Tuesday, 3 September 2013
Kodak exits bankruptcy with new focus on business imaging
We'll be liveblogging Sony's IFA press conference tomorrow at 10AM ET
Nokia Has Lost 20% of Smartphone Market Since Microsoft Partnership
Expand and World Maker Faire: Two great events at one smart price!
Microsoft-Nokia Deal Proves Apple Was Right All Along
Creative launches a trio of audiophile-grade headphones for Europe
Nook Newstand now offering access to college papers
Meet Human, A Beautiful Fitness Tracking App To Help You Effortlessly Stay Healthy
Human is a newcomer in the crowded fitness space, but its take is different. Instead of being a stat-heavy activity app like RunKeeper or a life tracker gadget like Withings, Fitbit or Jawbone, Human is a passive iOS app designed to help you stay healthy. The goal is to move for 30 minutes every day, and to keep up with this simple habit. The company calls it the ‘Daily 30′. As it is extremely simple, keeping up with Human is easier than with competitive fitness systems.
“The basic premise of the app is very simple. Human tracks all of your activity and we put the focus on how many minutes you moved today and how many minutes you need to move,” co-founder and CEO Renato Valdés Olmos told me in a phone interview. “Each day of the week that you reach your Daily 30, we send out a push notifications,” he continued.
The startup chose to develop a very simple app to appeal to a mass audience, with an emphasis on design. The UI looks great with an ever-changing background picture. Everything is animated, making you want to open the app every time you receive the Daily 30 notification. But the most interesting aspect of Human is the technology behind it.
Along with Protogeo, it is one of the first fitness app to use passive location tracking. You set it up once and forget about it. Then, it calculates your speed with your location and your activity with the accelerometer. But when you launch Human, it doesn’t show you a timeline of your activities.
The most interesting aspect of Human is the technology behind it
“Showing the user a chronological timeline of your daily activity is great for the first few days. But after a few days, the magic wears out,” Valdés Olmos said.
That’s why the app’s depth is hidden behind the big minute count. If you tap on it, you’re taken to the activity timeline. And if you tap on an activity, you will see a map, the duration, distance and average speed. You can share this on Twitter and Facebook as well. In other words, Human automatically tracks your activities like RunKeeper — but you don’t have to remember to launch the app.
Over time, the team plans to use all this personal data to improve your daily habits. For example, you can tell the app where your office, your home and your gym are. The service can then build up the basic pattern for user behaviors.
“The goal is to send a notification that says ‘get off the subway two stops early and you’ll be on time to work,’” Valdés Olmos said. When it comes to privacy, he was quick to reassure me. “We want to be a different type of company when it comes to data collection,” he said. Users can export and delete everything with a single tap.
The startup hasn’t closed its seed round yet, but multiple angels are already committed to invest hundreds of thousands of dollars in total. The app is available to iOS, but an Android version is coming soon. “We want to get as many people as possible to do the Daily 30,” Valdés Olmos said.
via TechCrunch » Startups http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/techcrunch/startups/~3/ve6M--z9S6s/
Amazon's new Kindle Paperwhite officially announced, ships September 30th
New Amazon Paperwhite Makes Whites Whiter
Google Names Latest Mobile Operating System 'Kit Kat'
8GB Nexus 4 is sold out at Google Play and it won't be coming back, new Nexus handset on the way?
Google's next version of Android is called Kit Kat
Ballmer promises shorter names for Nokia phones: goodbye Nokia Lumia Windows Phone 1020
Google's All-American Moto X Phone Contains Few U.S.-Made Parts
Apple Sends Colorful Invite for Sept. 10 iPhone Event
Apple confirms September 10th iPhone event, and we'll be there live!
We're live from IFA 2013 in Berlin!
WePopp Wants To Cut Down On The Back And Forth When Planning Nights Out With Friends
We all know the problem. You want to plan that big night out with friends so you ping them on your mobile messaging apps of choice, SMS, and if you’re old, maybe Facebook or email. Then the responses come in. Some of your friends are up for it, while others suggest a different time and date. The trick then becomes finding a happy middle ground where all or most of the group can make it (or at least the friends who you really want to be there).
