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9 New Channels on IFTTT!
Wikipedia goes fully native on iOS and now lets you edit articles too
As one of the biggest brands on the Web, Wikipedia needs little introduction. The world’s biggest online encyclopedia is available across a multitude of platforms, including desktop and mobile. However, on mobile, it has hitherto largely relied on HTML5 wrappers on iOS and Android – in other words, not exactly coded ‘natively’ for each platform. Things are changing though. Hot on the heels of the overhauled Android incarnation that arrived on Google Play a little more than a month ago, which brought native coding and in-app editing, Wikipedia for iOS has been completely rebuilt from the ground up. And ‘native’...
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Distiller is now a social network for whisky lovers
Back in February, we brought you news on Distiller, an iPhone app that’s striving to be the ultimate whisky-drinker’s companion. Distiller analyzes tens-of-thousands of data points across flavors, price, reputation and more, then delivers personalized whisky recommendations from around the world. It later arrived for Android too. Today, Distiller is expanding beyond a simple recommendation engine into a fully fledged social network for whisky drinkers, where fans of a dram can hang out, swap notes, share favorites and learn about a multitude of different malts. How it looks You’ll now see your own dedicated activity feed alongside a whisky notes...
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Runtastic enters Orbit with a waterproof wristband that tracks activity, sleep and ambient light
With every man and their dog seemingly launching a wrist-worn activity tracker, it’s difficult to muster much in the way of enthusiasm for new entrants to the space. Just last week, Chinese smartphone juggernaut Xiaomi entered the fray with a more-than-affordable $13 effort, while Nokia spin-off PulseOn is courting the increasingly saturated market by focusing on your heart-rate. And this really is just the tip of the iceberg. Now, Runtastic is throwing its hat into the activity-tracking wearable ring. The Austria-based company may be better known for its arsenal of cross-platform fitness-tracking apps, which include its flagship GPS app for...
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PlayStation Now game streaming service hits open beta today on PS4 in the US and Canada
Sony is launching a public beta for its PlayStation Now video game streaming initiative in the US and Canada today (July 31). For now, the service will be available exclusively on the PlayStation 4, although Sony has reiterated that it’ll be coming to other platforms such as the older PlayStation 3, PlayStation Vita handheld and PlayStation TV micro-console. Over 100 titles will be available to rent through the PlayStation Store, with different prices for 4-hour ($2.99), 7-day ($5.99), 30-day ($7.99) and 90-day ($14.99) loan periods. These prices could be altered – Sony says a $1.99 tier will be added in...
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Xiaomi gets slapped with a $20,000 fine for misleading consumers in Taiwan
It’s been a rocky journey for popular Chinese smartphone manufacturer Xiaomi recently, what with having to face criticisms that it has ripped off Apple’s products and privacy issues with the Redmi Note. Now there’s another bump in the road for it after Taiwanese authorities found out that Xiaomi hasn’t been all that truthful about the number of products it made available during each flash sale in the country, and slapped a NTD600,000 ($20,000) fine on the company. Xiaomi typically sells its smartphones in batches, creating hype around its trademark flash sales which usually see thousands of devices being snapped up...
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The trouble with crowdfunding: When an interesting product blinds you to red flags
Writing about crowdfunding campaigns is a minefield. We don’t cover many, but when we do, we’re very careful to only bring you the highest quality projects. On one recent occasion, we may have missed the mark. There are so many crowdfunding campaigns vying for attention that we reject well over 95 percent of the pitches we receive. After all, in most cases, they’re nothing more than pipedreams. At their best, crowdfunding campaigns bring fantastic products like the Pebble smartwatch and Oculus Rift into the world. At their worst, they can be scams designed to extract money from over-enthusiastic coolhunters. The...
