One piece of the car puzzle that is often left out of discussions about the new generation of car rental, ridesharing and taxi businesses: The pain in the ass that is the airport car rental experience. That’s where Silvercar comes in. The Austin-based startup, which will launch officially this winter, announced today that it has raised $11.5 million in series A financing to help it fuel a… → Read More
AT&T and T-Mobile have already pulled back the curtains (well, mostly) on their stock of Nokia Lumia Windows Phones, but rival carrier Verizon has remained awfully quiet on the matter. That may soon change though, as a pair of newly leaked images point to the existence of a Lumia 820 variant meant for Verizon’s airwaves. → Read More
I don’t always play social games, but when I do, I like them to help me pay for my education. If “The Most Interesting Man In The World” were to endorse Grantoo, this might be his conclusion. Grantoo is a social gaming platform that allows college students to compete against each other to win tuition grants and donate to charity in brand-sponsored gaming tournaments. → Read More
Google rolled out its own integrated, social review system for businesses with Google+ Local in May of this year. Not only was this a nice addition for Google+, but it finally utilized Google’s acquisition of Zagat. Having said that, I haven’t used the service all that much, because there are some usability issues there. → Read More
You can call Oyster the Netflix for books, but founders Eric Stromberg, Andrew Brown and Willem Van Lancker want to bring something more to ebook reading. The startup aims to be the first real subscription service for books. When it comes to digital entertainment content, you can either buy everything you want or subscribe to an unlimited service. Yet, ebook offerings are still behind. Oyster will… → Read More
Telefonica today has announced a deal with Telenor as its first carrier partner to the BlueVia API platform — one of the Spanish company’s many efforts, via Telefonica Digital, to create new lines of revenue around its operator assets. In this case, it’s a platform that it opens up to developers to incorporate different carrier-based actions into their mobile apps, such as messaging and billing… → Read More
Great design and developer talent is, as so many know, hard to come by. So online social club Grouper is launching what it calls a “Hackation” in which it plans to offer select developers a free, week-long trip to New York City. On this week-long trip, thanks to partnerships with Airbnb and Hipmunk, developers and designers will get the opportunity to visit NYC (which means free airfare from… → Read More
Kickstarter today announced it will begin making it possible for projects to be based in the U.K. on its crowdfunding site beginning October 31. This marks the first time Kickstarter projects will be able to be built around bank accounts located outside of the U.S., and it should help the company continue to grow as it looks to refine its existing model and project preference. → Read More
Swarm, a startup that helps retailers connect with in-store shoppers through their smartphones, has raised $1 million in seed funding from an … eclectic list of investors (more on that in a second).
Co-founder and CEO Rudd Davis says brick-and-mortar retailers don’t have a clear idea about who’s in their store, and they don’t have an efficient way to engage with each customer personally —… → Read More
Facebook giveth and Facebook taketh.
When the company first talked about the Open Graph at the last f8 developer conference in San Francisco last year, there was the promise of a whole slew of apps that would have many types of actions feeding into the ticker and news feed. The company demo-ed social cooking apps and running apps (like what you see to the right).
But after more than a year… → Read More
On stage at the second-day keynote, Major General Robert Wheeler talked about the changing role of industry and enterprise as it relates to technological innovation, and how where once the military led in that department, now the vast majority of advances are being driven by advances made in the private sector. And that means the DoD is in a position of asking for help from a variety of sources. → Read More
Facebook Gifts could make a lot of money on mobile by getting you to buy presents for friends, but birthdays were buried in Events and celebrations weren’t shown on mobile. So today Facebook for iOS and Android began displaying birthdays and celebrations atop the mobile news feed for users in the Gifts Beta, Facebook has confirmed.
You’ll be able to click through these alerts to buy Gifts. → Read More
On stage at CTIA’s MobileCon keynote today, RIM’s Jeff Gadway gave on on-stage demo of the upcoming BlackBerry 10 operating system. It emphasized that RIM’s goal with BB10 is to provide something for everyone: a social, entertainment platform for consumers and a secure environment to make IT managers happy. But can a mobile OS these days have its cake and eat it, too, in the way RIM envisions? → Read More
Google just released the first stable version of mod_pagespeed, the company’s open-source Apache module that can automatically optimize your web pages to improve download and rendering speeds. With this release, Google is declaring this tool ready for broader adoption, though it’s worth noting that a number of large hosting providers like DreamHost, Go Daddy and content delivery network EdgeCast… → Read More
Online media and advertising company CityGrid, the parent company of properties like UrbanSpoon, CitySearch and Insider Pages, is announcing a round of layoffs today that will affect about 15% of its workforce. → Read More
LocalResponse just announced a new way for its customers to target their ads.
