TechCrunch
Android and Samsung dominate the phone market in Q1
Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/05/14/gartner-android-samsung-q1-2013/
If you’ve been following the trends, Gartner’s mobile phone market figures for the first quarter of 2013 won’t surprise. The research firm estimates that Android was on 74.4 percent of all smartphones sold in the period, with Samsung the key beneficiary of such dominance. While the Korean behemoth doesn’t release solid sales figures, Gartner believes its market-flooding strategy has paid off, topping the league with 30.8 percent market share — Apple has a firm grip on second place, with 18.2 percent, which is well ahead of LG, which has 4.8 percent. Samsung is also king of the mobile phone space, owning 23.6 percent of the market, ahead of Nokia, which has fallen to 14.8 percent share. Gartner’s research also found that feature phone sales are slowing, so we guess that it’s only a matter of time ! before t he humble candybar goes the way of the netbook.
Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile, Apple, Samsung, Nokia, LG
Via: TechCrunch
Source: Gartner
White House unveils National Day of Civic Hacking to solve problems with open data
Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/01/23/white-house-national-day-of-civic-hacking/
Sure, the freshly announced National Day of Civic Hacking may sound like it’ll occupy a single square on your calendar, but the White House wants folks to get together on June 1st and 2nd to solve problems with a bit of coding and info from Uncle Sam. Government agencies including the Census Bureau, NASA and the Department of Labor are set to serve up publicly available data for developers and entrepreneurs to concoct solutions for problems affecting cities, states and the country. In addition to government support, the effort is being organized by outfits including Code for America, Random Hacks of Kindness and Eric Schmidt’s Innovation Endeavors. Currently, 27 cities have events scheduled during the weekend in question, but the initiative’s coordinators are looking to spawn even more powwows throughout the US. If you’d like to pitch in or submit ideas for challenges participants should tackle, hit the source links below.
Via: TechCrunch
Source: White House OSTP, Hack for Change
Hearst starts publishing iPad magazines days before print editions
Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/01/18/hearst-starts-publishing-ipad-magazines-days-before-print/
Magazine publishers have more directly embraced tablets over more than a year as it became clearer that they were boosting the bottom line. We may be witnessing a watershed moment today, however. Hearst has started publishing issues for 22 of its magazines in the iOS Newsstand days before their print equivalents hit the racks — that we can tell, the first time a major magazine producer has given tablets an early lead. While the full terms aren’t public, Apple has confirmed to AllThingsD that other publishers are welcome to take the same route, and it mentions in the App Store that other online stores don’t have the same privilege. The early access has clear competitive benefits for both Apple and Hearst, which get customers to flock away from competing e-bookstores and publications, but it’s also a sign of Hearst’s confidence in the tablet as a medium: much like movie studios, it’s betting that digital is strong enough to stand on its own.
Via: AllThingsD, TechCrunch
Source: App Store
Nielsen teams up with Twitter to create social TV ratings
Source: http://www.engadget.com/2012/12/17/nielsen-twitter-tv-rating/
Nielsen’s long been the gold standard for TV ratings, and as our watching habits change, the firm’s reforming its ways to keep track of what we’re watching. Earlier this year it combined its online and broadcast metrics to give advertisers a more comprehensive look at a show’s reach, and now its going to track how much buzz shows are getting on Twitter. Called the Nielsen Twitter TV Rating, it aims to provide a look at real-time social activity during programming, so networks can provide tailored interactive experiences and better engage with their viewers. What kind of interactive experiences, you ask? We aren’t sure just yet, but you can get the full PR spiel touting the nebulous benefits of the forthcoming Twitter tracking after the break.
Continue reading Nielsen teams up with Twitter to create social TV ratings
Filed under: Home Entertainment, HD
Via: TechCrunch
Facebook Is Launching a Numberless "Social Calling" Service
Source: http://gizmodo.com/5962449/facebook-is-launching-a-numberless-social-calling-service
TechCrunch is reporting that Facebook is teaming up with carriers to provide a “social calling” service. Initially striking up a deal with French carrier Orange, it seems the service will allow friends to make voice calls without knowing each other’s numbers.
The service will apparently allow users to make calls from mobile and desktop flavors of Facebook, using ties on Facebook, rather than possession of a phone number, to allow calling. It’ll also apparently support group calls, too.
The service will be powered by Orange’s new IP-based call app Libon—already available on iOS—which is effectively a mobile Skype competitor. The Facebook social calling service is planned to go live in France during the summer of 2013. Orange’s reach spreads far and wide across Europe, though, so it seems likely that the service’s tentacles will spread.
