MobileCrunch |  |
- Klip Debuts Sleek Mobile Video Sharing App For iOS, Raises $2M From Matrix Partners
- Skype Aware Of XSS Vulnerability In iOS Apps, “Working Hard To Fix” It
- Smartphone-Powered EEG Makes For Creepy Meetings
- Facebook’s Spartans Ready For Battle, But War Won’t Come At f8
- TechCrunch Review: Google Wallet
- Amazon Stays Quiet As Their Appstore Goes International
- Appcelerator Launches Open Mobile Marketplace, An App Store For App Components
- Leaked Photo Purportedly Shows iPhone 5′s Insides: A5 Processor, Bigger Display And Battery
- AT&T Talks Asset Sales With Rivals In Time For First Hearing
- Mobile Ad Networks’ Fill Rates Drop, Windows Phone Tops CTRs
- Opera Acquires Mobile App Store Handster
- Samsung Exec: We’re Coming After The iPhone 5 As Soon As It Lands In Korea
- A Twitter Poem: Next Nexus Leaked With Specs, Details, And Launch Info [Update]
| Klip Debuts Sleek Mobile Video Sharing App For iOS, Raises $2M From Matrix Partners Posted: 20 Sep 2011 04:30 AM PDT  A new startup is throwing its hat into the mobile video sharing and discovery space this morning—Klip. Klip’s newly launched free app allows users to capture, share, discover and view mobile videos. While many mobile video apps focus on the capture, editing and sharing of videos, Klip’s focus is on the discovery and providing the highest quality video streaming around for mobile device. You simply shoot a new ‘Klip’ or grab one from your Camera Roll and share it with the Klip community, your friends on Facebook, Twitter, on your YouTube channel, or by email. Within the app, you can watch Klips from around the world, follow other Klippers, re-klip the Klips you think are worth sharing again, or stay on top of hot topics by following hashtags. All sharing is built around hashtags, making it easy to surface relevant content by topic or event. Of course, there are a plethora of video sharing apps in the market but what makes Klip more unique is the technology used in the app. If you want to preview a vide, you can Swipe the video and it will plat at the accelerated speed at which you move your finger across the video. If you shake the phone, all the videos will begin playing on the page. The design of the app itself is fairly sleek, with an easy to use UI. And because mobile bandwidth can be flaky, Klip includes adaptive video streaming. The app will actually check and adapt streaming to your bandwidth once every 4 seconds. The startup was actually founded in April 2011 by Alain Rossmann, and has raised $2 million in funding from Matrix Partners and Rossmann (who is credited with being the father of wireless access protocol, WAP). The company’s team includes engineers and staff from Google, YouTube, Yahoo, and Apple. Klip faces competition from Vlix, SocialCam and others.
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| Skype Aware Of XSS Vulnerability In iOS Apps, “Working Hard To Fix” It Posted: 20 Sep 2011 01:47 AM PDT  If you’re using Skype for iOS on your iPhone or iPod touch, consider yourself warned: a cross-site scripting vulnerability looms in the “Chat Message” window in version 3.0.1 and earlier versions. The hole allows attackers to execute malicious JavaScript code that runs when a victim views a chat message, enabling theft of information, including a user’s address book (see video below). Skype says it is aware of the security issue, and had issued the following statement:
The non-patronizing first sentence would have been sufficient, Skype. AppSec Consulting security researcher Phil Purviance, who also made the video below, writes:
On Twitter, Purviance says he reported the XSS vulnerability to Skype nearly a month ago. Let’s hope a fix follows shortly now that he’s gotten media attention. Skype is a software application that allows users to make voice and video calls and chats over the Internet. Calls to other users within the Skype service are free, while calls to both traditional landline telephones and mobile phones can be made for a fee using a debit-based user account system. Skype was founded by Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis who were also the founders of the file sharing application Kazaa. Skype has also become popular for its additional...
