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Yahoo Shuts Down Its Email Service In China
Aug 19, 4:23AM
Yahoo's email service in China has shut down, with a note on its log-in page asking users to transfer their accounts to Alibaba's Alimail. The closure of Yahoo China email was announced on April 18 and is part of its gradual ceasing of services in China since acquiring a stake in Alibaba, one of the country's largest Internet companies, in 2005.Fly Or Die: Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 8.0
Aug 19, 2:00AM
The Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 8.0, while having a numerically challenging name, is a slick little guy that's not too big, not too small, but just right. Still, is that enough to compete with not only the iPad mini but also Samsung's own Galaxy Note 8-inch tablet?Inside Patch's Leaked Revenue Numbers And Its Hunt For Profitability
Aug 19, 1:25AM
Patch, AOL’s hyperlocal news project, is undergoing steep layoffs as it aims for profitability by the end of the year. Leaked memos detail Patch’s revenue both in its lower reaches, and what its sales bosses expect it to accumulate daily. This grants us a window into Patch’s health, and why the project is cutting as deeply as it is. The core result of analyzing its financial health is that if we presume the upper end of rumored cuts to staff, fair cost per employee estimates, and reasonable top line sums based on what has leaked from AOL, Patch has a shot at reaching the black before the end of calendar 2013. The memos, obtained by Jim Romenesko, outline several important metrics: How much money Patch has brought in recently and how much money it wants to bring in daily. With these two figures, we can do some number work and parse out the ranges of Patch revenue. We can then contrast those figures with reasonable estimates of Patch’s cost structure, given that we have a recent employee number, also via the leaked memos. If you don’t care about the monetization of media and the future of news, prepare to be fantastically bored. (Standard disclosure: AOL owns TechCrunch.) Here’s our first key bit of memo, written by Jim Lipuma, head of U.S. ad sales for Patch on Tuesday: “Over the last 5 sales days, we have amassed our worst results of the year.” Let’s fit that with what Lipuma said on Friday: “We had $36K day yesterday, when we need to be having $100K+ days. I understand why yesterday happened, but we cannot settle for days like this going forward.” So, the $36,000 day was part of the worst period of ad sales of the entire year. The $100,000 figure is interesting, as it sets high-end expectations for what Patch should earn on any given day. So, we have upper and lower bands on what Patch should and should not earn day to day. We need another data point, however, which Lipuma happily provides in his memo: “This is the time to drive the ball and swing big. Do it for yourself, your families and the 1,200 people who call themselves ‘Patchers.’” Now we can dig into the math. There are two main ways for us to estimate Patch’s revenue: By discounting weekends, and by not. If we discount weekends, we assumeBehind The Scenes At Homejoy, A Cleaning Startup That Says It's Really A Tech Company
Aug 19, 1:00AM
If I were ranking startups based on how much I value their services, Homejoy would place pretty darn near the top — every month or so, one of their cleaners comes by my apartment and in two or three hours it becomes more sparkly than I've ever been able to make it. All for just 20 bucks an hour. Homejoy's been growing quickly, too — it raised $1.7 million in seed funding from Andreessen Horowitz, First Round Capital, and others, and about 10 months after its official launch, the company says it now has a workforce of more than 50 employees in its San Francisco office. And yet ... when I'm asked about exciting startups, Homejoy isn't the first one that comes to mind.OpenDesk.cc Is Like Ikea For Open Source Zealots
Aug 19, 1:00AM
Furniture is probably the last thing on the mind of most open source proponents but now it doesn't have to be. OpenDesk is a free, open source line of furniture that you can make yourself or order unassembled from a maker with a CNC machine. Not only is the furniture cheap - free if you have the wood and hardware - it's actually cool-looking.Vancouver's GROW Conference Shines A Spotlight On Canada's Growing Startup Scene
Aug 19, 12:00AM
When it comes to the tech conference circuit outside of Silicon Valley, Canada is probably not top of mind for most people, but I've got a feeling that's slowly changing. Last week, Vancouver hosted the fourth edition of the GROW conference, a two-day event (plus one for outdoor activities around the city) that brings together startups from all over Canada and the West Coast. Four years ago, the inaugural event attracted 400 people. This year, over 1,200 made the trip to Vancouver's Convention Center, which will also play host to TED next year.The Internet: We're Doing It Wrong