It remains unclear how quickly that will happen, of course, and whether or not Facebook plans to roll it out internationally any time soon. It’s also not clear how consumers will embrace the news: while there’s certainly a shift towards voice calls being made online, the idea of any Facebook contact calling at will is maddening even in theory. [Tech Crunch]
Facebook Is Launching a Numberless "Social Calling" Service
Source: http://gizmodo.com/5962449/facebook-is-launching-a-numberless-social-calling-service
TechCrunch is reporting that Facebook is teaming up with carriers to provide a “social calling” service. Initially striking up a deal with French carrier Orange, it seems the service will allow friends to make voice calls without knowing each other’s numbers.
The service will apparently allow users to make calls from mobile and desktop flavors of Facebook, using ties on Facebook, rather than possession of a phone number, to allow calling. It’ll also apparently support group calls, too.
The service will be powered by Orange’s new IP-based call app Libon—already available on iOS—which is effectively a mobile Skype competitor. The Facebook social calling service is planned to go live in France during the summer of 2013. Orange’s reach spreads far and wide across Europe, though, so it seems likely that the service’s tentacles will spread.
It remains unclear how quickly that will happen, of course, and whether or not Facebook plans to roll it out internationally any time soon. It’s also not clear how consumers will embrace the news: while there’s certainly a shift towards voice calls being made online, the idea of any Facebook contact calling at will is maddening even in theory. [Tech Crunch]
NPD study finds average display sizes continuing to rise in all areas but laptops and tablets
Source: http://www.engadget.com/2012/10/16/npd-study-finds-average-display-sizes-continuing-to-rise-in-all/
Not exactly a huge surprise here, but a new study out from NPD DisplaySearch today has confirmed that the trend towards larger screens in continuing at a steady pace in all but a few key areas. The big exception is “mobile PCs,” which NPD defines as laptops and tablets for its purposes. That area dropped from a 13.6-inch average in 2010 to 12.1-inch in 2012 (with an ever so slight increase to 12.2-inches projected for 2013), a drop that represents a ten percent decrease overall and is largely attributed to the growth of tablets . All other areas have seen small to significant growth in recent years, with LCD TVs growing 9 percent, mobile phones increasing 38 percent, and portable media players jumping 29 percent. The biggest growth, by far, comes in OLED TVs, which have gone from a mere 15-inch average in 2010 to an average of 55-inches today — a growth of 267 percent.
Filed under: Cellphones, Displays, Laptops, Tablets, HD, Mobile
NPD study finds average display sizes continuing to rise in all areas but laptops and tablets originally appeare! d on Engadget on Tue, 16 Oct 2012 15:47:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Meat, Cheese, Salt, And Candy
Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/the-next-big-thing-in-tech-meat-cheese-salt-and-candy-2012-9
Hamburger is a $100 billion market just waiting for technology to disrupt it.
So says top venture capitalist Vinod Khosla, who is funding a stealth startup working on just that.
He’s investing in a company that turns protein, fat, and fiber from plant sources into a juicy, beefy-tasting patty.
“There are no cows involved, but you can’t taste the difference,” he promised during a talk at the TechCrunch Disrupt conference in San Francisco today.
“When you put in on the grill it browns like a burger,” said Khosla. “I’ve tried it. It’s not quite there yet, but this is R&D, high-risk stuff.”
Khosla promised that the product tastes “a lot better than any soy burger.”
He’s also working on fake cheese, which is further along: “I had a couple of people taste the cheese. They couldn’t taste the difference.”
It takes 33 pounds of corn, plus water, to produce one kilo of beef, he says. So ultimately, if tech could solve this, it would go a long way to feed the masses more affordably.
Khosla also mentioned investing in a startup which is working on less-salty salt.
As well, he’s backed Unreal, a candymaker which promises healthier sweets.
“Innovation driven by tech is altering every area,” said Khosla. “Who would have thought [we could disrupt] beef?”
Don’t miss: From Virtual Shopping To Virtual People: 6 Tech Breakthroughs Coming Soon
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Dr. Augustine Fou is Digital Consigliere to marketing executives, advising them on digital strategy and Unified Marketing(tm). Dr Fou has over 17 years of in-the-trenches, hands-on experience, which enables him to provide objective, in-depth assessments of their current marketing programs and recommendations for improving business impact and ROI using digital insights. 
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