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| Smartphone-Powered EEG Makes For Creepy Meetings Posted: 19 Sep 2011 05:49 PM PDT  The Technical University of Denmark has put together a portable EEG system consisting of a low-cost scalp monitor and a smartphone app. It’s not the biggest technical breakthrough, but I find it comforting to see these pocket computers, more powerful than our PCs were a few years ago, being used for something other than social media and finding the nearest Starbucks. The team at milab, part of the Cognitive Systems Section at DTU, is focused on “mobile context awareness, media modeling, and user experiences.” So it’s natural that they’d want to put together something like a handheld EEG unit. It’s really a fairly straightforward system: a commercially available Emotiv headset is connected to a wireless USB receiver, which is in turn attached to a Nokia N900. The data from the EEG (live gross activity data from the regions around the contacts) is instantly decrypted by the phone and converted into an 3D OpenGL-based animation. Total time from reading to display is around 150ms. This allows for quick, on-site monitoring without the need to wheel around a station or set up a laptop. Easy deployment and natural settings are very important for psychological experiments, and I know for a fact that having one of the full-on, gel-enhanced, wires-everywhere EEG caps on kind of interferes with your normal thought processes. It can decode brain states enough, it seems, to perform some rudimentary actions like scrolling through galleries or opening and closing apps. The greatest thing, though, is the new style of meeting they seem to have invented: It reminds me of the meetings conducted by the big blue guys in Fantastic Planet. Will we be required to wear these in the future at AOL? Will we be shocked into submission if we don’t maintain proper alpha frequencies during HR lectures? Mercy! [via Reddit]
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| Facebook’s Spartans Ready For Battle, But War Won’t Come At f8 Posted: 19 Sep 2011 03:49 PM PDT  Facebook’s f8 is quickly approaching — by all accounts, it’s going to be massive. Ten days ago, I laid out some of what we were hearing would be coming. Now it’s time for one important update — for something not coming: Project Spartan. Facebook’s HTML5 app project (which will not be called Spartan at launch) is ready to go. But the latest word is that Facebook is worried that the project is so ambitious and the ramifications of it will be so large that there’s some concern that it may overwhelm some of their other big announcements at their event. The fact is that they have so much coming that they don’t need to announce it just yet. Originally, developers were told to have Spartan projects ready to go by July. But the scope of the project expanded to include not only mobile Safari, but Android and desktop browsers as well. Then the plan was to launch at f8, and Spartans (that is, Project Spartan developers) were going to be a part of the lower-key f8 hack event the following day. Now it looks like Facebook will have another event a week or two after f8 dedicated to Spartan, we’re told. A separate event will also give more time for key Spartan partners to present. Right now, those include companies like Zynga and others big players, we hear. It will likely be a giant HTML5 love-fest. But again, don’t worry about f8. All indications are that the amount of stuff coming will be overwhelming. Everyone knows about the music launch, but we’ve been hearing about something else that will be bigger. Stay tuned. Update: And here we go: we’re hearing Facebook will use f8 to launch new buttons for “Read” “Listened” “Watched” and “Want”. This is all about populating data in the Newsfeed around actions and intent. Think: Beacon, without the controversy (or so Facebook hopes). Facebook is the world’s largest social network, with over 500 million users. Facebook was founded by Mark Zuckerberg in February 2004, initially as an exclusive network for Harvard students. It was a huge hit: in 2 weeks, half of the schools in the Boston area began demanding a Facebook network. Zuckerberg immediately recruited his friends Dustin Moskowitz and Chris Hughes to help build Facebook, and within four months, Facebook added 30 more college networks. The original idea for the term...