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Android reached a record 85% smartphone market share in Q2 2014: report
Market research firm Strategy Analytics new second quarter 2014 numbers estimate the Android platform’s share of the global market at a record 84.6 percent. Strategy Analytics reported 295.2 million smartphone shipments during the period, just 0.1 million off from IDC’s number. Growth seems to have tapered off, with the firm recording the market’s slowest growth level in five years. Android widened its lead on all its competitors. Apple’s share reportedly fell from 13.4 percent a year ago to 11.9 percent. Microsoft dropped from 3.8 percent to 2.7 percent, and BlackBerry shrunk from 2.4 percent to 0.6 percent. ➤ Strategy Analytics
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Yahoo completely rebuilds Yahoo Finance App for Android
Yahoo has completely rebuilt its Yahoo Finance app for Android. The updated app has an updated UI and is rebuilt to focus on your stocks and the news surrounding those stocks. You can now add stocks to a watchlist for real-time quotes and news, get notifications on those stocks and market news, and have access to interactive graphs. The UI also includes three tabs for access to News, Markets, and Home for your stocks watchlist. Yahoo also updated its Yahoo Finance app for iOS with the new Home feature with quick access to your stocks. ➤ Yahoo Finance for iOS...
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Google Hangouts drops Google+ requirement for Apps customers, integrates with other video call providers
Google is pushing Hangouts, its group video call service, into the enterprise space in a big way. Starting today, Google Apps for Business customers no longer need a Google+ account to jump on a call; they can use their existing credentials and instantly join a conversation with up to 14 other people in high-definition. To coincide with the move, Google has shifted Hangouts under the same Terms of Service that cover its other Google Apps for Business products, such as Gmail and Google Drive. As a result, customers can expect 24-hour phone support, 99.9 percent “guaranteed” uptime (although even Google...
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Square readies new Reader with chip-and-PIN card support ahead of EMV adoption in the US
Square has unveiled plans to release a new Square Reader – a smartphone and tablet dongle that allows businesses to easily accept credit card payments – that supports chip-and-PIN cards in the US. The refreshed Square Reader will be compatible with EMV, a standard developed by Europay, MasterCard and Visa, ahead of its introduction in the US later this year. Square says its refreshed hardware will be available for pre-order in the coming months, but refrained from giving a price or firm release date. As Square notes, the US is “late to the party” when it comes to adopting chip...
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Project Tango partner Movidius announces the second generation of its vision processor
When Google first announced its Project Tango initiative for 3D-sensing smartphones and tablets, one of the key components was Movidius’ Myriad 1 vision processing chip. Building on its accomplishments, Movidius today announced a next-generation Myriad 2 chip that offers as much as a 20x boost in efficiency over its predecessor. The company claims to have spent eight years and $60 million developing its technology. Movidius CEO Remi El-Ouazzane said in an interview that Myriad 2 has been specially tuned for power management, delivering “teraflops of performance in less than half a watt.” It will be produced on a 28-nanometer process...
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Sony says EA Access subscription service isn’t good value for PlayStation 4 owners
Sony has offered an explanation for why EA’s new video game subscription service, Access, was only announced for the Xbox One yesterday. A spokesperson told Game Informer via email that it wouldn’t represent ‘good value’ for PlayStation 4 owners: “We evaluated the EA Access subscription offering and decided that it does not bring the kind of value PlayStation customers have come to expect. PlayStation Plus memberships are up more than 200 percent since the launch of PlayStation 4, which shows that gamers are looking for memberships that offer a multitude of services, across various devices, for one low price. We...
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Spaceships, castles and Steve Jobs’ abandoned mansion: The houses that tech built
The biggest names in the technology world generally had humble beginnings – many were started in garages or basements and gradually grew into the powerhouses we know today. But with technology now one of the largest business sectors, how can the demands of finding or building ‘homes’ for fast-paced technology companies be married with the sometimes glacial pace of architectural practice and construction? One of Brazil’s hi-tech hubs. Image via Nelson Almeida/AFP/Getty Images Whether a company is building a bespoke HQ, leasing an existing building or repurposing a different structure entirely, the only constant remains the growing need to find...
