Category: Tech

Results from Horowitz Associates, Inc.’s annual State of Cable and Digital Media – Multicultural Edition 2011 study have just been released and reveal some interesting facts about urban consumers. On a weekly basis, about a third (31%) of urban consumers watch TV content on a computer/laptop, a mobile device/tablet, or streamed directly from the Internet to the TV through devices like Apple TV, a Vudu Box, an Xbox, or a Blu-Ray DVD player.

Among those who consume media via alternative platforms, they spend 15% of their time on average watching TV on these alternative platforms. This is in addition to watching shows on demand or that have been recorded via DVR.

Compared to our white counterparts, black urban consumers use alternative platforms for TV at a much higher rate. While 25% non-Hispanic White consumers use alternative platforms, 36% of black urban consumers do the same.

Smartphones and other mobile gadgetry has increase from 35% in 2010 to 46% in 2011. Throw in a bunch of apps for accessing video content on-the-go and the black communities high mobile phone usage and you find that mobile TV viewing is highest among Black and Hispanic urban consumers: 14%, report at least weekly viewing, compared to 7% among White and 5% among Asian urban consumers.

More details from this research will be revealed at next week’s Multicultural Media Forum on Wednesday March 16th at The Roosevelt Hotel in New York City from 8am-1pm. You can also visit the Horowitz Associates website for more information.

Twitter’s #DickBar Debacle

Earlier this week, Twitter released an update to their official iPhone application which brought along a “feature” not well received by users of the application. It added a bar which overlaid your tweet stream, displaying trending topics and often Promoted Trends. While Twitter feels these trends add value for users, most users just don’t care about Justin Beiber’s hair or how much Charlie Sheen is #winning.

Those against the changes started tweeting with the hashtag #dickbar, which is a jab at Twitter’s CEO Dick Costolo (get your minds out the gutter). John Gruber was so disgusted with the updates that he restored his iPhone to a previous backup to get the old version of the Twitter app. That’s deep. Twitter has since updated the app to make the bar less annoying, but this doesn’t actually solve the problem for most users, who just want the bar gone entirely.

via NewsGrange

Facebook Starts Renting Movies

Well, they made one movie available. The Dark Knight, which is about three years old and everyone interested in watching it has probably done so on numerous occasions, is available for rent on Facebook for $3, or 30 Facebook Credits. Of course, any time online video purchases are mentioned, Netflix is also mentioned. While Facebook does have about 600 million users and could probably compete in any online business, providing one movie on a single fan page run by one movie studio is just not compelling enough to trump Netflix’s subscription model. This has only been a test, but it will be interesting to see if Facebook continues down this path.

via NYT, AllThingsD

Kinect Grabs Guinness Record for Fastest-Selling Consumer Electronics Device

via DRS

I was surprised too. You’d think the title would be taken by some fancy mobile device or at least an entire gaming system, but the Kinect has taken the crown. The Kinect for XBox 360 sold an average of 133,333 units per day, for a total of 8 million units in its first 60 days on sale from 4 November 2010 to 3 January 2011. These numbers knock the iPhone and iPad completely out of the box.

“The sales figures here speak for themselves. We can confirm that no other consumer electronics device sold faster within a 60-day time span, an incredible achievement considering the strength of the sector.” — Gaz Deaves, Editor of Guinness World Records 2011

Not only does this illustrate the popularity of the Kinect, which lets you play games my moving your body instead of manipulating a controller, but it also shows how popular the XBox 360 itself is. Can’t Kinect without the gaming system behind it.

via Guinness World Records

Readability Goes HTML5 After Being Snubbed by Apple

Not long ago, Apple announced a new subscription layer for their Apps Store. It amounts to Apple getting a 30% cut of the action from users who use apps that require a subscription. One app, Readability, was booted from the App Store after they neglected to implement this new subscription layer. Understandably frustrated, the Readability folks posted an open letter on their blog.

About two weeks later, Readability was back in the ring with a shiny new mobile interface. While they’ve submitted their app to be reconsidered for the Apple App Store, they’ve launched a slick HTML5 version of Readability which should work on any mobile device with a browser. Kudos to the Readability team for putting in the hard work and getting the HTML5 version done so fast. Other developers should take note.