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| TechCrunch Review: Google Wallet Posted: 19 Sep 2011 01:24 PM PDT  I have seen the future, and it is called Google Wallet. Note, however, that this future is just that: the future. As in, something not now. I’ve lived with Google Wallet in my life for the past week or so, and have walked away thoroughly impressed — but while Google Wallet may be launching today, don’t expect it to kick your actual wallet out of your pocket any time soon. How It Works:Back in May, Google announced their mission to kill your wallet. Tying into the near field communication (NFC) system built into select Android handsets, Google Wallet allows your phone to act as your credit card. By tapping your Android phone against a compatible card reader available in select retailers, your payment credentials are transferred to the merchant without any swiping or physical cards required. While the idea of combining your phone and your credit cards may terrify some, Google Wallet is (at least in theory) more secure than their real world plastic counterparts. If your phone’s screen is off, the transmitter chip can not be powered and stores no data (thereby preventing a passing hacker from skimming your card as he walks by). If you haven’t used Wallet in the past 30 minutes or so (or if you’ve manually locked it), a PIN is required before anyone can use your cards or even see which cards your Wallet contains. My Experiences:“What? Wait, do that again.” “Is that legal?” “Whoaaaaaaaaaaaaa.” Every time I use Google Wallet, the person on the other side of the register looks at me like I’m Marty McFly and I’ve just stepped out of the DeLorean, hoverboard in hand. More than once, as I touched on above, they wondered aloud if I’d just pulled some techno voodoo on their system (though my favorite reaction of all was easily “Oh my god! iPhone 5!”) When Wallet works (as it did for nearly all of the transactions I tried at compatible NFC readers), it works really, really well. It’s lightning fast, ultra-intuitive (turn on display, tap phone to reader. If you haven’t punched in your PIN recently, do so and tap the phone again. You don’t ever need to launch the app manually.) The merchant simply sees it run through their point of sales machine as any other card might, the receipt prints out, and you’re on your way. When it doesn’t work, things get a bit… awkward. The one time the system failed, the merchant legitimately had no means of figuring out why. My phone’s screen read “Sent!”, their card reader made all of the appropriate bloops, and then.. nothing. I tried an NFC-enabled AmEx card I had handy, and it worked without a hitch. This was a location that I’d used Wallet at before. These same mystery issues can pop up with any credit card payments system, of course — but with the newness of NFC and that air of caution that a few folks conveyed, you should probably be prepped to explain yourself. Where It Works:Google Wallet will not work everywhere your credit card will. It won’t work everywhere there’s an NFC-friendly card reader, either. Wallet requires an NFC reader based on a new-ish specification, and only a select bunch of retailers have gotten around to updating. With that said: even out in the relatively low-tech East Bay of California, I had no trouble finding locations to at least test things out. Making that effort considerably easier was an included MasterCard PayPass application, which can find and display all compatible retailers near your current location or any location you manually input. The list of compatible retailers within a 5-mile radius of my home was about a dozen items long, almost entirely made up of Jack In The Boxes, CVSes, and 7-11s. Therein lays one of Google’s biggest challenges: getting these card readers everywhere. The readers are by no means Google Wallet specific (as mentioned above, the reader just needs to be based on a relatively new spec, but is the same tap-to-pay reader already used by Visa/AmEx/Mastercard) and the card vendors themselves have long been making the push — but until these things are nearly ubiquitous, your wallet (or at least one physical credit card you keep at arm’s reach) isn’t going anywhere. How You Pay:On Day 1, Wallet supports just one third-party card: the Citi Mastercard. I don’t have one of those, and had a hard time finding anyone who does. Fortunately, Google is well aware of this. For those of us with other banks and other cards, they’ve created the Google Pre-paid card. You add funds to the pre-paid card from any other credit card you’ve got, then tap into this pre-paid pool whenever you make a purchase. It’s not the most convenient extra step, but it at least opens up Wallet to just about anyone with a credit card. Google has just announced that they plan to support Visa, Discover, and AmEx cards in future releases — alas, no timeframe was given and it’s not clear whether or not support will be rolled out on a bank-by-bank basis. The AppThe Google Wallet app is executed with near perfection. It’s gorgeous, thoughtfully designed, and perfectly intuitive. The app is made up of four sections: Payment Cards, Loyalty Cards, My Offers, and History. Payment Cards displays all of your Wallet-ified credit cards in a horizontally scrolling carousel. A small toggle below each card allows you to set anything in your e-plastic armory as the default. You can also add retailer-specific giftcards to your collection, though the only retailer supported at launch is American Eagle (Google promises more are on the way. I believe Subway is on board for the future.) Loyalty Cards looks nearly identical to Payment Cards, but is meant for your myriad “Buy 10 sandwiches, get one free!”-type cards. As with giftcards, though, the only retailer at launch is American Eagle (but again, more are said to be on the way.) My Offers lets you view any nearby promos you’ve purchased through Google’s daily/local deals app, Google Shopper. The History section is a bit bare bones on day 1. It can currently display only the timestamps of your recent transactions (here’s a screenshot), leaving out any details regarding where it was used and even how much was spent. Google tells me this is something they plan to address quickly, but they just couldn’t get it done in time for launch. Conclusion:Google Wallet is great, magical, impressive, and all sorts of other positive adjectives. But today’s launch is just a small, but meaningful, first step. NFC-based payments via Mobile is something the world has long unanimously agreed would be awesome, but nearly all of the progress toward it (at least in the US) has been behind the scenes. This is the first time the public has really gotten to play with it — and while it’s going to take a few years (at the very least. Think about how many shops still insist on “Cash Only”.) before it’s ubiquitous enough to kill your wallet, Google seems in it for the long haul. (… now, can anyone tell me what the heck I’m supposed to do when the battery dies and I’ve left my wallet at home?) Here’s a quick demo of me using Google Wallet to buy food at a drive-through: Google provides search and advertising services, which together aim to organize and monetize the world’s information. In addition to its dominant search engine, it offers a plethora of online tools and platforms including: Gmail, Maps and YouTube. Most of its Web-based products are free, funded by Google’s highly integrated online advertising platforms AdWords and AdSense. Google promotes the idea that advertising should be highly targeted and relevant to users thus providing them with a rich source of information....
