Tuesday, April 17, 2012

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Who Wants To Come To The TechCrunch Mini Meet-Up In NYC? Top
new_yorkSo, I've just recuperated from our VA mini meet-up tour, during which John and I visited DC, Norfolk, and Richmond in an attempt to find startup gems in unexpected corners of the country. This time we're bringing things a little bit closer to home. That's right New Yawkers: get your pitch in order, your demo up to snuff, and throw on your schmoozing hat! We're having a meet-up in the Big Apple, and if you aren't there, you're probably shaped like a box. This isn't a seminar, panel, a conference, or really anything that requires people to sit down at a desk and look through a PowerPoint. Instead, John and I simply want to look upon your beautiful faces and hear about how you plan on disrupting the world through technology. Over beers. So this is the plan:
 
Happy Birthday, Apple II Top
earlyappleadThe Apple II personal computer is 35 years old today, a bit of news that I'm sure is either making you feel wildly old or gives you an odd rush of steampunk retro-nostalgia. The computer, launched on April 16 and 17th at the 1977 West Coast Computer Faire, went on to become the definitive machine for primary and high schools everywhere and whose wonky screen and clacky keys brought millions of kids and adults into the information age. Steve Jobs was 22 when he and Steve Wozniak launched the II. The device, with its eight expansion slots and rapid upgrade cycle, defined the computer as a platform rather than a one-time purchase. You could improve this thing, although I've rarely seen any models that were truly tricked out. As Harry McCracken notes, the Apple II and its progeny existed well into the 1990s as a computing solution for many customers.
 
The Twitter IPA: What Does "Defensive" Really Mean? Top
bicycle patentTwitter is an innovative company, and today's introduction of the Innovator's Patent Agreementshows that their legal department can be innovative too. The Innovator's Patent Agreement, a draft of which was released on GitHub, will allow inventors to retain control of their inventions to make sure that they are only used for defensive purposes. This new agreement is a clear PR and recruiting win for Twitter, but whether it will be anything more is debatable. At first glance, the Innovator's Patent Agreement is a huge derivation from the standard assignment model, where an employee assigns all of their rights in an idea to their employer.  In today's climate, where many developers openly dislike the patent system, this new agreement may be a game changer.  Recently, a Yahoo developer openly lamented the use of his technology in Yahoo's lawsuit against Facebook.  The Innovator's Patent Agreement appears to be Twitter's direct response to that mindset.  Thus, the most likely initial result will be the use of this agreement as a recruitment tool.  Indeed, in Twitter's blog post Twitter asks interested developers to #Jointheflock.
 
Sprint Goes Green (Yet Again) With The Eco-Conscious LG Optimus Elite Top
LG_Optimus_Elite_Indy_LN696_white_GVRWell, Sprint certainly seems hell-bent on making this Earth Day one to remember. Not only have they decided to launch the LTE-friendly LG Viper and Galaxy Nexus on April 22, Sprint has announced that they have chosen that same day to release the new eco-friendly LG Optimus Elite. Unlike the flashier handsets launching alongside it, the Optimus Elite is unlikely to turn too many heads. It's a strictly entry-level device, though I imagine its $30 price tag (after a $50 mail-in rebate) should help it pick up a little steam among first time smartphowners.
 
Is The Lumia 900 Headed To T-Mobile? Top
Screen shot 2012-04-17 at 2.08.28 PMThe Lumia 900 is an excellent handset, whether or not European carriers like it. But it's hard to imagine how Nokia and Microsoft plan to achieve a high level of penetration with the phone on a single carrier (AT&T). Luckily for the partnership, it would seem as though T-Mobile will be getting the Lumia 900 over the course of the summer as well.
 
Curation Service Storify Partners With Pulse In First-Ever Syndication Deal Top
storify-pulse-Photo 1Storify, the startup that lets anyone "curate" stories from around the web by collecting posts from social media sites like Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, is today announcing its first-ever syndication deal. Through a new partnership with popular news reader Pulse, Storify's curated feeds will now appear within Pulse's app, allowing readers to subscribe to curated stories from a number of sources across tech, politics, social media and more.
 
