop and Metro components, continues that trend. I have a ping out to Microsoft for comment on the image. The company will respond sometime in the next few hours indicating that it doesn’t comment on rumors or speculation. |
Amazon Web Services Moves Beyond Developer Tools | Frederic Lardinois | 2,014 | 7 | 12 | is known for many things, but all of those have to do with developer services like cloud computing instances, databases and storage. Lately, however, AWS is slowly getting more into productivity tools that are meant for end users. ‘s first attempt to get into this market was Amazon Cloud Drive. It launched back in 2011, but while there are no exact numbers about its usage, I doubt all that many consumers ever signed up for it. Now — maybe in the wake of its Fire Phone launch — it feels like the company is starting to reboot its efforts, and it is doing so for enterprise users under the AWS label. After Cloud Drive, things got pretty quiet in this space for Amazon, but last year, it launched an invite-only beta of , a virtual desktop for enterprises that . With WorkSpaces, an admin still has to go into the AWS Management Console and provision it, but for the user, the experience is pretty straightforward. That project, of course, was more about virtualization than about an actual web application. With Zocalo, however, Amazon launched a full-featured competitor to Google Drive for Work and Dropbox, complete with a web-based interface. The focus here is still mostly on enterprises, and there is no free tier for consumers (though the regular price of $5 per user/month is extremely aggressive). But once it’s out of preview, it’s hard to imagine that Amazon would only allow businesses to sign up. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbjMrQtoZlU While Amazon itself has long offered some kinds of web apps for its e-book and music service, for example (and one could probably argue that Amazon.com is also a web app), Zocalo is a step in a very new direction for AWS. It’s also one that startups should be worried about. , for example. But what if Amazon now wants a piece of this market for itself, too? With Fire OS, the company has shown that it can do design and it’s probably no coincidence that Zocalo takes some of its design queues from Fire OS. While it isn’t for consumers, AWS’s new similarly puts Amazon into competition with other Analytics services that were likely built on top of its architecture. Its feature set doesn’t seem to be quite on par with the likes of just yet, but it has a pretty generous free allowance and may just be enough for many developers. At this point, AWS offers pretty much everything developers need to build their applications, whether that’s for mobile or web apps. While it continues to roll out new features for its services at a rapid clip, most of them are now very incremental updates. It makes sense that the company is looking at how it can expand AWS into new areas (or at least new for Amazon), and many of those involve going beyond developer services and APIs. Amazon is nothing if not a very ambitious company and that’s on display right now with the launch of the Fire Phone and these new web services. That may irk some of its competitors in these spaces, but that’s probably not something Amazon is all that worried about. |
The Great Fragmentation: We Are All Weirdos Now | Jon Evans | 2,014 | 7 | 12 | “Technology isn’t a section in the newspaper any more. It’s the culture,” quoth editor-in-chief Ben Smith, prompting some eyebrow-raising by and columnists. And here’s some more from … but my stance is a bit different. “The culture”? That’s an oxymoron. There is no such thing as majority mainstream culture any more. We are all weirdos now — thanks to tech. of wrote a in last year, in which he observed: An infinity of subcultures outside the mainstream now blossoms on the Internet — vegans, body modifiers, CrossFitters, Wiccans, DIYers, Pinners, and support groups of all forms. Millions of people are finding their true peers in the cloud, a remedy for the isolation imposed by the anonymous apartment complex or the remote rural location … The latest wave of technology is not just connecting us intellectually and emotionally with remote peers: it is also making us ever more mobile, ever more able to meet our peers in person. He suggests that a “reverse diaspora” could cause groups of likeminded people to come together and form new communities — indeed, new ; “cloud cities or countries.” Which immediately brings to mind the phyles of Neal Stephenson’s , geographically distributed nations whose footprints are dispersed unevenly all over the world rather than contained within a single contiguous piece of real estate. Plausible, but distant, I think. For now let’s just take a look at the recent and short-term cultural effects of technology, what I call the Great Fragmentation. Once upon a time, only a couple of decades ago, there really was such a thing as mainstream culture. Its gatekeepers — a handful of TV channels, an incestuous music business, a clutch of radio mavens, a few movie studios, and the jealously guarded print industry — controlled 95% of the media. There was an independent counterculture, sure, but you had to go out of your way for it, and you had to go out of your way to communicate with others who shared your interests, unless they happened to live nearby. Nowadays, though, wherever you are, whatever your interests, however baroque and obscure, you can find and join groups and mini-communities of people who share them. Indeed, you can and likely do find yourself part of several or even distributed communities, one or more for each subject or context that really interests you. (Not that it’s ever that clear-cut in real life; cultural borders are always fuzzy and ill-defined, and every comment thread on your Facebook news feed is arguably its own mayfly-ephemeral mini-community.) Doomsayers frequently warn us about how the Internet fragments society and causes us to become more polarized. “The Internet is a driver and enabler for the process of radicalization,” intones an NYPD white paper ( ) on terrorism. Princeton’s Cass Sunstein : “When like-minded people get together, they tend to end up thinking a more extreme version of what they thought before they started to talk.” Everyone always talks about that kind of polarization in terms of , loss of civility, doom of society, etc etc etc. But a far more interesting corollary, if you ask me, is this: all those quirky little Internet subcommunities and subreddits to which people increasingly belong? The polarization effect means that they will just keep getting quirkier and more idiosyncratic. …In other words, as a direct result of technology, our entire society will, slowly but steadily, become weirder and more fragmented. Dismayed? Don’t be. This is news. Well, maybe not for marketers and advertisers, who no longer have a single barrel full of all the fish to fire their weapons into, but now have to catch us as we all swim through the new online oceans. Stephenson again, from his prescient short story , written : It was an unexploited market niche of cavernous proportions: upwards of one-hundredth of one percent of the population. …but for the rest of us, it’s a very heartening development. Given a choice between …I’ll take option 2 any day of the week and twice on Sundays, thanks. A society in which people accept that their personal views generally are and will remain minority perspectives, rather than seeking to impose “normal” beliefs and tastes on any who don’t fit in, is enormously healthier, both culturally and politically. Given time, maybe this social transformation could even fragment American politics beyond its infantile two-party divide, into a genuine three-or-more-party democracy like the rest of the West enjoys. In the meantime and the medium term, though, the weird will slowly but steadily efface the normal. My friend Meredith Patterson recently wrote a entitled “When Nerds Collide: My intersectionality will have weirdoes or it will be bullshit.” (Intersectionality: .) It is, to oversimplify, about the culture gap between old-school weird hackers and new-school progressive techies. She writes: Many programmers aren’t hackers, and there isn’t a single thing wrong with that. Literacy of any kind is a beautiful thing. In today’s market, demand for code-literate employees far exceeds the supply, so engineering teams contain both hackers and non-hackers. Increasingly, the latter outnumber the former. This is still a beautiful thing — until the latter realise there are enough of them to push the weirdos out, and do it. Call me an optimist, Meredith, but I think that in the medium term, this problem is self-solving. Because the Internet isn’t just a home for weirdos; it actually them … and when most of us realize that most of us are weird, we will see that this is actually a very good thing indeed. yours truly, . |
With Publicize, Former Tech Blogger Conrad Egusa Offers A More Affordable Approach To Startup PR | Anthony Ha | 2,014 | 7 | 13 | We’ve written about several attempts to rethink PR for startups, including (which ) and (which ). A new firm called may not embrace the self-serve, tech-centric model quite as a fully, but it does have a pretty appealing price tag — its standard cost is $499 a month, in contrast to traditional firms that can charge thousands or tens of thousands dollars. founder (pictured above with his partner Eddie Arrieta) is a former tech journalist — we worked together at VentureBeat. He also runs . Egusa told me that before launching Publicize, he “looked at the PR process and deconstructed it to a multitude of steps,” and then tried to see which steps were necessary, and how the remaining ones could become more efficient. And while Publicize offers other services like content marketing, its basic process (as outlined in the graphic below) is pretty straightforward — when a startup has news that it wants to promote, Publicize draws on a team of “crowdsourced” journalists and marketers to put together a press release, which it then offers as exclusive news to a single publication. (Egusa said he personally approves each release, so hopefully the process doesn’t result in pitches that are too spammy.) If the news gets picked up, the firm then does a more widespread email blast in the hopes of attracting follow-up coverage. Again, nothing about this sounds revolutionary, but it seems that by creating a standardized process focused on the basic service that startups are looking for, Publicize can keep costs down. Egusa said he also offers $50 and $75 discounts when he doesn’t think a client has a good chance of landing in top-tier tech publications. (That’s not the most intuitive way to make the pricing more fair and performance-based, but hey, it’s not likely to raise journalists’ hackles as much as .) As one indication of the quality of its early customer base, Publicize says it has worked with more than eight -incubated startups. One of those startups was , whose co-founder told me that when he connected with Egusa, he’d been looking for PR that was more affordable than a traditional “full-service” firm. He was happy with the results, and particularly happy that the Publicize team was perfectly willing to share its knowledge, even if that might could mean losing as a customer later on. “I was upfront with them,” Laughlin said. “I told them, ‘We’re poor and we’re not going to be able to use you all the time, so I want to learn a lot when we’re doing this.'” I was also curious about the challenges of starting a PR firm in Colombia. After all, it’s a relationship-driven business, and presumably, Egusa is largely trying to reach reporters in the United States. However, he said that when talking to customers, location has “never been an issue.” After all, he’s lived in New York and Northern California before. And as I’ve learned over the past few weeks, even from Colombia, Egusa can be plenty persistent over email, particularly when a story (like, uh, this one) gets delayed. |
Winners Of The TechCrunch London Meetup: GiftGaming, Rook And Keekla | Mike Butcher | 2,014 | 7 | 13 | The TechCrunch London Summer Meetup rolled into town this week as part of our . We had a bunch of brand new startups apply. The pitch-off was judged by TechCrunch writers Ingrid Lunden and Natasha Lomas and myself, with Andy Chung of and James Governor of , our hosts. We were kindly supported by sponsorship from , and . We listened to a bunch of brand new startup founders talk about their products in a fast-paced 90 second style, achieved in difficult conditions as the supplier of air conditioning units had… not supplied them. But in the end, we had one overall winner: . This startup is addressing the problem that 50% percent of games are free-to-play but only 1.5 percent of players make in-app purchases. Meanwhile, UK mobile ad spend will reach £2 billion and the in-game ads industry is worth £1.1 billion. GiftGaming’s idea is to create a platform for self-service in-game adverts, enabling game publishers to integrate it and brands to run campaigns on it, such as offering power ups and discount coupons. In other words, brands pay for your in-game purchases when you interact with their ads. GiftGaming then runs on revenues from commissions. This is a seriously great idea and they have have not even raised any money yet. They will receive a Startup Alley table at TechCrunch Disrupt London. The runner-ups and winner of two tickets each to Disrupt London were Rook and Keekla. is an eBook platform with an innovative content delivery method. Users have free access to their entire library of books when on defined networks or locations such as cafes, airports and transportation networks. When not on these networks, content switches from freemium to premium – users must now pay for the same content. The analogy is this: you can walk into a bookstore now and read any book you want but if you want to walk away with it you have to buy it. The other runner-up was , a mobile first platform connecting companies and individuals directly during a recruitment campaign. Keekla wants to disrupt the outdated recruitment market by providing a “discreet, accurate and direct mobile platform built exclusively to connect the hiring company with job seekers.” A person creates profile and says what looking for . Here is the full list of the startups that pitched. All of them were interesting, and many had already raised seed capital. Thanks for making the TechCrunch London Summer meetup a success and we’ll see you next year!
Location-based search to find and book fitness classes and sports activities.
A fundraising platform that helps charitable organisations raise funds by auctioning unique celebrity experiences and memorabilia.
One app on your phone that automatically adapts its content to your location, with offers.
A social discovery app that lets users play the matchmaker, select two friends and set them up on a date. ‘My single friend in mobile app form’. Friend-Chain
App for iOS, where users can create fun video compilation ‘chains’ with their friends and share them with the world.
A booking and hotel management platform for independent hotels.
‘Gamifying Romance’ this blends together social interactions, human courtship, behavioural psychology and neuroscience with video game mechanics.
With Tellyo TV broadcasters and media companies can engage TV viewers on 2nd screen devices as well as monetize this interaction by enabling TV viewers to capture short video clips from television to instantly share them on social media. Similar to ConnectTV but in Europe.
A platform designed and built to connect the London Tech Community. – Peer reviewed UGC content platform |
Stream (What It Feels Like To Be At) The World Cup On Snapchat | Josh Constine | 2,014 | 7 | 13 | You can watch the World Cup final game on or , but is transporting all its users to Brazil today through clips of people celebrating in the streets or cheering from the stadium. With this bold test of its new collaborative , people in Rio De Janeiro can submit snaps to Riolive2014 which are curated by Snapchat into a feed anyone around the world can watch. But unlike the first Our Story for , Riolive2014 isn’t opt-in and instead automatically appears at the top of every Snapchat user’s story list. This hints at how Snapchat could employ Our Story as a powerful promotional tool that big events might be willing to pay for. To watch Snapchat’s World Cup Our Story, just open the app, swipe left to view your stories list, then tap and hold on Riolive2014. You’ll see a stream of hundreds of the best photos and videos out of the submissions from people in the Rio geo-fence. Some shots include exclusive geo-fenced filters for Rio De Janeiro, similar to the ones Snapchat is experimenting with for neighborhoods in LA and New York. You’ll see people putting on face paint, repping jerseys of their teams, dancing in the streets, or watching the game from the cheap seats. I praised the first Our Story at Electric Daisy Carnival as a “genius, collaborative reinvention of the livestream” because I was at the event in person, and watching on Snapchat truly captured the essence of the three-night twerkathon. The geo-fencing of submissions is what’s really special here. It makes adding content to Our Story exclusive and keeps out the random riff-raff from people less likely to have anything interesting to share. Now we’ll see if Snapchat can handle curation from a much larger event with much wider appeal. If it can nail the World Cup final with a compelling peek at the madness in Brazil, it will have a huge proof point for Our Story’s potential. It will also have to endure the onslaught of traffic without load times spiraling out of control. That’s largely because Snapchat forcefully injected the World Cup Our Story into people’s feeds whether they want to see it or not, rather than asking them to search for and add the account. That essentially makes this a “Sponsored Story” even if the World Cup didn’t pay Snapchat for the promotion. As I wrote in June, “Snapchat could charge for inserting an event’s account into people friend lists, giving global visibility and buzz to music festivals, sports matches, and other big gatherings.” Now it’s doing that insertion. It seems like only a matter of time until Snapchat gets paid for it. And I’m fine with that. It’s not forcing me to watch ads like Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram. Snapchat’s just saying “Hey, this big important thing is happening somewhere in the world, here’s what it’s like to be there.” |
Silicon Valley’s Dilemma Over Credentials | Danny Crichton | 2,014 | 7 | 13 | Silicon Valley has been heavily derided by the media these past few months, on everything from and to startups and . Despite the shrill news around “ ,” I believe that Silicon Valley on the whole is fundamentally a decent place, one that tries to create opportunities for the world rather than diminish them. To see this, take a look at our industry’s efforts to make the acquisition of credentials more open and democratic, particularly around those in education. Today, the most important credentials for new graduates continue to be college name, GPA, major, and internship employer names. Yet, many of these credentials are extremely difficult to afford. over the past few decades, and (except in our industry, where ). Some notable people are trying to change this situation. , , has sponsored the eponymous , which provides a set of twenty students under the age of 20 annually with $100,000 to drop out of college and work on their ideas. Thiel is hardly the only one hoping to transform our society’s obsession with college degrees. The entire premise of massively-open online courses (MOOCs) like and is to uncouple the knowledge gained from courses from the slips of paper offered at graduation. Both now offer their own credentialing systems, which over time could offer an alternative credentialing model that would be more affordable for workers. Unfortunately, Silicon Valley’s efforts here have mostly centered around changing the credentials themselves rather than reducing demand for them in the first place. And that is the serious conundrum facing entrepreneurs hoping to build a more meritocratic and open labor market. Competition is rising for the best jobs in the economy as more people apply for a limited set of opportunities. As our technologies have improved the nation’s productivity, there has been a decrease in good jobs available to workers (this data is discussed more below). Yet, the human population continues to grow in much of the world, with the United States alone , up from around 300 million today according to the Census Bureau. With such a labor environment, credentials are becoming even more crucial in differentiating talent, the exact opposite goal we are striving towards today. While it is hardly desirable to reverse our efforts around productivity, if we hope to change the way credentials are used in our economy, Silicon Valley should emphasize more of its resources around rebalancing the labor market rather than merely changing the pieces of paper used. , chairman Jim Clifton wrote that “the coming world war is an all-out global war for good jobs.” He heavily underlined the importance of “good jobs,” which can be defined as jobs that provide a stable, regular income in exchange for work. The challenge for policymakers is that good jobs are , an effect largely driven by growing productivity from technology and economies of scale. While Washington often fixates on the unemployment rate as the barometer for the country’s economic health, that statistic is heavily misleading, since it assumes that any work is better than no work. As can be seen in data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, are increasingly “bad” jobs – those jobs that are highly unstable, provide few benefits, and have little hope for advancement. This is a productivity crisis, brought on by the incredible advancement of technology by Silicon Valley. In almost any context, greater productivity is something to rejoice. With less labor required to build outputs, we can enjoy more of the fruits of our economy without increasing our workloads. The challenge has been that those fruits have not been shared well, but rather have been increasingly concentrated in a narrow elite of the population. Middle-class jobs are disappearing and are being replaced almost entirely with lower-class jobs. Even with taxes and income-transfer programs like Social Security and TANF, we don’t have robust mechanisms to guarantee that workers left out of the elite workforce still have the means to have a decent and stable lifestyle. Silicon Valley seems to be more reflective about this topic these days. Just this week, Google’s chief executive about the future of the 40-hour workweek. Page, quoted in Mashable, said “… the idea that everyone needs to work frantically to meet people’s needs is just not true.” He noted that while work was necessary for humans to “feel needed,” the solution to our current employment crisis was to reduce the workweek rather than just eliminate jobs. There are certainly