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| Amazon Stays Quiet As Their Appstore Goes International Posted: 19 Sep 2011 10:12 AM PDT  Amazon’s Appstore has always been a great place to pick up great Android apps on the cheap, but it came with a caveat: ever since its launch this past March, it has only been available to U.S. customers. Surprisingly, Amazon seems to have lifted this restriction today without so much as a peep, because international customers are reporting that they can now download the free app of the day sans hassle. At first it looked like only Europe was granted access, but Pocket Gamer reports that a few countries outside the EU have been given the green light too. So far, the list of countries where the Appstore appears to have gone live include the UK, Germany, Denmark, Spain, Australia, India, and Holland. Both free and paid app purchases are reportedly running smoothly, albeit with a vestigial American influence. The prices still appear in US dollars, which means enterprising app fans can take advantage of favorable exchange rates. Before today, international users could still access the Appstore, but it required a bit of dedication: they had to create a new Amazon account with a US address. Now all it takes is a quick .apk download from Amazon, and setting the Android device in question to install content from unknown sources. It’s a bit puzzling as to why Amazon flipped the switch on the Appstore without a word, but there are a few theories already making the rounds. It could be that Amazon is just doing a little stress testing to see how an official rollout would manage in the future, or it could be a bit of foreshadowing for an impending Amazon tablet launch. Of course, it could also just be a huge mistake, in which case international users should enjoy it while it lasts.
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| Appcelerator Launches Open Mobile Marketplace, An App Store For App Components Posted: 19 Sep 2011 10:00 AM PDT  Mobile cloud platform company Appcelerator, makers of the cross-platform Titanium platform for building mobile, tablet and desktop applications, is today announcing the launch of the “Appcelerator Open Mobile Marketplace.” The new store, which was announced at the company’s Codestrong Developer Conference this afternoon, includes mobile app modules, templates, design elements, cloud extensions and other components for the Appcelerator developer community to use. At launch, the store will offer 50 mobile solutions from PayPal, Salesforce, Millennial Media, AdMob, Box.net, Dropbox, Bump, TestFlight, GetGlue, DoubleClick, Greystripe, Omniture (Adobe), Flurry, Scanbuy, Twilio, Urban Airship and others. It will also include mobile gaming modules like Gamekit, OpenGL (graphics) and Box2D (physics). Third party developers will be able to list and sell their HTML5 mobile app modules and components in the store, too. Self-serve tools are being made available to publishers, allowing them to upload their content, maintain listings, promote their assets, and integrate with existing subscription services. Apps can be either free or paid, says Appcelerator. Revenue on paid apps will be shared with developers via the standard 70 (developer)/30 (app store) split. Below, an example of a component built by the Titanium app developer community: All components are designed for easy integration with Appcelerator’s mobile platform, which allows developers to build native apps using open Web standards. The Marketplace will now be included as a feature within Titanium’s development workflow, the company says. The Appcelerator Open Mobile Marketplace comes on the heels of TechCrunch Disrupt finalist Verious‘ own app store launch just last week. Like Appcelerator, Verious’ store includes mobile app components and self-serve component listing tools. But Verious also allows developers to request mobile app components by stating how much they would be willing to pay for a given bit of code. In the future, developers using Verious will be able to rate, review and comment on the listings, too. Verious has a different revenue model than Appcelerator, which is based on commissions (20-40%), referral fees for premier partners and revenue share for server-side partners. Scott Schwarzhoff, Appcelerator’s VP of Marketing, says that his company’s store is “significantly different” from others because it targets the 1.5 million mobile app developers in Appcelerator’s ecosystem. “In addition,” says Schwarzhoff, “we’ve