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Smartsheet Adds Android App For Collaborative Spreadsheet Service As Enterprise Warms To The Mobile Platform
Sep 18, 2:59AM
A growing list of SaaS providers are launching Android apps. iPhone apps still dominate but the shift to mobile is forcing companies like Smartsheet to extend their mobile reach as much as possible.
Smartsheet is a SaaS provider that markets a collaborative spreadsheet application for the enterprise. Today the company launched its first Android app which it did for two reasons.
How To Decide Between The New Apple iPhone 5s And iPhone 5c
Sep 18, 1:25AM
Apple is launching two new iPhones, the iPhone 5c and the iPhone 5s, and the big question for many is going to be which is worth their hard-earned clams. Both present attractive packages, as detailed in our reviews, but is there a strong reason to choose one over the other? Here's a breakdown of the main considerations for those facing that choice.Apple iOS 7 Review: A Major Makeover That Takes Some Getting Used To, But Ultimately Delivers
Sep 18, 1:01AM
This is a big week for Apple; it has two new phones hitting store shelves, and a brand new operating system that becomes available tomorrow for compatible devices. The new mobile operating system is a big visual change, and is likely to feel somewhat disorienting to users upgrading from iOS 6, but in most important ways, it's not that dissimilar from what you're used to, and many of the changes are definitely for the best.iPhone 5s Review: Apple's Latest Smartphone Goes For (And Gets) The Gold
Sep 18, 1:01AM
Apple's new iPhone 5s is set to go on sale this Friday, Sept. 20, and the phone is already generating a lot of buzz. The 5s is the more advanced of two new Apple iPhones, and offers a lot of technical advantages over the iPhone 5c also launching the same day. Apple has worked some behind-the-scenes magic with its latest and greatest, and made some design changes for the better, too, all of which adds up to a new smartphone market king.iPhone 5c Review: Apple's Colorful Take On The iPhone Is A Refreshing Change Of Design Pace
Sep 18, 1:01AM
Apple's iPhone release schedule has been predictable in the past when it comes to number of devices: each year, a single new smartphone. For 2013, that's changed with the iPhone 5c, as for the first time Apple has eschewed simply bumping down the outgoing iPhone as a lower cost option, and has instead released hardware specifically designed to be more affordable. The iPhone 5c is the result of this rare change in Apple's game plan, and it makes a good argument for being flexible with product lines.NSA Spying Justification Declassified
Sep 18, 12:56AM
The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC), America's super-secret spy court, has finally revealed the legal justification for the National Security Agency's phone record dragnet program. According to the decision, judges had declared that every single call record was relevant to the fight against terrorism, and thus legal for spy agencies to collect en masse. Perhaps most importantly, telecommunications companies never challenged the NSA's authority to collect the data.Kevin Systrom Sees Instagram Turning Into A Fashion Commerce Platform
Sep 18, 12:09AM
Instagram is not yet launching ads on its photo and video-sharing network. But it has plans to in the next year, and this evening Kevin Systrom, its co-founder and CEO, made an appearance in London where he described how in some ways it is already on the way there.Yep, Social Discovery Startup Sonar Is Dead (And Its CEO Explains Why)
Sep 17, 11:27PM
So, uh, what's going on with Sonar? The startup, which promised to connect users with relevant people nearby (using data from Facebook, Foursquare and elsewhere), seemed to have disappeared from the web, as noted in a Valleywag post earlier this month. But we've been trying to get in touch with the team to figure out if the startup was truly dead or just preparing for a relaunch. When I spoke to former CTO Paul Fisher last week, he didn't sound entirely sure himself.Inside Microsoft's New $40 Billion Stock Repurchase Program
Sep 17, 10:26PM
Microsoft has announced a new $40 billion share repurchase authorization with no expiration date. With the move, Microsoft in effect granted itself $40 billion in latitude to buy its own shares whenever it wants to. The announcement came with a dividend increase of 22 percent to $0.28 per share. Its stock has responded by doing very little, rising just 0.39 percent in regular trading. It trails the NASDAQ's rise of 0.76 percent during today's normal hours. It almost feels odd that investors would less than shrug at the company's news.TC Cribs: eHarmony's Santa Monica HQ, Where Love Is Definitely In The Air
Sep 17, 9:30PM
Welcome to a brand new episode of Cribs, the TechCrunch TV series that takes you inside the walls of the tech industry's hottest companies to see what it's like for the smarty-pants staffers who work there every day. It's not often that a tech company's office can be described as "romantic," but that's exactly the theme of the decor at the Santa Monica, California headquarters of online matchmaking pioneer eHarmony. As you'll see in the video above, eHarmony likes to keep its users front and center, so the office is covered with photos of smiling happy couples (many of them in wedding attire) who have met each other using the website.Google Expands Chrome Data Compression Feature On iOS
Sep 17, 9:03PM
Google has begun expanding access to its Chrome data compression feature to more users, specifically those on iOS devices who have the company's mobile browser app installed. The feature's existence was announced some time ago, but TechCrunch understands that Google is now rolling out notifications about its iOS availability to more users, making many aware of the feature for the first time.EA Anoints Dark Horse Candidate And EA Sports EVP Andrew Wilson As New CEO