ways that technology can be used to make discovering work easier, particularly for those who want to stitch together several part-time jobs into a full work schedule. , it seems that we have an opportunity in Silicon Valley to radically redefine how work gets done. But those hopes and opportunities don’t change the reality facing families across America. Productivity growth has made many people irrelevant in our economy, and will continue to do so well into the future. That means fewer good jobs, even though the number of college graduates is increasing. Silicon Valley has a complicated relationship with credentialing, often arguing for the democratic elitism of “meritocracy,” emphasizing proven results and one’s actual ability to build products. In reality, it still clings to the same credentialing system used by the rest of the economy, where brand names, particularly those in education, have disproportionate power in the labor market. That has always been part of the irony with Peter Thiel, who holds two degrees from Stanford yet encourages others to drop out through the Thiel Fellowship. It’s also doubly ironic since many of these dropouts end up returning to school, . Let’s talk a bit about credentials themselves, a concept I have thrown around a bit without adequately defining. A credential in the labor market is some sort of heuristic about the future performance of a worker. Since an employer has not properly vetted a potential employee through actual job performance (interns are an obvious exception), it must rely on past data to predict success in a role. Ideally, an employer would spend significant time poring over a candidate’s records, reading their previous output of college essays and contributions. In reality, such search costs are hard to bear, particularly since keen competition for jobs has increased the size of applicant pools. The best credentials obviously provide high signal. These credentials provide a way to segment a group of job applicants into two groups, one with high potential for success, and the other with low or lower potential. The smaller and more accurate the identification of the first group is, the better. If a certain credential could screen all but one candidate out of the applicant pool who had a guaranteed chance of success at a new role, it would be perfect. But signal is just one factor that makes a great credential. Recognition matters a lot too. Presenting a research paper at a specific computer science conference might be incredibly prestigious, but if no recruiter understands the signal inherent in such a talk, then it is mostly useless from a labor market perspective. There is a balance then, between having too few people with a credential and making it irrelevant, and having too many people with a certain credential making it low signal. To get a sense of what these numbers look like, take a look at the enrollment size of top universities like Harvard and Stanford. Nearly all top schools ranked by US News hover between 1,000 and 1,700 students per class, with some notable exceptions like Caltech having fewer students. In fact, it is only at #16 with Cornell and #20 with the University of California – Berkeley that we see entering class sizes significantly deviating from this rule. In addition to signal and recognition, a credential must also be simple to understand and widely comparable. Having an engineering team read over the source code of a candidate is probably one of the best ways to see a potential engineer’s performance. But with limited time, that mass of data is often projected down to a single number like GPA or number of stars on GitHub. This also allows candidates to be compared in an ostensibly more “objective” manner even if they have widely different backgrounds. If these three factors were all that mattered, then startups would have a great shot at transforming credentials. Much like startups are disrupting FICO Scores and the measurement of credit worthiness with better data, it would seem obvious that better data could change the way recruiting works. Imagine taking advantage of all the data available from a candidate’s portfolio and using machine learning to judge a candidate on a small scale of numbers. . The problem for Silicon Valley is that credentials are not just used as devices for recruiting, but instead as a means of social proof. Companies in industries as diverse as Google, McKinsey, and Goldman Sachs want to select graduates with certain credentials to maintain a certain “culture” or “fit.” In fact, some industries like management consulting are . Clients often care about the credentials of the professionals they employ, and they are hardly going to look into constructed metrics by startups to judge their lawyers, bankers, or investors. Given all of these factors, companies are going to continue to demand candidates with certain credentials, because it makes their job easier and it ensures a certain culture that may be more difficult to develop through other means. So, we have fewer good jobs being created due to our productivity growth, and we know that companies desire candidates with better credentials than those with worse credentials, because it is simpler and safer. Thus, in a tough labor market, credentials are crucial for workers hoping to secure a good job in our economy. As competition increases for a limited number of slots, the standard required to secure a particular position also rises, which means that certain credentials become even more important just to get employment. This basic analysis is known intrinsically by most middle-class families in the United States, and explains why so many parents send their kids to college, even though the kids may not be ready or interested in such a pathway. Nearly any professional job requires a college degree today, a simple function of the depth of the labor talent and the shallowness of the labor demand. Given this analysis, I would argue that startups are working on the wrong set of challenges. They should be much more focused on creating good jobs, rather than trying to minimize the use of credentials in employment or transforming those credentials into something more open. The value of credentials will automatically decrease if our labor markets are more balanced between workers and corporations. We don’t have to cognitively travel far to see this – just take a look at our own industry. As demand for engineers has increased because of Silicon Valley’s booming startup ecosystem, there is now much more interest in looking beyond the typical college degrees and academy companies. The demand for labor is the only value for a startup like , which attempts to discover engineers who might not otherwise show up on a company’s recruiting system, because maybe they lack the typical college credentials or their work on open-source projects is not fully appreciated. To see the opposite trend, take a look at a professional labor market like legal services. There, the top jobs go almost exclusively to students graduating from . The difference in work outcomes is staggering. . Those entering the top firms will make an income around $160,000. Otherwise, the typical job pays around $50,000, or maybe even hourly these days. Due to the glut of new lawyers, legal credentials have unbelievable power on the job outcome here, unlike in Silicon Valley for engineers. Credentials are an ingrained part of how we judge candidates, and startups trying to change this culture are facing a Herculean task trying to persuade human resources professionals to adopt a new paradigm. But we do have the ability to make credentials less useful if we can provide better income opportunities and increase the competition for talent. Photo by used under a . |
Snowden Document Exposes Extensive List of British Spying Tools | Cat Zakrzewski | 2,014 | 7 | 14 | The Government Communication Headquarters (GCHQ) — Britain’s National Security Agency (NSA) equivalent — commands a wide-ranging set of tools that enable it to hack into popular social media and communications outlets and plant false information on the Internet, according to a document Monday. The long list of options ranges from inflating the results of online polls to allowing the agency to monitor Skype communications in real time, though the details of that capability remain murky. The , which is dated from 2012, detailing the code names of various capabilities is the latest revelation from the trove of classified information leaked to reporters by former government contractor Edward Snowden. Journalist Glenn Greenwald in the same publication that last week under the Foreign Intelligence Service Act. As Greenwald puts it, the tools “allow GCHQ to seed the internet with false information.” Created by the the GCHQ’s Joint Research Threat Intelligence Group (JRTIG), the arsenal of hacking options can falsely impact page view counts. Another tool called Silver Specter allows for scanning over , software intended to protect users privacy online. The NSA attempted to attack TOR users, . The JRTIG tools go beyond what we’ve seen in the past, targeting particular social networking outlets. It is unclear from the document how complicit companies were in the programs, like the program that targeted Skype. Microsoft uses advanced encryption in Skype, and the company has said it only complies with legal requests to authorities when they refer to specific accounts. But the report claims JRTIG was capable of accessing user’s contact lists and providing real time call and instant messaging records of targets. Another operative tactic allows the agency to find photos of specific targets on Facebook that were not available to the public. The agency also claims to have the ability to amplify messages on popular multimedia websites, such as YouTube. Facebook and Google did not immediately respond to a request for comment, and it is unclear from Greenwald’s report if the companies are aware of or complicit in such practices. The code names for the programs are listed in a page that looks similar to a Wikipedia page as Greenwald says. It was updated as recently as July 2012, and the long list is apparently not a comprehensive catalog. “If you don’t see it here, it doesn’t mean we can’t build it,” JTRIG says at the top of the list of programs, which includes the following code names and descriptions: I sent a list of questions to GCHQ about The Intercept revelations, and as seems to be typical intelligence agency practice, it simply responded with a vague, blanket response. The agency deflected my questions about how GCHQ obtains permission to use these particular tools on targets or if the companies these programs target like Microsoft or Facebook are aware of the tools’ existence. “It is a longstanding policy that we do not comment on intelligence matters,” the GCHQ said. “Furthermore, all of GCHQ’s work is carried out in accordance with a strict legal and policy framework which ensures that our activities are authorised, necessary and proportionate, and that there is rigorous oversight, including from the Secretary of State, the Interception and Intelligence Services Commissioners and the Parliamentary Intelligence and Security Committee. All our operational processes rigorously support this position.” The statement appears to be the same as the one the agency issued to The Intercept. Greenwald expresses skepticism that the agency is subject to “rigorous oversight,” citing a former cabinet minister Chris Huhne that the ministers were in “utter ignorance” about one of the largest GCHQ programs Tempora, which allows the UK to collect, store and analyze communications much like the American PRISM program. The document was revealed as the British parliament is . The law would require telecom companies to retain customer data for a year, a practice that had previously been in place but was in the spring. Privacy groups and Snowden have , saying it is happening too fast without enough of a public debate about human rights. Today’s revelations in the Intercept cast further doubt on the U.K. spy agency’s concern for privacy rights and free speech, given the particularly invasive nature of the techniques detailed here. It is unclear from Greenwald’s report whether all of these programs were used and how often they are used. The document notes that sometimes the tools can’t be used because of operational requirements. It goes into some details about why some tactics may not be operational and, almost as an after thought, says “There may also be legal restrictions.” |
null | Darrell Etherington | 2,014 | 7 | 15 | null |
German Cartel Office Says Google, Other Tech Giants Could Be Regulated Like Utilities | Ingrid Lunden | 2,014 | 7 | 13 | Germany has not been the biggest fan of tech giants that it believes overreach their influence. Now, a report claims that it is considering a new way to deal with them: regulating them like utilities. The Sunday Times that the country’s Federal Cartel Office ( ) has prepared a 30-page proposal with suggestions of how to cope with the growing power of , along with other tech giants. Treating Google as a utility, one of the proposed suggestions, would mean the state having a stronger hand in how services like advertising on the search engine are priced, without diving into questions of how Google needs to alter its search algorithm. We have contacted both the Federal Cartel Office and Google for comment. If accurate, it’s worth wondering what other suggestions the Cartel Office has made in addition to the idea of regulating Google and other tech giants. It seems that this is not the first time that the document has been mentioned: it comes up in this story on Google regulation from July 1, describing that utility-style regulation could be used in an “emergency”, presumably when other routes to ensuring better competition have been exhausted. The Cartel Office has in the past butted heads with other large tech companies like Amazon, and prevailed. In November 2013 the Cartel Office an investigation into Amazon’s pricing after the e-commerce giant agreed to abandon a policy of on platforms competitive to Amazon. In any case, it seems like the Federal Ministry of Economic Affairs and Energy (where the Cartel/Antitrust Office sits) is not the only German government body thinking about utility-style regulation. In an interview at the end of June, the Minister of Justice, Heiko Maas, suggested that the company be “unbundled” to break open its monopoly on search services, if it could be demonstrated that Google has abused its market position. Asked in an interview with Germany’s Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper if he agreed with his political party’s chairman Sigmar Gabriel about “the destruction of Google”, Maas responded like this (via Google Translate and slightly edited): “Imagine an energy company covering 95 percent of the total market. The antitrust authorities would be quickly on it. Such conditions in a market economy do not make sense, are not healthy. So yes, if Google has abused its dominant market position to exclude competitors systematically, then consideration should be given as a last resort, something like an unbundling.” (No mention of other areas where Google is active such as in cloud-based applications like Gmail, internet browsing via Chrome or in mobile services with Android, which is the most popular smartphone OS in Germany.) The news of how a specific country might take action against Google comes at a key time for the company in Europe and its search ads business. While the most recent Google news concerns how it is implementing the “right to be forgotten” in search results, made in the name of more privacy for individuals, there has been another issue specifically related to search advertising — the same thing that is at issue in these German proposals. The EU has reached an agreement with Google over how it can modify its search ads and results to make way for more competitors from vertical sectors (eg travel) in its popular search portal. But the settlement has been , who are now hoping that the incoming European Union president, Jean-Claude Juncker, will block the settlement and re-open the investigation. To complicate things, now Yelp has also moved from being an observer to active participant in the debate with against Google. If the reports about the German proposals are accurate, they are a sign that even without a change in that European ruling, Google could potentially face problems in individual countries. Meanwhile, there are other ways that Google may raise its profile and influence in this part of the world: Last week the company’s investment arm, Google Ventures, that it would be opening its first office in Europe, in London, with a $100 million fund for startup investments in the region. That’s not the only investment that Google could be making in Europe. In December, Google that it was earmarking some $20-30 billion of its foreign cash to “fund potential acquisitions of foreign targets and foreign technology rights from U.S. targets in 2013 and beyond.” In fact, in 2013, Google said it had already looked “pursued but discontinued a potential buyout of a foreign company, with a valuation estimated in the range of $4 to $5 billion,” although it’s not clear whether that was in Europe or another region outside the U.S. : Germany’s Federal Cartel Office has (finally) responded to our questions about the paper with the following statement, confirming that there is a review and that it is ongoing: “In the last weeks, Federal Minister Gabriel has repeatedly pointed out the changes by living in an increasingly digitalized world,” a spokesperson says. “The Minister has made clear that the technological changes not only affect the commercial field but more and more the private living conditions of citizens. Hence, the government and its institution ought to think about how to deal with such chances. This includes many aspects such as market power, regulation, data protection. It is the question of a new framework for the digital age. “With respect to competition law, the respective authorities are in charge (Federal Cartel Office, Regional Cartel Offices, EU Commission). The competition control deals with potential risks resulting from a market dominating position. The Federal Ministry of Economics reviews whether a further regulation exceeding current competition law is necessary in case such risks cannot sufficiently be addressed by competition law.” He adds that because the review is ongoing, he “cannot provide the mentioned paper of the Federal Cartel Office.” Google, meanwhile, declined to comment. |
Hardware Case Study: Why Lockitron Has Taken So Long To Ship | Cameron Robertson | 2,014 | 7 | 13 | There has been renewed excitement at HQ in the last few weeks as we pass shipping to our 3,000th backer. Following an incredibly oversubscribed crowdfunding campaign at the end of 2012 — during which we raised over $2.3 million (and garnered 15,000 backers) — we had to adapt our manufacturing plans and shift to volume production from our originally planned run of 1,000 units. So why has Lockitron taken so long to ship? Tech pundits and investors will frequently tout how “hardware is coming back” and tools like Arduino, 3D printing and rapid prototyping are allowing small startups to build great hardware experiences. While there is some truth to this, making hardware at scale is still incredibly difficult — if not for the actual physical manufacturing itself but for the compounding complexity of suppliers, tooling and testing. The argument can be made that building a hardware product is an order of magnitude more difficult than building a software product. While controlling for scope, “hardware” (in the Silicon Valley sense of the word) requires a breadth of competencies that not only encompass the app and web development but also industrial design, mechanical design, operations, embedded development, and more. Better prototyping tools have lowered the barrier to entry along with falling costs in electronic components, namely components like Wi-Fi and Bluetooth radios that enable Lockitron to talk to the rest of the world. But debugging tooling, coordinating dozens of suppliers and establishing QC procedures can be incredibly difficult. Beginning in 2010 we sold a first-generation product that we assembled by hand in our living room from off-the-shelf parts. By contrast, the product now integrates dozens of discrete plastic, POM (a form of nylon), steel and aluminum components — and nearly every component is made to order. In our initial RFQs (“request for quote”) we leaned heavily towards manufacturing entirely in the United States. Our impetus for this was largely around logistics; if we could make everything domestically, we wouldn’t have to travel far and wide to ensure the quality we expected. It quickly became apparent that manufacturing domestically would cost far beyond what we had budgeted for. Given the number of parts, required touch time (the amount of time it takes someone to assemble a product), various materials and processes used, building entirely in the U.S. wasn’t viable. Potential domestic suppliers still looked East for most of the components we needed, albeit with longer lead times. At the end of the day we opted for a mix; we manufacture our high touch time mechanical assembly in China and high value components, like our circuit board, in California. Final assembly takes place in California, giving us easy access to final stage quality control. Unlike replacement locks, we designed to fit entirely over an existing lock and we knew that most components would have to be custom made as a result. We quickly learned that there was no concept of “off the shelf” when manufacturing in China. Even what seemed to be commodity components like switches, screws and motors would be made to spec. This also meant protracted lead times as well as the potential for vendor lock-in for our most specialized parts. Perhaps the most frustrating aspect was that a delay or quality-control issue in any one of the 41 discrete mechanical components necessary to build our hardware throws a wrench into production. The perfect storm of an inept supplier, poor quality control and rushed work meant the first small run of Lockitrons couldn’t turn, had inconsistent finishes and generally were inoperable. Several gears and rings had “flash” or excess material where they meshed with other parts; the die casting for the aluminum was poorly machined preventing our circuit board from installing correctly. Using tools like problem follow-up sheets, we documented each individual problem on each part and worked with our contract manufacturer to adjust tooling, test injection mold cycle times and find new suppliers where corners had been cut. All of this, however, comes at the cost of time; it would take another two months of debugging before we had working products. We demonstrated one of the first fully operable prototype Lockitrons in 2013. Connecting over Bluetooth Low Energy, our demo carried out everything as expected; however the motor was loud, connectivity was intermittent and the circuit board was finicky. We spent the next few