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Wikipedia scores a key victory against paid-editing services using cybersquatting legislation
The Wikimedia Foundation, the not-for-profit responsible for Wikipedia and a number of other wiki-based projects, has gained a small but notable victory in its fight to stamp paid-editing on its flagship online encyclopedia. To recap, the Foundation recently changed the terms of Wikipedia editing, requiring anyone who has been paid to edit articles to disclose this. Editors must make this clear through a statement on their profile page, as part of the edit summary, or on the talk page alongside the relevant edits. The reason? Well, it seems that many companies have been paying to have information about their services...
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Как стать уверенным оратором
Перевод статьи на русский язык сделан в анимационной студии Lemon Digital. Мэтью Капала — автор книги Away with the Average, профессор Университета Нью-Йорка, а также основатель SearchDecoder.com. Источник статьи – запись в блоге Мэтью на Medium. Я жил в Польше вплоть до своего 23-летия. Затем, 10 лет назад, моим домом стал Нью-Йорк, где я успел побывать во многих ролях: рабочий на стройке, стропальщик, официант, офис-менеджер, диджитал-маркетолог, консультант, бизнес-тренер, предприниматель, профессиональный спикер, профессор и топ-менеджер. Именно в таком порядке. На самом деле я и не собирался связывать свою жизнь с публичными выступлениями до того, как несколько лет назад моя жизнь круто...
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Popcorn Time shows no sign of slowing, as the ‘Netflix for torrents’ adds support for AirPlay
Just a few weeks after Popcorn Time announced expanded support for Google Chromecast, the torrent-streaming platform is introducing support for AirPlay too. To recap, Popcorn Time is a cross-platform movie- and TV-show streaming service that beams out torrents in real-time. It’s like Netflix, except it’s peer-to-peer (P2P), offers much more content, and has questionable legality. While the movie industry has been pushing hard against the rise of torrent sites in recent years, Popcorn Time is showing no signs of slowing in its push to make torrents even more easily accessible. Available for PC, Mac and Android, Popcorn Time is Hollywood’s...
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Our 9 favorite startups from the 500 Startups Demo Day
At the ninth edition of 500 Startups’ demo day, 30 startups took to the stage vying for investment and a mention in the tech press. Underneath the rock star claims and hyperbole about changing the world, there were some gems that hit the stage in Mountain View. Today, the companies ranged from child care to bitcoin. As Silicon Valley tries to expand beyond the build-an-app and hope Facebook/Google/Apple/etc buy’s it business plan, start ups have become more eclectic. But shiny rocks, onesies and solos don’t automatically equal solid business plans or something you might find interesting. So after sitting through...
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Peloton releases an iPad app for streaming cycling classes on your own indoor bike
Peloton is expanding its indoor cycling regimen with the release of an iPad app that lets you stream live and on-demand classes. While Spinning remains the most well-known indoor cycling brand, Peloton entered the scene last year with a crowdfunding campaign for its bike. In April, the startup raised $10.5 million. Since Peloton’s bikes cost $2,000, the new app is an affordable alternative for folks who already have an indoor bike and have been interested in the company’s classes, which are filmed at its New York studio. You’ll get 20 credits for live classes and 4 on-demand rides to try...
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Google Shopping now features product ratings in ads, blurring the lines between organic and paid search
Shoppers in the US will soon see ratings in Google’s Product Listing Ads, as the search giant looks to lure more companies on board with the promise of better click-throughs. While the temptation for you and me may be to skim over anything ‘Sponsored’ in our online searches, this is an easy way for Google to further blur the lines between organic and paid search, as it gives the listings an extra air of authority. And it also makes the ads more useful for shoppers, as it pulls on real review data from across the Web. “We believe these ratings...
