technology

Yahoo buys mobile newsreader app Summly from 17-year-old London kid for a seven-figure sum

"Yahoo! announced plans Monday to buy mobile news reader app Summly from the London teenager who invented it, likely transforming him into one of the world’s youngest self-made multimillionaires. The company did not disclose the terms of the deal it struck with 17-year-old Nick D’Aloisio, but the London Evening Standard said Yahoo! would pay between £20 million and £40 million ($30 to $60 million). The Wimbledon youth, who would become one of the world’s youngest technology millionaires, claims to have created the app as a hobby. 'I didn’t realize it was possible to make money out of it,' he was quoted as saying." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingYahoo buys mobile newsreader app Summly from 17-year-old London kid for a seven-figure sum

Is Apple Becoming A War Profiteer?

"Apple has some cozy relationships with the U.S. government. Last month, CEO Tim Cook had a nice seat at Obama's State of The Union Address. There's the online Apple Store for Government, where federal employees and military personnel can get special pricing (paging Laurence Vance). There's having Al 'Global Warming Climate Change' Gore on the Board of Directors. There's the 8 million iPads sold to indoctrination centers (aka "schools"). And now (1 month after Obama's speech) news comes out that the U.S. Army has an order for 650,000 iOS devices." Continue reading →

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Microsoft and Oracle ask European Union to ‘protect competition’ against Google Android

"Google was in the firing line again on Tuesday after a group of major companies, including Microsoft and Oracle, complained to the European Commission over Google’s offerings for Android-powered mobile phones. 'We are asking the Commission to move quickly and decisively to protect competition and innovation in this critical market,' said Thomas Vinje, Brussels-based counsel for FairSearch, which groups 17 high-tech companies, including also Nokia, Expedia and TripAdvisor. FairSearch said it had filed a complaint with the Commission, charging that the Internet giant wanted Android operators to use its leading applications such as Maps or YouTube." Continue reading →

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Mark Zuckerberg Launches Political Campaign Group

"The 28-year-old billionaire is forming a political campaign group that is expected to focus initially on liberalising the US immigration and visa system. Work on the group will reunite him with Joe Green, his room-mate at Harvard University, who also went on to be a successful technology entrepreneur. His new campaign group is to be fronted by Jon Lerner and Rob Jesmer, political consultants from the Right wing of the Republican party. Rob Jesmer was the campaign manager for John Cornyn for US Senate; the John McCain Presidential campaign and the Southeast Regional Political Director, RNC; Chief of Staff, Congressman Mike Rogers (R-Ala.)" Continue reading →

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These Startups Are Betting Everything on Bitcoin

"BitInstant is just one of several Bitcoin startups attracting funding from established venture firms and investors at a valuation in the millions. Coinsetter, a New York startup working on a foreign exchange trading platform for Bitcoins, recently raised $500,000 led by Tribeca Venture Partners and SecondMarket at a valuation that we hear is in the 'low single-digit millions.' Coinbase, a startup that provides a digital wallet for Bitcoin transactions, has raised $600,000 to date from Y Combinator, IDG Ventures and others. (Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, the twins who had a disputed role in the founding of Facebook, are also big Bitcoin investors.)" Continue reading →

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iPhone app tracks route of cab ride so you can see if cabby took you for a ride

"It’s the oldest trick in a crooked cabby’s playbook — and it’s about to become obsolete. Taxi Turvi keeps hacks honest by tracking their route with GPS technology, then checks it at the end of the journey to see if there was a shorter, cheaper way to go. The free app — the brainchild of a former NYC resident whose Southern accent made her a frequent victim of the trick — was launched two weeks ago. To use it, riders simply press 'start' at the beginning of their trip. Then, at the end of the ride, they hit 'stop' — and the app displays the route that was taken in a red line. The shortest route on the same map is overlaid in a blue line." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingiPhone app tracks route of cab ride so you can see if cabby took you for a ride

Entrepreneurs crowdsource traffic tips to help drivers out of jams in newly car-dense cities

"If you own a mobile phone and spend sunup to sundown watching the traffic pass in Ghana’s capital, then Iddrisu Mohammed wants you to be his spy. With an iPad in his hands and two phones in his pants pockets, Mohammed crisscrosses Accra on foot, looking for people to become informants for Jamless, a recently launched traffic information service that hopes to restore a little sanity to the capital’s hectic commute. 'What Jamless will do is give you the traffic situation in any part of Accra that you are and give you alternate routes to use if the place is jammed,' said Mohammed, who is the company’s informant manager." Continue reading →

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The End of the Battery – Getting All Charged Up over Supercapacitors

"'Is this for real?' Doug was referring to an article in the recent issue of Nature Communications on a novel way to mass-produce so-called superconductors on the super-cheap – using no more equipment than the average home CD/DVD burner. Hacked together by a group of research scientists at UCLA, the ingenious technique is a way of producing layers of microscopically nuanced lattices called graphene, an essential component of many superconductor designs. It holds the promise of rapidly dropping prices for what was until now a very expensive process." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingThe End of the Battery – Getting All Charged Up over Supercapacitors

Google Introduces Way to Manage Your Data Beyond the Grave

"Death is Nature’s way of telling you it’s time to get off the Internet. But when you finally shuffle off this mortal coil, you leave something behind: all your email and other digital assets. That’s a huge problem not only for the deceased—once you’re on the wrong side of the Great Beyond, there’s no way to delete those incriminating messages—but also any relatives who might want to access your (former) life. And it’s a problem Google’s seeking to solve with the new Inactive Account Manager." Continue reading →

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