Sep 17, 8:40PM
EA elevated Andrew Wilson, the company’s executive vice president overseeing EA Sports, to the top position as the company’s new CEO. The other widely rumored internal contender was President of EA Labels Frank Gibeau. Wilson is a young and hungry up-and-comer within EA who was looked at slightly later in the selection process, which has been going on for six months since previous CEO John Riccitiello stepped down. He’ll be leading EA into a challenging era. The company not only has to manage multiple franchises on consoles; it is also trying to find its way in a new world where games are services and are free-to-play. In a letter EA published, Wilson reiterated that his top priority going into the next few years will be to focus on the company’s “continued transformation for our digital future.” Wilson joined the company more than a decade ago, and led the company’s Asia online publishing group before serving as executive producer of EA’s very lucrative FIFA franchise. Notably, FIFA also saw respectable traction with in-game purchases. After that, he became the executive vice president overseeing EA Sports and then shepherded the company’s online, games-as-a-service platform Origin into existence. In that sense, he has overseen products using the ‘packaged goods’ model of gaming and he has successfully worked in ‘free-to-play’ world as well. He’s also the first studio executive to serve as CEO. That hybrid mix of skills will be key to EA’s future. Financial “shortcomings” led to the sudden resignation of EA’s last CEO Riccitiello, in March after a six-year tenure. Essentially, EA is like a massive ship that has to balance stagnant growth for console platforms with the rise of emerging platforms like tablets and smartphones, which require entirely different revenue models. Executive chairman Larry Probst announced the new appointment in a memo today. He said that Wilson is “a compelling and charismatic communicator who cares deeply about organizational development, teams, and the individual careers of people who work for EA. Most of all, he has a powerful sense of respect for and commitment to our consumers.” Probst added that EA’s board of directors looked both inside and outside the company at a number of candidates. He said, “Andrew's appointment is a clear demonstration of the deep bench of management talent at EA.”Apple's 'App Resurrection' Feature Great For Customers, But Opaque To Developers
Sep 17, 8:30PM
In the early hours today, a user on Reddit discovered that Apple had updated the App Store to allow users on old iOS versions to download the ‘last known compatible‘ version of apps. At first glance, this is a great feature and should benefit customers with devices stuck on old versions of iOS. But the opaque nature of how the feature is implemented for developers raises questions and could cause some problems for users too. The way the feature works is actually very simple and seamless for the user. If a user has a device that only supports an old version of iOS — say an iPhone 3GS on iOS 6 — and tries to download a new version app which has gone iOS 7 only, it will get the last viable version of the app. So the last edition uploaded by the developer that supported iOS 6. There’s no fuss, the user just gets a version that works. That’s actually pretty clever, and should eliminate a lot of the reluctance by some developers to adopt iOS 7 technologies immediately. Many developers that I’ve spoken to are also planning on shipping iOS 7-only versions of their apps as well. This feature will also benefit them as those old hardware users will still be able to download and use the old versions of their apps. And, if one takes a bit more cynical tack, you could also think about this as a hedging bet by Apple — just in case iOS 7 adoption rates aren’t as quick as they have been in the past. Those early bird developers won’t be left in the lurch. The issues with the process for developers were recognized quickly by some like Dragon Forged’s Kyle Richter. “The likelihood of any complex app, especially anything API driven, working after several years of neglect are slim. Those that do work may be incredibly unreliable and buggy,” says Richter. “Where does this leave things? Users will blame the developers for releasing substandard products, because the average user doesn't understand the process of software development. This will result in apps being reviewed poorly and an increased support load for developers.” To give you a brief example, any old version of Your Favorite Twitter Client that hasn’t been updated to work with the new v1.1 API will be very buggy or broken completely if you try to download it on anAdobe's Creative Cloud Surpasses 1M Subscribers, But Q3 2013 Revenue Falls To $995.1M
Sep 17, 8:14PM
Adobe today reported quarterly earnings for its third financial quarter of the year. While the company reported another decline in revenue and earnings per share to $995.1 million and $0.32 respectively - something most analysts expected - the company also announced another quarter of impressive growth for its Creative Cloud subscription service.Garmin's New Forerunner 220 & 620 Running Watches Are More Colorful And More Capable
Sep 17, 8:13PM
There's plenty of commotion surrounding the smartwatch space these days, but let's not forget that some of us have essentially been strapping tiny computers to our wrists for years now. GPS-enabled running watches are a serious tool in a runner's arsenal, and Garmin recently outed two new ones -- the Forerunner 220 and 620 -- to help runners get a better grip on their performance.Adobe Gets Serious About Hardware, Will Start Selling Its Mighty Digital Pen And Napoleon Ruler In The First Half Of 2014
Sep 17, 8:05PM
