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MobileIron Launches Anyware, A Service For Managing Apps And Devices Through Salesforce.com
Aug 27, 5:41AM
MobileIron is launching Anyware, a service that gives Salesforce administrators the ability to manage devices, provision them and give users access to a personal app store.
With Anyware, a CRM administrator configures devices through an interface that MobileIron has abstracted of most of its complexity.Judge Approves Facebook's $20M "Sponsored Stories" Settlement
Aug 27, 5:24AM
A U.S. District judge has granted final approval to a settlement in which Facebook will pay $20 million for including users' names and profile photos in its "Sponsored Stories" advertising program without their approval.TxtMeApp Offers An Easy Way To Drive Mobile Downloads From Desktop Ads
Aug 27, 1:44AM
Here's one way advertisers can convince desktop viewers to try out their mobile apps — send them a text. That's the proposition behind TxtMeApp,a new product from Israel-based digital media agency Say Media Group (not to be confused with Say Media, the San Francisco-based advertising and publishing company that owns sites like XOJane and ReadWrite). The company delivers ads in the form of an offer wall, which is supposed to point users at apps that are tailored to their interests. If something attracts them, they just enter their phone number, then they'll receive a text with a link to the app.With Funding From Top Flight Investors, Fast-Growing NoRedInk Is On A Mission To Rid The World Of Bad Grammar
Aug 27, 1:30AM
The declining quality of humanities education (and student performance) in the U.S. has become a big problem. Last year, the College Board reported that SAT scores in reading and writing have hit record lows, while this year, the state of New York revealed its new, Common Core-based test results, which found that only 31 percent of its students in third through eighth grade met the standard in language arts.Inside Funny Or Die's Celeb-Filled Video Production House
Aug 26, 10:30PM
Funny Or Die has spent the last six years making some of the funniest content on the web, and unlike a lot of the new media companies that have popped up lately, it’s done so without leaning on YouTube for distribution. Instead, Funny Or Die has relied on hilarious, celeb-filled videos to drive content to its own website. The concept behind Funny Or Die was spawned kind of from Hot Or Not, according to CEO Dick Glover. At the time it was formed, there weren’t all the social media outlets that we have today, and there was no real place on the web to find all the best comedy content. So they set out to build it. The Funny Or Die headquarters is surprisingly small, but within a constrained space, the writing and production team are able to churn out upwards of 20 to 25 videos a month. That’s because the team has kept scrappy and small, with a kind of startup mentality you might not expect from a media company that has celebrities dropping in all the time. “The nice thing about Funny Or Die is that everything is produced in-house, so all of the writers, directors, producers, and editors — they’re all under one roof literally,” Mike Farah, the company’s head of production, told me. So how does Funny Or Die get so many stars to participate? Glover says it’s able to do so by giving them the freedom to create content that they can’t do anywhere else. That sort of creative freedom is appealing to celebs who might want to work on something different than what they usually are known for. “The incentive for them is they can do whatever they want and that’s a powerful incentive,” Glover said. “This is a community where by and large, that’s not the case with them. Yes, they can pick and choose their projects, but once you’re into a project you’re getting notes from six different people and you have demands from other people.” That’s attracting big-name talent to work with Funny Or Die, which in turn is attracting viewers and outside investment. Last year, it got some strategic funding from Turner. Check out the video above, which is the last in our series on the new digital media companies in Los Angeles. And be sure to watch all the others that we’ve published previously to learn more about howWorth $100B, Facebook Has Recovered $58B In Market Cap Since Last September
Aug 26, 10:21PM
Today Facebook ended normal trading with a market valuation of $100.6 billion, capping a long return to form after a botched IPO and mobile concerns led investors to unload the shares in the company in its first year as a public entity. The company has recovered $58 billion in market capitalization since last fall, more than doubling in value since its 52-week low.Now With 10M Users, Wanelo Adds Search And 'Stories' To Its Hot Social Shopping App
Aug 26, 9:45PM
Today Wanelo, the online platform that lets people discover and share things they "want, need, and love," issued an update to its iOS app that brings two handy new features, search and "stories," to its mobile shopping experience. In general, Wanelo has emerged as a powerful player in the social shopping space since it launched back in 2010 -- I'm told that Wanelo's user count just passed the 10 million mark, which reflects nearly 70 percent growth in the past five months alone. The app's core demographic of young fashion-savvy females is certainly one of the most lucrative target markets out there.VMware's Cloud And The Fit With IT, Cloud Foundry And OpenStack
Aug 26, 9:18PM
