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The Xbox Metro Update Nudges Microsoft's Console Closer To Set-top Hedgemony
Dec 05, 5:00AM
The upcoming Metro update to Microsoft's Xbox, shipping tonight and arriving on your console some time this week, pushes Microsoft's gaming product away from the traditional run-and-gun of gaming consoles and into a new realm: that of the home media center. While the Xbox existed as a media center before, allowing you to download video and music content and stream content from your home computers, this new update makes it easier to find disparate pieces of content, whether its from Microsoft's own video/music store or another source or directly from the Internet through YouTube and various partner services. The update also allows Windows Phone users to control the Xbox remotely, adding items to the queue and looking up content to send to the TV while other content is playing. In short, this update isn't about the games, it's about content.
There And Back Again: A Lengthy Weighing Of The Galaxy Nexus And iPhone 4S
Dec 05, 1:08AM
Before me sit two phones. On the left is the iPhone 4S, which I bought (and signed my soul over to Verizon for) in October. On the right sits a loaner GSM version of the Samsung Galaxy Nexus, sporting Android 4.0. I like the one on the right better. I'll have to send it back to Google soon, but I'm already certain that through a combination of mysticism and Craigslist I'll be swapping the iPhone 4S for a Verizon Galaxy Nexus shortly after it launches. The following is a reflection on how I came to that decision, and why I think the aura of superiority that's surrounded iOS since its introduction is really more of a residual mist at this point — particularly when compared to Ice Cream Sandwich. iOS is better at some things than Android. And it is prettier. But it is no longer superior.Dear Federal Trade Commission, Thank You For Not Saving Us From Facebook's Privacy Changes
Dec 05, 12:59AM
The Federal Trade Commission intervened this week to stop Facebook from doing things like making private user information public... back in 2009. Besides being years too late to impact key product decisions, the proposed settlement doesn't go far in controlling what Facebook can do in the future. Which is a good thing. The company has willfully changed its product countless times over the years, ignoring its users, the developers on its platform, its advertisers, privacy advocates, politicians, etc. Facebook protest pages (um), scathing articles, and petitions to quit have pressured Facebook revert back from whatever it was trying to do.Friend Count Up, Sharing Down: Path Only Works If You Reject Those Friend Requests
Dec 04, 11:42PM
You're going to be tempted, but don't do it. Don't add all your friends on Path. Don't come anywhere near the 150-friend limit. And make the tough decision to reject the friend requests of people you care about. Because the whole point of Path 2 is sharing everything, and you won't do that if you're sharing to people that aren't your best friends. Path's power comes from the intimacy of your connections, not the quantity.Cyber Monday Kicks Off Record $6B Online Holiday Shopping Week Thanks To Free Shipping Offers
Dec 04, 11:16PM
Consumers continue to set records with online shopping sales this holiday season. After spending a whopping (and record) $1.25 billion on Cyber Monday, online shoppers continued spending online, with two other days in the past week eclipsing the $1 billion mark in e-commerce sales, bringing the total week's value to $6 billion. comScore reports that Tuesday, November 29 reached $1.12 billion, while Wednesday, November 30 reached $1.03 billion. These three billion dollar spending days currently rank as three of the four heaviest online spending days in history (with Cyber Monday 2010 being the other). To date, $18.7 billion has been spent online this holiday season, a 15 percent increase from the same period last year. So what is the reason why more consumers are spending online? comScore says that free shipping is one major factor many shoppers are considering when paying for presents this holiday season. This incentive, says the data research company, is being used at record levels over the first few weeks of the holiday season.LG Nitro HD Review: You Win Some, You Lose Some
Dec 04, 10:06PM
I find myself looking at the Nitro HD with mixed feelings. In some ways, it's exactly what I've been asking for from LG, and in others it simply brings about disappointment. The software, in particular, failed to impress me. Hopefully a much more clogged 4G LTE network from AT&T (compared to the like, seven people that are using it now) will still find a way to outweigh the lag on what should be a high-end Android handset.Princeton Beats Out 13 Schools to Win Facebook's College Hackathon
Dec 04, 9:46PM
Overcoming stiff competition from MIT and Waterloo, Princeton won this year's Facebook College Hackathon finals. Over the past few months, Facebook conducted run-off competitions at fourteen colleges across the United States and Canada, and this Friday held the finals at Facebook headquarters in Palo Alto. The Princeton team was the only one comprised mainly of women, and their winning project Color Me Bold allowed users to submit a photo of an outfit and receive instant, algorithmic fashion suggestions for how to improve its color scheme. Watch as we interview some of the top teams, play around on Facebook's famous Ripstick skateboards, and talk with the winners about whether they'll be turning their project into a startup.LiveLead Lets You Share And Watch YouTube Videos With Your Facebook Friends In Real-Time