Adobe’s first foray into hardware is about to become reality. When Adobe announced its thin-tipped Project Mighty digital pen and Napoleon digital ruler at its MAX conference earlier this year, they were still considered experiments. Even then, though, Adobe’s David Macy told me that these projects were more than just hobbies, so it is not a huge surprise that the company now says it will start selling them in the first half of 2014. Earlier this month, I sat down with Michael Gough, who leads Adobe’s Experience Design (XD) team which incubated this project, and take the latest versions of Mighty and Napoleon for a spin. Adobe won’t say when exactly the devices will launch or how much they will cost. Gough, however, told me that the company is looking at them as a premium product, and, after holding them for a while, they definitely feel like that. Both the Mighty and Napoleon have gone through a few design revisions since the company first showed them earlier this year. The Napoleon ruler, for example, now only features a single button to switch between different tools and shapes and the Mighty pen, which still retains its triangular form, is now charged through the back instead of the front. “We want to do hardware to push us,” Gough told me. The way we interact with software is changing and to stay on top of these developments, Adobe wants to try new things. Until earlier this year, Gough told me, Adobe was still planning to go it alone and develop the project completely in-house. After MAX, though, the team decided that its core competency wasn’t really hardware, and that it would rather focus on the user experience and design instead of the technical details of the hardware. After talking to a few potential partners, Adobe decided to work with Adonit, a company that’s probably best known for its Kickstarter-financed Jot digital pens for the iPad. Adobe plans to produce its hardware with the help of an OEM in Taiwan, though it’s still finalizing the production details. As Gough told me, the final version will likely talk to the iPad over Bluetooth to transfer data about pressure and signals from a built-in accelerometer. The Mighty Magic? Making The iPad Recognize A Thin Tip One of the breakthroughs with the Mighty pen is its very thin tip. By default, the iPad and most other tablets areDistill Raises $1.3M To Make Technical Recruiting, Hiring Dead Simple
Sep 17, 7:55PM
With recruiters viciously competing for the best talent in the Valley, startups end up with plenty of paperwork and files to contend with. A San Francisco-based startup called Distill is looking to make recruiting dead simple and just picked up $1.3 million in funding in a round with Felicis Ventures, China’s Innovation Works and DN Capital. “Hiring and recruiting is painful wherever you go. It doesn’t matter what stage you’re at,” Chen said. “We want to bring a level of analytical rigor and data analysis to the hiring process.” The company has built a video interviewing and scheduling service that makes it easy to vet candidates and their problem solving abilities side-by-side. The startup’s two founders Deng-Kai Chen and Ken MacInnis built up technical teams at companies like Tapjoy and StumbleUpon after working at Google and Yahoo. They became familiar with the frustrations of hiring and scheduling interviews. Distill’s product takes the basic features of a video chat service like Skype, and puts them alongside a text editor and file upload space so that an interviewer can walk a candidate through a collaborative coding session. There is also a co-browsing experience in case an interviewer, for example, wants a design candidate to walk them through an interface or their portfolio. While they’re naturally starting out on the familiar turf of technical recruiting, Distill aims to serve a market that’s much broader than the world of startups and large tech companies. “People do ask about why they should use this over Skype and Google Hangouts,” Chen said. “But there’s a lot of friction. You have to get the candidate’s Skype name, then pass all of that information onto interviewers. We’d rather have video become secondary and focus on the collaborative part of an interview.” Distill also compiles all the relevant data and interview output in one place, so recruiters and managers don’t have to go scavenging for it in multiple places. The way they handle IDs and connecting candidates with companies also prevents the awkwardness of staying linked to a candidate on Skype even if they didn’t get the job or took a competing offer. Distill’s whole experience is browser-based, so clients don’t have to download any software or plug-ins. Interviewers send candidates a simple link to start an interview. An extra scheduling tool also makes it easy to sync up people for meetings. But this tool is not just aboutAfter Bono's Blessing, Ghana's MEST Moves Up A Gear With New VC Head
Sep 17, 7:36PM
It's been fascinating to track what has become a groundbreaking non-profit project to teach tech startup entrepreneurship in Ghana. We first covered the Meltwater Entrepreneurial School of Technology (MEST) last year in a special report filed from the capital, Accra.YouMagine Brings Some Heat To The Free 3D Model Space
Sep 17, 7:33PM
Is the 3D modeling space big enough for multiple competitors? Martijn Elserman, Siert Wijnia and Erik de Bruijn sure think so. They're the founders of a new 3D object sharing site called YouMagine and were the creators of the Ultimaker, a $1,500 3D printer that comes in kit form and is a favorite with the DIY set.CanvasPop Lets Any Photo App Sell Framed Prints To Make Money
Sep 17, 7:11PM
There are over 30,000 photo apps, and many are dying a slow death with little way to make money. CanvasPop is about to give developers a hot cash injection by letting them earn 30% on framed photo prints sold through its new API. Alongside options like sharing to Twitter, web and mobile apps can add a "Print" button that delivers physical 8''x10'' to 38'' x 76''s blow-ups to a user's door.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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