At a press event Thursday at their headquarters in Mountain View, LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner and SVP of Product Deep Nishar discussed the company’s product strategy. They covered a few previously released products, including LinkedIn InMaps and LinkedIn Signal. They also covered their new LinkedIn Today product.

LinkedIn Today leverages the vast amount of professional and social data stored in the service to bring each user a personalized news experience. Similar to paper.li, LinkedIn Today shows you the top stories in your network and industry. It also allows you to break down the stories by industry, location, company, and more.

The company’s iPhone app will also gain access to LinkedIn Today. Saving an article on the app will show them under Saved on the website and vice versa. Most powerful in this tool is the ability to see stories shared by those outside of your network. You could, for example, see all the top stories for marketing professionals.

LinkedIn Today and LinkedIn’s other products are all part of a simply strategy. Weiner explains they want to first become the professional profile of record. Next, they want to be the primary source for professional insights. Finally, LinkedIn wants to become ubiquitous in the workplace.

via TechCrunch, Mashable, LinkedIn

AOL will cut 200 jobs in the U.S. and 700 in India said CEO Tim Armstrong Thursday at the Bloomberg Media Summit in New York City. Armstrong says that AOL’s staff is moving toward 70% editorial and other content divisions. They are also moving to having less freelancers and more full-time staff.

The Huffington Post acquisition costed AOL 40% of its cash. Arianna Huffington, now the president and editor-in-chief over all AOL media outlets, will be moving to New York Thursday. Armstrong believes the Huffington Post deal is “a signal” to competitors. While Armstrong remains positive, AOL stock has dropped 25% since its IPO.

“AOL will turn around. I have no doubt about that. The employees deserve a ton of credit,” he said. “To go from managing a decline to managing growth is physically getting up and doing something different every day.”

At this point in time, AOL still makes mosts of its money from dial-up customers. These customers account for 40% of its business, but the revenue there is shrinking. AOL’s annual yearly decline in that revenue stream is 25-29%. This year alone, AOL has spent $530 million on acquisitions in an effort to transition from an ancient dial-up Internet company into a content powerhouse. Last year, they acquired TechCrunch, online video distributor 5Min Media, and social media company Thing Labs.

It remains to be seen if these big moves will pan out in the end, but Armstrong has an interesting take on the transition:

“You have to reinvest in your content,” Armstrong said. “Access to cash can be like a rich uncle — you just get money and you never have to learn. It’s time for that to change.”

via CNN

Tomorrow, in Washington, the Obamas will host an anti-bullying conference at the White House. The US Department of Education, the Department of Health and Human Services, students, parents, and teachers are invited to discuss how to stop this bullying epidemic. The video description states:

A special Facebook message from President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama about how preventing bullying is a responsibility we all share. Visit Facebook.com/StopBullying.gov and Facebook.com/FbSafety for more information.

In the video, President Obama touches on the fact that bullying has been an accepted part of growing up, but it’s now obvious that it is harmful to our society and must be stopped. Michelle touches on “the responsibility each of us has to teach our children to treat each other with respect.”

The video is featured on the Stop Bullying.gov Facebook Page, which includes information on what bullying is and how to recognize the warning signs. It also covers Cyberbullying and LGBT bullying. More importantly, the page links Kids, Teens, and Young Adults to help resources.

The White House Conference on Bullying Prevention begins Thursday, March 10th at 10:30am EST. RSVP for the event and watch the live stream tomorrow on Facebook.

via ZDNet

Group chat and location are two of the hottest tech trends right now. Beluga just got snatched up by Facebook and Kik just got a round of funding and added photo sharing. Foursquare just launched version 3.0 which includes real-world recommendations. It actually tells you where to go and RWW calls it Foursquare’s Google moment.

The intersection of these two huge trends is in private location-based apps. Not everyone is looking to share their location with every other person in the world all the time. Does the world need to know you’re pumping gas or buying milk? Maybe not. Those close to you, however, just might be interested.

That’s where apps like Neer come in. Wondering if hubby has left work yet? Forgot to tell the wife to grab some eggs at the store? Trying to figure out why your son isn’t home from school yet (yeah, you forgot about band practice. It’s all good.) Just fire up Neer and you can see where the folks important to you are.

Neer updates in real-time, so there is no need to remember to check-in. It also allows you to specify exactly which locations you want to share and what times/days you want your location to be visible.

