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What Gadgets Will Be Hot in 2010???? »
Becky Worley looks at what new technologies are coming in the new year, and what will be the hot grabs for all techno lovers. As the years move on, we now find ourselves well into the 21st century, and as a result technology is dominating our lives. It’s good to keep up with what devices [...]
PSA: Some OLED screens don’t suck under direct sunlight anymore »
I loves me some AMOLED screens. They’re easier on the battery, easier on the eyes, and the colors tend to be so damned strong that they just about jump off the screen and punch you in the face. I mean, what’s not to love? Oh, that’s right – they tend to fail miserably as soon as you step outside. Mix one part direct sunlight with one part AMOLED screen, and you’ll find yourself with a completely illegible screen. At least, that used to be the case.. We’re not quite sure why they didn’t play this up with deafening fanfare, but it seems like Samsung has stealthily solved the direct sunlight dilemma. The guys over at OLED-Info pit the Samsung Omnia II’s OLED screen against the transflective LCD of the N900. While the LCD didn’t perform too poorly at all, the OLED screen absolutely demolishes it. See for yourself in the video below. [Via IntoMobile ] Crunch Network : CrunchBase the free database of technology companies, people, and investors
Taptu iPhone app gets real-time search with OneRiot »
Taptu , the mobile search engine, announced a partnership with OneRiot last month to provide real time search results in their mobile-friendly web site. This worked from any mobile client, not just the iPhone. But one of the points of using a smartphone is the use of native applications. Today Taptu announced that they’ve rolled the real-time search results into their iPhone app . With the new version, we have added integration with OneRiot, including: Real-time hot topics right on the home page Real-time search results that appear alongside other search results Filter for Real-time results In addition to OneRiot integration, we added a few other things in to this 1.6 update : Thousands of new Touch-friendly sites Re-tuned the engine to improve relevancy including one-tap access to the most popular site Super fast pre-loading of source sides while connected via Wi-Fi Bug fixes & memory leak fix Crunch Network : CrunchBase the free database of technology companies, people, and investors
The App Store Forgets It’s Not The Android Market, Temporarily Sells NES Emulator »
As stringent (and arguably overzealous) as Apple’s App review policy is, things still slip through the cracks from time to time. I mean, who can forget the infamous baby shaking simulator slip-up? The latest bit of contraband to hit the App Store isn’t nearly as offensive – that is, unless you’re Nintendo. Earlier today, an application called “Nescaline” popped up on the App Store. Everything about the application, from the name, to the copyrighted icon, to the very functionality of the application rang of something that Apple would generally deny without batting an eye.. and yet, there it was – for all of one day, at least. You see, Nescaline is an emulator of 1985’s living room king, the Nintendo Entertainment System. By duplicating the functionality of the system’s hardware in software form, Nescaline would allow you to play NES games on your iPhone. You’re stuck with slightly frustrating touchscreen controls instead of the sharp-cornered, palm-destroying original controller – but hey, it was old school gaming on the go. It’s worth noting that Nescaline didn’t include any copyrighted games out of the box, instead providing just a handful of community-made home brew games. However, if the user just so happened to know the URL of another ROM — be it another home brew game or an unlicensed copy of Super Mario — Nescaline would download the ROM to its internal library. The legality of applications of this sort are endlessly debated, and remain in a bit of a legal gray area. Apple avoids any potential copyright battles by banning “executable code”, a term just vague enough to work wherever its convenient. They’ve thus far denied all emulator submissions, including those that had their licensing in order . If you want an emulator on the iPhone, you’ll have to jailbreak first. Apple’s negative stance on emulators is something that fans of Android love to poke fun at, considering that emulators are amongst the most popular on Google’s platform. While Google’s not about to come out and officially support console emulation, the only apps they won’t sell are those that are malicious, explicitly illegal, or adult in nature – none of which fits the bill for most emulators. Nescaline went up on the App Store early this morning, and was pulled by the end of the night. Assuming that this was an accident and not some App Store reviewer’s way of resigning, we’re left wondering: how’d this happen? The app’s description clearly explains everything – and even if they didn’t read a word of that, the app’s icon was a friggin’ Super Mario mushroom. Maybe the “Approve” and “Deny” buttons are just right next to each other. Crunch Network : CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0
New cell phone maker NEC-Casio goes America, targets 200% international sales boost »
As MobileCrunch reported back in August , three of Japan’s eight top cell phone makers, namely NEC, Casio and Hitachi are going to merge their cell phone businesses next year. Under the agreement, NEC plans to integrate its handset division into a tie-up that already existed between Hitachi and Casio starting April 2010 (the begin of the new fiscal year under the Japanese business calendar). In the meantime, the companies involved decided on a name for the new venture: NEC Casio Mobile. The company’s capitalization stands at a relatively modest $55 million, with NEC holding a 71% stake, Casio 20% and Hitachi 9%.And as I speculated in my previous article , that new company plans to enter the global market in a (relatively) aggressive way. NEC Casio Mobile plans to ship a total of five million handsets in markets outside Japan, up more than 200% from the numbers for fiscal 2008 (handset sales of NEC, Casio and Hitachi combined). By the end of 2011, the new company wants to sell handsets, including “smartphones”, in North America. NEC Casio will also enter the Mexican and Australian markets by that time. In fiscal 2008, the three companies involved in the new venture shipped a combined 8.9 million cell phones, 1.5 million of which found their way outside Japan. NEC Casio follows both Sharp and Panasonic in their plans to bring their cell phones abroad. Via Nikkei [registration required, paid subscription] Crunch Network : CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