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Product Hunt’s first custom leaderboard lets you help rank the teams at today’s 500 Startups demo day
Product Hunt, a kind of ‘Hacker News for products’, has taken the startup world by storm over the past few months. While at its heart it’s focused on a daily contest in which users vote up and discuss their favorite new products, today it’s being used in a more timely fashion to highlight the startups presenting at 500 Startups‘ demo day in Mountain View. There’s nothing special in terms of features here, just a chance for the teams to compete not just for the attention of press and investors at the demo day itself, but also for upvotes from the...
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Another music streaming service joins the fray in Asia: Guvera seeks to stand out with hashtags
Guvera is a music streaming service you probably haven’t heard of, but it’s been around for some time. It was launched in Australia in 2008, and subsequently in the US and Indonesia. Now, it has expanded into Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore and the Philippines as it seeks to compete against services like Spotify and Deezer. It is probably a challenge of mammoth proportions for Guvera to gain a standing in the region, but a partnership inked with Lenovo in March could help it raise its profile. The deal will see Guvera pre-installed on Lenovo’s mobile devices — and the smartphone...
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Spotify’s iOS app gets an equalizer to give you more control over your music
Spotify has updated its iOS app with an equalizer feature that offers 22 audio presets, including electronic, hip-hop, acoustic and classical among other options. The music streaming service is also letting users manually define their own equalizer settings within the app. The update is still rolling out to all iOS users today, but once you have it, you can access the feature under ‘Playback’ in settings. Spotify’s vice president of product, Sten Garmark, says the equalizer has been one of its most requested features on iOS — and there’s no surprise there as it lets users have more control over...
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Apple’s MacBook Pro with Retina display laptops get faster processors, more memory as standard
With the release of OS X Yosemite fast-approaching, it’s hardly surprising that Apple has decided to give its MacBook Pro with Retina display lineup a quick refresh. On the outside Apple’s laptops look exactly the same, but under-the-hood specs have been bumped up across the board. The 13-inch model starts at $1,299 and now comes with a 2.6GHz dual-core Intel Core i5 chip and 8GB of memory. An extra $200 will increase the flash storage from 128GB to 256GB, while a further $300 adds a beefier 2.8GHz dual-core Intel Core i5 chip into the mix. The entry-level 15-inch MacBook Pro...
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Leak lets you send nearly anonymous emails to friends, family and enemies
Leak is a new email service that lets you send messages without disclosing your identity. Because passive aggressive subtweeting and Facebook rants aren’t enough. The service is simple: Type in the email address; choose your relationship (friend, family member, coworker, friend of a friend, or “someone”); type a message and hit “Send This Leak Anonymously.” The recipient will get an email with that thing you’ve always wanted to say but were afraid to. Maybe it’s a declaration of love. Maybe you just need to tell your boss to stop being such an ass. Whatever your message, it’s almost completely anonymous....
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Why Internet of Things startups need to shift speed gears to survive the era of Net Neutrality
Brian Kelly is the chief technology officer of Golgi, a data transport platform that helps developers eliminate the detrimental “spinning wheel” of long loading times for connected devices and mobile apps. The fight over net neutrality will soon be in your fridge. Net neutrality is one of the hottest debates of the year. It has developers worrying that their services won’t be able to compete without access to the internet’s “fast lane.” Internet Service Providers (ISPs) like AT&T and Verizon argue that to provide optimal internet speeds, they need to charge large data consumers more money for their heavier usage....
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Motorola is reportedly working with Google on a large-screen Nexus phone
Google may have sold Motorola to Lenovo, but that hasn’t stopped the two companies from continuing to work together. In fact, it makes it possible for them to partner up without other manufacturers worrying that Google is favoring an in-house team. The Information is reporting that, as part of a mounting Motorola comeback, the phone maker is collaborating with Google on a phone-tablet hybrid. According to writer Amir Efrati, work on the “Shamu” project began after the Lenovo deal was signed at the start of this year. Unique Motorola features like active display and passive voice recognition could make an...