months redesigning our gearbox to reduce noise while increasing power to deal with sticky or hard-to-close locks. While the choice was the right one to make, it cost us valuable time; a few parts had to be retooled and there were cascading effects on our electronics and supplier choices. We selected an ultra-efficient, powerful motor to place at the lock’s heart, but this also impacted our timeline. Most challenging, however, was the meshing of electronic and mechanical worlds. An initial circuit board design proved overly complex and underpowered. The resulting power and torque requirements of our gear box required a number of changes on our circuit board that would have been nearly impossible to predict from our prototype units. It took several more PCB iterations to fine-tune the circuit board’s electromechanical requirements. Creating an assembly line that can reliably manufacture, assemble and QC a product with dozens of discrete, custom components is an incredible challenge. Each step along the way needs to be clearly documented with the expectation that anyone with little training can sit down and understand what needs to happen. Something as small as an overtightened screw or improperly angled switch can wreak havoc when products arrive in a customer’s hands. Even with numerous quality control steps, units need to be subjected to random spot checks and production lines overseen by third parties (or ideally us). Along with printed and video guides to assembling Lockitron, we also record the failures we see from different components. This lets us see if there is something wrong with a single batch of units or with our assembly or QC steps. When we originally launched Lockitron using our own homebrew crowdfunding app after being rejected from Kickstarter, we did so with only a single funding tier promising Lockitrons would be shipped in order to our backers based on their place in line. Unlike other crowdfunded projects, we missed the opportunity to create a “developer”or “beta”tier and unwittingly put some of our earliest backers through a rough experience. Given the support our backers have shown us to bring Lockitron to market, building a structured beta would have brought in valuable feedback more quickly and with a smoother experience for our earliest backers. When Lockitron’s crowdfunding campaign rocketed beyond all expectations, one of our close advisors from the software world asked us why we couldn’t iterate Lockitron in batches. “Ship 1,000 units, pause, and learn from what users wanted in the hardware, then build another 1,000.”With limited resources, this simply isn’t possible; each Lockitron prototype was a $3,000-5,000 investment. Conversely, while consumer grade 3D printing allows for the creation of a broad range of prototypes, the strength and precision of the parts it yields simply isn’t good enough for mechanical prototypes. On the software front, however, we built Lockitron to allow for continuous updates. Lockitron’s Wi-Fi connectivity has proven crucial in letting us roll out promised functionality, solve problems and diagnose faulty units. While our initial users at the beginning of this year had a barebones feature set with poor battery life, we’ve since updated the firmware over a dozen times, each time incrementally improving the Lockitron experience. Bluetooth-only devices are beholden to their smartphone leashes for updates; rather than prompting users at the door each time a new build is pushed we can push new features, security updates and bug fixes without making Lockitron owners wait. Our commitment to our incredibly patient backers in simple; Lockitron will get better everyday from the first time you install it. From additional features to improvements in battery life and connectivity, we’re excited for what’s in store over the few months. We’re a small but dedicated team working with some incredible partners to take Lockitron to next level while building a seamless experience. We’re excited to see where developers take Lockitron through our simple web API that’s available today. Ultimately we believe the true value behind Lockitron is in how others integrate will integrate into their own experiences as they see fit; just as we could have never predicted the massive support we would receive during our crowdfunding campaign we’re excited to see where backers install their Lockitrons. |
The Fate of The 98-Year-Old At The Heart of SF’s Anti-Eviction, Tech Protests Is Still In Doubt | Kim-Mai Cutler | 2,014 | 7 | 14 | Mary Elizabeth Phillips, the 98-year-old woman who has been at the heart of San Francisco’s ongoing anti-eviction and tech protests, still faces an uncertain future. After living just a few blocks from Dolores Park for a half-century in the Mission District, the epicenter of the city’s tech gentrification and Google Bus wars, she has been fighting an ongoing eviction battle for more than a year. “Young lady, I’m 98 years old,” she told me when I visited over the weekend. “I’m in fair shape for an old lady of my vintage, but I’m not going anywhere. They’ll have to take me out of here feet first.” Phillips doesn’t have children, so it’s not clear where she would go after living in San Francisco since 1937. And if the other remaining tenant, public school teacher Sarah Brant, is evicted, Phillips will basically be left alone inside an otherwise empty building. All the other residents have either been evicted or bought out. Her story became a rallying cry for activists, who say a tech-fueled economic boom is fueling rent increases and evictions across the city. In particular, they focused on a legal loophole from a . That law was explicitly created to give property owners the leeway to go out of business as landlords. But instead, anti-eviction activists pointed out that certain landlords were abusing the Ellis Act, to do no-fault evictions of longstanding tenants and then resell the empty individual units as tenancies-in-common. ( ) A came together to change the Ellis Act at the state level. that would have required property buyers to own a building for at least five years before they could invoke the law. (Phillips’ landlord Urban Green had owned her building for less than a year before it started eviction proceedings against the tenants in the building.) In an urgent push to get the bill passed, Phillips and Mayor Ed Lee testified in Sacramento, while to write in letters of support for the act. But three weeks ago. Leno couldn’t secure a couple of key votes from Southern California representatives in time. The real estate lobby was simply too powerful. So Phillips’ fate is still in doubt. Last Friday, , was going to allow her to stay for free through the end of her life. “Urban Green Investments and 55 Dolores Street, LLC have offered Mary Phillips the opportunity to remain in her home for the rest of her life with no cost to Mary. This offer was first communicated to Ms. Phillips’ lawyer in March 2014, and has been the topic of negotiation ever since then.” (Urban Green has not replied to any of my requests for comment, and Phillips hadn’t heard of the offer when I talked to her on Saturday.) The issue is that even if she is allowed to stay, she’ll be alone. While the rest of the building has been emptied out, there is one other tenant still there. It’s a friend and , who sometimes helps out with Phillips’ needs and has lived in the building since 1998. While Phillips’ case was filed, it was not served. In contrast, Brant’s case is being actively litigated. “It’s an illusory offer,” said Joseph Barber, who has been working on the case through the non-profit Tenderloin Housing Clinic. “It’s not really feasible for her to continue living there without Sarah.” I’ve followed the case for the last few months. When I spoke to Brant’s lawyer back in April, the clinic was actively working on a half-dozen other cases involving Urban Green. At the time, Urban Green was also in the process of evicting a severely disabled Chinese-American woman and her son nearby. “This is their business practice. This is their modus operandi. They purchase buildings with senior and disabled tenants and serve them with eviction notices,” said Tenderloin Housing Clinic attorney Matt McFarland back in April. “This is not even an isolated event.” Brant, who can no longer speak to the press because she is in active litigation, told me back in April: “It’s heart-breaking. Our dominant culture in the United States doesn’t show a lot of love to elders. Elders can really be isolated,” she said. “Mary wakes up every morning. She knows where she is. She knows where her things are. She has 50 years worth of memories and pictures here.” Aside from the costs of legal representation, the filing fees alone are more than Brant earns in a single month as a public school teacher ( ). McFarland estimated back in April that Brant would be facing at least $6,500 in legal costs, although that figure is higher now. The clinic didn’t have a hard figure when I spoke to them today. . Anything extra raised will go toward legal defenses for senior tenants. Phillips moved to San Francisco in 1937, when her first husband was in the Navy. She worked as an accountant and moved into the building at least 50 years ago. She remembers going to dance at the Fairmont, and sunbathing in an open field nearby. “I feel that I’ve lived a good life,” she said. She was married and widowed three times. “All happy,” she added. Before Urban Green evicted all the other tenants aside from Brant and Phillips, there were several other families living there. There was a couple who worked in a restaurant and their baby, a special education teacher, a nurse at San Francisco’s General Hospital and their partner. “Everyone was really happy living in our building,” Brant told me back in April. “We got along really well.” The toddler would go and watch TV with Phillips at night. But in the last few months as the building has fallen into disrepair, homeless people have clambered in from the construction site next door to sleep in the building’s walkways. They were cleared out in the last week or two. There’s also been one break-in. “Most of my friends are all gone,” Phillips said, flipping through an album on her coffee table full of photos of old friends who had long passed away. “Thank God Sarah is still here.” |
Oculus Spots People Selling Rift Pre-Orders, Cancels Their Shipments | Greg Kumparak | 2,014 | 7 | 14 | The second version of the Oculus Rift VR headset is expected to , but actually getting your hands on one is going to be tough. Over 45,000 units had been pre-ordered as of the first of this month — and of those, only 10,000 are expected to actually ship in July. If you waited even to get your pre-order in, you might be waiting a while. Perhaps eBay is the answer? Surely someone is selling their spot in line there, right? Yep! And Oculus is banhammering those orders. Take, for example, for an Oculus Rift DK2 pre-ordered on the first morning of availability. The asking price? $5000 (versus the headset’s original pre-order pricetag of $350).
Oculus fans, angry at the idea of anyone buying their way into a line they’d been waiting in for months, gathered up the pitchforks. In hopes of being able to gather enough information to get the pre-order canceled, they started poking the partially-anonymous reseller for more details. Within a few hours, they knew the exact time they reseller’s order had been placed. By this afternoon, Oculus’ community manager popped in to drop the official word: Don’t worry guys. We found him and we cancelled his order. Shortly thereafter, the eBay listing was cancelled. After word started spreading that resold orders were being cancelled, users began voicing concerns that they might be framed. Many early Rift DK2 buyers had shared any and all details of their pre-orders to help each other establish a shipping timeline — now they were concerned that others might use these details against them to bump their way up the line. Oculus’ Community Service Lead stopped in to clear things up:
Just so everyone is clear, the information provided alone was not enough to take action. We perform our own investigations with tools at our disposal to make sure that there isn’t a false positive. Our community is awesome! Thank you for helping us make sure that we are getting kits into the hands of devs and shutting down profiteers. Meanwhile, the company who seemed to have gobbled up multiple pre-orders to resell, and banned their entire orders in one fell swoop: ”Orders,” as in plural. All gone. Pwnt. While Oculus’ Terms of Sale don’t seem to explicitly ban pre-order sales at this time, they say that they can cancel orders at any time before the units are shipped. Meanwhile, this says that Rift DK2 resales “as they are meant for developers and are not consumer products.” This is the second release of Oculus’ work-in-progress VR headset, but neither this unit (the DK2) nor the one that came before it (the DK1) are meant for consumers. They’re meant for developers to prep their games and apps for the day the consumerRift ships. While Oculus doesn’t make anyone jump through too many hoops to order a unit, they make the buyer check a box acknowledging that things aren’t meant to be consumer-friendly just yet. Of course, Oculus isn’t psychic. If someone were to play it extra safe with their pre-order details, there probably isn’t much Oculus could do about it (besides perhaps complain to eBay to try to get the listing pulled). But you certainly wouldn’t be making any friends amongst the Oculus enthusiasts that way. |
Fly Or Die: Adobe Ink & Slide | Jordan Crook | 2,014 | 7 | 14 | The are Adobe’s first foray into the hardware world, comprising a special stylus and a digital ruler. Paired with the , users can draw and use the ruler to create perfect shapes and straight lines. The Ink, the stylus, is aluminum and feels and looks great. And if that weren’t enough, it works splendidly, too. There’s a slight delay, but generally speaking the Ink is a solid little Bluetooth-connected stylus. The Slide, on the other hand, is harder to use. Adobe chose to use magnetic bits to simulate the capacitive touch of a human, meaning that you have to be applying a bit of pressure to use the Slide properly. On a smaller device, like an iPad mini, that can be difficult. Still, there are some pretty nifty tricks included with the Ink stylus, like the ability to grab a drawing from one device and plop it down onto another. These are the types of smart features that make the Ink and Slide a good enterprise choice for graphic design houses and the like, as the $199 price tag on the duo is a bit high for someone who doesn’t take this stuff seriously. |
New York Gets Another Learn To Code Academy | Natasha Lomas | 2,014 | 7 | 13 | New York is getting a new tech skills training academy. The twist it that the just launched academy is being created by a dev studio drawing on their existing expertise making apps for others to teach budding entrepreneurs the web development skills they’re going to need to turn their big idea into a big business. At a price, of course. The dev studio in question, , says its new stands out from other local players in the learn-to-code space — such as and — because of the real-world business experience it will be bringing to class. TL;DR It’s a coding academy for people who want to make apps taught by people who actually make apps. Indeed, part of the incentive for HFC to start the academy is the difficulty it has in finding enough skilled developers to fuel a growing business, according to co-founder Ben Schippers. “We can’t actually hire people fast enough,” he tells TechCrunch. “It’s a great business, it’s doing very well, it’s growing unbelievably quickly.” HFC’s client roster includes the likes of , (TechCrunch corporate overlord) , , , , McGrawHill, MoMA, Scribd, Verisign, Victoria’s Secret and The Webby Awards, to name a few. It’s planning to draw on that network to help graduates of its Academy find jobs at the end of their course — and, indeed, is likely to be cherrypicking promising candidates itself. “Selfishly the tech industry is growing and so is HFC and so selfishly we are look at the academy to do a very very fine-tuned recruiting. You can look at that way,” says Schippers. “The way in which we are going to teach you, if we do our job well… we should be able to hire people from the class. So we are really going to be under the spotlight for the first few classes to see how many of those students we can actually hire. Our goal will be to hire students from that first class.” “It’s a no brainer for us to do this — then we can get pick of the litter and we can give them jobs,” he adds. “It also keeps us really honest because if we’re not able to pull from the Academy then we’re not really helping the services side of the business.” Are we in a bubble? If app makers can’t put their hands on enough skilled staff to meet demand — and believe they can get non-techie folk to pay to be upskilled so that they can fill their own empty tech seats, then yes we’re in a bubble. The new academy is not HFC’s first foray into teaching tech skills. It previously dipped its toes in the waters by teaching a “traditional engineering entrepreneur course” at Bates college in Maine. But Schippers says it wanted to try its hand at shaping an entire course without having to fit within a traditional academic curriculum so that the focus on skills learnt could be entirely within a business application perspective. “Instead of working with all of these colleges to figure out how to write the curriculum for them, we said let’s just do it ourself. The class that we taught was the way in which we coach or teach entrepreneurs that come through HFC as a business. And we said there’s a really great opportunity here to take all of our learnings over the years of building the software and wrap a really great coding curriculum around that,” he says. “That is really a huge differentiator between what we do and what the couple of other schools are doing.” “In our little world there are a couple of people doing similar things. In the grand scheme of things there’s not nearly enough seats to fill all the students. The demand is really high,” he adds. “Within HFC we have product architects, we have visual designers, we have user experience designers, and we have all of the front end and back end engineers so within this large curriculum that we wrote what we’re going to be able to do is we’re going to be able to on a daily or weekly basis, bring in key stakeholders from the services business and have them actually go through real-life examples of problems that they have had to encounter on a weekly basis. And so it’s a very, very, very hands on approach to teaching software engineering.” Schippers concedes that is doing “something sort of similar” to its new HFC Academy — being as they are also an engineering firm “first and foremost”. “They are really the closest to us but if you look at Flatiron or if you look at App Academy, what you’ll see is those curriculums are great, and they make a lot of sense, and a lot of what they’re doing were going to be doing as well — but the missing pieces in those curriculums are the inherent, day-to-day opportunities of the real-life exposure coming in to the academy,” he adds. “It’s a lot more learning by doing vs just learning.” Discussing how the Academy compares with incubators or mentoring programs, he says the price point is “very competitive” (albeit incubator programs are usually ‘paying’ the startups to be part of the program via an investment) but also stresses that it’s more of a class environment than you’d get at an incubator. “This is much more of a class. You’re paying to come in, to have a desk and from nine to 12 in the morning you, deep immersion, and then from one til five you work. So it’s a full time class commitment with these sprinkles of real world practitioners being brought in,” he adds. “Y Combinator and Tech Stars… what they do really well is the exact opposite of what Flatiron does well. What Flatiron does really well is full immersion across the board. It’s just you’re learning how to code, and that’s really what you’re doing. With YC it’s ‘ok you already have a business idea and we’re going to help put people in front of you to help you push that idea through’. And with us, we’re saying we should blend both of those — and that’s what people are doing to be paying for.” Who exactly is the program for? Schippers says the philosophical thrust is to serve a growing demand among graduates of liberal arts degrees who have found decreasing demand for their ‘soft skills’ vs the job market of 25 years+ ago — and who are therefore looking for ways to upskill after formal education, with a focus on gaining technology skills (and specifically skills that can help them get jobs). “People are really having a hard time getting jobs, and that has been the movement of the learn to code movement. Technology has been one of these growth sectors where there’s so much growth right now and there aren’t enough people,” he says. “It’s the people who are graduating from school or into their late twenties and thirties and they’ve realised that they graduated with some degree and they don’t really like their job anymore — and what they really want to do is they want to get involved in technology. That is going to be the demographic of the first couple of classes.” “There’s a huge opportunity for these highly educated and motivated people to start making money in technology. They just need help getting started,” he adds. The first class at the HFC Academy starts in September, and only some 15 souls will get tapped for the inaugural program — likely to last around six weeks. The cost for learning code from HFC’s coders starts at $3,500, stepping up (within three weeks) to circa $5,000. Participants will be taught Ruby on Rails, HTML, JavaScript — aka the skills required to become a web developer, says Schippers. “They will be learning all of the progressive tools needed to begin the conversation of getting a job in technology. To begin the conversation of continuing to learn in the field of technology — that is the whole mission of these classes. You should be able to graduate and a business for instance like HFC should be able to hire you. That’s the whole idea,” he adds. HFC is taking applications for the first class now, and will be doing some selection — based on ensuring that a class has the right profile of participants, according to Schippers. “We’re going to be looking at the class as much more of a unit [than other tech academies might]… We’re going to be trying to get those 15 students profiled the right way, so from different backgrounds, from different jobs, from different education areas,” he adds. In January the length of the class is likely to extend to eight or ten weeks, and the Academy will be adding a scholarship program to help underprivileged inner city kids get places within the Academy — likely one or two seats per class will be offered on a scholarship basis, in partnership with the city of New York. While the initial focus for HFC’s Academy is on New York, where its services business is headquartered, Schippers sees potential to spread the initiative to other cities in time — naming the likes of Austin, Texas as another potential “hotbed” for tech skills demand. The northern mid west is another possibility — “the Twin Cities, and/or Chicago and maybe even Boston”. Also increasingly interesting in the tech skills demand area is the UK. “It’s really hard to ignore the UK right now,” says Schippers. “I think there’s definitely an opportunity there. People just need to do a little more research to figure out where the right pockets are to do something like this.” |