VMware announced general availability of VMware vSphere 5.5 and VMware vCloud Suite at VMworld today. The new version of its virtualization technology includes the integration of Cloud Foundry, the platform-as-a-service that is now part of Pivotal, which spun out from VMware parent company EMC.Apple's iPhone Trade-in Program Is Already Being Piloted, Here's How It Works
Aug 26, 9:00PM
Apple is about to introduce an iPhone trade-in program that will allow users to walk into a Retail store and trade up from an old model to a new one. We’ve heard some interesting details about the way that the program will work, and indeed, is working right now in some pilot Apple Stores. The program, has gotten a bit of press today, with Macrumors‘ Eric Slivka reporting that the training for the program is underway and Mark Gurman of 9to5Mac quoting a start date sometime in September. But the trade-in program is actually already being piloted in some Apple stores, we’ve discovered. Those stores aren’t just preparing internally for an eventual program, they’ve been offering trade-ins to customers for several weeks. According to a source, this program was presented to them as something that may not be available at every Retail Store. Some of these pilot stores have been processing ‘multiple’ trade-ins a day at this point. The program works like this. A customer brings a working, non-liquid-damaged iPhone into an Apple Retail Store. It’s then evaluated by an employee with the help of an online site that an employee can access using the store’s iMacs or iPads. The customer then answers a series of questions about the condition of the device in order to determine a value. This procedure is similar to the way that Apple handles its iPhone recycling program now, but that is by mail only, covers a wide variety of products and is not offered in-store. If a customer wishes to trade in an old broken device for which there is no monetary value, they can do so as a simple recycle. Values can range depending on a variety of factors, including device color, physical damage and liquid damage. Though the prices could very well be tweaked before the program goes wide, the range is said to be around $120-200 for 16GB iPhone 4 and 4S models. A 16GB iPhone 5 in good condition could go for around $250, less than is being offered by some of the other trade-in sites like Gazelle, Glyde or NextWorth. Still the in-store convenience of the program could definitely offer the advantage here. Being able to walk in and get the deal done instead of mailing it off and waiting is powerful. Once the paperwork is done, the value is added to a gift card. The balance is applied to a newParty With TechCrunch At Disrupt SF
Aug 26, 8:28PM
There ain't no party like a TechCrunch party. And with that bit of trivia, I'm excited to announce that this year, tickets to TechCrunch Disrupt SF after parties will be available to the general public. These parties are mostly reserved for Disrupt attendees. Buy a Disrupt general admission ticket and you're granted access to the three day conference and all the parties listed below. But we're trying something new for Disrupt SF 2013 and are making a very limited number of tickets available for purchase.Anonymous Document Sharing Site Pastebin Surpasses 1 Million Members, Keeps Growing
Aug 26, 8:23PM
Pastebin officially announced that they've surpassed 1 million registered members since the introduction of the login service two and a half years ago. The service allowed users to log in using social media tools and control the pastes they uploaded to the site. Members can also edit and delete pieces of information they post to the site. Users can still paste items anonymously.Google Palestine Hacked And Defaced Through A Domain Registry Attack
Aug 26, 7:58PM
Google's primary search domain for Palestine has seemingly been hacked, with the standard Google search interface for the region being replaced by a political message from its hackers. >From the information available so far, it doesn't appear that Google's own servers were hacked — instead, it seems that Google's Palestinian domain was hijacked and redirected to another server altogether. How that was done, exactly, is unclear. One current theory is that Google's top-level domain provider for the region was compromised, allowing hackers to point the domain somewhere else.Owlet, A Bootie That Tells You How Your Baby Is Breathing, Hits The Crowdfunding Trail
Aug 26, 7:49PM
The lives of new parents are fraught with stress but now the weight of knowing whether or not your wee one is breathing can be lifted. Owlet is a small bootie that the baby wears while sleeping. It signals heartrate and respiration and you can check in on the little shaver via a mobile device. As a parent of three, I remember a few rough moments spent peeking in on the quiet little ones out of fear or curiosity.Facebook Announces Shared Photo Albums To Boost Group Engagement
Aug 26, 7:38PM
Facebook is rolling out shared photo albums, as first reported by Mashable. Users can share access to an album with up to 50 contributors, who can each add up to 200 photos. Facebook users can share these new group albums with the public, friends of the contributors, or just contributors to the album.Sequoia- And Khosla-Backed Cloud Phone Company RingCentral Files For $100M IPO
Aug 26, 7:37PM
RingCentral, a company offering cloud-based phone and communication systems, has filed for an initial public offering of up to $100 million. Incorporated all the way back in 1999, San Mateo, Calif.-based RingCentral says it saw revenue of $50.2 million in 2010, $78.9 million in 2011, and $114.5 million in 2012. However, it's also experiencing growing losses, with net losses of $7.3 million, $13.9 million, and $35.4 million respectively.Android Developers Can Now Use Google's Play Store To Distribute Their Free Apps In Iran