Dec 04, 9:15PM
Watching videos on YouTube or browsing through photos on Facebook is inherently a social action that you may do with friends while in front of a computer or TV. Startup LiveLead, which is in private beta, allows you to remotely watch and chat about YouTube videos or photos remotely with your friends in real-time. Anyone in the group can search for new content, click 'lead' and it will automatically load on everyone's computer. We have 500 invites for readers to try out the service here. Here's how LiveLead works. You can create a room to share and watch YouTube videos in. You actually log-in with Facebook, and you'll see a list of your friends that you can invite into a room. You simply click the '+' symbol next to their name to send them a link that invites them to your active LiveLead group. If they are online, it will send them a link via Facebook chat, and if they are offline, you can send the invite link via a customizable Facebook message.Guest Post: Tablets Deliver a New Business Book Mashup
Dec 04, 8:33PM
As a voracious consumer of Web content since the early days (and an active blogger myself since 2004), I've found one of the most important aspects is the interactive component. When readers of content, like TechCrunch, want to learn more, the hyperlink, author's Twitter feed, and additional headlines are ready. I often get lost following the bread crumb trails from one blog post to another and then to a video or Twitter feed and back again. It's content with context. And those links (as well as searches) drive people I don't know to my stuff. Contextual links are the currency of the social web.TechCrunch Tokyo Japan 2011: The Cambrian Explosion In Startups [Video]
Dec 04, 8:22PM
A massive number of species appeared and began evolving some 580 million years ago, forming the basis of modern life. Now we're in the middle of another "Cambrian Explosion," Erick Schonfeld explains in the video above, where the internet is primed for new startups like Precambrian Earth was for rapid evolution. Lower costs for getting started and the prevalence of internet-connected devices make it more possible for new companies to create big changes in seemingly slow-growing industries like health care, education and transportation. But that's not great for everyone. Like the fossils show, many of the species didn't find a way to survive in the ever-changing world.
The White Album
Dec 04, 6:40PM
On the border, the hazy chirping of birds of a lazy Sunday morning, I lay here trying not to wake up too fast. And in that delicious world of memories old and newly created, I was back in Cambridge in my friend's back yard listening to him talk to his friend James Taylor. I knew James' sister from school, but only knew of him. Now, in that tween world, I realize he was on his way or just back from the White Album.Mint Founder's New Project, Swift, Studies Personal Maglev Vehicles
Dec 04, 5:29PM
Aaron Patzer, the founder of Mint, has a new project that he is spending half his time on (he continues to spend the other half as VP of Product Innovation at Intuit, which acquired Mint two years ago for $170 million). His new project is called Swift, and it is his vehicle (if you will) to exlore the feasibility of building a personal maglev vehicle transit system. "The goal is to see if I can develop a new transportation system to displace cars in most urban and suburban settings," he told me recently, "with the goal being 5x the speed, and bringing the cost of maglev from today's costs of $50m / mile down to $4-5m / mile, which would be the same as adding one lane of asphalt/concrete road. Not sure if it will pan out, as I'm deep in the science and simulation phase."Building For The Long Haul
Dec 04, 5:00PM
At a recent Startup School, Mark Zuckerberg made some very poignant comments about Silicon Valley's lack of long-term focus. While the quick turnover of capital, people and innovation makes the Valley an incredibly attractive place for starting companies, it also produces an environment that's almost hostile when it comes to building them for the long haul. The tension is remarkable, yet it's rarely highlighted among the more explicit challenges – say, going up against the 800lb gorilla – faced by entrepreneurs. Every so often, my non-tech friends half-jokingly ask, "Have you sold yet?" And for the first few years of Box's existence, to placate them, I would ask for just a couple more quarters. Right after we get our next product to market, after we double again, and so on. But soon it dawned on me that I wasn't going to stop. I couldn't. There was just too much to do, too much unexplored territory. Even when things weren't going well, the challenge of righting them was like another shot of pure adrenaline.Exploring The "Labs" Trend in Consumer Startups
Dec 04, 3:30PM