Autobutler Raises €5.8M To Vet Garages For European Car-Owners | Mike Butcher | 2,014 | 7 | 14 | Over the last few years we’ve seen a number of startups appear that would like to bring the market power of the Internet to bear on a traditionally tough market: car repairs. We’re all too aware of the obvious issues to be solved: the lack of consistency and transparency, and the difficulty of vetting both the work of the garage and its customer service before you entrust your vehicle to them. since 2007 and has raised $21.3M to date. Last year OpenBay its auto repair marketplace to connect car owners with local mechanics. YourMechanic wants to be , sending you one on call. And BodyShopBids for a site that allows consumers to solicit custom auto repair estimates by uploading a photo. Now , an online platform for car maintenance and servicing, has raised €5.8m in a round led by Index Ventures. Index lead the round with participation from existing investors including Dawn Capital and Nordic venture capital firm Creandum. The funds will be used to expand across Europe, starting with Germany and the UK. The site claims 140,000 customers have used it to find a garage to repair or service their car, chosen from 3,300 garage chains or independent workshops. A user selects their make and model of car on the site, the work that needs to be done, a location, and the job goes out to 24 hour tender. Within 24 hours, the car-owner receives up to three offers from vetted local garages, and can read customer reviews before making their choice. Autobutler’s Global CEO and Partner Christian Legêne believes its killer feature is its CRM tool for individual mechanics and larger chains where they can get deeper insight on how to improve their business and at the same time making it easy for them to find customers online. With so many US startups concentrating on their home market, it looks like Autobutler has a pretty good window of opportunity here. |
Y Combinator Calls For Strict Net Neutrality Rules, Reclassification Of Broadband Under Title II | Alex Wilhelm | 2,014 | 7 | 14 | Early this afternoon , written by its own , calling on the FCC to abandon its current plan to pursue net neutrality regulation under Section 706 of the Telecommunications Act, and instead work to manage broadband providers under Title II of the Communications Act. Classifying broadband under Title II would grant the FCC wider purview to regulate and control the industry. YC, a popular technology company incubator, is not the first firm to push for a strong form of net neutrality. A steady beat of young technology companies have recently pushed for similar reform, including and . Y Combinator’s call for Title II reform is notable for its technicality. Its missive digs into the technical side of why the group favors that specific form of reform, which is contrary to what the FCC is currently proposing: The Court held that, absent reclassifying broadband providers as Title II carriers, the FCC would be treating broadband providers as common carriers unless it left open room for “substantial room for individualized bargaining and discrimination in terms.” Therefore, the FCC cannot impose a nondiscrimination rule–unless it classifies broadband providers under Title II. The Court also held that, without classifying broadband providers under Title II, the FCC could not ban charging fees for priority access, even though the FCC recognized such fees would be a “significant departure from historical and current practice.” This section is interesting given that ISPs themselves have argued that under Title II, paid prioritization would be illegal. AT&T for example had : We noted in particular that calls for reclassification of broadband Internet access services as a Title II telecommunications service would cause risks and harms that dwarf any putative benefits, all but scuttle the administration’s ambitious broadband agenda, and would not, in all events, preclude the paid prioritization arrangements that seem to be the singular focus of reclassification proponents. So, there is dissension among the ranks. The technology group is joined today by , who also . In the same note the Senator disparaged paid prioritization, which is often called the allowance for the creation of ‘fast lanes’ for some providers of Internet services. Y Combinator’s complaint matters as it lends a fresh institutional voice to the idea that the economic impact of net neutrality being enacted would be net positive, not negative. Currently entrenched market players like AT&T have argued that open Internet rules would restrict investment in broadband and the like. (The Internet Association, which counts a host of technology companies as members, has a .) The technology incubator certainly has a profit motive in the matter. Y Combinator has benefited financially, on the back of an open Internet. For shame? Not in this case. Financial incentive can sometimes put corporations on the right sides of an issue. has spoken out in favor of less active government surveillance in recent weeks. Bad for its business? The opposite. But that doesn’t mean that its notes are out of key. The first public comment period comes to an end tomorrow evening. Expect more dissonant cries of dissent in the coming 34 hours. |
Lexalytics Acquires Semantria To Bring Sentiment Analysis To The Masses | Kyle Russell | 2,014 | 7 | 14 | Sentiment analysis is an important tool for businesses looking to get a better understanding of how their customers feel about their products. Instead of surveys that offer abstract ratings, it lets companies look at the emotions underlying how users talk about their goods or services. has offered such technology for years, licensing its Salience Engine to other firms who then baked it into product’s like social media filtering platform. Now it’s looking to bring that same technology to smaller firms around the globe with the acquisition of , whose offers an easy, affordable way to find out the emotions behind customer satisfaction ratings. CEO claims that his company’s Excel plug-in can get a person from zero to complete sentiment analysis within minutes of signing up, assuming they’ve already got tweets, Facebook posts, or some other data set to look at. Now that it’s joining , the company is rolling out a series of products that will extend its reach and usefulness. First is a Google Doc plug-in — giving Mac users access to the tool — that is set for release in early September, as well as a native app powered by Lexalytics’ backend, which is due closer to the end of the year. For its part, Lexalytics is looking to use its investment, which I’ve been told came in below $10 million, to expand its customer base within the United States and abroad. Lexalytics CEO told TechCrunch that Semantria’s sales team will allow the company to shift its focus from purely powering applications and services for others to a more traditional enterprise software as a service business. According to Catlin, the combination of Lexalytics’ four years of research in natural language processing for a including Mandarin, Korean, and Japan and Semantria’s affordable service gives the firm a lead in Asia, where millions join the middle class each year and hundreds of millions use a diverse set of social networks. Those interested in seeing what sentiment analysis can say about customers can use to analyze up to 20,000 documents, tweets, or survey responses for free. |
Do You Feel Pressure Or Do You Apply Pressure? | Ben Horowitz | 2,014 | 7 | 14 |
under-appreciated law of business physics is: Another obvious but not well-understood law: If we take these two together, it is easy to see that without intervention, the larger your company becomes, the more people will complain and blame you. This seems simple enough, but CEOs often fail to understand the logic, become overwhelmed by the criticism, lose confidence in themselves, and decide that they are no longer capable of running their own companies. This can be tragic as I explained in If you are a logical and open-minded person, it is difficult not to take a 10X increase in criticism seriously. More importantly, it’s difficult not to take a 10X increase in criticism personally. So how can a CEO keep from getting grounded into sawdust by complaints from her own people? The answer comes from a simple CEO aphorism: . Let’s begin by looking at the overwhelming spiral. As your company grows, people start complaining about everything from your sales efforts being underwhelming to there not being enough organic snacks in your free food section. Meanwhile, you are trying to wrestle serious product strategy questions posed by scary competitors to the ground. You don’t know the answers to most of the complaints, so you defer them and focus on what you know. The problems related to the complaints fester and grow. Your employees get frustrated that the issues are not being fixed, and they complain louder. They begin to lose confidence in you as CEO. The key to breaking the cycle is to stop feeling pressure and to start applying it. The most basic way to do this is to assign the problems to your team. This transfers the pressure from you to the organization and has the added benefit of empowering the team. At this point, those of you who have read my book are thinking: “Ben, that’s not the hard thing about this. The hard thing isn’t delegating, the hard thing is when the executive disagrees that there’s a problem or there is no logical owner or the problem is cross-functional or the executive tries to give it back to you.” Let’s take these in order. Imagine that your employees are complaining about the number of bugs in your product and you ask your head of engineering to improve quality. Chances are that he will not say: “Sure thing, boss.” He will much more likely say: “By what definition?” He will likely have way more data than you about product quality and it will be difficult for you to win the argument. Yet you know the employees are right, which is why you didn’t explain to them they were wrong in the first place. The reason for the stalemate is that quality in the abstract is an intractable problem. In fact, most problems in the abstract have this property. If you want it fixed, you must be specific. Doing so is tricky in this case because no software organization has ever produced bug-free software in every version. So if you don’t want zero, then how many bugs are too many? Imagine that your sales people keep complaining that there aren’t enough leads. You feel as though they are Jack Lemmon in . But then you go to your head of marketing and he demonstrates that he’s generated 150 percent of the leads that he was supposed to generate based on his objectives. What do you do? There are many possible issues: The definition of a lead differs, the profile of the target customer differs, somebody is lying, etc. As tempting as these possible solutions may be, resist the temptation to solve this one yourself. Instead, get both executives together and let them know that you need them to agree on a common definition of a lead, a method for determining whether any given lead meets the description and an objective for the head of marketing to hit next quarter that both he and the head of sales will be happy with. Give them a firm deadline and let them know that you will take no excuses, because you have a whole field filled with demotivated sales reps and you will not stand for that. Apply pressure. Sometimes a problem has no owner. Customer churn has increased in the past two quarters. It’s an important issue, and left unchecked it could become mission critical. However, it’s not the top priority in the company today. To further create CEO procrastination, it’s not clear whether it’s a customer support problem, a sales problem, a services problem, a product quality problem or some combination of all four. In reality, it’s probably a CEO problem, but if it’s not the top priority in the company, having the CEO personally drive it to resolution may not be the best idea. So, what do you do? You assign the problem to an illogical owner. In this case, you might assign it to the head of sales, because she has the highest incentive to fix it properly. Otherwise she has to resell all those deals to make quota. You empower her to dig into each churned account, find the root cause analysis, and report back to the team on a frequent basis. Once the root cause has been determined, she should propose a cross-functional plan to fix the problem. This is an imperfect strategy in many ways. The problem might be entirely with sales setting poor expectations and she might cover that up. The various groups might not get along well and not want to listen to a peer. The head of sales might not have a great idea of what’s possible in engineering or customer support. Imperfect yes, but far better than doing nothing, which is generally what happens when the CEO has too much on her plate and doesn’t apply pressure. Your company’s engineering schedules are unpredictable and your engineering throughput is poor, so you ask your VP of engineering to fix the problem. She complains: “The schedule keeps slipping because the product management team keeps changing the priorities and thrashing the engineers back and forth across the various projects.” You say: “Great. I will work with product management to get them to cut that out.” The VP of product management replies: “I’d love to stop with the requirements, but we need certain things to close large deals and make the quarterly number.” You then go to the head of sales and she says: “Do you want me to make my number or not?” In this case, everyone is under-empowered to make the right decision and get you what you want. The key to delegation is better empowerment. You could simply give the head of engineering the ability to say “no” to everything, but you may well miss all your sales forecasts and cause yourself an even bigger problem. A better approach would be to formalize the change process. You can say that once a project begins, you can alter its definition, resources, priorities or schedule, but doing so requires a formal meeting with all the stakeholders and the CEO. At that meeting, all changes and their potential consequences will be discussed and a decision will be reached. If you implement such a process, you will find that the number of changes drops by an order of magnitude. By simply making it more difficult to make a change, you will apply pressure to the team to find another way to make the sales number. At this point, you haven’t empowered the head of engineering to control her own destiny, but you have empowered the team to give you what you want. Founding CEOs often find it difficult to evaluate executives. How do I know if my head of marketing is world-class? I’ve never run marketing. Applying lots of pressure is a great way to sharpen your instincts when evaluating executives. If you consistently apply pressure to an executive and get no results, then you very likely need to upgrade that position. The whole point of paying an executive all that money and giving her that fat stock option package is to take the pressure off of you and give you some leverage. If she can’t do that, then she must go. She may be a fine executive for another CEO, but not for you. On the other hand, when you have a problem that you have no idea how to solve and you delegate it to an executive and she solves it, then she’s extremely valuable. If you are feeling overwhelmed and under competent, then you are very likely not applying enough pressure. |
Real Cheese From A Lab, No Cow Necessary | Sarah Buhr | 2,014 | 7 | 14 | Vegans who miss the creamy taste of real cheese, rejoice! A group of biohackers from in Oakland, Calif., and in Sunnyvale, Calif., are using baker’s yeast to produce the world’s first cheese that did not originate from milk in the udder of a cow. Most vegan cheese is soy or nut-based and doesn’t taste much like cheese at all. If you’ve been vegan for awhile you may not remember the creamy, salty, delicious taste of a good sharp cheddar or the pungent stink of Limburger or Brie. That’s all about to change for you, thanks to science. By now you may have some questions as to how this is possible. The group, known as the San Francisco Bay Area iGEM Team, is engineering this very real cheese from a genetic sequence found in mammals. They plan to insert that sequence into the yeast, no cows needed. What you may be wondering at this point is how it’s vegan if the genetic sequence is from an animal. Here’s the trippy “magic of science” part. These natural milk protein genetic sequences are not actually from the animals, but based on the sequence found in animals. The scientists then take that DNA blueprint and build that same sequence in the lab from scratch. They take that lab-grown sequence and insert it into the yeast to make the necessary milk proteins. Oh and here’s a part some of you may find weird – some of these “animal” DNA sequences may be human. They’ve taken DNA sequencing from humans to create some of the cheeses. The logic behind this is that it’s healthier for us to consume milk proteins produced from our own bodies than it is for us to digest cow milk. It also reduces allergens. Some people produce more mucous or have trouble breaking down the lactose from cow’s milk. But for those who do not find the thought of human cheese appetizing, they also use cow DNA sequences to make milk for cow cheese. Mix in some water, oil and sugar and that makes a sort of milk to “grow” cheese that is cruelty, hormone and antibiotic free. But creating cheese this way is really expensive. So the group launched an to raise the $15K needed for all the initial ingredients. Lucky for them they’ve already hit their goal in less than two weeks. It’s at $15,460 as of this writing and has 30 days to go. The group of unpaid volunteers plans to create four different variants of the baker’s yeast to make the cheeses. All research will be up on a public wiki as they get into it and “the patentable technology will be released into the public domain.” These scientists would like to eventually see their lab-grown cheese out in stores for everyone to buy, but we’re still early days here. Group member, Craig Rouskey, says they first need to prove they can do this, then figure out how to scale up. The FDA will also need to approve this cheese. It will most likely have to be labeled “Not for human consumption” before that happens. The goal is to have the first batch ready to go by the end of the Indiegogo campaign in late August. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eh6I7IXiEVM&w=560&h=315] |
Toonimo Raises $2.5M To Liven Up Websites With Custom Cartoons | Anthony Ha | 2,014 | 7 | 14 | , a startup that says it can make websites more engaging and lucrative by adding custom animations, is announcing that it has raised $2.5 million in funding. The idea is that online visitors might appreciate having a cartoon character who can point out the important parts of a website and walk them through some of the trickier bits — and that, in turn, can lead to increased sales. For example, when you visit , animated characters lead you down the page and explain the concept behind the company, in the hopes that you’ll sign up for a free trial. If a business wants to add similar characters to their own websites, they can customize the characters’ look, set the triggers for when they should appear, and write the script for what they should say. Then they add the character by just including a line of code from Toonimo. The idea of an animated helper may give you , but animations are quite a bit more sophisticated. Chief Marketing Officer Jake Levant said Toonimo can test different scripts and different versions of an animation, then automatically deliver the one that’s delivering the best results, . Sometimes, that means leaving out the animation entirely. Levant told me that the goal is to add more personalization over time and eventually to become “the multimedia layer” for sites to add and test different types of content, not just animation. The funding was led by of . Toonimo’s founders include CEO , founder of ( ), and CTO . By the way, if you’re having trouble playing the animations on the Toonimo site, you may want to switch browsers — I couldn’t see them until I switched from Safari to Chrome. (I dunno, maybe I just need to .) [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HK6F7Fkw2-o&w=560&h=315] |
Floret Is A Gamified Dating App For Virtual Romance | Jordan Crook | 2,014 | 7 | 14 | And in this week’s episode of might I introduce . Floret is a new dating app that focuses on a common problem known as the , which essentially means that elements in a group are matched based on preferences, without any two elements in the group preferring one another over their original match. Here’s the exact wording : Given n men and n women, where each person has ranked all members of the opposite sex with a unique number between 1 and n in order of preference, marry the men and women together such that there are no two people of opposite sex who would both rather have each other than their current partners. If there are no such people, all the marriages are “stable”. With that principle as the guiding force, takes four girls and four guys and puts them in a ranking game together. After ranking the opposite sex from one to four, Floret tells you who you match up with based on the stable marriage problem. In other words, you always match with someone, but that doesn’t mean you will always match with your first choice. Players are ranking each other in real time, with a little over a minute to make your final choices from a set of pictures and a short bio. “If the players in the game were all on a desert island, none of them would ever have to worry about their partner running off with someone else,” said Floret CEO and CTO . Unfortunately, the players are not on a desert island and it’s somewhat demoralizing to be matched with your third or fourth choice in the group. Oddly enough, Floret doesn’t focus on location the same way that most dating services do, hoping instead to create a virtual world of romance. When I asked why, Moh simply said, “It’s easier.” “Having a relationship virtually, through videos and photos and messages, is easier than meeting up in real life,” he said. “That’s why we’re using online communications tools so much right now, anyways, right? Because it’s easier.” That said, Floret doesn’t seem like the kind of app that will match you with your soul mate. It’s more of a game, paired with the excitement of an online fling. That’s not to say that some virtual relationships don’t eventually become very serious, but I think most people consider IRL interaction a necessity of a real relationship. Floret is currently focused on user acquisition, with plans to sell virtual goods through in-app purchases somewhere down the road. Floret graduated out of StartEngine, and claims to have an undisclosed amount of funding from a large dating company, though declines to specify which. You can check out Floret in the . |
