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One Day Will People Be Living In Shroom Houses?
May 14, 12:55PM
Construction material manufacturing often produces hazardous byproducts that are either toxic or difficult to recycle, as are many of the materials themselves. Brooklyn based Planetary ONE is experimenting with the idea of grow-your-own construction materials by making bricks from mushrooms. Their latest project, Mycoform, places mushroom roots known as mycelium spores into a mold and feeds them with agricultural byproducts like buckwheat husks. In just over a week at 80 degrees, the spores grow to fill the form, resulting in a light yet solid structure. The brick is heated to 100 degrees when complete to kill the spores, preventing further growth.
Lockitron Lets You Unlock Your Door With Your Phone
May 14, 12:31AM
Ever wish you could just call your keys? Well the Ycombinator-backed Lockitron aims to replace physical keys entirely by letting you control your door lock with your phone. The Lockitron web app and hardware package are as of today available for general users, for a one time fee of between $295 to $500. Instead of using relatively unreliable wifi, the service works by utilizing a plug server and ethernet cable tied to an electronic lock. Your smartphone talks to the server controlling the lock via the web which means that you can control the lock from wherever you are. Lockitron also has an NFC option if you've got a Nexus S or are planning on buying a iPhone 5 if/when NFC happens. The system works with both deadbolt and handle locks.
Weekend Giveaway: Something Called An iPad Two (??)
May 13, 9:51PM
A company called PunchTab wants to test their new contest entry system, appropriately-named the PunchTab widget. To that end, they've offered us the ability to give away a black 16GB Apple iPad Two (was there ever an iPad One?), some sort of new tablet computer for people who like that sort of thing. All the kids seem to want one, like the Teddy Ruxpin. So here's where it gets a little weird.
Uber Goes Breakers To Bay This Weekend With Unlimited Gatorade And Jack Daniels
May 13, 9:18PM
As everyone in the Bay Area will know, this Sunday is the annual Bay to Breakers run/boozefest. The 12k run normally goes from the bay (in the city) to the breakers (at the ocean), hence the name. But Uber is going to do the opposite. As they've just announced to customers via email, starting at 10AM and going through 4PM, they'll be going breakers to bay, picking up weary runners/pukers in their cars. If you happen to be in the Golden Gate Park area in that timeframe, there will be limos there waiting for those who use the app. And those limos will be "stocked with Gatorade, Granola Bars and 50ml bottles of Jack Daniels and Skyy Vodka so you can refuel/party."
Cake Health Wants To Be The 'Mint For Health Insurance' (Beta Invites)
May 13, 9:14PM
If you're like me, terms like "out of network" and "deductible" are cringe-inducing. Not just because they generally involve me forking over money for healthcare, but also because navigating the waters of health insurance — and figuring out exactly what I should be paying for — is a complete pain. Cake Health is a startup that's looking to help by becoming the 'Mint for health insurance', offering an attractive and easy-to-use interface for managing common tasks like choosing an insurance plan, monitoring your claims, and figuring out which health services you should be taking advantage of. Cake Health is still in private beta, but they've extended 500 invitations to TechCrunch readers. The first 500 people to click this link will be able to sign up. The company was founded by Rebecca Woodcock and former TechCrunch developer Andy Brett, who walked me through an early version of the service. During the initial signup process you'll be asked to connect with your healthcare provider's website.
Yes, There Are Tech Startups in Nigeria. Here Are My Favorites.
May 13, 8:16PM
Last week I wrote about Computer Village, where many of the gadget-hounds in Lagos go to get their gadgety fix. But what about new technology being developed in the country? The city's tech entrepreneur scene is small, but several people are working on changing that. Oo Nwoye-- or @oothenigerian as he's known on Twitter-- is one of the more enthusiastic champions of this nascent scene. (That's him on the left.) I met him two years ago in London, where he cornered me at an event and made a case for me going to Nigeria, so he was one of the first people I contacted when I finally did. Since then, he'd moved back home. He's working on a to-be-determined startup and spending the meantime trying to galvanize a startup community. He organized a fantastic demo day to give me a taste of what people are working on.