New "Listen" Button On Facebook Musician Pages Instantly Plays Their Songs In Your Favorite Streaming App Top
Listen Button PagesToday Facebook co-opts the best thing about Myspace pages -- rapid music discovery -- by prominently adding a "Listen" button to musician Pages right next to the Like button. When clicked, the artist's jams will start to play in your most frequently used Facebook music streaming app such as Spotify or MOG. If you haven't authenticated any music apps, Facebook will prompt you to set up the one that's most popular with your friends, or around the world. Now with just a single click of an immediately visible button, visitors to Facebook Pages can sample an musician's sound and decide if they want to "Like" them. The button will help artists get more people to fall in love with their recorded music, and while streaming royalties are small, it could get inspire people to buy high margin t-shirts and concert tickets.
 
Gmail Suffers Downtime, Google Is Investigating [Update: It's Back] Top
gmailGmail seems to be suffering from a bit of downtime this morning. Most of us here at TechCrunch haven't been able to log in to our accounts and the reports on Twitter seem indicate that this issue is affecting users worldwide. On its app status dashboard, Google confirms that it is aware of this issue and that it will provide more information shortly.
 
Twitter Announces Innovator's Patent Agreement, Gives IP Control To Engineers And Designers Top
twitter logoIt looks like Twitter is taking a fresh approach to the huge, expensive mess that is the U.S. patent system, as outlined in a just-published blog post. The post summarizes something that Twitter is calling the Innovator's Patent Agreement, which would commit the company to only use employee-invented patents defensively — any offensive litigation could only happen through the approval of the inventor. In other words, Twitter is saying that it only wants to hold patents to make sure it doesn't get sued by other patent holders — it won't sue other companies without employee approval. Twitter says that even if it sold its patents, that inventor approval restriction would still apply.
 
Gnip Signs Deal To Syndicate Tumblr Firehose Top
gnip logoSocial data startup Gnip has scored another impressive partnership — it says it's the first company to syndicate the full firehose of content from blogging service Tumblr. Gnip is probably best-known for being the first authorized reseller of the Twitter firehose, but it also offers data from Facebook, Google+, Disqus, WordPress, YouTube, and more. So what does Tumblr add to the mix? (Besides hipster puppies, that is.) President and COO Chris Moody tells me via email:
 
YouTube Now Lets Video Creators Solicit Donations For Kickstarter & Indiegogo Projects Top
donate-exGoogle is announcing this morning that YouTube creators can now link their videos to projects on Kickstarter and Indiegogo. The company says that these crowd-sourced fundraising platforms were already being used by many YouTube creators, so it wanted to make it easier for those folks to connect their YouTube viewers to their project's page. The new links will be supported by YouTube's annotations feature, says Google.
 
Report: Wearable Computing Will Soon Intensify The Platform Wars Top
proejct_glass_350Google made quite a splash with its Project Glass video earlier this month. While Google's vision of wearable computing still looks a bit like science fiction today, a new report by Forrester analyst Sarah Rotman Epps argues that "in three years, wearables will matter to every product strategist" and that smart developers should start experimenting with applications for wearables on the "big five" platforms (Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon and Facebook) today.
 
Setster Gives All Daily Deal Companies Their Own Groupon Scheduler Top
setster_logo_square As the daily deal space has become increasingly crowded over the last two years, local merchants increasingly feel pressured to run deals, but for many reasons, they end up overwhelmed by the prospect of managing those deals from start to finish, and the big deals players are failing to help them. So, Setster has decided to do what LivingSocial, Woot, Gilt, and other deal providers are either too lazy or distracted to do, today launching an API that allows them to offer integrated scheduling packages to local merchants using their platforms. As Setster wrote in its blog post today, daily deal companies are doing an abysmal job of helping merchants close the loop "on the mile of the transaction where [they] have been touching the client." Their API aims to change that.
 
Happly For iPad Helps Curious Kids Discover The Web…Safely Top
iPad_TOC_sizediPad guilt? There needs to be a technical term for that feeling in the pit of a parent's stomach that arises from handing over the iPad to their kids, only to watch them play brain rotting Outfit7 games or level after level of Angry Birds. Fortunately, some startups are focusing on developing more educational content for the iPad to help parents assuage some of their guilt over their kids' ever-increasing screen time. One such company is Daily Interactive, which is now launching Happly for iPad, a collection of original and curated content for kids, including online videos, games, and stories. And while the content may be deemed educational, the kids might not realize it, given the app's focus on topics kids love to explore, like dinosaurs, space, sports, animals, how to's and more.
 