Aiming to remove some of that friction is a neat iOS app called WePopp. It promises to do one thing only, and do it well: Help you plan events with friends in just a few taps with a simple way to poll the group to find a date, time and place that suits everybody.
The way the app works is simple:
As the event organiser, you first pick what it is you want to do from a list of pre-defined categories, such as go for a drink, meal, a party, or take a weekend trip.
Next you fill out further details, including — crucially — up to three preferred dates and times.
Then you invite your friends to join your “popp”, from which they are asked to vote on the time and place, as well as suggest any other changes to the itinerary via the app’s messaging functionality.
Finally, you select the chosen date, time and destination, asking everybody to confirm once and for all if they are in or out.
One other clever aspect of the WePopp app is that it doesn’t require everybody in the group to be a user. If you are sans-WePopp, you can still be included in a “popp” via being notified by SMS and asked to respond/vote via a browser-based version. The final event details are then also sent as an SMS notification.
Now, admittedly, WePopp is far from the only startup to be tacking the problem of organising a get together with friends. Competitors could be seen to include Doodle, although something like Rundavoo comes a lot closer. There’s also Facebook’s event planning functionality.
Interestingly, WePopp is already iOS7-ready in terms of its ‘flat’ design, which isn’t going to be to everybody’s taste (can we say flat fatigue yet?), but it looks pretty nice to my eyes.
The French startup behind the app, also called WePopp, is self-funded aside from the €4,500 given by Google as part of going through the French accelerator Le Camping.
It plans to make money from the app via affiliate marketing and in the near future offers from partners it’s already signed deals with. This includes a partnership with lafourchette (the OpenTable of France). “When you plan on going to a restaurant, we will be able to help you pick and choose which restaurant you and your friends will book based on your location and table availabilities,” says co-founder and CEO of WePopp Julien Hobeika. “If you book a table on our application, we get a commission from lafourchette.”
via TechCrunch » Startups http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/techcrunch/startups/~3/hFyJA0bZPb8/
This week's Tokyoflash watch comes in maple and sandalwood (video)
Engadget Giveaway: win one of two Bolton Street backpacks, courtesy of ONA!
Xbox One will support up to eight controllers
Remember When Nokia Also Made Paper, Galoshes and Gas Masks?
Amazon lists next-generation Kindle Paperwhite with new display technology
Hands-on with Acer's DA241HL 24-inch all-in-one running Android
Amazon Offering E-Book Discounts for Print Copies
Microsoft Buys Nokia's Phone Business and Other News You Need to Know
Making Its First Acquisitions, Eventbrite Buys Ticketing Service Eventioz And Event Data Company Lanyrd
Ticketing company Eventbrite is announcing what it says are the first two acquisitions in its seven-year history — London-based event data company Lanyrd and Latin American ticketing service Eventioz.
Eventbrite co-founder and CEO Kevin Hartz said the company has “traditionally had an organic mindset with an aversion to acquisitions — we really wanted to build everything in-house.” Now, however — thanks in part to $60 million in new funding raised earlier this year — he said Eventbrite is at “the stage and size to be acquisitive,” with “an appetite” to expand geographically and technologically.
Hartz praised both the Lanyard and Eventioz teams, but he said each company brings something besides talent — Lanyrd will allow Eventbrite to incorporate more structured data into its listings (for example, Hartz suggested that by integrating with Lanyrd, Eventbrite might eventually be able to automatically provide event organizers with speaker data), while Eventioz will give Eventbrite a foothold for Latin American expansion.
“We certainly looked at pure talent acquisitions and we’re not averse to those,” he added.
Lanyrd was founded in 2010 and raised $1.4 million in funding from Index Ventures Seed, PROfounders Capital, Y Combinator, Start Fund, and others. The team will move to Eventbrite’s San Francisco headquarters, and Hartz said his company will continue to support the Lanyrd service and community.
As for bringing Lanyrd data into Eventbrite (Lanyrd has supposedly been used to help nearly 40,000 events in 148 countries, and it hosts more than 72,000 speaker profiles), he said, “We have no dates to report, but we plan to start pushing things out as soon as possible. It’s more an incremental change versus a flip being switched.”