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Yelp for iPhone now lets you add 12-second videos to your reviews, Android to follow soon
While the move isn’t exactly surprising, Yelp has announced that it is now opening its mobile apps to user-generated videos to help create more engaging, visual reviews. The feature is already live in its iPhone app, and the company says the Android incarnation will follow “soon”, though it doesn’t indicate how soon. At any rate, this means that if you’re out dining downtown and a photo doesn’t quite do the mood of a place justice, you can now capture it with video. Yelp says that 23,000 photos are already being updated each day from its mobile apps, so it’s clear...
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Fitbit finally comes to Windows Phone, with live stats and real-time Bluetooth syncing
Fitbit is a name synonymous with activity-tracking and wearables, with an estimated 67 percent of all trackers in the US shipping with the Fitbit brand last year. It’s also notched up more than one million app downloads on Google Play alone, though it remains tight-lipped about the specifics of its App Store figures. At any rate, Fitbit is finally expanding its mobile scope beyond that of Android and iOS by launching a version for Windows Phone users later today. This move isn’t entirely unexpected, and it does have a version for Windows 8 already, but this is significant in the...
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Why last click attributions breed bad decisions in a multi-device world
Sam Barnett is the CEO and co-founder of Struq. The last click attribution model has always been flawed. It attempts to simplify complex conversion paths on a last come first served basis, and allows advertisers to ignore the vast amount of data available to them. With the rise of the multi device user, it is now actively driving bad decisions. We need to rethink the way we measure effectiveness without resulting to traditional methods. Measure your performance not your clicks How we measure performance is the first crucial part of the issue; Click Through Rate (CTR) is one of the...
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How to shoot, edit and publish videos from your Android smartphone
Without meaning to stray to far into truism territory, the core raison d’être of smartphones is that they are designed for many tasks. In a single, compact device you have a mobile phone, digital camera, PC, MP3 player, video player, travel guide, supermarket and any other service you can think of that works online. Yes, your smartphone is a jack of all trades. But is it a master of any? Dedicated point-and-shoot digital cameras and lower-end camcorders are surely facing a slow road to extinction, with many modern phones capable of shooting ridiculously high-quality photos and videos. But can your...
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Why it might be time for Twitter to start filtering your feed
If you came to this article via our Twitter account, did you click the link the first time we tweeted it? Maybe the second? Or the third? It seems that of late, publishers are losing their inhibitions when it comes to tweeting a link to the same piece of content multiple times over a period of hours or days. I’ve noticed a particular leap in this practice since Twitter’s new Analytics dashboard launched earlier this month. The realisation that tweets from any given account get seen by a tiny fraction of its total followers seems to have hit home. At...
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Google Docs now turns Microsoft Word tracked changes into Suggested Edits automatically
Microsoft Word is still the world’s go-to application for writing reports, essays and other documents, but Google is trying to make it easier to switch to Drive and Docs. Announced at Google I/O and introduced at the end of June, ‘Suggested Edits’ allows contributors to recommend changes in the sidebar. The author can then reply, dismiss or confirm the changes as they continue editing. Starting today, tracked changes from .docx files will be imported as Suggested Edits; likewise, Suggested Edits will be exported as tracked changes in Microsoft Word. It’s a small tweak, but one that makes Google Docs more...
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China’s Baidu follows in Google’s footsteps as it reveals it’s working on partial self-drive cars
Google took the wraps off its self-driving cars in May, and now Baidu — commonly known as China’s Google — has also revealed that it is working on a similar project. Kai Yu, Baidu’s deputy director of its Institute of Deep Learning, told TNW in an interview that the company doesn’t view it as a driverless car, as he still envisions a driver being in control. “This is actually an intelligent assistant collecting data from road situations and then operating locally… We don’t call this a driverless car. I think a car should be helping people, not replacing people, so...
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BSkyB makes a small piece of history as it airs movie at the same time as cinemas
A small piece of history is being made today in the UK, as satellite broadcaster BSkyB (‘Sky’) airs a movie on the same day as it hits cinemas. While Sky has previously offered same-day cinema releases for rental via its Sky Store service, this is the first time it has broadcast it to Sky Movies subscribers at the same time as it arrives in movie theaters. Believe is a story about a young football (soccer) player who gets into trouble, who is then brought to the attention of former Manchester United manager Matt Busby. And yes, Busby comes out of...