ScribbleLive Acquires CoveritLive, Will Still Operate Both Brands | Matt Burns | 2,014 | 7 | 14 | Once bitter rivals and are now family. Scribble Technologies is today announcing the acquisition of CoveritLive from Demand Media, effectively bringing two of the largest live content creation companies under one roof. The two companies have slightly different product sets, but the same aim: To empower brands and companies with tools to bring live content to their readers and fans. Several years ago, the two companies participated in a sort of arms race to build the best liveblogging platform. One always trumped the other and then WordPress dropped a bombshell and released its own, effectively removing all the air from the room. Still, ScribbleLive and CoveritLive moved past simply offering a liveblogging platform and now have a bevy of content creation and social media products designed to provide live content to the reader. “2014 has been a great year for Scribble and our company’s growth. We’ve expanded our international presence, released a new enterprise product, and powered more than 4 billion engagement minutes in the past 30 days alone,” said Vincent Mifsud, CEO at ScribbleLive, in a released statement. “CoveritLive will help us accelerate our growth rate even further and exponentially increase our influence in the market.” With the addition of account, will power engagement for an impressive number of companies, including over 1,500 total customers, the NFL, NBA, NHL, MLB and all three of the U.S.’ top news networks. Terms of the acquisition have not been released yet and are being held up by SEC regulatory steps. The plan is to operate both ScribbleLive and CoveritLive as separately branded solutions and eventually merge the two products into one encompassing live content platform. |
Save $9, Here Are The TechCrunch Staff’s Email Addresses | Romain Dillet | 2,014 | 7 | 14 | I hate email. But there’s one thing I hate even more: people selling my email address. Currently trending at the top of , is an email database for tech journalists — and it’s not free. After creating an account, you can pay $9 a month to get access to a curated list of email addresses of people working for publications such as , , , , and, yes, TechCrunch. With a free account, you can only see the names and Twitter handles. In other words, keep your credit card handy if you want the 214 email addresses. This is nothing new. Countless people have been selling email lists on the Internet. Most of the time, you can get thousands of email addresses for very little money. But Pressfarm is different. It’s a slick website built using the framework and with a well-tailored list of journalists. It doesn’t look like your average shady website for pro spammers. Yet, you don’t have to pay to get our email addresses. You’ll find them at the end of this post for FREE. But that doesn’t mean you should spam us for coverage. As Sarah Buhr on Product Hunt, don’t send out mass emails. These emails don’t work — we skip them. Instead, find out who tends to cover your startup’s area of opportunity, and reach out with something short and sweet. Don’t pitch too early, , and build relationships. Finally, don’t take it personally if we don’t cover your startup — there are so many good things out there that it’s hard to keep up with everything. If you follow this advice and work on something that catches my attention, there is no reason I won’t get back to you. Well, unless TechCrunch’s parent company AOL messes up my email inbox again: Aand my TC email address is working again! We’ll all remember this day as “that day AOL accidentally deleted my TC email.” — Romain Dillet 🙃 (@romaindillet) And without further ado, here’s the list. Go buy an ice cream or two with your $9. |
Google, Other Leading Internet Companies Support Net Neutrality, Call For Extension To Mobile Providers | Alex Wilhelm | 2,014 | 7 | 14 | As the initial comment period regarding the FCC’s currently proposed net neutrality rules comes to a close, the today released a strongly worded statement calling for strict net neutrality rules that would not include paid prioritization, or what many refer to as Internet “fast lanes.” The letter also supports applying net neutrality rules to wireless connections, and argues for more Internet Service Provider transparency to prevent abuse regarding network interconnectivity. The group, which counts , and TechCrunch-owner as members, debases paid prioritization as currently proposed as a “difficult to enforce, multi-framework that is not focused on the goals of broadband deployment and adoption.” The public, the group argues, “would be far better served by clearer and more straightforward prohibitions against blocking and paid-prioritization.” The group believes the FCC’s proposed “commercial reasonability” test to determine when paid prioritization could be allowed has holes — and isn’t actually workable. More reasonable action, the group says, is needed to get rid of a potential flaw or weakness in net neutrality rules. The Association is not impressed by the argument that net neutrality regulation will harm investment in new broadband capacity. Instead, in its view, the opposite will take place: Open Internet rules will preserve the driving force of the Internet — unencumbered innovation and growth — increasing its utility. The average consumer will therefore buy more, and better access to the Internet, something that their ISP would certainly appreciate. Noting a rising amount of investment by private companies in both wired and wireless connectivity, and consumer spend in streaming video and mobile apps, the group argues that “[w]hile correction does not imply causation, the symbiotic relationship of Internet broadband access providers and content providers is indisputable.” In a sense, this is the offer of a somewhat aggressively ironic détente — what’s good for me is what’s good for you. “It is edge providers – whether they provide content, applications, or services – that fuel Internet growth and innovation. Consumer demand for broadband comes from the applications that consumers access via their broadband service, rather than from the service itself,” the Association said. The Association also delved into a topic that has seen less discussion: Treating wireless connections the same as wired for the purposes of regulations. Currently, mobile providers face the same transparency requirements as wired connections, but do not face the same rules and regulations when it comes to other aspects of net neutrality, like blocking. The members of the Association, which are often content providers themselves, want their content to be unencumbered, regardless of what device or connection is being used to access it. Peering was left out of the FCC’s Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, with Chairman Tom Wheeler stating at the time that it was “better addressed separately.” Given the strong comments association member Netflix has made on the matter, and the fact that it cropped up in the group’s letter, it seems that some technology companies disagree with the Chairman. However, the letter doesn’t go as far as to say that paid-peering agreements of the sort that Netflix has signed with several ISPs, should be banned, but instead that the FCC “should ensure that carriers are not engaged in any market abuses through peering arrangements and be prepared to exercise its authority to prevent any abuse that it uncovers.” Mild, perhaps, but likely all that the group could hope for given that peering is outside the scope of the proposed rules as they stand now. The FCC has received more than . Users can continue to submit comments until 9:00 p.m. PST on Tuesday. |
Microsoft Presses Ahead With Its Cloud Strategy | Alex Wilhelm | 2,014 | 7 | 14 | This morning at its , made a lengthy pitch to its assembled clients that the cloud isn’t the future, but rather the present. The company presented its cloud products and services as a way for partner companies to generate more revenue and land more customers. Microsoft, however, wasn’t overly boastful during its speech — instead, the company described itself as something akin to an insurgent player, scrapping for new market share. COO highlighted the fact that the PC ecosystem remains a roughly 300 million unit market, of which Microsoft controls more than 90 percent. But of the larger devices market, Microsoft controls a far more modest 14 percent. That’s the number the company says it is focusing on. Turner argued that when you have 90 percent market share, your work is mostly aimed at preserving your perch. When you have 14 percent, you view the market slightly differently. Microsoft’s recent focus on devices and services was in full repair during the speech, with the company’s executives weaving between devices — Surface Pro 3, Windows Phone, partner-OEM tablets and so forth — and its cloud-based software — Office 365, its CRM tools, Sharepoint, and Azure. As TechCrunch has noted in the past, Microsoft’s enterprise cloud tools have led to a at the company, with its revenues painting a new direction for the company. Turner said that Sharepoint is now a $2 billion business and that Office 365 is the company’s “fastest-growing commercial product ever.” And Azure picked up 42,000 new customers in its fiscal 2014. It’s currently picking up 1,000 new customers a day, according to the company. Microsoft admitted that the changes it’s introducing haven’t been easy for the company. It specifically stated that its decision to not charge royalties for Windows-based devices that have screens smaller than 9 inches was nettlesome. But, the company noted, following that choice, OEM activity to build small Windows devices has picked up. The company claimed that it won back 785 customers from in the past 18 months. In some places, Microsoft is leading. appears to be whatever the equivalent of a hit is in enterprise software. is healthy, but lags behind its key competition in terms of mind and market share. Windows Phone, an important part of the company’s mobile vision, ambles along, but its lack of quick growth is evidenced in that desultory 14 percent figure. Windows on tablets retains minor market share. That could change this year, with Microsoft promising cheaper laptops and tablets running its operating system. It’s hard to set a grade for Microsoft’s overall set of product progress, as the tools in question are quite diverse. But the company’s strategy isn’t hard to understand: It wants to sell cloud services across every platform, while building its own vision for what a platform — both software and hardware, or services and devices, depending on how you want to style it — should look like in the second half of the this decade. Here’s the company’s stated plan, which it showed toward the end of the presentation: Today’s event was aimed at partners, the companies out there pushing Microsoft products. Microsoft still sells quite a lot of its traditional product through its traditional channels. But it thinks that it can make more money selling services, and it is currently working to convince its partners of the same thing. |
Anonymish App Secret Has Raised Another $25M, Adds Facebook Login And Collections | Ingrid Lunden | 2,014 | 7 | 14 | , the app that lets users share notes with others without revealing their identity, has attracted a lot of controversy (or celebration, depending on who you are) for how it enables the spread of racy but sometimes mean or simply controversial notes about people, places and things. But it is also attracting a lot of something else: moolah. Today, the startup co-founded by ex-Googlers and has announced that it has . The Series B round includes Index Ventures, Redpoint Ventures, Garry Tan and Alexis Ohanian, SV Angel, Fuel Capital, Ceyuan Ventures, and — fittingly — “several others that shall remain a secret.” Index’s is joining the startup’s board of directors. The company has now raised , with other investors including Google Ventures, Joe Montana (!), Kleiner Perkins, David Sacks and many more. The notes that this latest round values the company at over $100 million. On top of this, is adding two new features: A digest it is calling “Secret Collections” and the ability to log in using Facebook, which it says has been its most-requested feature. There are two key things to note about the Facebook login. The first is that it will expand your Secret network beyond the contacts that you have in your mobile phone contact book; in the past this has been the primary way that Secret links up your network on the app, with friends and friends of friends being the only ones that can comment on each others’ posts; geographical or more distant connections cannot. The second is that even when you log in with Facebook, your content will not be shared there — it will remain completely anonymous, the company says. “Yes it’s anonymous, we don’t even store your public name,” the company notes in its blog post. The collections, meanwhile, is Secret’s attempt at further curation, with users getting the ability to “subscribe” to topics. “The conversations about work, love, loss and even food that have traveled far and wide through Secret give you a sense of what people are really feeling,” the company writes. Collections will appear in a users’ main Explore stream and looks to be just the beginning of how the company will further shape the app. “This is a first step in giving users more control over their experience on Secret,” the company writes. Over the last several months, Secret has been making moves to help scale out its service to a wider audience. That’s included adding an Android app to its original iOS app, and opening the app to users outside of the U.S., and letting people key into secrets near them, even when not from their more immediate circle. A spokesperson says that the app is not disclosing user numbers. “Growth in U.S. and particular countries, like Netherlands, Russia and China has been promising and exciting,” she adds. “Our next six months will be focused on continuing this growth and engagement.” The company has also been making efforts to make sure that people “Say something kind,” as the prompt notes in the text box on the app; and to let people flag and report content that is not. It doesn’t stop all hurtful posts, or even pre-empt many of them, however. And that’s before you begin to consider how Secret will ultimately choose to deal with other kinds of content that you may want to see more of, or not at all — such as the profusion of secrets about sex. Indeed, this is one area where Collections and other curation moves might come in handy. I could see a time, for example, when Secret may start to implement a “learning” algorithm, where it sees what kinds of posts you like to view, or flag those you do not, and shows you results that fit those parameters more closely. As Secret moves — or tries to move — beyond the tech early adopters thus becoming a noisier experience, that kind of shaping will likely become even more essential. |
Timberman Is The New Flappy Bird | Kyle Russell | 2,014 | 7 | 14 | Gamers looking for a new way to spend time waiting in line or on a commute should go check out , the latest indie game to take the App Store by storm. According to , the game has made its way to the top five apps overall in more than 20 countries and is the most-downloaded game in eight countries as of yesterday. Timberman’s gameplay nails the recipe for addictiveness in a smartphone game. It’s easy to get into — all you’re doing is cutting down a tree by tapping on one side or the other, trying to avoid the descending branches as you progress. After a few rounds where you frustratingly die because you can’t tell how close those branches really are to your character, the game clicks. As you get into the rhythm of the game, getting a good run becomes easier but improving your score gets harder. You’re thankful for rounds where the random generator gives you a tree that doesn’t require you to switch sides more than once a second, making you curse your phone when faced with a seemingly impossible run of branches. Although Timberman has been on the App Store since May, it only really took off towards the end of last week. As you can see from its , it did fairly well upon launch, then steadily dropped down the charts through June. According to Timberman creator Paweł Kitajewski, Apple featuring the game as an Editor’s Choice led to the recent spike in downloads, with 1 million of its 2.5 million total downloads taking place in the last three days: Timberman is free to download on the and . There’s also a $0.99 for those who want more things to unlock and don’t want to see ads every couple of rounds. |
Google Brings Ingress Location-Based Game To iPhone And iPad | Darrell Etherington | 2,014 | 7 | 14 | has brought its with a launch of the app for iPhone and iPad released late yesterday. The app has been available for two years now, and has managed to accumulate over four million downloads on Android. Google’s is likely hoping to be able to boost usage by expanding its offering to the iOS cloud, because even the Google crowd can’t deny the reach and impact of the App Store. ‘ download numbers in the Play Store are nothing to sneeze at, even though they don’t even approach the high figures of viral titles like . And Ingress is showing steady growth; it managed three million downloads between August of last year and today. that “a large chunk of those are active,” though he didn’t specify beyond that. The Ingress team also says that in the first six months of this year, they’ve seen 12,500 ‘Agents’ (Ingress players) take part in events across 65 cities worldwide, with 74,000 miles traversed and 22,400,000 in-game actions performed by players. The game also features a rich storyline complemented by video and other media assets, just like any other large-scale MMO. But despite all of its success, it still manages to fly pretty much under the radar for the general user population, and a launch on iOS could help propel it to a more mainstream audience. What Google is attempting to do with Ingress is similar to its aim with the Niantic-created Field Trip app; namely, it wants to get smartphone users out and interacting with their world. The advantage of this is two-fold, offering up data potential to Google, and in terms of giving device owners more compelling reasons to use their devices for more than just traditional activities like checking email. Motivating users to get out their devices and engage in real-life scavenger hunts isn’t exactly the easiest task, however – makers of similar augmented reality, location-based games like Shadow Cities and Please Stay Calm have told me in the past that players still prefer to play at home and in the office, while stationary, even when games encourage exploratory activity and real-world interaction. Ingress remains an interesting experiment that’s managing to pick up traction at a decent clip, however, so its progress on iOS will be interesting to watch. |
With $1 Million In Funding, Sr.Pago Is Ready To Serve Mexico’s Unbanked | Ryan Lawler | 2,014 | 7 | 14 | More than half of the Mexican population doesn’t have a bank account. Due to the length of time it takes to set one up, as well as taxes that consumers have to pay monthly, approximately 75 million Mexicans remain unbanked. But a startup called wants to change that with its mobile point-of-sale system that includes a Square-like card reader, mobile apps for managing payments they receive, and a prepaid debit card that gives them instant access to funds that they’re paid. Sr.Pago, which basically translates to “Mr. Pay,” hopes to serve the huge number of Mexican residents who don’t have a bank account by enabling them to accept debit and credit card transactions in lieu of cash. Today, those consumers are mostly limited to making and receiving payments in cash due to the difficulty in setting up a bank account. According to CEO Pablo Gonzalez Vargas, it can take nearly a month for a consumer to get a bank account. Not only that, but once they have one, they have to declare and pay taxes on their transactions every month. That’s a huge disincentive to consumers, which is why many businesses have begun paying their employees with pre-paid debit cards. But now that there are more than 116 million debit and credit cards in the country, there aren’t a lot of options for small merchants, laborers, and others to accept payments from those who wish to pay with them. Sr.Pago lowers the barrier to entry by providing them with an easy-to-set-up mobile app that connects with a specially designed card reader. That reader was specifically created to work with chip-and-PIN cards, which are increasingly becoming standard in many parts of the world. It also provides them with a debit card of their own to be able to access and pay with their own funds. Unlike banks, Sr.Pago requires only that a user take a picture of their government-issued ID, along with a bill to verify their address. With that info, users can register in about five minutes and be up and running with its mobile point-of-sale system within a day. Once they use the card reader to charge someone else’s card, the funds are instantly available in their account and can be used immediately. They can be accessed via debit card or users can take funds out at the local . The company charges $50 U.S. for its debit card and card reader, which is sold in big box retailers in Mexico. But it primarily makes money as a payment processor, charging 3.59 percent for each swipe made on the reader, and a $1 fee for transferring money to the card. While it’s launching in Mexico, the Sr.Pago team sees a huge opportunity to expand to other nations in Latin America that have a large number of unbanked residents — places like Colombia, Chile, Costa Rica or Nicaragua. Sr.Pago was founded by Vargas and CTO Antonio Flores Aldama, and now has a staff of about 25 based in Mexico City. The company has raised $1 million in seed funding, with notable investors that include and Digg co-founder and Defense.Net and Prolexic co-founder along with a number of Mexican angels. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NP7InVItPO0 |