Previously, the startup’s advertisers could reach audiences based on social network activity — for example, after someone checked in to a specific store, they could be targeted with ads that were relevant while in the store. Now those advertisers can also look at historical data, including posts from Twitter… → Read More
BlackBerry-maker RIM demoed another pre-release build of BlackBerry 10 in London today – including showing the camera Timeshift software working in real-time, and detailing a feature which allows BB10 users to switch between a personal and work mode. The new UI is a big departure for the company – as indeed it needs to be. The word RIM continually uses to illustrate its ethos with BB10 is… → Read More
Tel Aviv-based KIDO’Z, which got its start back in 2009 as a kid-friendly media browser for desktop computers is finally making the jump to mobile. The company is today officially announcing an Android version of its software that enables parents to lock down their smartphones and tablets, only allowing kids access to approved mobile applications and websites. The app also provides kids with a… → Read More
Over the last couple of years a new trend amongst startups has been towards addressing incumbent industries. And there are few such traditional sectors as the world of fashion. Hence we’ve seen a great deal of activity in the space. We’ve seen the rise of apps to measure our bodies for clothes and personalise our fashion shopping experience. We’ve even seen fashion startups start to acquire each… → Read More
Have you ever clicked on suspiciously salacious videos or links from your Facebook friends, only to find out that it leads you to a website full of naughty images and pop-up windows? Chances are, your friend wasn’t posting porn intentionally; their account was hacked and posting links to websites filled with viruses that then infect your computer, ransack your Facebook account, and perpetuate the… → Read More
A teenage hacker who goes by the name of “Pinkie Pie” will receive $60,000 in prize money from Google, by producing the first Chrome vulnerability at the Hack in the Box conference on Wednesday. The exploit was discovered and successfully launched just ahead of the deadline for completion, according to early reports from the event. Before awarding the cash prize, Google had to first verify and… → Read More
Bluetooth portable speakers come in many styles and sizes, and some are just wonderful. But when audiophiles go aquatic, options become much more limited.
Enter the ECOXBT waterproof speaker. It’ll take you from the pool to the lake to the beach and back again with no trouble at all. → Read More
Stripe, the YC-backed payments startup funded by Sequoia and PayPal’s original founders, is launching a new way for marketplaces and collaborative consumption startups to let their users directly accept payments.
It could be a huge win for early-stage peer-to-peer marketplaces, since many more mature companies in the space like Airbnb have had to go through the hassle of building in payments… → Read More
For you hardcore Twitter users, the main app just doesn’t cut it. You need multiple windows and notifications and more windows and stuff like that. For me, I enjoy the simple original web version of Twitter, but what do I know. Today, TweetDeck for all platforms, except iOS, was updated, and you can now go check it out and rejoice. → Read More
The Ubuntu Linux distribution has always been free. It’s also always welcomed donations from users. Historically, though, the donation page hasn’t been featured prominently on the Ubuntu website. As of yesterday, users who download Ubuntu are now invited to donate to Ubuntu.
It’s important to note two things. First, donations are completely voluntary. Ubuntu is still free to download and use. → Read More
I always get a warm and fuzzy feeling when two European tech companies cozy up. To that end, TechCrunch has learned that Deezer, the music streaming service which announced ambitious plans for growth today (off the back of a new $130 million funding round), has chosen the U.K. startup Songkick to power its concert recommendations. → Read More
Hey, remember that $325 million fund we said Trinity Ventures was raising last week? Well, the firm says it finished raising the money yesterday.
General partner Fred Wang tells me that the target for the fund, Trinity Ventures XI, was $300 million (the same as the last fund), but there was enough interest from limited partners (LPs) that it raised an extra $25 million — there was a hard cap… → Read More
Social network for fashion photos Trendabl has raised $835,000 from Khosla Ventures, Forerunner Ventures and other angels. → Read More
Democracy just got an iPad upgrade: Citizens of San Francisco are now greeted by campaign volunteers with tablets who can sign-up voters through California’s new online voter registration system. Facebook investor Ron Conway and San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee were out registering citizens yesterday to promote the city’s new push to have the most innovative government. → Read More
At today’s New York press event, eBay set the bar high by stating that it would unveil “the new eBay” today. The company introduced eBay Now, the same day delivery service they have been testing, and a completely redesigned website with a better search experience and item pages. And it looks a lot like Pinterest. → Read More
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