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You can now buy an Amazon Fire Phone in the US
As promised, the Amazon Fire Phone is now available in the US. The new, premium handset is available exclusively on AT&T for either $649 (32GB) or $749 (64GB) without a service plan. Cheaper handset prices are on offer, provided you take out an applicable AT&T contract. The smartphone could be a breakthrough moment for Amazon. While it’s experimented with e-readers and tablets in the past, this is its first attempt at cracking the lucrative smartphone market. How it performs in the US could dictate when and how Amazon releases it elsewhere. The device comes with a few unique features; four...
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10 lessons from veteran book cover designers
Alexander Huls is a freelance writer who has been writing about pop culture for over five years. His work has appeared in the New York Times, the Atlantic, National Post, Film School Rejects and more. This post was originally published on the Shutterstock blog and has been reprinted with permission. With hundreds of thousands of books published (and self-published) every year, it can be difficult to get noticed; a great cover can often mean the difference between a sale and a trip to the bargain bin. Book-cover designers have to choose from a wide range of techniques — illustration, collage,...
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Looking for things to do in London? Timista’s smart planner for iPhone has you sorted
Two years after Timista launched for the Web, the intelligent ‘things to do in London’ service now has a dedicated iPhone app too. As with the original site, which responds to a user’s ‘wish list’ by helping them decide what to do based on three key metrics – location, time and availability – the iOS incarnation serves as your own digital concierge, morphing activities, bespoke plans and availability to tell you exactly what you should be doing, and when, in the UK capital. The good news is that Timista works straight out of the box. No signing up, no accounts,...
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China Telecom will start selling Microsoft’s Xbox One in September as its exclusive carrier partner
One of China’s three largest telecommunications firm, China Telecom, revealed at a press conference yesterday that it will be the exclusive carrier partner of Microsoft’s Xbox One and will start selling it in September (as first reported by Reuters). The press event was for the unveiling China Telecom’s internet of things effort in the form of a smart home series called “Yue Me,” featuring several products including a set-top box and a smart TV. The Xbox One looks set to fit right within China Telecom’s move to conquer the living rooms of the Chinese. Microsoft confirmed in April this year...
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News summary app Clipped gets automated infographics as it readies API
Clipped, an app that automatically generates summaries of news articles using natural language processing (NLP), has released a major update on iOS that creates custom infographics and offers improved accuracy. The startup is also taking sign-ups for an API that will open up its NLP engine to other developers. With the move, Clipped has dropped official support for Android, but founder Tanay Tandon said he is working with a group of developers to create an open source version for Android. Similar to the Summly app acquired by Yahoo last year, Clipped uses machine learning to scan an article and then...
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Pinterest shares diversity numbers: 40% female, 50% Caucasian
Pinterest today released a diversity report for its organization, revealing that it’s composed of 40 percent female employees and 50 percent Caucasian. The figures were shared by Pinterest engineer Tracy Chou, who called for greater transparency last year about the proportion of women tech employees in the industry. Since then, a number of major companies have piled on to share their diversity figures, including Google, Facebook and Twitter. In terms of gender ratios, Pinterest fared noticeably better than other tech companies. While just 21 percent of its tech segment is female, that’s better than Twitter’s 10 percent and Facebook’s 15...
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Why stress sucks and how to escape it
This post originally appeared on the Crew blog. I’ve never been good at dealing with stress. In high school, I used to pluck out my own eyelashes. That’s how bad I was at dealing with stress. People would be like, “Oh Andrea why don’t you have eyelashes?” And I would be like, “BECAUSE THEY GIVE ME ALLERGIES!” I took my social studies final with a wet paper towel over my eye because I was convinced it would block out any allergens. That’s where I was in my life at that time. I had no idea how to cope with stress,...
