Look out Plancast and Upcoming, here comes rd. Ok, maybe that's a slight exaggeration, but if it's possible to have a SXSW "tipping point" at an event then Lanyrd had it at struct, a popular design and developer conference in the UK.
So what is it? The guys behind Lanyrd say they are not trying to build a general purpose events site but instead they are just interested in conferences and everything associated with them: speakers, attendees, venues, books, video and audio, twitter conversation, blog coverage - you name it.
Want To Use Gmail Priority Inbox With IMAP? Tough LuckTechCrunch 09/04/10 12:49 AMCurious what Google's l Priority Inbox means for those of us who use an IMAP or POP client like Mail or the Mail function on an iPhone? Well as of yet the feature is not fully enabled on either IMAP or POP-compatible third party or mobile clients, leaving a large percentage of people who hate viewing email their email on a standard web browser out in the cold.
If you try to use the service in Mac Mail right now the emails determined by the Priority Inbox algorithm to be "Important" are sent to an "Important" folder under Gmail. In order to reach them in Mail for the iPhone you have to search for the "Important" folder under your Gmail account.
Fast Trains to Connect US Cities, Alleviate Highway CongestionTechCrunch 09/04/10 12:30 AMThe Obama administration promised $8 billion in funding for cities and states to build -speed, intercity rail projects back in January.
This week, the rtment of Transporation issued its specifications for the manufacture of new fast trains, namely double-decker coach, dining, baggage, and business class passenger rail cars that can travel between 79 MPH and up to 220 MPH.
Bi-level rail cars not typical in the US today, would accommodate more passengers, and hopefully alleviate congested roads and some resulting air pollution...
Video Impressions Of Google TV On Logitech Revue HardwareTechCrunch 09/04/10 12:27 AMIt seems that one of the beta testers for Google TV couldn't keep all that goodness to himself, and has posted several pictures and some video of the near-finished interface and hardware. It's a brief and not particularly shocking video, but seeing it running on a home TV and hearing a regular guy expressing legitimate (if subdued) excitement make it a lot more real.
Why This New Apple TV Makes Sense — For NowTechCrunch 09/04/10 12:24 AMAs a longtime Apple TV owner, I'll admit a dirty little secret: I really like the device. Sure, it has been one of the rare flops for Apple in recent years. And it could be so much more with say, a Blu-ray player or a web browser. But it is really good at its core functionality: bringing iTunes content into your living room. And that's why this new version of the Apple TV makes sense -- at least for now.
When I first bought the Apple TV, there were two varieties: a 40 gigabyte version and a 160 gigabyte version. I was torn between which one to get, but I ultimately went with the 160 GB one thinking I could put most of my movies on it. Big mistake. I basically never use the hard drive on my Apple TV, so it's a 160 GB hard drive sitting there doing nothing. Instead, I stream everything to the Apple TV.
In fact, the only time I do use the hard drive on my current Apple TV is when I rent a movie on it. Currently, even when renting, you download a movie to your hard drive where it sits for up to 30 days (or 24 hours after you start playing it). But with the new iTunes rentals (both TV and movies) everything is streamed -- no hard drive is required (besides a small one for buffering purposes). Thanks to that, and undoubtedly the knowledge that most owners were using it for streaming, Apple removed the hard drive from the device, and cut it down in size and price.
Vidyo Bets On The iPad And iPhone For The Future Of Video ConferencingTechCrunch 09/04/10 12:10 AMo, a company that specializes in high-quality video conferencing technology for the enterprise, is betting big on bringing video conferencing to mobile devices, including tablets and smartphones. Similar to Skype, Vidyo offers a technology that allows people to connect with each other over the web via video conferencing. However, the company says that Vidyo system is focused more on the enterprise, providing a reliable system, allowing conferencing for many parties at once, and offering high quality video.
And Vidyo has built a big business licensing its technology to large electronics companies, such as HP, Intel and Hitachi. Vidyo’s technology is also used by Google to power video for Google Chat.
CNET News, now on AndroidCNET 09/03/10 05:54 PMThe iPhone's no longer the only smartphone with a CNET News app. Our breaking stories and in-depth features are now even easier to read and browse on Android devices from the new, free CNET News app. Read about what it does and why it's worth downloading.
Google settles Buzz lawsuit for $8.5MCNET 09/03/10 05:08 PMInternet privacy groups will be the beneficiary of the settlement, which came as the result of a lawsuit filed over Google's maligned Buzz launch.
China's Baidu Refocuses on Mobile and AppsReadWriteWeb 09/03/10 04:00 PMu is the most-visited website in China and has captured 70% of search revenue in that country. Alexa's 500 Global Sites list puts it at number 6. But with virtually no penetration outside Asia, can it really be considered a global company at all, or just an awfully big one?
Until it reaches beyond its shores in an appreciable and sustained fashion, it probably won't be considered a global player of consequence. But its latest move may do just that. It is refocusing a great deal of its enormous resources into the mobile and app markets.
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At the annual Baidu developers conference yesterday, CFO Jennifer Li reiterated the company's dedication to the mobile space. The 10-year-old company started focusing on mobile last year with the development of a texting language and mobile mapping. At that point it also established a dedicated mobile department.
As for apps, last night its Box Computing Open Platform went live. The BCOP allows users to run apps, including games, videos and e-books, through the Baidu website using any platform.
A lot of coverage of China focuses on Google's issues there. Among those issues are the lack of stability: what can a company or developer expect, day to day? With China's shifting censorship regime, it is hard to anticipate what might be disallowed. Mobile apps are dependent on the robustness of their developer community.