Nuance Launches Voice-powered Dragon Search App For iPhone »
Hot on the heels of the launch of their Dragon Dictation app (and a short-lived and mostly overblown privacy scandal ), Nuance has just launched a second iPhone application: Dragon Search. Heralded by Nuance as the “fast, accurate, and smart way to search online content on your iPhone”, Dragon Search allows iPhone users to search across Google, Yahoo!, Bing, iTunes, Twitter, Wiki, or YouTube by speaking their search terms. Dragon Search is powered by the Dragon NaturallySpeaking engine, just as with Nuance’s other offering. If you’re having good luck with Dragon Dictation, you should see similar results here. The design of the application is rather clever; while you’re only shown one search engine’s results at a time, you can flip between them on a whim via the carousel at the top. You can search for Dr. Dre’s Wikipedia page, then flip over a few boxes on the carousel to check out Dre’s music videos videos on YouTube. Like the Dragon Dictation app, Nuance is saying that the app is available for free for “a limited time”. We’re not sure when they’re planning to bump it up to for-pay, nor the price they’ll charge – but in the meanwhile, you can nab it here for the always-welcome price of free: App Store link . Crunch Network : TechCrunch obsessively profiling and reviewing new Internet products and companies
Video: Apple’s “12 Apps Of Christmas” iPhone commercial »
Apple just pushed out a new, Holiday-themed commercial. Playing on the classic “12 Days of Christmas” song, they rattle off a different type of application for each of 12 days. They make no mention of baby shaking applications , which isn’t too surprising – “baby shaking” has way too many syllables to fit the tune. Crunch Network : CrunchBase the free database of technology companies, people, and investors
Japan’s smartphone market: The iPhone is huge, the BlackBerry and Android aren’t »
It’s big in Korea , it’s probably big in China’s grey market , and the iPhone continues to be big in Japan. According to a report [JP] released by Tokyo-based research company Impress R&D, the iPhone has captured a whopping 46.1% of the domestic smartphone market. For this year, Impress sees the 3G commanding 24.6% in this segment, while the 3GS contributes another 21.5%. The 3G was introduced in Japan in summer 2008 (the 3GS followed earlier this year). Sources in Japan say that the iPhone user base in Japan now stands at 3 million, which is an impressive 10% of the global userbase. Three models from Willcom , a Japanese mobile phone carrier, are ranked 3 to 5. The HTC HT-03A (aka HTC Magic), the first Android phone in Japan , made it to No. 10 (2.3%). The BlackBerry Bold, which is offered by Japan’s No. 1 carrier Docomo , is one rank behind with 1.2%. A major reason for this development is the hyper-aggressive marketing strategy SoftBank Mobile , the iPhone’s exclusive carrier, pursues in Japan: TV commercials virtually around the clock, print ads in major media, super-competitive pricing etc. do have an effect, it seems. On the other hand, I’ve never seen any of this coming from Docomo for Android or BlackBerry, so it’s no wonder virtually no one in Japan (where I live) knows what these devices actually offer – apart from geeks, obviously. Crunch Network : CrunchBase the free database of technology companies, people, and investors
App Store Champ Smule Raises Another $8 Million »
When you’re running on a hot streak of smash hits, it’s not too tough to find investors. Such is the case for Smule, the developers behind I Am T-Pain , Ocarina , Leaf Trombone , and a handful of other App Store success stories. Today, Smule is announcing that they’ve secured an $8 million dollar round of Series C funding. That’s an absolutely massive pot for a development house focused solely on the iPhone, and it more than doubles Smule’s total funding thus far. This latest round of funding was lead by Shasta Ventures , and backed by Bessemer Venture Partners and Granite Ventures . Both of the latter companies had invested in Smule before; Bessemer fueled Smule’s $1.6 million seed round, and joined Granite Ventures and Maple Investments for their $3.9 million Series B. All in all, Smule’s total funding to date is coming in at around $13.5 million. All the fledgling entrepreneurs out there fighting for funding might want to plug their ears at this point; turns out, Smule wasn’t exactly looking to vie for backing right now. Jeff Smith, CEO and co-founder of Smule, on the topic: “Candidly we were not planning on raising capital at this stage of our business plan. Yet as we got to know the partnership at Shasta, we found they had a similar perspective on the importance of innovation, and a robust understanding of the new consumer market realities. We are therefore excited to have them join us on our mission to redefine the mobile social experience.” So, what is Smule planning to do with the new-found cash? Make more iPhone apps, of course. It’ll also go toward expanding the “Smule Sonic Network” which serves as the backbone for their applications. Crunch Network : TechCrunch obsessively profiling and reviewing new Internet products and companies
Cash Cab cruises onto the iPhone »
Nothing kills the productivity amongst myself and my roommates like accidentally stumbling across an episode of the Discovery Channel’s Cash Cab . If you’re unfamiliar with the show, the premise is pretty simple: a snarky bald dude drives around New York in a cab, surprising passengers with the opportunity to win some cash by answering trivia questions. There’s just something about the wise-crackin’ cab driver — not to mention the opportunity to make yourself feel smart compared to a bunch of grumpy New Yorkers — that keeps our eyes glued. Unfortunately for our hopes of ever getting anything done, the Cash Cab is now cruising the streets of Pocketville. Just released this morning by Capcom, the iPhone version of Cash Cab is a wee bit less brain-racking than the show that inspired it; where as contestants have to pull most of their answers out of thin air, the iPhone app gives you the benefit of multiple choice. Outside of that, however, the familiar mechanics, such as Red Light Challenges and Video Bonuses, are all there. Coming in at $5 bucks, it’s a bit pricey – but considering how unlikely it is to find yourself in the Cash Cab amongst NYC’s endless sea of taxis, this might be the closest any of us get to the real thing. You can find it on the App Store here . Crunch Network : CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.