signed up over 1,000 customers including NBC, eBay, Kellogg’s, Merck, Medtronic, GameStop and others. We felt it was important to establish the demand for a marketplace first, much like Salesforce did before AppExchange and Facebook before it opened up its API.” Verious Founder and CEO Anil Pereira says that Appcelerator’s app store is “great” for Javascript developers, but for native developers, Verious is the way to go. “In our conversations with thousands of app developers to date, we have found that native development wins out over Javascript when you are trying to deliver apps that take advantage of the complete range of smartphone and tablet functionality coupled with high performance,” says Pereira. He also likens his company’s product to “Switzerland,” as its not limited to iOS, Android, HTML5 (soon), etc. The new Appcelerator component app store is live now at: marketplace.appcelerator.com. Updated 1:34 PM ET with comment from Verious. Appcelerator provides open source platform for building and managing rich Web, Desktop and Mobile applications.
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| Leaked Photo Purportedly Shows iPhone 5′s Insides: A5 Processor, Bigger Display And Battery Posted: 19 Sep 2011 08:46 AM PDT  Being the pedigreed gadget geeks that we are, most of us here at TechCrunch are always up for a good gadget tear-down. We’ve seen everything from phones, to tablets, to friggin’ FBI tracking devices get splayed apart, and we loved every second of it. So when a tear-down gives a glimpse inside of what very much looks to be the iPhone 5? Yes, please. Leaked on Chinese microblogging site Weibo (if Twitter and Facebook had a baby that only spoke Chinese, that’d be Weibo), this little glimpse into what’s being claimed as the innards of an iPhone 5 show at least 3 things of note:
If you’re having a hard time telling heads from tails in the picture, note that the components on the right would actually flip over (see the attached cable) and rest on top of that visible on the left. Note that some components appear to be missing — most notably, there’s no antenna, nor any body/caging to hold it all in place. What do you think? Is this one the real deal, or just an inside look at a rather detailed clone? Started by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, and Ronald Wayne, Apple has expanded from computers to consumer electronics over the last 30 years, officially changing their name from Apple Computer, Inc. to Apple, Inc. in January 2007. Among the key offerings from Apple’s product line are: Pro line laptops (MacBook Pro) and desktops (Mac Pro), consumer line laptops (MacBook) and desktops (iMac), servers (Xserve), Apple TV, the Mac OS X and Mac OS X Server operating systems, the iPod (offered with...
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| AT&T Talks Asset Sales With Rivals In Time For First Hearing Posted: 19 Sep 2011 07:56 AM PDT  It should come as no surprise that AT&T may have to make a few sacrifices to settle their pending T-Mobile deal, but a new report today reveals who exactly AT&T has been starting conversations with. In order to help grease the wheels, AT&T is reportedly in talks with MetroPCS and Leap Wireless (parent company of insectoid bargain carrier Cricket) regarding the sale of spectrum access and subscribers. AT&T appears to be engaging in preliminary talks with both companies, but Bloomberg’s sources report that they have also reached out to a handful of other companies about striking a deal. That short list includes CenturyLink, Dish Network, and perhaps most interestingly, Sprint-Nextel. In light of the Department of Justice lawsuit filed on August 31, AT&T’s plan to sell off assets is meant to minimize concerns that an AT&T/T-Mobile merger would reduce competition and lead to higher prices for consumers. AT&T’s talks with their smaller competitors are likely to be very informal at this point, which could work out to AT&T’s advantage. By engaging in preliminary talks with competitors AT&T can say that they’re making efforts to address DOJ concerns and put on a cooperative face for the public (and their shareholders) in time for their first hearing on the 21st. Even so, Bloomberg reports that even if an asset purchasing agreement were to be struck, it still may not be enough to sway the Justice Department. AT&T seems to be testing the waters here to see what kind of reaction their initial talks get them, but we’ll see how things really play out in just a few days.