The Pressures Driving Adaptive Re-Use and Silicon Valley’s Strange Reverse Commute | Kim-Mai Cutler | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | Given Google’s and , I wanted to point out a few things. San Francisco is now at record employment levels . Commercial rents are . Even though , most of the space coming online in next two years is already pre-leased to tenants like , and (see below). The city is about to run into a nearly two-decade old law called Proposition M that caps the amount of office space that can be built in any period. Under Proposition M, there is an that can go toward large commercial real estate projects in San Francisco. That amount rolls over into following years, so we have about 2 million square feet under Proposition M available for allocation. However, so developers are scrambling to get their projects entitled in time. There are good intentions that went into the San Francisco’s historically cautious approach to growth. Proposition M was created as the city erected the . Residents became concerned about the “Manhattanization” of the city as tall buildings ate into available sunlight, created wind tunnels downtown and encroached upon the historic enclaves of Italian North Beach and Chinatown. But there are also consequences and trade-offs, as there are with any policy choices. Here are two architectural appraisals of San Francisco, taken 30 years apart: , when the city embarked on a strategy of restricted growth through the “Downtown Plan,” which was passed the year before Proposition M won voter approval: “The plan, which was formally presented by the San Francisco planning department to the City Planning Commission last month, strongly limits the size and location of new skyscrapers, requires the preservation of several hundred older buildings, and sets specific design guidelines to assure that new skyscrapers are slender and tapered rather than boxy in profile. If it is adopted, it would give San Francisco the most restrictive downtown zoning of any major city in the United States. It is, moreover, one of the most complete prescriptions for growth any American downtown has been given, for it specifies, block by block, what should happen in this city’s now densely built-up downtown…. The plan is intelligent and sensitive in its sense of what makes this city special. It emerges out of an understanding that the need for continued growth must be balanced by a cautious, knowing sense of the past, and by a respect for what is small and psychologically comfortable.” , as the lack of new commercial office space creates economic pressures for ‘adaptive re-use’ of older buildings: “Tech firms have taken over more than three million square feet of existing office and industrial space. That’s nearly the equivalent of New York’s new 1 World Trade Center. Driven partly by young tech workers’ desire to live in cities, the trend helps explain why those suburban office-park projects like Mr. Foster’s seem far behind the curve even before they’ve been completed. The phenomenon is not entirely new, of course. Back in the 1990s, tech firms took over bunches of old warehouses with exposed brick, tall ceilings and no corner offices during the first dot-com boom. The buildings were cheap. Traditional downtown tenants like law and finance weren’t interested in them at the time. This new wave is also opportunistic. But in a much hotter real estate market with lower start-up costs, it’s driven as well by a taste for “authenticity,” “character” and other buzzwords today’s tech firms love. At the same time, constructing anything new here is a major headache. The city is crippled by an obstructionist set of city planning rules — the consequence of local activism and a Talmudic bureaucracy. Legislation from the mid-’80s caps the total amount of new office space that can be built here. All this contributes to why adaptive reuse has taken hold.” Because of the lack of office space coming online and changing aesthetic tastes, startups chose older buildings and warehouses in the first dot-com boom. That continues to this day. I toured one of them earlier this month as moved into a former department store built in 1909 on Market Street (pictured at the top). Its windows are framed by terra cotta Corinthian columns and the interior has exposed brick and bits of graffiti left over from years of vacancy. Two firms called Cannae Partners and Westport Capital Partners bought it in 2012 for $9.5 million and renovated it for another $9.5 million. Zendesk’s new office on Market Street before it underwent a $9.5 million renovation. It was filled with pigeons, trash and all kinds of discarded junk. The new office after renovation on Mid-Market street between 6th and 7th street. While many of the city’s historic buildings are being preserved and renovated, the lack of office space is fueling a brutal competition between startups and lower-rent . Earlier this month, the city’s board of supervisors blocked Pinterest from moving into the Design Center because it would have meant displacement for dozens of design showroom tenants. The space wasn’t zoned for office use; it was specially zoned for production, distribution and repair-design (PDR). But there was an exception that allowed buildings designated as historic landmarks to convert to office uses. The local supervisor for that district, Malia Cohen, who is running for re-election in November, tabled the landlord’s appeal to change the building’s zoning. “This was about solving a problem in the most fair, equitable way possible,” said Cohen, who said that the decision would have set a precedent for more than a dozen nearby buildings with PDR zoning. “You’re more than welcome to come to San Francisco and have a business. But we are unwilling to sacrifice PDR space for office space, when you consider that office space is being actively built already and PDR space is not.” Pinterest will likely have to look elsewhere. However, at the end of the last quarter, with more than 100,000 square feet available in San Francisco. The restriction on office space also contributes to Silicon Valley’s unusual reverse commute where tech workers bus in from San Francisco to the South Bay. After Proposition M passed, the amount of office space built annually , partly because of the law and partly because of the economic fallout from the 1980s Savings and Loans Crisis. Supporters of Proposition M point out that it saved San Francisco from a glut of office space and But it also meant that the center of the Bay Area’s workforce gradually shifted south as job growth favored Silicon Valley’s big suburban campuses and industrial parks. In 1985, San Francisco made up of the Bay Area’s workforce. By 2012, of the region’s workforce after ticking up again over the past decade. That trend reversed beginning with the dot-com boom. In the 1960s, corporate interests envisioned that San Francisco would become a “world class” city and gateway to the Pacific with with workers commuting in via BART and the highways from the suburbs. But the city politically revolted against that vision in the mid-1980s, seeking to insulate residential communities from the boom-and-bust cycles of capitalism. Instead, regional growth subverted that intent. While the city didn’t produce office space for major corporate tenants, everyone including the peninsula cities and historical Silicon Valley didn’t produce housing. Hence, the reverse commute. Office rents are about than they are in San Francisco, but the for a residential listing in Mountain View is as it is in San Francisco. So today, San Francisco’s neighborhoods and longstanding communities are beset by gentrification as tech workers move in. San Francisco chose slow-growth policies in the early 1980s just as major cities on both U.S. coasts began a three-decade demographic trend of population increases that reversed post-war “white flight” to the suburbs. These policies and the lack of regional coordination exacerbated big economic and demographic shifts that are frankly beyond the control of any single city. The nuclear family waned, giving rise to more single Americans than ever before. Changes in the labor market meant more flexible employment with workers hopping into new jobs every few years. All of these transitions favor the serendipitous collisions made possible by urban environments. If the city doesn’t revisit the caps, there will continue to be intense pressure and competition for existing space in old buildings, which will push out lower paying tenants. Tech may spill over into Oakland’s downtown district, compared to If current trends hold, commercial real estate firm Cassidy Turley says San Francisco’s , driving rents higher. If the city does revisit the caps — which will not affect office supply for years in any case — the region will have to figure out housing for all those workers too. Tough choices loom ahead. |
This Temporary Tattoo Can Unlock Your Phone | Greg Kumparak | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | I’d think this was just a clever April Fools’ joke, if it weren’t the middle of July. has teamed up with a company called to make a temporary tattoo that can unlock a smartphone, no PIN required. Slap it on your skin, hold your phone up to it, and bam — phone unlocked. Who needs gestural passwords or face recognition when you can unlock your phone like a time-traveling space wizard? [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15uIFmysZV4&w=630&h=354] So how does it work? It’s an ultra-thin NFC circuit, wrapped up in medical-grade 3M adhesive that won’t (or, at least, ) freak out your skin. A . Motorola says these things should stand up to swimming and other exercise and should last for up to five days — so that 10 pack would optimally last you a bit over a month and a half. Before you go and order a pack, there’s one catch: these tattoos work with the Motorola X right now (because nothing helps test a wacky niche product concept like severely limiting the potential customer base). If you’ve got any other Android phone, you’re stuck unlocking your phone manually like a chump. (Alas, while the video above suggests they threw some pretty serious design efforts in here, the tattoo ends up looking a bit like a mole you’d want to have someone check.) |
Hands On With The Amazon Fire Phone | Kyle Russell | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | Announced , the Amazon Fire Phone is the company’s first attempt at mobile hardware. Like its cousins in the Kindle Fire line of tablets, it runs a fork of Android and gives you quick access to everything in Amazon’s large (and growing) content library. The device itself has a premium feel that’s competitive with flagship phones from , , and . Like the iPhone 4 and , it has glass on the front and rear, while the curved plastic around the edge of the device has a smooth, solid feel, much like Amazon’s Kindle Paperwhite e-reader. Those familiar with the Kindle Fire’s interface will feel right at home with the Fire Phone’s “Carousel” home screen, which lets you scroll through your most recently used apps and content. A widget underneath the carousel shows notifications or links to related content in Amazon’s store, while a quick swipe from the bottom of the screen brings up a more traditional grid of your apps. [gallery ids="1033534,1033533,1033530"] The Dynamic Perspective feature on the Fire Phone uses four infrared cameras located on the front of the device to let you look “into” the device by drawing screen elements so that they give the illusion that they’re in 3D. It’s most heavily used on the lock screen, where you can select different scenes that look like animated dioramas. Dynamic Perspective also powers the “peek” feature, which hides most info from cluttering your screen until you tilt your device to a certain angle. From what we’ve seen so far, not many third-party apps take advantage of Dynamic Perspective just yet. The other stand out feature on the Amazon Fire Phone is Firefly, which you get to by holding down the dedicated camera button next to the volume rocker. Our quick testing shows that it can in fact pick out almost any product you point it at as long as it’s available on Amazon. We tried books, movies, CDs, toothpaste, office phones and hand sanitizer, and all were recognized instantly. Of course, those all have labels on the front — so don’t expect to point it at someone walking down the street and see their outfit show up on your phone. Of course, that might be possible in a few months, as Amazon is making the Firefly feature available to outside developers via its software development kit. |
PayPal Expands Its Working Capital Service To UK, Switches From Loans To Cash Advances | Ingrid Lunden | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | As payments platforms look for more ways to grow their margins and usage among businesses, they continue to push into a wider and deeper range of financial services. In one of the latest moves, eBay’s is expanding its service to the UK. This is its first market for PayPal’s lending platform outside of the U.S., where it and has provided $140 million in capital to businesses to date. , the CTO of PayPal, says that the creation and expansion of Working Capital is part of how the company is trying to reinvent itself and return to its tech roots to grow its platform, essential as it matures in some markets and pushes into completely new ones (PayPal’s now live in 203 markets/regions, he says, and is looking to add more specifically in emerging countries. That in itself poses its own challenges and also points to why PayPal may be looking to expand beyond e-commerce payments and into services that would be used more by cash-only merchants.) “All of our customer experiences are new or will soon be new,” he told me in an interview. “The checkout experience is modern and clean. We are also redoing wallet. And we have a new way to offer merchant reporting and analytics,” is how he described other projects on PayPal’s agenda. (And, since departed for from his role as PayPal president, I also asked what the latest was on that front: “We’re not in a rush to find a new head,” he says. “[ CEO ] has a process, and we’ve had a clear strategy and are in the middle of executing that. I loved working with David but we’re not missing a beat.”) By moving into working capital lending, is going head to head with other online services that are targeting the same kind of business and the same kind of customer and the same pain point: expensive banks that move too slow in the lending process. For example, companies like , which advances online merchants money and even uses merchants’ PayPal histories, among other things, as part of its credit profiling algorithm. In the U.S. it also competes against the likes of , another payments platform that has recently. PayPal, too, has an algorithm to decide how much to offer users: decisions are based on PayPal sales history, essentially. Since the merchants already have all their details in the platform, processing takes literally minutes. PayPal’s U.S. and European services, while operating under the same brand, are actually not the same under the hood. Specifically, the original launch was focused around business loans, which PayPal offered in partnership with a third party lender, WebBank. In Europe, however, PayPal has a banking license in Luxembourg, so the company will run things a bit differently by offering advances rather than loans. The key difference here is how the money can be lended and also repaid: you pay back PayPal as you earn money — and you don’t pay when you are not. When PayPal starts the program later this year, it will open it only to merchants who use the PayPal platform already — although over time that may be extended to other services. The company says it will lend up to 8% of what a merchant typically makes on the PayPal platform. |
Open Labs Launches Stagelight 2.0, Signs Deals With Lenovo, Dell, Microsoft And Guitar Center | Sarah Buhr | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | Tons of news from today. The Linkin Park- and Timbaland-backed production software for amateur musicians for the PC now comes preloaded on Lenovo and Dell laptops, tablets and computers. Additionally, has signed distribution agreements with , and . The company also just released its 2.0 version software today, complete with the added LoopBuilder feature designed for DJs. Stagelight, for the Mac people reading this, is the PC version of GarageBand. It allows amateur artists with virtually zero musical training to create, edit and mix music. The new LoopBuilder feature adds the ability for amateur DJs to create mashups and ringtones of their favorite tunes. The 2.0 upgrade is free to current users and includes a fully functioning in-app store with additional sounds, loops, packs and exclusive artist bundles. A few other things available in the new 2.0 version are the Electro Instrument Series, native FX and Key Lock. Key Lock is basically an easy way to play piano within the platform; it essentially “locks” in the correct keys for the song you want to play, making it virtually impossible to play the wrong notes. Stagelight previously offered just a 30-day trial of the 1.0 version on some PCs. The new agreement means the full 2.0 version will be preloaded on all XPS 18, XPS 27 and Alienware Dell products, all Horizon and educational Lenovo tablets and notebooks, and soon all Lenovo Yoga II Pro products. CEO told me over the phone that he expects Stagelight to bring in around a conservatively estimated 2-3 million downloads in the next few months from the preload and distribution partnerships. That is a conservative estimate. Lenovo alone last year. Dell moved in 2013. Stagelight is currently closing in on 1 million downloads of the full version at present. Open Labs hasn’t had to take much by way of funding. The company raised a seed round three years ago and launched Stagelight 18 months ago. After the Linkin Park and Timbaland investments, Mountain bootstrapped the rest and says he hasn’t had to ask for much more. “Stagelight was pretty much profitable from the beginning,” Mountain told me. It’s not that much of a surprise that a bootstrapped company that launched its first product 18 months ago is out of the red so fast. Mountain used to be a VC himself with the now defunct Accent Capital and he also led million-dollar deals for Dell prior to this gig. While he didn’t want to mention just how profitable Stagelight has been so far, it’s easy to guess that a company with software that sells for $9.99 has just inked some pretty big deals with some major players and has had nearly a million downloads is doing all right. There’s also a hush-hush deal with Microsoft at the moment. Stagelight didn’t want to talk about that just yet, but Mountain and his team were eager to mention the . Amateur artists can enter the contest using the Linkin Park bundle to create jams and then upload their work to . The contest runs every month for 12 months. A winner is chosen each month to win $3,000 for their work. Most of the entries at the moment seem to be centered on electronica. Here’s a sample from artist to give you an idea of what can be done with the current software:
The software is only available for PC right now, but Stagelight has plans to release an Android version within the year. Stagelight is also rumored to be in talks to add more artist bundles soon. Both Linkin Park and Timbaland currently offer their own music bundles on the platform. |
POP Gets $700K To Make Prototyping Apps Easy, Releases Second Version | Catherine Shu | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | , an app that lets developers quickly turn paper sketches into prototypes for mobile apps, has raised an angel round of $700,000 from , , (which POP participated in last year) , and other investors. , which launched for iPhone first, also released a new version that can be used to create apps for iPads, Android devices, and desktop as well. Created by Taipei-based startup , POP was launched in November 2012. Since then, it has signed up 150,000 users, including designers at , , , , and , and been used to create 1.5 million sketches, founder tells TechCrunch. The aim of the first version of the app was to make prototyping as simple as possible. To use POP, developers simply sketched their app’s wireframe and took a photo of it. POP then turned the sketch into a prototype. Lin says that before POP 1.0 launched, they handed it to a seven-year-old, who was able to figure out how to use the app after playing with it for five minutes. POP’s second version includes features intended to make it easier for developers to get their finalized wireframes from POP onto their desktop computers for further tinkering in Photoshop, such as Dropbox sync. Duplicate projects, mockups, and links allow users to collaborate from different devices. Other additions include the ability to scroll, which lets developers import mockups with longer page views; and support for gestures such as swiping, zooming, and tapping so designers have a better idea of how their prototype will work once it is an app. Since POP first made its debut, more easy app prototyping tools have made it to the market. Some of POP’s most notable competitors include and . In order to keep attracting users, Woomoo Inc.’s team expanded POP’s range of platforms (which is potentially helpful for developers creating cross-platform apps) and also added new features to make the prototyping process smoother. “POP is the first to provide a prototyping solution on mobile and it has the lowest entry barrier, which lead to a group of loyal customers when we first launched the service. Since we now support multiple platforms on iPhone, iPad, Android, and even the Web, users can be connected through POP, which is not yet available for other prototyping services,” says Lin. |
Inside Shutterstock’s Fourth Annual Hackathon | Anthony Ha | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | Here’s a weird confession: Until last week, I’d never been to a company hackathon. Obviously, I’ve been to hackathons, including the ones TechCrunch hosts before our Disrupt conference. But I’ve never made it to one of those company-wide events that as a way to develop new ideas and stay connected to their startup roots. So when stock photography (plus video, ) company invited me to its hackathon last week, I was happy to catch up with the company’s executives and see some cool projects, but I was also just interested in getting a taste of how these events actually work. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to stay for more than an hour of the full 24-hour-plus hackathon, so I didn’t get to see things like the midnight rave. (I’m told that the rave place in the office yoga room, because of course that’s where you’d do it.) However, I did get to see the early stages of the event, as different employees milled around — eating, drinking, and tossing out ideas. Despite the giant countdown clock projected onto the wall, everyone seemed pretty relaxed. One thing I hadn’t expected: The extent to which people were perfectly happy to hop from team to team, offering a little bit of their expertise to multiple projects. Another surprise: The team leaders who said they’d been eagerly awaiting the hackathon, because it gave them time to focus on projects that had long been on the backburner. CTO and Vice President of Product told me that one of the unofficial rewards for winning the hackathon is a chance to continue working on these hacks, turning them into real Shutterstock products. The company pointed to its Suggested Images feature in Shutterstock search, its , and the yet-to-launch Compositor tool for combining Shutterstock video and music as products that emerged from hackathons. As you may have gathered from those examples, hackathon projects don’t have to be technical — there can be marketing campaigns, or other projects that don’t require writing any code. One of the goals, Jenkins said, was to connect Shutterstock employees who might never otherwise speak to each other. In fact, one of the rules of the hackathon is that team members have to come from at least three different departments. Here are some hackathon stats that the company sent me: The winner this year was an ImageOptimizer tool for “enabling customers to see which images work best for their audience,” so maybe we’ll see that on Shutterstock sometime soon. |