Aug 18, 11:09PM
This week Facebook's ban-bot went berserk; Github went down; and all Google services collapsed for a few minutes, taking 40% of the Internet with them. Just another week on the Internet, then. We love our centralized services, until they let us down. Bruce Sterling calls them "the Stacks": Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google, Microsoft. In his most recent (always riveting) State of the World conversation, he wrote: In 2012 it made less and less sense to talk about "the Internet," "the PC business," "telephones," "Silicon Valley," or "the media," and much more sense to just study Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon and Microsoft. These big five American vertically organized silos are re-making the world in their image.Goldfinger: The Next iPhone
Aug 18, 10:50PM
"Gold? All over?" M asks James Bond upon hearing how Jill Masterson died in 1964's Goldfinger. While Bond goes on to explain that the gold coating on Ms. Masterson caused her to die of "skin suffocation", the same fate will not befall the next iPhone. But only because the iPhone will not require oxygen. Yes, there will be a gold iPhone.Security Researcher Hacks Mark Zuckerberg's Wall To Prove His Exploit Works
Aug 18, 10:25PM
Earlier this week, security researcher Khalil Shreateh discovered a Facebook bug that allowed a hacker to post on anyone's wall, even if they weren't that person's friend. While he was able to prove to Facebook that his bug was legit (despite a response that it wasn't a bug at all), Facebook wasn't too happy with the way he did it: by using the bug to post on Zuck's otherwise private wall.Britain Detains Partner Of Journalist Who Exposed NSA Spying. Are They Crazy Or Stupid?
Aug 18, 10:07PM
The partner of Glenn Greenwald, the journalist who published classified information on U.S. government surveillance, was detained for 9 hours in London’s Heathrow Airport. On Sunday morning, David Miranda was detained for the maximum allowable time under British Law; his property was confiscated and has yet to be returned, according to Greenwald. Miranda was visiting Laura Poitras, a documentarian who has also worked on exposing classified intelligence practices. However, there is no indication that Miranda, who was transferring in London en route to Brazil from Berlin, should have been subject to Britain’s Terrorism Act of 2000. Greenwald’s response, in the Guardian, is admirably measured and worth quoting in full: “If the UK and US governments believe that tactics like this are going to deter or intimidate us in any way from continuing to report aggressively on what these documents reveal, they are beyond deluded. If anything, it will have only the opposite effect: to embolden us even further. Beyond that, every time the US and UK governments show their true character to the world”. In a separate statement to his newspaper, Greenwald said, “This is a profound attack on press freedoms and the news gathering process.” Greenwald, who first interviewed rogue whistleblower Edward Snowden, has been ground zero for the international attention brought upon the National Security Agency, which is suspected of monitoring millions of Americans, by collecting data on phone and Internet browsing behavior. Details of the interrogation are still unknown, as Miranda has no way of contacting Greenwald. I can’t tell if British authorities are crazy or stupid. On top of being horribly anti-democratic, how could authorities think it was a smart idea to detain the family members of a critic with the largest soapbox on the planet. Immediately, on the usual lull of a Sunday afternoon, the story is front page news at every major news outlet, as both British and Brazilian lawmakers express outrage. If authorities were brazen enough to detain someone so closely connected to the leaks, it means they’ve probably extended their legal powers to intimidate others with less fame. Now a bright and unwavering spotlight is on their questionable tactics. Even worse for authorities, most of the debate around NSA spying (and proposed legislation to limit their authority) has been whether agencies have too broad of a definition for who qualifies as a suspect. As the New York Times points out, Miranda’s detentionWhat Games Are: Something's Adrift With Oculus Rift
Aug 18, 9:00PM
Take a step back from what Rift does and consider where it does it. What do you see? A hulking PC at a desk powering it and its games. Oculus Rift's problem is essentially that it's a peripheral for a device category which is ever-so-slowly passing into the West. The business case doesn't make sense.Required Reading Regarding Mobile
Aug 18, 5:00PM