Klout Launches Brand Pages To Help Companies Engage Influencers Top
kloutKlout, the startup that measures influence on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, Foursquare, Google+ and other social apps, is launching a new feature called Brand Squads, consisting of dedicated profile pages which give companies a centralized place to engage with influencers. For background, Klout evaluates users' behavior with complex ranking algorithms and semantic analysis of content to measure the influence of individuals on social networks. The company is now topping 12 billion API calls, which is up from 100 million API calls in January 2011. The company has more than 5,000 API partners, up from around 100 in early 2010. And it has indexed north of 100 million public profiles. Klout also just raised around $30 million in funding from Kleiner Perkins and others, with partner Chi-Hua Chien joining the startup's board.
 
Shasta Ventures, Founders Fund Put $4.5 Million In The Uber For Carwashes, Cherry Top
CherryCherry, a recently launched startup that brings on-demand car washes to you and your car, has raised $4.5 million in new funding from Shasta Ventures, Founders Fund, Shervin Pishevar and Bill Lee. Shasta managing partner Tod Francis will join Cherry's Board. The startup previously raised $750,000 in seed funding from a number of ex-PayPal employees including Yammer CEO David Sacks, PayPal founder Max Levchin and Square COO Keith Rabois. In addition to the funding news, Cherry is also expanding to include their service in a total of 10 cities in the Bay Area, and releasing a new iPhone app. Similar to Airbnb, Uber, and GetAround, Cherry is a business that wants to make our lives in the real world better using data, location and mobile technologies. Via either the web or a native iOS app (Android will be released in a month), users can specify the location of their car on a street (as well as what type of car, color and license plate number) in a parking lot, or another public area. Once you check in with your car's location on Cherry, the service's technology immediately finds and dispatches a car wash professional to wash your car right where you left it, and you don't even need to be there.
 
Watch Out, Best Buy, Ikea Will Soon Sell Their Own HDTV System And It's Awesome Top
ikeaIkea is entering a brave new world: home entertainment systems. The company unveiled its UPPLEVA line today with a smart YouTube ad (embedded after the jump). The video spot quickly explains that the UPPLEVA line is the savior to living rooms everywhere with hidden cable tracks, integrated wireless components and a customizable cabinet design. Argue all you want, but an HDTV is a glorified monitor. It should not be the primary point of focus when designing a home theater system. The new UPPLEVA line completely disrupts the big box store's HDTV buying process with a high-dose injection of Ikea genius.
 
Review: Epson WorkForce Pro WP-4540 All-in-One Printer Top
wfp4540_fca-cor-fi_396x264We've covered quite a bit of the Epson line and usually found the printers to be solid, respectable, and inexpensive. This latest addition to the WorkForce family, the WP-4540 is arguably all of those with a few caveats. This is a workhorse printer, designed solely to pump out as much paper as possible in an office setting. It's quite large and heavy, and adding on the extra paper drawer makes it nearly a foot high. It weighs in at 36 lbs, making it cousin to some more compact laser printers. It can hold 580 sheets and prints duplex, which is at once a potential cost and time savings as your employees use less paper and have to fill the thing up less frequently.
 
This $650 iPhone Case Can Withstand A .50 Caliber Shot In The Back Top
info-product-007The iPhone is a notoriously fragile device. That's where cases come in. However, this case, by a Japanese firm called Marudai, might be the toughest (and most impractical) case ever made. The massive backside is made of a combination of steel and aluminum, which is apparently tough enough to save an iPhone from a .50 caliber bullet. That is, of course, if the round hits the backside 'cause the front is as exposed as a naked iPhone on the subway.
 
Oakley Could Be Cooking Up Smart Glasses To Take On Google's Project Glass Top
oakleypatentBack when rumors of Google's fabled augmented-reality glasses began picking up steam, one of the most frequently repeated bits was that they bore a striking resemblance to (rather old) Oakley's Thump mp3-friendly sunglasses. The concept that Google eventually revealed looked nothing like them, but it turns out Oakley may eventually throw their hat into the smart eyewear ring. In a brief interview with Bloomberg, Oakley CEO Colin Baden revealed that the company has been working on a way to project information directly onto lenses since 1997. Once perfected, the technology would allow the company to create a rival to Google's Project Glass
 

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