Apple Faces Class-Action Lawsuit In California Over Alleged Labor Violations Affecting 20K Employees | Ingrid Lunden | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | While today reported its , another group seized the moment to push out another bit of Apple-related news. The company is being sued in a class-action suit over a series of alleged violations of the California Labor Code, including the “timely” granting of meal and rest breaks as well as final paychecks. The case potentially affects some 20,000 current and former employees in the state, the plaintiffs say. The case was originally filed in 2011 by four people who worked across both Apple’s retail and corporate operations. It was only certified as a class action yesterday, widening the pool of plaintiffs considerably. The full court documents for both the case and the class-action certification are embedded below. Tyler Belong, a lawyer with the firm Hogue & Belong in San Diego, which is representing the plaintiffs, describes the case to us like this: “The lawsuit was filed by Brandon Felczer and several other retail and corporate Apple employees (the “Plaintiffs”) beginning in December 2011. The Plaintiffs sought to represent themselves and all other similarly situated Apple employees in California who were not provided timely meal breaks, timely rest breaks, and timely final paychecks according to California’s Labor Code and Wage Orders. Just yesterday, after years of litigation, against Apple’s opposition, and after voluminous briefing and lengthy oral argument, the California Superior Court granted Plaintiffs’ motion and certified the case as a class action, appointing Plaintiffs and Plaintiffs’ counsel (Hogue & Belong) as the class representatives and class counsel on behalf of approximately 20,000 Apple employees. In other words, as of yesterday’s ruling, Apple now faces claims of meal period, rest period and final pay violations affecting approximately 20,000 current and former Apple employees.” Reading through some of the case, the complaints, even among the four named on the documents at the moment, range fairly widely in terms of the accusations. One person cites a five-hour working stint without a break, for example, while another refers to a 72-hour notice period and getting a final paycheck two days after that ended (two days late). If you read through the documents you will see the total number of employees at 18,000. Belong tells us that this was based on the first estimate given to the plaintiffs’ lawyers by Apple early on in the case, “but the class size continued to grow as the case continued on and time passed due to employee turn over. It is now over 20,000.” Apple, the iconic iPhone and Mac maker with a , is no stranger to class action lawsuits. One of the more recent also concerned employment practices, although of a different nature: the company, along with Google, Intel and Adobe, for $324 million with high-tech workers who were accusing the companies of conspiring to keep salaries down by refraining from poaching from each other. The lawyers in the case tell us that no financial demand has been made yet in this current case. We are reaching out to Apple for comment. [scribd id=234808089 key=key-u2LrBEm4GkePvwRiCO8r mode=scroll]
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Laura Arrillaga-Andreessen To Talk Philanthropy, Open-Source Education At Disrupt SF 2014 | Alexia Tsotsis | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | is the founder and president of the Laura Arrillaga-Andreessen Foundation, a private operating foundation that functions as a philanthropic innovation lab. The foundation’s mission is to inspire, educate and empower people to give in a way that matters more. Arrillaga-Andreessen is trying to radically change the way we give, and we’re thrilled to announce that she’ll be joining us on-stage at . The Laura Arrillaga-Andreessen Foundation’s innovation lab uses technology to scale open-source education innovations to help individuals change how they give money and time. They also create philanthropic resources to advance the educational, institutional and individual fields of philanthropy and amplify their measurable social impact. In September, the foundation will launch their first MOOC to bring their expert philanthropic lessons to the broader online learning community. Speaking of the MOOC, enrollees will have a fantastic teacher in Arrillaga-Andreessen, who currently serves as a professor of Business Strategy at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, leading their courses on strategic philanthropy since creating the program in 2000. She also developed Stanford’s first courses in philanthropy and social innovation, philanthropic design thinking, collaborative grant making, and philanthropy and technology. Arrillaga-Andreessen is well-connected in Silicon Valley. She advises the likes of Hewlett-Packard CEO Meg Whitman, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, and Airbnb co-founder and CEO Brian Chesky, on their philanthropic ventures. Perhaps most notably, her work with Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan led to the couple donating $100 million to education in Newark, N.J. Oh, and she’s married to Marc Andreessen, the entrepreneur who coauthored Mosaic, co-founded Netscape, and co-founded and serves as partner at the powerful venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz. The two also run the Marc and Laura Andreessen Foundation, a proactive, strategic grant maker committed to several current initiatives. Come to Disrupt SF 2014 and listen to Arrillaga-Andreessen talk about philanthropy and how to give in a way that matters more. Tickets for Disrupt are , and if you’d like to help sponsor the event, are also available. |
InMobi’s New Suite For Game Developers Sports Voxel’s Playable Ads | Kyle Russell | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | Independent ad network is to take advantage of gamers’ emotional states to produce high click-through rates on advertisements in their games. Along with tools for including interstitials that look like part of the game experience and ads that give you gameplay bonuses for watching videos, the company’s SDK now includes playable ads powered by ‘s To better take advantage of the different ad units available, InMobi decided to take a more in-depth look at how ad placement could be informed by gameplay. The company claims that its research shows ( ) that using these different ads at different points in the gameplay experience can significantly boost engagement by playing off of their emotional state. For instance, let’s say you’re playing a game like Flappy Bird. You die pretty regularly, which makes you pretty frustrated. Are you going to click on a banner ad that pops up, or will that only upset you more? Apparently 20 to 40 seconds playing something else — the approximate length of demos in InMobi’s playable ads — is a welcome respite when a game is wearing you down. The following graphic shows which ad unit works best based on what a player is going through: |
Apple Has Paid $20 Billion To iOS Devs, Half Of It In The Past Year | Greg Kumparak | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | A quick update for those keeping track of how well the iOS developer money train is chugging along: As of its earnings call this morning, has paid out over $20 billion to iOS developers. More surprising than the overall amount, however, is the rate at which the money is coming in. Of the $20 billion paid out since the launched in 2008, “nearly half” of it has been paid out in the last 12 months. As of January of this year, Apple . That means around $5 billion was paid out in the last six months. By comparison, Google mentioned back at I/O that they’d paid out $5 billion to developers in the past year. (For those curious about what Apple’s cut of all this was, a quick calculation: Apple’s share is 30 percent, with the developer taking 70 percent. $20B is 70 percent of around $28.57 billion, meaning Apple has made around $8.5 billion from app sales so far.) |
Microsoft Confirms Decision To Kill The Surface Mini | Alex Wilhelm | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | Remember the Surface Mini, a device that got axed at the last minute? gave it a shout out in its . The company noted in its hardware section that its “[c]urrent year cost of revenue included Surface inventory adjustments resulting from our transition to newer generation devices and a decision to not ship a new form factor.” Ding. The Mini was yanked from the Surface Pro 3 event at what I’ve . The Mini, so hastily squirreled away, has in manuals and . Microsoft’s earnings call is now, so we’ll have to see if the company addresses it specifically. Surface revenue for the period was $409 million, down from its sequential quarter’s tally of $494 million. We’ll have more from the call shortly. |
Microsoft Sold 5.8M Lumia Handsets In Its FQ4, But That’s A Partial-Quarter Sales Figure | Alex Wilhelm | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | Today in its , reported that it sold 5.8 million Windows Phone-based Lumia handsets. Last year, in the second calendar quarter — Microsoft’s then fiscal fourth quarter, welcome to the world of finance — sold 7.4 million Lumia handsets. However, Lumia sales didn’t fall 22 percent as those figures appear to indicate. Microsoft’s fiscal fourth-quarter sales figure is based on a partial-quarter sales period. The company only sold Lumia handsets starting April 25, after its deal with Nokia closed, meaning that it lost 24 days of sales in the period. Twenty-four days of a 90-day period — a quarter, in other words — is around 26 percent. So sales fell 22 percent compared to a full-quarter time period during a 26 percent-smaller timeframe. If you correct for the smaller timing, you can calculate that (extrapolating from a per-day sales basis using implied figures from the 5.8 million unit figure) Microsoft would have sold 7.9 million handsets in the quarter had it had the full time period to do so. That would have been a very, very modest increase of around 500,000 Windows Phone handsets sold. But it would at least be pointed in the right direction. The 7.4 million figure last summer grew to 8.8 million in the third quarter and 8.2 million in the fourth. It may be reasonable to expect that Microsoft will therefore see growth in its phone sales due to market cyclicality over the next two periods. That would, however, be an optimistic-leaning projection. Microsoft had $1.99 billion in phone revenue in the quarter. That revenue had an operating loss of $692 million attached to it. If you wanted a full explanation on why Microsoft is from its hardware division, that’s a good picture. The phone revenue led Microsoft to both a revenue beat and a profit miss. If it can cut costs and keep the revenue, the now-completed deal could bear out well for the software giant. |
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TC Cribs: A Trip To BarkBox HQ, Where Dogs Rule | Colleen Taylor | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | We definitely dig dog-friendly companies here at , so when we were in New York City recently, we swung by for a tour of an office where pooches are definitely welcome: , the startup known for its monthly subscription service of treats and toys for dogs and other pet-related ventures. Once we got inside, the Bark & Co. office did not disappoint. There were lots of dogs everywhere, and features in the office had been built especially with pets in mind, such as built-in hooks on desks for leashes, flexible pen areas, and of course tons of toys. Also, ‘s founder is originally from Denmark, and he made sure that underneath all the colorful pet stuff is a cool dose of minimalist Scandinavian design. Check it all out in the video embedded above. |
Apple Sold 35.2M iPhones, 13.3M iPads And 4.4M Macs In Q3 2014 | Darrell Etherington | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | has released its latest , and the hardware story is one that you might have heard before: For the most part, the company sold more devices year-over-year, with the notable exception of the iPad, which continues to see slight declines as it did . By the numbers, Apple sold 35.20 million iPhones, 13.27 million iPads, 4.41 million Macs and 2.96 million iPods. During the same quarter last year, Apple sold 31.24 million iPhones, 14.62 million iPads, 3.75 million Macs, and 4.57 million iPods. Analysts sales of 35.78 million iPhones, 14.43 million iPads, 3.93 million Macs and 2.34 million iPods for the quarter. It beat expectations for Macs and iPods, but everything else fell slightly below predictions. The 12 percent increase on iPhone sales beat last quarter’s 7 percent growth, however, and Macs grew nearly 20 percent year over year. Apple has been riding high on iPhone gains, despite it being late in the refresh cycle for the smartphone, which generally gets a new version come fall. These results mean it’s still doing well despite rumors of a new device with a larger screen. The slight dip in the iPad numbers isn’t encouraging for the potential growth of that segment, but it’s also been a while now since the tablets were updated, and Apple still clearly rules the roost when it comes to slate devices. If this market is stalling as some suggest, it isn’t a problem unique to Apple. The iPad earned Apple 8 percent less revenue compared to last year, while the iPhone revenue grew by 9 percent. Mac revenue was up 13 percent, while iPod units shipped were down 36 percent, resulting in a 40 percent revenue drop year-over-year.
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Yik Yak Gets A Much-Needed Makeover | Jordan Crook | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | It’s been about three months since anonymous messaging app raised their first major round of funding , and already the app has released a major update. The app, which has traditionally been incredibly ugly (just being honest), now has a slick new design with a much-refined user experience. For those of you who haven’t heard yet, Yik Yak is a mobile app that offers anonymous, location-based messaging. Users can choose to post messages to all Yik Yak users nearby. The company started by targeting college campuses in the South East, and has since expanded beyond that to over 100 universities across the country. Yik Yak has not recently disclosed user numbers, but said that they grow by 100 users per network per day, with some networks already topping 10,000 users. When we first interviewed them in February of this year, the team said they were seeing over 100,000 monthly active users, with 15,000 messages going up every day. With the update, the app allows for easier up-voting of messages, redesigned Share Cards, and a more intuitive design. “Yakarma” scores (essentially how popular your posts are) will be shown on the top left, and the company has provided special tips for getting more “Yakarma” points for those interested. Yik Yak redesigned the composition layout of a Yak, letting you edit and change your handle from within the compose window. Plus, the team added a new “Me” page to let you organize your yaks, replies, and check out your top yaks. Perhaps more important than these incremental updates to features is the overall cleaner look to the app. Given the recent funding, it says something about the level at which the company wants to compete, especially with Secret and Whisper already thriving. For a long while, Yik Yak was a pretty bare-bones app. It almost reminded me of the early Snapchat, all bubbly and amateur-looking. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing, when you’re first starting out. It’s possible that younger generations feel more open to “bare bones” UIs based simply on the fact that they are assured it’s a small company — not a big corporation like Facebook — providing them services. Yik Yak tried out the high school and middle school market before amid bullying issues. After all, there aren’t great systems in place on the platform to prevent people from calling each other out by name in a network of their peers. [slideshow ids=”1033543,1033542,1033540,1033538,1033537,1033536,1033535″] |
LinkedIn Will Acquire Business Marketing Company Bizo For $175M | Anthony Ha | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | just that it has reached an agreement to acquire , a company that helps advertisers reach businesses and professionals. LinkedIn says the deal is worth around $175 million — 90 percent cash and 10 percent stock. back in 2008. It raised a total of $20 million in venture funding (at least as of ) from investors including Bessemer Venture Partners, Venrock, and Crosslink Capital. It also raised . Bizo offers targeting and analytics for display and direct response ads. At the beginning of 2013, the company told me that it during the previous year. In , LinkedIn’s David Thacker pointed to the growth of business-to-business advertising on LinkedIn, particularly of . ( that its Marketing Solutions division brought in $101.8 million in revenue in the first quarter of 2014 — up 36 percent year-over-year.) Bizo’s technology could help LinkedIn improve its offerings. “It’s our goal to integrate Bizo’s offerings into our content marketing products to become a more powerful tool for brands that want to build stronger relationships with professionals,” Thacker wrote. He also noted that although Bizo will “honor their existing contracts,” LinkedIn does not plan to continue Bizo’s Data Solutions business, and it will not be making its data available to “grandfathered” customers. LinkedIn also says the deal is expected to close in the third quarter of this year, and that “many members of the Bizo team” will be joining LinkedIn as part of the acquisition. “It’s exciting for us to bring Bizo’s expertise and technology into our ecosystem,” said Deep Nishar, LinkedIn’s senior vice president of of product and user experience, in the acquisition release. “Our ability to integrate their B2B solutions with our content marketing products will enable us to become the most effective platform for B2B marketers to engage professionals.” |
China Drove Big iPhone And iPad Sales For Apple During Q3 2014 | Darrell Etherington | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | ‘s earnings are out, and there’s a narrative contained therein of the emerging importance of China and BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) countries in general – the company revealed that iPhone sales are up 55 percent year over year in the BRIC nations, and Chinese iPhone sales are up 48 percent, with the iPad sales in that country rising 51 percent year over year despite falling slightly globally. Revenues in the Apple market segments also reveal the rising importance of China to the company’s bottom line – while revenue was up single digits or nearly flat in the Americas, Europe, Japan and the rest of Asia-Pacific, in China it rose 28 percent year over year, blowing away growth in all other markets. The growth in the iPhone and iPad segments in the region, which now include China Mobile as a carrier partner, meant that the company avoided the typical lull that tends to arrive before a new iPhone launch in the fall. The iPad sales were also up over 50 percent in the MIddle East, India and China, and saw a lot of new sales to education and health customers. |
Apple’s Mixed Q3 2014 With $37.4B Revenue, $7.7B Profit And $1.28 EPS | Romain Dillet | 2,014 | 7 | 22 | has just its fiscal Q3 2014 earnings, reporting $37.4 billion in revenue, $7.7 billion in net profit representing $1.28 per share. Compared to the , it corresponds to a growth of 5.9 percent in revenue, and 19.6 percent in EPS (adjusted for the ). ‘s consensus among analysts was for Apple to report earnings of $1.26 per share on $38.31 billion in revenue, with both revenue and EPS growing. In particular, analysts estimated that the gross margin should be around 38.0 percent, boosting the company’s Earnings. What happened in reality is that the gross margin was even higher than that at 39.4 percent. But the company slightly disappointed when it comes to revenue. That’s why it managed to stay ahead of analysts’ expectations for earnings per share with a revenue below what everyone anticipated. In particular, sales were disappointing.
Apple’s own guidance from its last earnings release predicted between $36 billion and $38 billion in revenue, with gross margin between 37 percent and 38 percent. In 2013, Apple’s guidance has been much more accurate than before, with the upper end of the forecast very close to what it actually reported. was an exception as Apple was above its numbers. Now everything is back on track. In other words, analysts and Apple itself all anticipated a good quarter, especially due to a . It was indeed the case, but revenue was supposed to be even better than that. While the iPhone 5c was designed to solve the company’s gross margin issue, it didn’t sell as well as anticipated. There are probably other improvements. Maybe people chose the iPad Air over the iPad mini compared to last year. “Our record June quarter revenue was fueled by strong sales of iPhone and Mac and the continued growth of revenue from the Apple ecosystem, driving our highest EPS growth rate in seven quarters,” Apple CEO Tim Cook wrote in the release. “We are incredibly excited about the upcoming releases of iOS 8 and OS X Yosemite, as well as other new products and services that we can’t wait to introduce.” This quarter, Apple sold 35.3 million iPhones, 13.3 million iPads and 4.4 million Macs in the quarter. Compared to Q3 2013, iPhone sales grew by 13.9 percent while iPad sales declined by 8.9 percent. Read all the details about hardware sales in .
China represented once again a big growth driver for the company. A significant portion of iPhone and iPad sales came from China. Read more in .
Apple has performed incredible well on the stock market. After splitting its shares stock split and boosting its dividend strategy, shares have been steadily going up for the last three months, nearing its all-time high of $100.81 after adjustment. Shortly after the release, shares are stable in after-hours trading (down 0.44 percent). Apple’s own guidance for Q4 2014 predicts between $37 billion and $40 billion in revenue with a gross margin between 37 and 38 percent. The company reported $37.5 billion in revenue last year.