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Watch the first trailer for Halo: Nightfall, the live-action digital series by Ridley Scott
Microsoft has released the first trailer for its upcoming Halo: Nightfall live-action TV series, which Ridley Scott is working on as an executive producer. Not to be confused with the show Steven Spielberg is working on – that’s a separate digital feature – Halo: Nightfall will come bundled with the upcoming Halo: The Master Chief Collection video game for Xbox One later this year. The trailer reveals a new element that can selectively wipe out humans, which protagonist Jameson Locke, a an agent for the Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI) and his squad must seek out and destroy. It’s typical...
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Google updates Gmail for iOS with the option to save and insert attachments from Drive
If you regularly access Gmail from your iPhone or iPad, Google just made it a whole lot easier to save and retrieve files from Google Drive. Inside an email, you can now tap the paper clip icon to attach a new file and select ‘Insert from Drive.’ The corresponding app will launch and you can browse your files at leisure. Once you’ve found the document you need, press the arrow icon in the top right-hand corner to quickly attach it. “The apps will even tell you if your file isn’t shared with the person you’re sending it to so you...
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Chrome Beta for Android updated with Material Design tweaks and simplified sign-in
Google updated its Chrome Beta for Android app today with Material Design elements and “simplified sign-in,” which gives users the ability to have their log-in credentials submitted for Gmail, Maps, Search and other Google websites automatically. With the latest version installed, you can dive into the Menu – located in the top right hand corner, with three dots stacked vertically – followed by Settings and the option ‘Sign in to Chrome.’ Google will also remember your password for multiple accounts if more than one is stored on your device. “In addition to having your accounts a click away, your bookmarks,...
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Foursquare says Swarm for Windows Phone is coming ‘in the next few weeks’
Foursquare’s decision to launch a new check-in app called Swarm has caused quite a stir. If you’re a Windows Phone owner though, you’ve probably been wondering when the controversial app would arrive on Microsoft’s mobile OS. Well, worry no more. Today, Foursquare said its Swarm for Windows Phone app would be ready “in the next few weeks.” It showed a few tantalizing screenshots in a blog post, revealing a mostly similar design to its iOS and Android counterparts. Only yesterday, the company teased its upcoming Foursquare redesign and a new logo, which swaps the check-in iconography for a pink, capital...
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Google updates Hangouts on Air to help brands promote merchandise and related products
Google today unveiled Showcase, a new Hangouts on Air app that allows broadcasters and brands to easily promote merchandise and related content. In particular, Google’s live streaming tool has become a popular way for the movie industry to host Q&A sessions with a group of actors and actresses. In this scenario, the tool could be used to promote theater tickets on Fandango, the latest trailer on YouTube or the film’s official website. Furthermore, music artists could use it to share their Google+ page or new records in the Google Play store. It follows the company’s experiments with “shoppable” Hangouts on...
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Google’s Chromecast turns one: 400M casts to date and free All Access trial for owners
Exactly 12 months ago, Google unveiled its Chromecast streaming dongle for the first time. To celebrate its first anniversary, Google is offering all Chromecast owners a 90-day free trial for Google Play Music All Access, its premium music streaming service. The offer is available now in the US and can be redeemed up until September 30, 2014. To grab the free subscription, you’ll need to head here; it’s unclear whether this offer stretches to other territories, however. To put the icing on the cake, Google today revealed that Chromecast users have hit the ‘Cast’ button 400 million times in total....
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12 things product managers should do in their first 30 days at a new company
Ken Norton is a product partner at Google Ventures where he advises startups on product management and also helps organize workshops. Congratulations, a product has found its product manager. Perhaps you’re joining a small startup, or maybe you have a new project in a big company. How you approach your first 30 days will make a tremendous difference, setting you up for success or struggle. Here are some tips for how to approach that first month. Emphasize these three areas: People, Product, and Personal: People 1. Set clear expectations with the CEO or your manager You’ve been hired to fill...