Why someone would opt to use Neer instead of just adding a select few friends on something like Foursquare, Gowalla, or Google Latitude? These services are all geared towards location sharing on a public scale and we all know how easy it is for a feature update or mistake to violate your privacy. Also, Neer updates in real-time and can send SMS notifications when someone leaves/arrives at a place. You just install it and forget about it.

Get Neer for iPhone 4 or Android at neerlife.com.

via That Tech Chick

Google is working with the Nelson Mandela Foundation to publish more than 10,000 of Mandela’s personal records. They will donate $1.25 million to the foundation so that these never-before-seen documents can be scanned and published.

“If you look at all the people talking about peace with the protests right now, there’s got to be some message we can extract from these documents.” — Daniel Lederman, Google’s director of new business development for Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

Google spokesman Luke Mckend says These personal records from Mandela span much of his life, including his 27-year imprisonment for fighting against apartheid. The database will eventually be freely accessible on the Internet. Mckend says Google joined the project because they have the capacity and infrastructure to not only preserve historical heritage, but also leverage the potential in classrooms.

While Mandela has given his foundation full control over what will get put on the Internet, they will skip the “extremely personal” documents. Achmat Dangor, the foundation’s chief executive, says these documents are not being censored, but simply don’t “add value to the life of Nelson Mandela” and are not relevant.

Mandela established the foundation in 2004 for the purpose of increasing access to documents about his life and the foundation is also appealing to foreign governments to share any documents they have on Mandela. As Dangor puts it anyone with a computer “from Timbuktu to New York” will soon be able to access these valuable documents, which definitely falls in line with the foundation’s objectives.

via The Associated Press

Re-Evolve, a leading developer in mobile and social apps for iPhone, iPad, Android, Blackberry and Web applications, has created an iPad application that makes verbal contracts easier to manage. The app allows you to create, collaborate, sign, and email all types of contracts directly on the iPad. This provides a simple way to turn those verbal contracts, which may or may not be enforceable in your state, into documents that can be referenced.

“You make a verbal agreement with someone like a friend, neighbor, gym partner or business associate at least once a day,” said Preston Tucker, Business Development Manager of Re-Evolve, LLC. “In most cases the other party holds up to their end of the deal, but sometimes they develop selective memory or an exact detail was heard wrong. Contracts HD can be used to help them recall their agreement.”

Definitely a must-have app for the average business person out there. You probably don’t want to whip out your iPad and make people sign on the dotted line for everything, but hindsight is always 20/20. If anyone feels that signing a contract on an iPad isn’t “official” enough, you can remind them that President Obama had no problem with it.

Get Contracts HD from the iTunes Store for $9.99 for your iPad or iPhone.

Sources have told Bloomberg that Microsoft Corp. will pay Nokia over $1 billion to develop Windows-based mobile devices as part of their previously announced strategic partnership.

“This gives Microsoft scale and allows Nokia to rip out costs,” said Colin Gillis, an analyst at BGC Partners in New York, who recommends buying Microsoft shares. “Microsoft is getting the platform boost that comes from acquiring a Nokia for about a billion dollars.”

These people say the agreement will run for more than five years and would see Nokia paying Microsoft a fee for each copy of Windows used on its phones. Nokia would offset these costs by shrinking its own software research and development budget.

Microsoft stock has dropped 7.8 percent this year while Nokia stock dropped 26 percent since they announced this partnership with Microsoft. Both are struggling in the mobile market against fierce competition from Android and Apple.

This deal should give Nokia some breathing room in their budget as they lose dominance in the mobile market. Sources say Microsoft opted for this $1 billion deal to prevent Nokia from going Android. Nokia may also use the newer Windows Phone OS as a way to stand out from the competition.

via Businessweek

Kik has just raised $8 million in Series A funding from RRE Ventures, Spark Capital, and Union Square Ventures. Union Square Ventures’ Fred Wilson and RRE Ventures’ Adam Ludwin are joining the company’s Board of Directors.

“Kik is a fast, simple, and elegant solution to cross device mobile messaging which we think is one of the most exciting investment opportunities right now…We believe the Kik team has shown that they

understand how to deliver the right set of features in the right package…” — Fred Wilson

It was only a month ago that AOL agreed to acquire the Huffington Post for $315 million. Now, the deal has been finalized. Arianna Huffington is officially President and Editor in Chief of what is now called the Huffington Post Media Group: “a leading source of news, opinion, entertainment, community, and digital information.” This group includes all of AOL’s properties, including TechCrunch.