Aug 26, 7:21PM
Google today announced that Android developers can now make their free apps available in Iran, one of the few countries where app downloads through Google’s store were completely unavailable until now. Paid apps and apps that use in-app billing, Google notes, will still remain unavailable in Iran for the time being. For developers, this move opens up an interesting new market, though given Iran’s tendency to shut down access to Google’s services, it remains to be seen how long these apps will remain available. Google and Iran, after all, have a pretty tumultuous relationship. Just this June, Google announced that it had uncovered an Iranian spy campaign that, ahead of Iran’s last election, targeted Iranian citizens through phishing emails. YouTube also remains unavailable in Iran and the country has regularly blocked access to other Google services, including Search and Gmail (though Iranians, it seems, can get around most of these filters by using standard VPN software). When those services are available in Iran, however, they do tend to be very popular. In 2012 when access to Gmail was cut off, Iranian legislator Hossein Garousi "threatened to summon Telecommunications Minister Reza Taqipour to parliament for questioning if it was not unblocked,” according to Reuters. We have asked Google to clarify why it decided to change its policy now and will update this post once we hear back from them.Microsoft's New Scroogled Ad Sets Fresh Low For Bad Writing, Boring Argument
Aug 26, 7:10PM
The annals of bad Microsoft advertising have a new member today -- a short clip that attempts to paint Google as evil because its services contain advertising. This is contrasted with Bing's educational offering which does not. So, use Bing in your classroom! Because Google is bad! Credit score! The ad is stilted, poorly written, and mostly annoying. The Scroogled campaign continues, much as it always has.Qualcomm Ventures Managing Director Quinn Li Is Excited About Wearables
Aug 26, 6:18PM
Quinn Li is the managing director at Qualcomm Ventures, one of the top wireless investment firms in the world since 2000, with portfolio companies including PayPal, Waze, and Fitbit. He also happens to be a resident of San Diego, where Qualcomm was founded and the site of our latest TechCrunch Meetup + Pitch-off, where he was kind enough to grace us with a fireside chat on stage.Rumors Of Apple's New A7 Chip Could Indicate That CPU Innovation Is Flagging
Aug 26, 6:01PM
With every new iPhone, most of the discussion centers around its look and not what comes inside. But, according to reports, Apple has designed a new dual-core A7 system on a chip for the iPhone 5S. If rumors are true, the A7 could supposedly be 31 percent faster, representing a serious slowdown in spec improvement. It could indicate that the smartphone market may have matured and that existing smartphone owners won’t feel the urge to upgrade to a new model anymore. When it comes to smartphone chips, Apple is a lone ranger. It has been designing its own ARM-based chips for a couple of years. It outsources production to Samsung and other manufacturers. But the important part is that only Apple devices use Apple chips. So far, this strategy has proven to be successful. The iPhone 4S was twice as powerful as the iPhone 4, and had nine times the graphics processing capabilities. The iPhone 5 was once again twice as fast as the iPhone 4S, with twice the graphics performance. That’s why this year’s 31 percent performance boost is lackluster, it it turns out to be true. If the new iPhone is indeed called the iPhone 5S, the ‘S’ will probably not stand for ‘speed’. A 31% CPU speed increase sounds like a huge failure to me, specially considering previous generations showed ~100% improvements.— Paul Haddad (@tapbot_paul) August 26, 2013 On paper, Android phones are more powerful. Right now, the Snapdragon 800 and Tegra 4 both come with at least 4 cores and more raw power. But Apple doesn’t want to compete in the spec game. The main advantage is that Apple can optimize the A7 for its own set of APIs, making it feel faster than it actually is. Even though Snapdragons have more GHz, iPhone apps are still fast because Apple takes advantage of its chip architecture like no one else. That’s why the gap isn’t as wide as expected. Moreover, Apple’s custom design strategy improves battery performance. Apple needs to reduce both component costs and R&D costs Yet, why were the A6 and the A5 much faster than their predecessors? Because smartphones were not as fast as Apple wanted them to be. If you want to use Siri or play nice games, you need the iPhone 4S. If you want to use the upcoming AirDrop feature, you need the iPhone 5. Today’s rumors could tell anotherVMware Launches Network Hypervisor, Signaling Deeper Competition With Cisco
Aug 26, 5:29PM
VMware announced its network virtualization platform today based upon its own internal technology with Nicira, which it acquired last year. NSX is a network hypervisor that abstracts the server. It exposes virtual networks, but they have the capability to be programmed, similar to virtual machines. But it's also still very new. In 2009 and 2010, there were more virtual loads than physical workloads running inside data centers. Now the number of virtual ports is scaling in comparison to physical ports.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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