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Square integrates IFTTT to let merchants automate business operations
Payments processor Square has announced that it now supports IFTTT integrations, allowing sellers to set-up triggers that can help to streamline their business operations when taking or sending payments. For example, sellers can create IFTTT ‘recipes’ for things like automatically sending a congratulatory email to employees, logging all transactions to a spreadsheet or receiving a weekly digest of the week’s refunds. If you don’t fancy creating your own recipe, Square’s IFTTT channel has more than 70 to get you started. With small business owners often carrying out many of the daily duties of running a business themselves, anything that can...
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Oyster now lets you read in any browser as the ebook subscription space heats up
If there was any lingering questions around whether there is a market for monthly ebook subcriptions, Amazon surely went some way towards answering them when it introduced its $9.99 ‘all-you-can-read’ Kindle Unlimited plan last week. While this raised many concerns around the implications for authors’ monetization, it will also have piqued the interest of existing players in the field – one of which is Oyster, the oft-called Netflix for ebooks. While Amazon’s monthly subscription serves up 600,000 ebooks for $9.99, Oyster delivers 500,000 books for $9.95 a month. However, it’s reported that the vast majority of the titles available on...
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Facetune finally takes its portrait and selfie photo-editor to Android
Way back in March last year, we brought you news on Facetune, calling it an intuitive, easy way to touch up portrait photos. The previously $1.99 app (now $2.99) from Israel-based developer Lightricks proved to be something of a hit among the iOS fraternity, quickly rising up the charts to become one of the top paid tools in the App Store. And today, due to popular demand, it’s available on Android too. Given the rise of the selfie in recent times, and with front-facing cameras improving all the time, Facetune will work just as well for those looking to enhance...
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Postmates beefs up its insurance package for couriers with new work accident coverage
On-demand delivery service Postmates has announced an expanded benefits package for its fleet of couriers. The new plans match Lyft and Uber’s own $1 million liability and auto-excess insurance policies. Couriers also benefit from accident-occupational insurance that will cover up to $50,000 in medical expenses per incident. All Postmate couriers are covered under the plan and it comes at no extra cost to them. The company is also offering new “soft benefits” that include membership to healthcare group OneMedical and discounts on bike gear. As the on-demand and sharing economy workforces grow, it’s great to see a startup doing more...
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Facebook now has 399 million users who login only from mobile devices
Facebook revealed in its second-quarter earnings today that it has 399 million mobile-only monthly active users (MAUs). That’s about 30 percent of its active user base of 1.3 billion. More than a billion users sign onto Facebook from a mobile device in a given month, but the number of mobile-only accounts saw a significant jump last quarter. The company picked up 58 million mobile-only users in the second quarter of this year. Considering that Facebook only added 41 million overall users and 62 million mobile users during the period, there’s a clear trend away from Facebook’s desktop services. The bulk...
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Duolingo launches Test Center, a $20 alternative to standardized language exams
Duolingo today launched Test Center, its own English language certification exam that can be taken on the Web or an Android device. The fresh alternative to standardized language tests was first announced by Duolingo co-founder Luis von Ahn at our TNW Europe 2014 conference in Amsterdam. It gives learners the ability to take a 20-minute exam from the comfort of their own home, and it’s priced at just $20; a similar test in a bricks-and-mortar facility would cost over $200, Duolingo claims. Cheating is obviously a concern, so the company is using remote proctors to monitor each exam via a...
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Hemingway Editor app helps you write in the legendary author’s economical style
The economical, understated writing style of Ernest Hemingway is renowned within the literature world. Now, there’s a Windows and Mac app to help you nail the American author’s approach. Simply called the Hemingway Editor, this $4.99 app will grade your work for ‘readability’ and is able to identify sentences that are hard to read, contain too many adverbs, or terms that should be simplified. The idea received a wealth of attention earlier this year when it launched as a website – you can still use that for free, although the desktop version gives you the ability to save your work,...
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