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Apple Secretly Acquired “Pandora For Books” Startup BookLamp To Battle Amazon | Josh Constine | 2,014 | 7 | 25 | TechCrunch has learned that has made another acquisition, one that it is using to boost its e-books effort and “beat Amazon at its own game.” It has bought , a startup based out of Boise, Idaho, that developed big data-style book analytics services. : Apple has confirmed our report of the acquisition. The company tells us “Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans.”] A second source says Apple bought BookLamp’s employees and technology for a price that was “higher than $10 million, and lower than $15 million.” BookLamp’s most well-known product was the Book Genome Project, a platform that let users find suggestions for books to read based on natural language analysis of other titles. BookLamp’s tech and talent could help Apple improve its iBooks service with better recommendations, search, and categorization. TechCrunch has reached out to Apple for confirmation on the deal with BookLamp, as well as to BookLamp’s CEO and several former employees including , and . Stanton said “Sorry, Josh. I can’t help you”, which meshes with the strict gag order Apple places on companies it buys. But in the meantime while we wait for an official response from Apple, here’s some more evidence we’ve amassed. The Former BookLamps team (from left): Matt Monroe, Sidian Jones, Aaron Stanton, and Dan Bowen We first heard of the sale via an anonymous tip (thank you, anonymous reader). Digging around, we found that several employees appear to have decamped from Idaho to the Cupertino, California-area where Apple is headquartered. Prior to the exit, BookLamp had raised around $900,000 from local backers. Yes, it looks like BookLamp is Apple’s first acquisition out of Idaho. And it turns out BookLamp had also been in talks with Amazon at one point, but how far they went is not clear. , another competitor in the book recommendation space, and Apple bought BookLamp. As is typical for many Apple M&A moves, the whole thing has been kept very quiet. Like “library voices” quiet. When BookLamp announced in April that it would be shutting down the Book Genome Project, it described the closure in vague terms, thanking users for being a part of its “journey to date” as the company “evolves its mission.” To keep up appearances and throw people off the scent, BookLamp still has an office in Boise, and a second office in Cupertino, but none of the startup’s 10 employees work in either. “This was just the line created for them so that they didn’t have to explain what was happening. They’ve all moved to Apple,” our source says. “We were wondering when someone would come knocking and asking more questions.” Indeed, as we started to look into this story, we could see BookLamp employees tagging Facebook posts in Cupertino, Palo Alto and San Francisco — while listing their state of residence as Idaho, where the company was located. Despite the site’s shut down, several members of the core team haven’t changed their current employer from BookLamp or updated their current city. These signals are hallmarks of . BookLamp was one of the first companies to get incubated in the , a hybrid co-working facility in Boise — a city that has produced some other notable tech companies and tech exits like (sold to Thomson Reuters), (sold to CPA Global), and (sold to Microsoft). Relative to other startup acquisitions, BookLamp went for a modest price. But that understates the company’s ambitions and track record. From what we understand, prior to the acquisition, BookLamp was working on a number of B2B projects alongside its initiative it described as “Pandora for books”. BookLamp’s public-facing product was designed to scan the writing style of books you like and suggest novels or authors with a similar feel. It could also break down plot themes and content, allowing for better search-ability and discovery. One source suggests that Apple bought BookLamp to power an ebook search competitor to Amazon. We back in 2011. At the time, BookLamp wanted to do for books what Pandora did for music: scanning content for quantifiable similarities to power recommendations. Last year, Book Genome Project and BookLamp CEO Aaron Stanton said Here’s a look at how the BookLamp technology works — as represented by a graphic created by . In this example above, its scan of King’s “Salem’s Lot” found the prevalence of ‘vampires & the supernatural’, ‘funerals / death/ memorials’, ‘homes & domestic environments’, and ‘pain & fear / negative emotions’. Here’s another appraisal, this time of “Carrie” by Stephen King: BookLamp could also analyze the pacing and density of certain themes, like sexual content. Below you’ll see using BookLamp data from 50 Shades Of Grey, which starts tame but is later peppered with moments of sultriness and intermittent scenes of graphic bondage. For comparison, there’s “His Mistress By Morning,” which is decidedly puritan except for a few raunchier bits, while the unabashedly erotic novel “Letters To Penthouse XXVIII” is a non-stop sex romp: After doing its analysis of a book you liked, BookLamp could offer suggestions that match its “BookDNA”. It could, for instance, recommend “The Templar Legacy” by Steve Berry for fans of Dan Brown’s “The Da Vinci Code” because they both feature ‘catholic institutions’, ‘history / academics’, ‘strategic planning’, and ‘libraries’. Its stated goal was to divorce its suggestions from what’s popular and just show you what’s most likely to become your next page-turner. Beyond the Book Genome Project, BookLamp also Kickstarted the creation of a sort role-playing game for reading called , where you’d level up and earn badges for reading around specific themes like science fiction or murder mystery. But the startup’s serious business of providing content analysis to e-book distributors was happening behind the scenes. Among its customers were Amazon, Apple and a group of publishers in New York. For them, BookLamp provided data analytics services that ranged from automatic book screening for proper categorization (Apple) to providing a platform for the publishers that they could use for screening manuscripts to consider whether a book would sell well with a particular demographic, or how much marketing budget should be allocated to it. Part of the reason that Apple made the move to acquire BookLamp was because of this long list of clients. “At first Apple and BookLamp talked about growing their contract, but then they talked more from a strategic standpoint,” a source says. “What Apple wanted to do was, instead of contract, they wanted to make sure whatever work was done was done just for them.” And what is that work? The details are not clear yet, but the source says, “in broad strokes, the goal that [founder Aaron] Stanton and three of the folks he was working with from the original BookLamp crew is to beat Amazon at their own game.” “I can tell you that in the next year to 18 months you will see some fairly major initiatives focused on books and reading coming out of Apple.” This is somewhat bolstered also by another detail from our original tipster, who claims that Apple is looking to from eBay to flesh out a search team using BookLamp’s technology. There are several big ways Apple could be using BookLamp to bolster its own e-book platform. One option would be to use BookLamp to build a competitor to , which lets readers see where and how often terms or characters pop up in a book. That could be useful for classifying books into categories or flagging ones with sexual or violent content as being unsuitable for kids — or simply providing feature parity with Amazon’s Kindle app, which offers X-Ray on iOS. Considering Amazon’s headway into self publishing, it’s enticing to wonder whether BookLamp’s technology for screening manuscripts to figure out their market fit, or the other tools they were developing and using, may end up getting implemented under their new owner to determine what it should promote. BookLamp’s algorithms could augment Apple’s human editors who choose what’s highlighted on the iBooks homescreen. The most obvious way, though, would be to use BookLamp’s content and style analysis to power individualized iBooks recommendations. Right now, Apple’s iBooks app doesn’t focus on personalization. It features Top Lists like the App Store, featured selections, author spotlights, and categories, but lacks “if you like that then read this” style suggestions. With books often available from many e-book distributors, companies like Apple need to offer extra value somehow. If Apple can make you recommendations you trust, you’ll probably follow through and buy or rent your books from it. While BookLamp once used the name to turn reading into a sport, it’s now become a weapon in the real Game Of Books between Apple and Amazon. |
This Site Lets You Check If A Hotel’s WiFi Sucks Before It’s Too Late | Greg Kumparak | 2,014 | 7 | 25 | There are lots of things that review sites should rank hotels on, but don’t. Is it known for bed bugs? Is the “heated pool” only heated during summer when the sun is out? How many ghosts live there? How fast is the WiFi? This site won’t help you with all of those, but it help you with that last one. Bad WiFi might as well not exist, but most hotels don’t really seem to care about connectivity quality. As long as they can check that little “WiFi Available” box on the amenities list, they’re happy. Sure, you’re paying $400 bucks a night — but you want to stream Netflix? Get outta here. Worse yet, the larger a hotel is, the more space they have to cover, and the more people they’ll have trying to cram onto the same poorly configured network — so counter intuitively, bigger/fancier hotels always seem to have WiFi. Thats where comes in. As the name implies, encourages its users to go to hotels and… test the WiFi. If you’re currently in a hotel, it can automatically pin down your location and help you run a speed test. While the above site seems to be getting bigger quick thanks to a recent burst of buzz, an alternative (spotted ) called seems to have been around a bit longer and thus has a bigger database. Alas, it doesn’t do quite as good of a job of letting you know if the WiFi is free or paid — and given that some of these places will try to hit you up for upwards of $30 a day, that’s important to know. |
Amazon’s Bet On Exclusive Games To Make Its Fire Gadgets More Enticing | Kyle Russell | 2,014 | 7 | 25 | Fire Phone is out today, and while it’s got that set it apart from your run-of-the-mill Android phone, it doesn’t seem like it will appeal to While some may be swayed by solid hardware or gimmicky features, the ecosystem of apps and content plays a big part in deciding which gadget to buy for most people. The doesn’t have the number of apps available on or Google’s version of — it’s running what’s known as a “fork,” with its own interface, services, and app store — Amazon does have a huge library of content, much of it available for free for those who subscribe to Amazon Prime. Oh yeah, and the phone comes with a year of Prime for free. While free access to movies, TV, music, and books (through the Kindle Lending Library) is great for those who just want to consume a bunch of content on the go, games are the dominant media on smartphones today: showed that smartphone users in the U.S., U.K., and Japan spent more time playing games on their phones than engaging in other forms of entertainment or shopping. Considering those are the two major use cases for Amazon’s Fire Phone (and its Kindle Fire line of tablets), it’s not surprising to see Amazon bolstering its games offerings in order to appeal to a broader market. As , Amazon purchased game development studio Double Helix earlier this year for both its talent and intellectual property. At the time, Double Helix had 75 employees, most of which were holdovers from the merger of two studios with long histories in gaming, Shiny Entertainment and The Collective. Since then, reports have noted that , bringing in the talent behind blockbuster titles like Portal, Far Cry 2, the Bioshock series, and others from Microsoft, EA, Activision, Zynga, SCEA, Ubisoft, Nintendo, Blizzard, Naughty Dog, Konami, Square Enix, Capcom, Bungie, Sega, Popcap Games, Apple and more. When you see all those big names, it’s hard to not jump to the assumption that Amazon Game Studios is pulling a Netflix — making big deals to create the video game equivalents of “House of Cards” and “Orange Is The New Black.” But so far, the closest thing to a blockbuster-style game to come from the retail giant is , a third-person shooter that looks an awful lot like and is only available on Amazon’s Fire TV set-top box. With the release of the Fire Phone, Amazon Game Studios has released a few more titles that it’s had up its sleeves. At the Fire Phone’s introduction in June, Amazon CEO showed off the Dynamic Perspective feature with , a cutesy platformer that lets you look around the game world by peering around the screen, like looking into a diorama. Amazon didn’t make the game itself, rather, it acted as a publisher — the work was done by , an independent game studio that has built mobile games for brands like Disney, Nickelodeon, and Warner Brothers, among others. This week Amazon also published , a puzzle-RPG developed by , another indie studio who has also . While Sev Zero and To-Fu Fury cost money up front, Amazon decided to try out the free with in-app purchases business model for Saber’s Edge, which suggests that the company is experimenting as it ramps up its efforts in gaming. When I reached out to Amazon to see if they wanted to talk about the games they’re working on or how often gamers should expect to see Amazon Game Studios titles, the response I got from a spokesperson was both classic Amazon and reminiscent of what normally comes from the studios mentioned above: “We have a number of games in the pipeline which will be released when they are ready.” Amazon isn’t just cranking out endless clones of popular mobile games. It’s also not relying on its own developers or those it can contract work out to. Amazon has also lined up a few exclusives from third-party developers, who’ve not only brought their games to Amazon’s app store but (in almost all cases) also taken advantage of features like Dynamic Perspective. , for instance, is a cute-yet-dark game that involves making your way through a series of mazes; here, the ability to actually “peek” around corners is pretty cool. Rounding out the exclusives are and , games that have been available for Kindle Fire tablets since April and July, respectively. I asked Amazon whether the titles it’s been developing, publishing, and lining up exclusivity deals for are meant to serve as flagships, showing what the Fire devices are capable of in order to draw in more third-party developers, or meant to be successful in their own right. Here’s what a spokesperson told me: We are creating great titles. We have a number of them – three currently available for customers and more in the works in different genres and gameplay, and we think we are adding a lot of value to the choices customers have. Customers should expect to see some really great games out of Amazon Game Studios. We’re making creative, fun games that are built from the ground up for the Fire Phone, Kindle Fire tablets and Fire TV. Our games aim to engage and delight a broad range of audiences – from core gamers to kids – and will launch exclusively on Amazon devices. We are also strongly focused on providing a solid set of services for game developers, which work cross platform. These services allow developers to build, monetize, and optimize their games. “Adding a lot of value to the choices customers have” is pretty strong PR-speak, but in the context of the whole quote it like Amazon sees its games as potential selling points for Fire devices. That’s the only interpretation of Amazon’s actions and words that makes sense — if it’s making really great games with broad appeal, you’d think it would put them on as many platforms as possible, right? — but it’s choosing to keep them on its own gadgets, which would indicate that it thinks these games might win over some gamers. It’s a shame that Amazon is so tight-lipped about its efforts so much of the time, as I’d love to hear how that works out for them. It’s hard to imagine that a handful of games could sway too many people. Microsoft, which has mindshare among gamers, hasn’t been able to use that success to bring gamers over to Windows Phone en masse despite Xbox Live integration and the release of several games for its core audiences, |
Automattic Experiments With Selfies App For Android | Kyle Russell | 2,014 | 7 | 25 | A couple of days ago, an acquaintance on Twitter pointed out the website for , a new social app from , best known as the company behind . I found it odd that the app was out in the wild and hadn’t received any press coverage, but according to the , that was the point: to see what would happen if they just put it out there. Selfies : after about a week of availability, it’s been downloaded somewhere in the range of 100-500 times. After stepping down as chief executive officer in January to , former Automattic CEO began to work on new products at the company. He told me that he’s been working with a six-man group informally known as the “tinker team” to experiment with fun, one-off concepts proposed in company-wide brainstorming sessions. is the fourth such experiment that the team has toyed with. It’s been in development for approximately eight weeks, originally conceived around the time Automattic raised a massive Right now, the app is extremely simple to get into. Within seconds of starting up the app for the first time you’re taking a pic, adding a caption and filter, and posting to the network. At the moment there’s a single, public stream of selfies in the app, and you can respond to selfies with a captioned image of your own, like a public or “Clearly [the one public stream] is not going to scale,” Schneider says, so the team is looking to add a filtering system to show only relevant or high-quality content as soon as possible. Until then, you can double-dip with the photos you take in the app by quickly sharing them to your other preferred social networks. I asked Schneider if this was WordPress using its new capital to start building out a family of apps, as we’ve seen from Facebook, Dropbox, Google, and Twitter. He says that’s “already natural for Automattic, as over the years we’ve taken a multi-product, multi-brand approach,” listing off , , and as products and services that Automattic has built out simultaneously. In fact, Selfies started out as a app and then “morphed” into its current form, as the team realized that they “wanted to make something more standalone.” That’s actually why Selfies is only on Android — back when it was still going to be an app for Gravatar, Automattic , asking where they’d like to see an app show up first. Android won. |
You Can Now Command The Tesla You Probably Don’t Have With The Smartwatch You Probably Don’t Have | Greg Kumparak | 2,014 | 7 | 25 | [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4e9BaP9JXCY?feature=player_embedded&w=640&h=360] Do you have a ? Do you also have an Wear smartwatch? Do you wish they worked better together? Don’t worry! Solving the #1 problem of Batmans everywhere, these guys have figured out how to let you control a Tesla Model S through a smartwatch. Sure, sure — you could do a lot of this same stuff through Tesla’s smartphone app, if you wanted. But, pft, what is this, 2014? BEAT IT, GRANDPA. If you actually have both a Model S and an Android Wear watch, you can Oh, and I should note — if you use this app, you are obligated to play this over the stereo at all times: [via ] |
CrunchWeek: Facebook’s Big Earnings Win, Life On The D-List, And Uber’s Summer Moves | Ryan Lawler | 2,014 | 7 | 25 | Let’s face it: We’re right smack in the middle of summer, at the time of year when tech news slows to a crawl. But that didn’t stop us from filming a wildly entertaining episode of CrunchWeek, because when the tech news gods give us lemons, we make lemonade. The big news of the week was with this week. Other than that, though, we had some fun talking about what it’s like to , and how Uber is looking to take over the world through its and its . Join me and my colleagues and in our effort to make a really dull news week actually sound kind of interesting. |
Google Wants To Improve Its Translations Through Crowdsourcing | Frederic Lardinois | 2,014 | 7 | 25 | Over the years, has gotten significantly better at giving its users (relatively) legible translations for most commonly used languages. It’s still far off from being perfect, though, and today a new initiative that aims to get more input from its users to improve its translations. The , which is now open for everybody, gives users who speak more than one language fluently the option to offer their own translations and validate current translations. On the service’s splash screen, Google also promises the option to match and compare translations, but I haven’t been able to bring these features up in the Translate Community yet. Clearly, though, these crowdscourced translations will influence Google’s algorithms. “You help will enhance translations for millions of users,” Google promises new members of the Translate Community. “We plan to incorporate your corrections and over time learn your language a little bit better.” Right now, your contributions disappear into the black box that is Google’s data centers, but the company says that over time it will give users more visibility into the impact of their contributions. For those who don’t want to join the community, Google also recently launched a new feature directly in Google Translate that allows you to contribute your own translation when you see a mistake. Google Translate always allowed you to rate translations as helpful, not helpful and offensive, but now you can actually provide the service with the actual correction. |
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