For those of us who studied (or suffered through) chemistry at some point in life, images from the chem lab inspire nostalgia (or dread). White lab coats. Protective goggles and gloves. Glass beakers and measuring cups. It is a place of experimentation. Students are given strict lab instructions, such as "Don't mix baking soda and vinegar," which many of course ignored. Whether one liked chemistry or not, there was usually an undeniable sense of excitement at conducting experiments that had the potential to cause chemical reactions, the kind that would trigger loud sounds, big messes, and new things. In the world of tech startups, the original image "labs" conjures up is of a few people "sitting in their garage" hacking new ideas. In this world, it's a powerful metaphor and how founders of seminal companies like Atari and Apple etched their legend. The "labs" nomenclature is back in vogue in the consumer web and mobile spaces, and the gritty garage has been replaced with urban loft studios filled with hipster gear and Blue Bottle Coffee.The Lean Finance Model Of Venture Capital
Dec 04, 8:35AM
The venture capital industry is going through a ton of disruptions lately. One of the better explanations I've heard recently of what is going on comes from Duncan Davidson, a managing partner at Bullpen Capital who gave a great talk on the subject at TechCrunch Tokyo last week. I interviewed him backstage on video, where he summarized his views. Just as there are now legions of "lean startups" which require less capital to build a product, Davidson argues that a "lean finance model" is also neededTonchidot CEO Talks 3M Downloads, Augmented Reality, And New App
Dec 04, 6:19AM
When I was in Japan earlier this week, I ran into Tonchidot CEO Takahito Iguchi at the TechCrunch Tokyo conference and dragged him back to my makeshift studio for an impromptu interview about the state of augmented reality and mobile apps. Tonchidot launched its Sekai Camera app at TechCrunch50 in 2008 before anyone really believed that augmented reality apps were possible. They were the crowd favorite. In the video above Iguchi tells me that Sekai Camera has been downloaded 3 million times (mostly in Japan).A List Of Startups Goldman Sachs Thinks Will Most Likely IPO
Dec 04, 4:52AM
Very very quietly (there is almost no Google footprint), investment bank and securities firm Goldman Sachs held its "Private Internet Company Conference" this week in Las Vegas. During the two-day conference, which lasted from November 29-30th, a gaggle of companies presented their business models to an elite audience composed of bankers, investors and peers.Joe Stump And Graham Blache Launch Sprintly, Project Management Streamlined
Dec 04, 4:21AM
It's been only a month since SimpleGeo co-founder Joe Stump left his last company, following its acquisition by Urban Airship, but he's already launching a new product (and company) today called Sprintly. The company was actually founded in March by Stump's co-founder Graham Blache, and Stump tells me he's "been plotting this product for nearly a decade." The startup is completely bootstrapped so far. Sprintly is a simple project management tool that is built for both software developers and other people in a company who rely on them. It is designed to remove the frustrations developers have with working in their own silo.Spare Me From "Product Guys"
Dec 04, 2:53AM
We're seeing people move away from finance and law and towards a culture of building things. It's great to see more people seek careers in technology. The problem, I find, is that so many people approach the transition poorly. The first, and I suppose seemingly easiest claim and means to justify your place in the startup world, as someone who has no experience, is to call yourself a product person. But that claim generally comes with a fundamental misunderstanding of what it means to do product. It is not code for a person who doesn't really know how to do anything but thinks he can boss engineers around. It doesn't refer to marketing guys who had an idea. Understanding what it means to drive a product means understanding the full scope of the vision of your company. It means understanding your engineering team, their capabilities, and their priorities. It means understanding what your next move is, and what your 6th move is from every angle. And here's my dark secret—a year and a half ago, I was sort of one of those "product guys." I was still working in finance. I had big ideas, but had never managed product at a tech companySAP Will Buy SuccessFactors For $3.4 Billion
Dec 04, 1:00AM
In what is perhaps the most boring piece of tech news to come out of this week, German software giant SAP has today announced that it will buy the US-based SuccessFactors, a company that "helps organizations align strategy with objectives and manage people performance to ensure execution & results," IN THE CLOUD, OF COURSE. I think this means that it provides enterprise software for human resources, but you can never be too sure with these incredibly dull companies. I am too bored to Google it. In fact, I am literally bored to tears writing this, like I am actually crying here in my local coffee shop and everyone is looking at me weird and I just want to show them this press release so they'll understand or something.If at any time you'd like to stop receiving these messages, just send an email to feeds_feedburner_com_techcrunch+unsubscribe-hmdtechnology=gmail.com@mail.feed2email.net.
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