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| Mobile Ad Networks’ Fill Rates Drop, Windows Phone Tops CTRs Posted: 19 Sep 2011 07:34 AM PDT  Mobile ad optimization platform Smaato, Inc. released the results of its latest mobile advertising report today, for Q2 2011. The findings include a look at mobile ad adoption, fill rates and the overall effect on mobile ad network performance. Smaato’s Mobile Metric Report, based on over 80 million ad requests and over 60 connected ad networks across 230 countries, found that ad inventory was increasing at a faster rate than budgets, leading to a decline in advertising fill rates. It also found that Windows Phone led iOS, Android, BlackBerry and Symbian in click-through rates both in the U.S. and worldwide. According to Smaato, the worldwide average ad network fill rate was 18% in Q2, a 2% drop from last quarter and a 3% decline year-over-year. Among the 40 top ad networks in the world, fill rates varied widely, running anywhere from 3% to 58%. In the U.S., among the 20 top ad networks, fill rates declined 27% to 19%. Only 6 of the 20 performed above average (between 28-62%.) Says Smaato CMO Harald Neidhardt, current economic conditions are a factor in the fill rate decline, but it’s also an indication of an increasingly fragmented market. Despite these drops, Smaato found that networks engaged in specialization saw greater returns, offering features like geo-location or video to add more value. Nine mobile ad networks out of the top 40 performed above the average Smaato Index, with rates ranging from 23% to 58%, despite “considerably” smaller volumes. In its platform comparison, Smaato measured the average CTR (click-through rate) of all devices and set this number to 100. Windows Phone (131) led the smartphone operating system (OS) index for the 2nd consecutive quarter, while RIM (91) overtook Apple (86) in ad performance on the Worldwide Performance Index. Nokia’s Symbian (114) is down from last year, and Android (76) increased performance by nearly 50%. In the U.S., the smartphone platforms performed differently, however, with Windows Phone (108) just barely ahead of Apple’s iOS (107), but losing ground to Android (89). RIM moved into 3rd place, and Nokia’s Symbian trailed. Neidhardt says the ad outlook for Android will continue to improve as low-cost Android-based smartphones enter the market alongside new Android-powered tablets in Asia. “As this trend continues, we will see even greater demand from big brands and advertisers for the Android platform,” he says, “and therefore greater revenue opportunities for publishers and developers as Android continues to proliferate.” The final metric measured this quarter was ad network response time, which ranged from 39 to 328 milliseconds (msec) for the top 10 networks worldwide. This translated to an average response time of 290 msec. Smaato is the Mobile Ad Cloud - operating the leading mobile advertising optimization platform called SOMA. More than 30,000 app developers and premium publishers have signed up with Smaato to monetize their content in 220+ countries and to manage close to 30 billion ad requests per month. Additionally Smaato is serving more than 150 millionen unique users. SOMA's unique feature is the aggregation of 60+ leading ad networks globally to maximize mobile advertising revenues. Through an open API and the...