Will non-Chinese developers be willing to put time and money into developing on Baidu's platform? Can Chinese developers develop on Baidu for Western users compellingly enough to attract them? Or will the future of China's global influence be on the rnet of Things, leaving Baidu a strictly Chinese concern?
This isn't a rhetorical question. We sent it to a couple of our friends with first-hand knowledge of the Chinese web industry. But if you've got knowledge of your own, share it why not?
uss
Bad news for gslist users who like to peruse the Erotic Services Adult Services section of their site. It's gone, replaced by a large black and white "censored" logo.
I've reached out to Craigslist for comment and await their reply. But the choice of words is significant - the section wasn't simply removed, the censored word was used.
The site has been embattled as old press and e attorneys general use any excuse to blame sex crimes on the site. From South Carolina Attorney General Henry McMaster's ed crusade against them to a variety of press stories about sex and other crimes. If it's just a sex crime it isn't a story. But if a listing on Craigslist was involved, it's a story.
Hate The iTunes 10 Icon? Think You Can Do Better?TechCrunch 09/04/10 12:46 AMApple CEO e Jobs' obsessive focus on design detail is at least partially responsible for why the tech sphere and the design sphere are so intertwined at the moment. Which makes ire that he's received for the current iTunes 10 logo (not to mention the les of Ping) particularly poignant. The universal hatred for this thing has spawned an lobalPR-esque Twitter account, pretty impressive suggestions of alternate logos over on design collaboration site bble, and an email to Jobs himself.
ValuLeads designer Joshua Kopac:
Enjoyed the presentation today. But … this new iTunes logo really sucks. You’re taking 10+ years of instant product recognition and replacing it with an unknown. Let’s both cross our fingers on this….
Steve Jobs to designer Joshua Kopac:
We disagree.
Coinstar Not Necessarily Not Partnering With Apple On Something Or NothingTechCrunch 09/04/10 12:30 AMCan someone please explain Bloomberg Businessweek story to me? I've read it a few times and am still having a hard time understanding what is or what isn't being implied, or not implied, about a partnership between Coinstar and Apple.
First of all, the title is awful because most people likely don't know that Coinstar owns Redbox (they acquired them last year), the DVD rental kiosk company. Instead, most people know Coinstar as those machines in supermarkets where you turn in your loose change for cash or silly things, like Facebook Credits. So why on Earth would they be partnering with Apple on some online venture?
Well, again, it's about Redbox, as they sort of note in the first paragraph. But what are they going to do with Apple?
Google Streamlines Its Privacy Policy. Should Facebook Be Next?TechCrunch 09/04/10 12:13 AMLocation-based service Echo recently posted the above image to their blog in a (successful) attempt to garner some media attention as the debate around online privacy continues to rage.
As extreme as their Mark Zuckerburg Cared About Privacy" example is, it does call attention to the less complexity of various web service privacy agreements, settings and policies.
In the wake of an $million lawsuit settlement today, search giant Google made sture of good faith in the "caring about privacy" department, assuring users that they were taking steps in order to make the minutae of online privacy easier to understand.
"For example, we’re deleting a sentence that reads, 'The affiliated sites through which our services are offered may have different privacy practices and we encourage you to read their privacy policies,' since it seems obvious that sites not owned by Google might have their own privacy policies."
The Funded’s Adeo Ressi Arrested After Virgin America Flight IncidentTechCrunch 09/04/10 12:12 AMFunded founder Ressi was arrested and briefly detained earlier this evening over an altercation with a flight attendant. The airline? Virgin America, which I've been holding up as virtually the only airline that doesn't suck (See in Airlines Fails To Commit Atrocities On Flight VX746 and a Flight 1843 From JFK To Hell).
Ressi's description of the incident is below, and he has sent this to Virgin, he tells me. I've reached out to Virgin America for their position.
I can't help but note the similarities with Jet Blue flight attendant Steven Slater, who has now been rewarded for his behavior with a ity tv show. The worse the flight attendant, the better the chance for fame and glory, I guess.
Java - It's not Dead, Folks - It's Doing Just FineReadWriteWeb 09/03/10 07:15 PMJava gets a bad rap. It's considered old-school. People say that young developers prefer Ruby-on-Rails and other Web-based hot stuff. True - but these are not bad times for Java at all.
s Governor of RedMonk wrote a post that provides several good reasons why Java is really doing quite well.
ce shows the current demand for people with Google App Engine skills is greater than those knowledgeable about Amazon Web Services. Audrey Watters of ReadWriteCloud saw the news and posted on the topic of IT Jobs as the question for ourkly poll.
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The reason why Google App Engine is doing so well? It's all about the enterprise. VMware's Spring Platform is based upon SpringSource, which has become the dominant platform for launching Java-based apps. It now integrates with Google App Engine, a primary reason for the growing success of the platform.
Governor makes some points that are worth noting:
L is one of the hottest trends in tech right now. Many of the technologies built on the platform are written in Java. It was born on the Web but will eventually move to the enterprise.
MapReduce? It's what Google and Yahoo! use to get fast responses over large data sets. It is built on Java. Hadoop is based on MapReduce. It has its own ecosystem developing around the technology.
And then there's this from Governor:
Of course we're also seeing innovation from the new hotness - thus ng underpins hDB and RIAK. But Java is certainly core to the innovation. Lets look at RabbitMQ for example - which though written in Erlang was acquired by SpringSource as a messaging engine to underpin a Java-based programming model.
Governor goes on to provide a number of other examples to make his point.
And we have to agree. Java is not dead. it still has plenty of room for innovation.
uss