It's cliched, overplayed, and the obvious new normal: mobile is the big, fundamental force driving consumer tech. Yes, we all know that, but even taking a few steps back for a minute, we should stand in awe of just how much of a massive platform change this is. "Tectonic" might be the right word. Readers of this site and column will already know this, but what I wanted to do this week is briefly highlight some of the best bloggers, operators, investors, and analysts writing about mobile today. As I've been focusing more of my work over the last year and a half to cover the product-side and investment-side of mobile, I've been trying to learn by reading from experts below, specifically trying to focus on the problem of app discovery and testing various techniques to lock-in distribution. On the list below, you will recognize some of these names, but I wanted to put them all in one place for reference. I've also listed them in alphabetical order, by last name, so there is no ranking, just to be clear.WebDev Video Tutorials Startup Learnable.com Gives Australian High School Students Free Classes To Address Looming Crisis
Aug 18, 4:56PM
Hoping to address the software developer skills crisis choking Australia's startup ecosystem, Learnable.com is giving away $10 million in credits to high school students to access its library of web development resources. Spanning 10,000 students, the Melbourne startup hopes to reverse the engineering deficit and replicate the success of Aussie successes, Atlassian, 99designs, and We Are Hunted (recently acquired by Twitter).3D Gesture Control Is An Area Of Focus On Innovation We Likely Don't Need Or Want
Aug 18, 4:00PM
Minority Report was an enjoyable action flick, but it may hold the blame for getting the idea stuck in our collective heads that 3D gesture control is the next frontier for computing. The Kinect from Microsoft helped further this idea around as well, with a pretty good (though highly limited regarding needed space, applications, etc.) gesture experience. But a lot of startups and other companies are chasing this carrot – and it begs the question of whether there's even a carrot to chase.Barnes & Noble Undercuts Amazon, Kobo By Dropping NOOK Simple Touch GlowLight To $99
Aug 18, 1:23PM
The Nook Simple Touch GlowLight is one of the best e-readers on the market. It has a very nice form and a great screen. And now it's also the cheapest of its kind. B&N just announced a $20 price cut, bringing the GlowLight's price down to just $99. The ad-supported Kindle Paperwhite is $119 and the Kobo Glo is $129.99.As Court Releases Files In Case Alleging Google Tracked UK Safari Users, Search Giant Wants To Move Case To U.S.
Aug 18, 12:55PM
Some new developments this weekend in the case of 12 people in the UK who want to sue Google for secretly tracking their online activity by working around privacy settings in Apple's Safari web browser. The UK courts released court documents related to the case, giving for the first time more details of the allegations; and Google has apparently finally issued its own response: it wants the complaint to be dismissed in the UK and moved to its own local jurisdiction in California. For all the advances of Android and Google in Europe, the case is liable to become one more publicity problem for the search giant, who has in the past accused of flouting consumer privacy and dodging local taxes, and is also the subject of an EU antitrust investigation over its search practices.CrunchBase Analysis Of Investment Activity By Season
Aug 18, 6:00AM
Many people in tech believe that VCs slow the pace of their investing during the summer, especially in August. We wanted to verify this using the CrunchBase dataset by comparing deals over the past few years.Cloud Service Architecture Will Power New Era Of Intelligent, Automated Applications
Aug 18, 1:00AM
The new way of the world for most web software development is the assembly of applications from cloud based APIs. Developers are saving loads of time by pulling in various cloud services and focusing their attention on the novel business logic of their solutions.CrunchWeek: BlackBerry Puts Itself In Play, Google's Geeky Easter Eggs, Mobile Ad M&A
Aug 17, 10:00PM
The great thing about CrunchWeek is that when a few of us writers gather to muse about the most interesting stories from the past seven days in tech news, it's never the same thing twice. It's like the special unique snowflake of TechCrunch TV!DO-RA Is An Environmental Sensor That Plugs Into Your Phone & Tracks Radiation Exposure
Aug 17, 9:00PM
DO-RA is a personal dosimeter-radiometer for measuring ionizing radiation that plugs into a smartphone and works in conjunction with an app to allow you to quantify your exposure to background radiation. The device, created by a Russian startup, is due to go into production this autumn and will cost around $150.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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