Keen On: Can The New Intimacy Economy Save The Music Industry? (TCTV)
May 13, 7:52PM
Should music artists be like the authoritarian Steve Jobs? Is it their responsibility to know what their fans want better than they do? Evan Lowenstein, the successful singer-songwriter and the current CEO of StageIT, certainly seems to think so. In a recent article tantalizingly entitled "The Artist to Fan Relationship: Dating, Love, Texting and Marriage", Lowenstein argues that "as an artist, it is our responsibility to know what our fans want better than they do." But, as I found out when I interviewed Lowenstein this week at the excellent SFMusicTech event this week, Lowenstein isn't quite as dismissive of his fans as he initially appears. 
Former Yahoo And Myspace Execs Raise $3M For Small Demons
May 13, 7:44PM
Small Demons, a stealth LA- based startup founded by former Yahoo Product VPs Valla Vakili and Tony Amidei has just raised $3 million in Series A funding, according to an SEC form filed today. While Vaklili and Amidei and the only people listed on the form, the company is rounded out by former Myspace Data Architect Christa Stelzmuller and former Myspace VP of Data Hala Al-Adwan. 
Disrupt NYC: The Full Agenda
May 13, 7:14PM
In about a week, Disrupt NYC will begin. We will launch over two dozen new startups in our Startup Battlefield and bring together the smartest people in tech to discuss how the Internet is disrupting industry after industry—from media (print, TV, music, gaming) and social commerce to payments and transportation. We've steered away from unwieldy panels, and instead tried to pair up interesting speakers to foster deeper conversations. Fred Wilson, Dennis Crowley, Arianna Huffington, and Ron Conway will kick things off in a series of talks on Monday morning. Gilt Groupe CEO Kevin Ryan and Kleiner Perkins VC Aileen Lee will delve into the shifting world of social commerce. Charlie Rose will interview Paul Graham on Tuesday. Betaworks CEO John Borthwick (who recently launched News.me) will talk tablet publishing. We've already announced many of the speakers, but the full agenda is below. You can still buy tickets, or try to win one.
Hipster Ventures? Lame Name For A Good Idea To Launch Euro Startups In The Valley
May 13, 7:08PM
There are rumours of a new European seed fund being built out of London right now, billing itself as a sort of "500 Startups of Europe". Admittedly Hipster Ventures is a Seppuku-inducing name, but stay with us... The idea is to whisk the best of European consumer web and mobile companies off to San Francisco to launch them on the West coast. The guy behind it is high profile freelance journalist and Telegraph columnist Milo Yiannopoulos, who appears to be dialling down on the journalism and dialling up a desire to become a VC of sorts. 
OpenFeint Expands Free-To-Play Mobile Gaming Platform OFX To Android
May 13, 7:00PM
Last year, OpenFeint launched the private beta of OpenFeint X (OFX), which offers indie developers the ability to create Zynga-like free-to-play games including microtransactions and virtual goods. Until now, the platform has only been available for iOS devices, but today, the company is expanding to Android phones with the private beta launch of OFX for Android. OFX allows developers can create social games with a chat wall where players can interact with each other, a newsfeed showing recent in-game activity, and game nudges. OFX also offers the ability to build and run a full virtual goods store, stocking and selling virtual currency and goods, access detailed analytics, and include a game-specific currency wallet. 
Google News Goes Local On Mobile: Introduces 'News Near You'
May 13, 6:23PM
The first thing many of us do in the morning is check for earth shattering news, and Google has just made the quest to find relevant news a little bit easier by introducing a geolocation-enabled "News Near You" feature in its U.S. Edition. While there are plenty of niche local news aggregators like Topix or Fwix available for local news junkies, Google News is the dominant player in the news aggregation landscape with 14.4 billion unique visitors in April according to Comscore. It has allowed users to view location based news by entering their zip codes on the web since 2008, but today's leap into mobile local-based news is significant; The battle to capture smartphone eyeballs has only just begun.
