Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/07/11/protect-ip-act-called-unconstitutional-by-bipartisan-group-of-la/
PROTECT IP Act called unconstitutional by bipartisan group of law professors originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 11 Jul 2011 22:19:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/07/12/amd-announces-the-radeon-hd-6990m-has-some-pointed-words-for-nv/
Continue reading AMD announces the Radeon HD 6990M, has some pointed words for NVIDIA
AMD announces the Radeon HD 6990M, has some pointed words for NVIDIA originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 12 Jul 2011 00:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Commonred wants to be the place you go to find a common link (the name is a shortening of “common thread”) with just about anyone — though they’ll need some user adoption to ensure that last bit. Essentially, the startup wants to take the cold call/email/approach out of the networking process. Or, another way of looking at it: Commonred is an attempt meld the meetup and “new people” discovery space, inhabited by startups like Sonar, Meetup, and LetsLunch, with professional networking sites/apps like Branchout and Hashable.
Vaporware Labs, like many others, holds a monthly meetup (called Startup Grind) that allows entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley to meet each other, network, and share ideas. The motivation for Commonred was bred from these meetups and from the observation — that is endemic to all new meetup experiences — that giving entrepreneurs (and people in general) ways to more quickly find commonalities between themselves and the people they’re meeting leads to less awkwardness and a greater chance of building a strong(er) relationship.
According to Vaporware and Commonred Founder Derek Andersen, Commonred is an attempt to “streamline the serendipity of finding someone that you went to the same high school with or someone that has also lived in, say, New Zealand”. Since much of our personal information is scattered across the social networks, “or lives on our blog or Plancast profile”, he says, when one wants to build a working relationship with someone, the process can be akin to a scavenger hunt.
In turn, this makes you slightly less (or more, depending on how you look at it) creepy when you approach someone or email someone in hopes of networking.
Of course, the problem with this is that we all have a lot of collective contacts on Twitter, Facbook, LinkedIn, etc., but, in reality, we have 5 to 10 relationships that we value higher than the others — those people that we’d go to bat for in any circumstance. Commonred has created a “Board of Directors” feature that allows users to select their 10 most trusted (or most valued) contacts. This will not only allow other users to know how cool you are when Mark Zuckerberg shows up on your Board, but just another filter for finding commonality.
Commonred is offering 200 free invites to TechCrunch readers, which can be accessed here. Check it out and let us know what you think.
Source: http://techcrunch.com/2011/07/11/an-iphone-gaming-thinger-i-can-stand-behind/
This little designware project would be amazing if it were real. Essentially it’s a double case for the iPhone can adds a D-pad, buttons, and more hand-room to the standard iPhone. It doesn’t exist (and probably never will) but it’s pretty darn cool-looking could actually work if someone made it.
Alan Li designed it as a student project and I hope Thinkgeek or someone buys it from him ASAP.
Source: http://techcrunch.com/2011/07/11/momentfeed-1-2-million-location/
Geo-based marketing is just getting started, and local businesses are feeling their way around how best to use service like Foursquare, Facebook Places, Gowalla, and even Twitter. It’s hard enough if you have only one store. For chains and national retailers, managing Foursquare Specials across 400 stores is a nightmare. MomentFeed is trying to bring some order and analytics to this chaos with a location-based marketing dashboard aimed at businesses with more than one location.
The LA-based startup just raised a $1.2 million seed round from DFJ Frontier, DFJ JAIC, Factual founder Gil Elbaz,and Rapleaf founder Auren Hoffman, and Walter Kortschak.
MomentFeed pulls in merchant location data from Foursquare, Facebook, Twitter, and Gowalla, and gives retailers a unified view of all the check-ins, deals, and specials across their locations nationwide. (It is also built on Factual’s location data, which helps to harmonize locations between services). With one dashboard, a retailer like 7-Eleven or a fast-food chain can see that maybe more people are checking in with Foursquare in New York, but with Facebook Places in the midwest and adjust their targeting accordingly. “We are built on the place signal, instead of the keyword as the primary signal,” says CEO Rob Reed.
The startup offers tiered services, from analytics to campaign management to CRM, which range in cost between $29 and $99 per year per location. It is still not clear what merchants will be charged to run specials on Foursquare and other services, but Reed expects to share revenue with each location service. “We are happy to share revenues with Foursquare and others for the data,” he says, “similar to Twitter with DataSift.” (DatSift also raised money today in a $6 million series A).
Source: http://techcrunch.com/2011/07/11/gmail-plus/
Further, Google+ makes Gmail look like even more of a dog. To be clear, Gmail is still the best email service out there — but it’s also still an email service. It’s a service based around technology that is decades old. And while Google has put a better front-end on email and added the killer search functionality, compared to tools like Google+, Facebook, Twitter, etc, email seems a bit like watching black and white television in a world of 1080p flatscreens. I hate it. I’d like it to die.
And Google may help.
Mark Striebeck, Google’s Engineering Manager for Gmail, left a public note in Google+ yesterday letting everyone know that Google is already working on integrating Google+ into Gmail. Specifically, he cites “several Gmail / Google+ integrations” in the works. At the same time, he wants to use Google+’s new Hangouts group chat feature to get ideas and feedback on how the integration should work. Tomorrow on Google+, Striebeck’s team will hold a brainstorming session. Here are his main questions for the integration discussion:
I’m pretty sure that all of you use some email client – many probably Gmail. But regardless of the client:
- What email features would make it easier to interact with Google+?
- How could we integrate Google+ features into Gmail?
- How can we integrate social concepts in Gmail to make the email experience itself better?
Those are all key questions. It seems as if the Gmail team is not only thinking about simple, surface-level integrations with Google+, but also deeper use of the technology behind the service to fundamentally alter Gmail. I’m all for that.
But wait, wouldn’t such integration just be another Google Buzz or Google Wave? If Google handles it as poorly as they did with those services, sure. But all indications right now are that Google has no intention of handling anything about Google+ poorly. Love or hate Google+ itself, it’s pretty clear that Google is firing on all cylinders with this project. And there’s every reason to believe that this will continue into the Gmail integration.
If handled correctly, Google+ could actually be the fastest service ever to go from 0 to 100 million users, as Bill Gross predicted earlier today. But that’s still a long ways off, let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves here. I just want a better email experience if and when I do come back to email.
Previously, I outlined exactly what I’d like to see from Gmail — that is, Gmail Lite – that still stands. But if I can’t have that, I’ll settle for Gmail with deep Google+ integration.
Update: Due to a “crush of interest”, Striebeck has posted on a slightly altered plan for feedback tomorrow.
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