AOL claims that the combined entity will have a user base of 117 million unique visitors per month in the United States and 253 million around the world. AOL has also expanded their editorial team with a number of talented writers:

• Yahoo’s Michael Calderone has been named Senior Media Reporter
• New York Times’ Trymaine Lee has been named Senior Reporter
• New York Daily News’ Michael McAuliff has been named Senior Congressional Reporter
• The Daily’s Jon Ward has been named Senior Political Reporter
• Bonnie Kavoussi will be Business Reporter
• Lucas Kavner has been named Entertainment Reporter

AOL CEO Tim Armstrong says this is his largest deal to date. He adds that the driving factor behind the deal is how well the Huffington Post illustrates the content platform he is trying to build. In particular, around influential women and local (his 80-80-80 strategy).

via TechCrunch, Business Wire

Facebook Like Button Takes Over Sharing Functionality

The Facebook Like button has become a fixture on sites across the web. It has become widely accepted and, with their latest changes, may become even more visible. Instead of being buried in your recent activity, Likes will now publish a full news feed story. This will raise the visibility of Likes within Facebook feeds and should increase referral traffic to sites with the Like button. Check out Inside Facebook for the full breakdown.

26-year Old Making Millions Selling Kindle eBooks

Traditional publishers are afraid and for good reason. Her name is Amanda Hocking and she is the best-selling indie author on the Amazon Kindle store. She sells around 100,000 books a month. Even at prices from .99 to $3 and with Amazon taking a 30% cut, that still amounts to a huge chunk of change for a writer with no publishing deal. Low prices and ease of distribution make for easy sales and impulse buys. Potential millions per month would make anyone want to dust off those old notebooks and fire up that editor.

via SAI

The T-Mobile Sidekick is Dead…Long Live the T-Mobile Sidekick

In a not entirely shocking move, the Danger servers which power the current generation of Sidekick smartphones will be shut down as of May 31st. While this move will render existing Sidekick devices useless, there is a light at the end of the tunnel. The device will be reborn with Android as its operating system. This is fitting since the father of Android, Andy Rubin, also co-founded Danger. T-Mobile plans to make it as smooth as possible for existing Sidekick owners to transition to the new devices.

via AllThingsD

Google’s Fight Against Spam Causes Collateral Damage

Wired reports that, while Google’s new ranking algorithm have resulted in better quality search results over all, it has also caused many publishers to rethink their business strategy. Many quality blogs have been lumped in with the content farms with no way to plead their case and no information on what changes they should make. One such site was Cult of Mac, which dropped below sites which reprinted the Mac-oriented site’s content without permission. Cult of Mac has since been restored, but many other sites are still contemplating whether to shut things down.

Google Profiles Redesigned

Google has finally decided to update their profiles with more personal information. This puts them just slightly more in competition with Facebook, offering “10 words that describe you best”, bragging rights, relationship information, structured information about your education and employment, and a scrapbook with your favorite photos. If you don’t like Google Buzz, you can now remove the tab from your Google profile page. Check out mine here.

via Google System Blog

The Enemy of My Enemy is My Friend: Google and Microsoft Join Forces

In an interesting twist, Microsoft and Google have joined forces to protect their best interests. A Texas company called GeoTag Inc. has a geotagging patent that they claim has been used in lawsuits against more than 300 entities. Most of these entities are Microsoft and Google customers and the two tech giants are moving to protect them. Their aim is to invalidate the patent and prevent the Texas company from filing any more lawsuits, saying the original patent was awarded in error since their was prior art at the time.

via FOSS Patents

This year, Microsoft will host a Realizing Your Dreams: Imagine Cup event at Tuskegee University in Tuskegee, AL. This will be the first year that Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) have participated in Imagine Cup and highlights Microsoft’s commitment to “enabling broader and more inclusive access to technology resources.”

The Imagine Cup, which attracts more than 300,000 students, empowers them to use technology, innovation and creativity to help solve some of the world’s most challenging social issues outlined in the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals.

Learn more about Microsoft Diversity at http://www.microsoft.com/diversity.