Mailgun Raises $1.1 Million For Its 'Twilio For Email'
May 13, 6:18PM
Last October I wrote about a small startup called Mailgun that was setting out on a bold mission: to provide developers a way to programmatically create and manage mailboxes and email messages using a straightforward API. Put another way, they want to abstract the complexities of email in the same way that Twilio has created an easy-to-use developer interface for telephony services. Today, the company is announcing that it's raised $1.1 million from some very well-known investors including SV Angel, Yuri Milner (individually, in addition to his previous investment as part of Start Fund), Maynard Webb, Paul Buchheit (who, among other things, created Gmail), and Geoff Ralston (who created Yahoo Mail back in 1997). Given the credentials of the investors, it looks like Mailgun may be onto something big.
Native Apps Or Web Apps? Particle Code Wants You To Do Both
May 13, 4:30PM
When it comes to app development for mobile devices, cross-platform implementation is the new hot thing. Developers have long struggled with fragmentation across operating systems, when they want to just be able to create one app and blast it out on every platform imaginable. Businesses like Heroku and Appcelerator, and gaming versions like Game Closure (and many others) collectively make creating, hosting, and deploying games a more manageable endeavor. But today, a startup is launching that hopes to make development of mobile apps even easier. Palo Alto-based Particle Code is building a platform that enables mobile developers to write mobile apps and games once, deploy both HTML5 and native apps across platforms and devices -- all from within a single codebase. Particle Code is built on the Eclipse IDE, an environment and suite of tools for Java developers, and supports development in a wide array of languages including Java, C# and ActionScript3. This means millions of additional programmers can now enter mobile app development in a way that is scalable to reach a whole bunch of devices. And, as a potentially interesting aside, here's TIOBE's ranking of the most popular programming languages this month. 
TechCrunch Giveaway: Last Free Ticket To Disrupt NYC, Plus Free iPod Touch #TechCrunch
May 13, 4:17PM
This is your last chance to win a free ticket to this year's Disrupt in New York City! The conference is from May 23rd to May 25th, a little over a week away, and has an incredible lineup of guest speakers and judges. You can read all about our speakers here, and you can take a peek at our three day agenda, as of now, here. We still have a couple other little surprises that we will be announcing. Some very special guests have confirmed and we will be revealing them shortly. Since this is your last chance to win a free ticket, we wanted to throw in something extra to make it special. A couple of weeks ago, Alexia wrote about a company named Talkatone. They were generous enough to give us a free iPod Touch with Talkatone already installed, so we thought it would be nice to give it away to one of our readers. So, the winner of this giveaway will win a free ticket to Disrupt, a ticket valued at around $3,000, and an iPod Touch, courtesy of Talkatone.
Gary Vaynerchuk: "99.5 Percent Of Social Media Experts Are Clowns" (TCTV)
May 13, 3:55PM
Wine enthusiast, author, founder, blogger, investor and serial entrepreneur (did I leave anything out?) Gary Vaynerchuk dropped by our TechCrunch TV studio in New York City with a bottle of red to discuss his new book, The Thank You Economy with TechCrunch Co-editor, Erick Schonfeld. "Context is the new battleground for business" says Vaynerchuk when asked to give the Twitter version summary of book. In essence, businesses need to better understand how to use social media and how to apply an authentic human touch while doing so. Vaynerchuk thinks current efforts are abysmal. ""99.5 percent of the people that walk around and say they are a social media expert or guru are clowns," he says, continuing with "we are going to live through a devastating social media bubble."
How To Install Netflix On Most Android Devices
May 13, 3:49PM
Netflix previously all but ignored Android, leaving users confused and annoyed by the lack of love. All that changed yesterday when the app dropped on the Nexus S and several HTC devices. But that's the catch. Only a select few devices currently support the streaming service, so the fun is only for those rocking the HTC Incredible, HTC Nexus One, HTC Evo 4G, HTC G2, and Samsung Nexus S -- unless you're comfortable following a few lines of instructions!