Eventioz, meanwhile, was founded in 2008, has raised $1.5 million from Kaszek Ventures, and is headquartered in Mendoza, Argentina. It will continue to operate in Latin America, with what Hartz said will be “as smooth a transition as possible” to Eventbrite’s technical architecture. He added that he’s definitely hoping to expand the team with more hires: “There’s a lot of great engineering talent available. There hasn’t been a pleasant macroeconomic environment, so building engineering resources down there to is very interesting to us.”
via TechCrunch » Startups http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/techcrunch/startups/~3/SqRSo4hn3Ns/
Acer Liquid S2 hands-on
Acer finally adds pen input to its big-screen R7 Ultrabook, we go hands-on
Acer Extend concept is a smartphone workstation, we go hands-on (video)
Amazon launches Kindle Matchbook: discounted ebooks for those who own the hard copy
Microsoft shows off ESPN and NFL apps for Xbox One, Yahoo and ESPN fantasy football likely for 2014
Acer's 10.1-inch Iconia A3 Android tablet hands-on
Después de Nokia, ¿cuál es el siguiente?
Esperanza de vida en trimestres. Autor: Horace Dediu, Asymco.
Horace Dediu en Unforgiven, Continued ,
La esperanza de vida [de las marcas de móviles] después de una situación de trauma [no obtener beneficios] es de unos 2,5 años [y] no hay ninguna marca que se haya recuperado.BlackBerry lleva aún dos años, por lo que de ella aún se podrÃan esperar otros 6 ó 9 meses de independencia.
HTC podrÃa aguantar hasta 2015 pero es mucho más pequeña que las anteriores y por tanto más vulnerable, asà que su esperanza de vida podrÃa ser inferior.
La excepción podrÃa ser LG que parece estar recuperándose y contar con recursos propios para mantener su negocio de telefonÃa móvil indefinidamente.
via Microsiervos http://www.microsiervos.com/archivo/tecnologia/despues-nokia-cual-es-el-siguiente.html
Nokia en 2007 vs Nokia en 2013
Pulsar para ampliar. Autor: Benedict Evans.
Los gráficos de arriba procedentes de Nokia then and now representan la industria de los teléfonos móviles en el año 2007 (arriba) y en el año 2013 (abajo). La posición de los cÃrculos determina el volumen de ventas (en millones de unidades anuales) y su tamaño los ingresos generados.
En 2007 Nokia era el claro dominante en la industria de la telefonÃa móvil tanto por unidades vendidas como por ingresos. Aquel año se anunciaba el iPhone y Nokia ya llevaba tiempo bocetando lo que serÃan los futuros smartphones desarrollando teléfonos algo más sofisticados y capaces de lo que venÃa siendo habitual hasta entonces.
Asà que resulta un poco raro, incluso triste, que según The Verge la marca Nokia no vaya a volver a brillar en un smartphone.
Más divertida es la suposición de Benedict Evans de que Microsoft ha podido comprar Nokia ante una posible tentación de Nokia por pasarse a Android para sobrevivir. O para simplemente impedir que Nokia desaparezca.
Recientemente Stephen Elop explicaba porqué Nokia se decidió por Windows Phone: «por el riesgo de que un único fabricante de hardware [Samsung] llegase a dominar Android». Por esa regla de tres en adelante nadie más deberÃa querer fabricar teléfonos con Windows Phone (oh, wait!)
También siempre se ha mencionado la sospecha de que la adopción de Windows Phone por parte de Nokia se debÃa a una cuestión puramente económica y al hecho de que Elop, el hasta ahora CEO de Nokia, llegase a su despacho en Finlandia directamente desde su despacho en la oficina de Microsoft con tal propósito. Asà que esta adquisición serÃa formalizar algo que se venÃa cociendo y era casi un hecho desde entonces.
Por cierto que con esta compra el ex CEO de Nokia vuelve a Microsoft, por lo que Elop pasa a ser «un candidato» como sucesor de Steve Ballmer a ser «un candidato de la casa», y eso seguro que da gallipuntos.
via Microsiervos http://www.microsiervos.com/archivo/tecnologia/nokia-2007-vs-nokia-2013.html