Facebook Faces Lawsuit Over Unauthorized Sharing Of User Data With Advertisers
May 13, 2:35PM
A judge yesterday threw out most of the claims made in a lawsuit against Facebook, in which two California individuals, David Gould and Mike Robertson, accused the social networking giant of sharing their names and other private information with some advertisers in direct violation of its own privacy policy. That said, the judge also ruled the lawsuit will not be dismissed in its entirety either, as Facebook had pleaded.
LIVE At the TimeCrafter's Show In New York
May 13, 2:23PM
I'm broadcasting live from the Timecrafter's watch show in New York with Hugh Dougherty, the Mart & Highlights Editor for the National Association of Watch And Clock Collector's own watch blog, WatchDig. We'll be looking at some higher end watches (and some affordable ones as well) and talk about the recent watch show in Basel, Switzerland. 
OpenTable Founder Launches OhSoWe, A Network For Neighborhoods
May 13, 1:50PM
OpenTable's co-founder Chuck Templeton is launching his latest venture today—OhSoWe. The site essentially aims to bring together neighborhoods. It's sort of like an online version of a block association. On the site, users can create a "neighborstead," to form a block club, neighborhood association or a neighbor-based organization. People have to create profiles and join the site (there's no Facebook integration). To join the site, you enter your address, and OhSoWe will automatically show you neighborhood activity near your home. People can message each other, post notices, organize meetings, and more. 
Google Bullies OEMs Over What Can And Can't Appear On Android Devices
May 13, 12:37PM
Based on a batch of documents released in the Skyhook/Google lawsuit, it seems that Google's Andy Rubin is not only the boss of Android, but the boss of just about everyone in the Android ecosystem. Freshly unsealed court docs reveal that Google is using Android's compatibility standards to bully OEMs into choosing Google products for their smartphones. Basically, anytime a manufacturer wants Android — or at least, Android with all of its best perks, like the Android Market or Google's ultra slick Gmail client — on its smartphone, the device must adhere to a compatibility standard, which is determined solely by Google. In an email dated August 6, 2010, Dan Morrill, a manager in the Android group, mentioned that it's pretty obvious to phone manufacturers that "we are using compatibility as a club to make them do things we want." 
The Wild Tale Of A Stolen Laptop In Brooklyn
May 13, 12:04PM
Analytics ninja Sean Power lost his laptop in Brooklyn - it was stolen, although it may not have been stolen by the man who had it - and using Prey he was able to track it to a particular bar near City Hall in downtown Brooklyn. Sean got some snaps of the guy and his browsing habits and asked that some of his Twitter followers visit the bar to wait for the police. When the police refused to come because Powers had not filed a report the Twooters took the matter into their own hands. Again, to be clear, the man in the photo probably just paid the thief for the laptop in what we can only assume is good faith. 
How One Swedish Startup Was Almost Acquired By Skype, Pre-Microsoft Deal
May 13, 11:45AM
Exclusive - Earlier this week, Microsoft dropped a bombshell on pretty much the entire technology industry, acquiring VoIP juggernaut Skype for a baffling $8.5 billion in cash. One side-effect unrevealed up until today: TechCrunch has learned that Skype came extremely close to buying Swedish startup MyWidz right before negotiations with Microsoft were kicked into high gear, freezing said acquisition plans.
Walmart Invests In Yihaodian, A Massive Chinese E-Commerce Company
May 13, 9:29AM
Wal-Mart this morning announced that it intends to acquire a minority stake in the holding company of Yihaodian, a massive B2C ecommerce company based in China. The transaction is expected to close within 60 days, the retail giant says. Launched in July 2008, Yihaodian offers more than 75,000 products ranging from clothing to grocery to consumer electronics. Less than 3 years after launch, the company boasts a whopping 2,000 employees and logistics operations in Shanghai, Beijing, and Guangzhou. 
NTT Docomo Partners With Twitter For New Location-Based Service In Japan
May 13, 8:35AM
Japan's biggest mobile carrier NTT Docomo today announced it will develop with Twitter a set of new mobile services for its domestic customer base of 58 million. Under the deal, Docomo plans to integrate a "touch and follow" app into NFC-equipped feature phones, allowing two users to start following each other just by placing their handsets together.
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