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| Opera Acquires Mobile App Store Handster Posted: 19 Sep 2011 06:47 AM PDT  Mobile browser maker Opera Software today announced the acquisition of Handster, Inc., a mobile application store platform company. Handster, based in Illinois with operations in Odessa, Ukraine, supports Google Android, Java, Symbian, Windows Mobile, BlackBerry, as well as netbook and tablet applications. It offers a white label version of its app store to mobile operators in addition to running its own branded site at Handster.com. Current Handster partners include MTS, Alcatel-Lucent, Ericsson, Huawei and LG. According to a recent report by Research2Guidance, Handster was the leading third-party application store for Android apps, beating out PocketGear, Amazon’s App Store, GetJar, and a dozen other popular brands. At the time of the report (June 2011), Handster hosted nearly 23,000 apps, with 2,500 more added each month. Opera, too, has its own mobile app store, the Opera Mobile Store, launched in March. The store, powered by Appia’s storefront technology, serves the iOS, Android, BlackBerry, Java and Symbian platforms, in addition to hosting Web content. The store’s content and interface is customized to each device, local language and currency. The Handster acquisition will serve to bolster Opera’s app store’s content, which is now offered directly to consumers, as well as to OEMs and mobile operators for on-device integrations. According to Opera CEO Lars Boilesen, “Opera is evolving from being a browser company into a fully integrated mobile services company,” he says. And this acquisition serves that goal well, clearly. Handster Founder and CEO Victor Shaburov will join the Opera Mobile Consumer and Publisher management team based in San Mateo, California, USA. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. Norway-based Opera provides web browsers for the desktop, mobile, and other electronics such as the Wii. It also provides a service called Opera Link that lets you access bookmarks across devices. Handster is an AppStore solution company offering a white label platform and a branded AppStore (Handster.com). The platform supports Windows Mobile, Google Android, BlackBerry, Symbian and Java applications. Smart phone users can access the store via a website, mobile web and an on-device client. The company offers a scalable white label AppStore solution for mobile operators, handset manufacturers and distributors. The Company powers the application store for HP EMEA and provides aggregated content for the LG App Store. Founded in 2004,...
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| Samsung Exec: We’re Coming After The iPhone 5 As Soon As It Lands In Korea Posted: 19 Sep 2011 06:33 AM PDT  As the pending case tally reaches almost two dozen, Samsung has decided to both go big, and go home once Apple’s flagship iPhone 5 debuts. With its Galaxy Tab 10.1 officially banned in Germany, and the GalTab 7.7 pulled off shelves at IFA in Berlin, Samsung is the only participant in the battle with casualty products. And apparently, it’s about time to strike back. According to an unnamed senior executive at Samsung, the firm plans to file suit against the iPhone 5 as soon as its released in Korea hoping to ban sales of the killer phone on its home turf. Here’s the direct quote out of the Korea Times:
You hear that? The iPhone 5 would need a downgrade to iPod touch territory in order to avoid litigation from Samsung. The chances of that are about as good as Apple discontinuing the iPhone altogether, so get ready for a showdown come mid-October. So far, Samsung has been on the receiving end of many of these lawsuits. But according to another unnamed senior executive, “We are taking different tactics since we are quite confident. If Samsung wins in Germany that will give us a big breakthrough and so will other envisioned efforts against such products as the iPhone 5.” For a short while after this Samsung/Apple madness started, it was somewhat expected that the fight would be resolved amicably based on the highly beneficial and symbiotic business relationship shared by the two companies. Apple is one of Samsung’s biggest customers, which is likely the reason for the South Korea-based company’s tentative attitude during these legal proceedings. But the plan has clearly changed. Should Samsung see a victory, Apple and Samsung won’t be the only affected parties. Both SK Telecom and KT, Korea’s largest mobile carriers, will feel a loss if the iPhone 5 gets banned. As will many South Koreans who have been waiting just as eagerly as we have for the next-gen iPhone. Samsung is one of the largest super-multinational companies in the world. It’s possibly best known for it’s subsidiary, Samsung Electronics, the largest electronics company in the world. Started by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, and Ronald Wayne, Apple has expanded from computers to consumer electronics over the last 30 years, officially changing their name from Apple Computer, Inc. to Apple, Inc. in January 2007. Among the key offerings from Apple’s product line are: Pro line laptops (MacBook Pro) and desktops (Mac Pro), consumer line laptops (MacBook) and desktops (iMac), servers (Xserve), Apple TV, the Mac OS X and Mac OS X Server operating systems, the iPod (offered with...
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| A Twitter Poem: Next Nexus Leaked With Specs, Details, And Launch Info [Update] Posted: 19 Sep 2011 06:08 AM PDT  Late last night the Android community was taken hostage by a rogue Twitter user. @tfleming223 started tweeting lines from a cryptic poem said to contain launch details about the upcoming Nexus phone and Ice Cream Sandwich Android release. But in true Internet douchbag fashion, this guy would only release parts of the poem when certain users followed him and he reached 1,000 followers. Well, as shown after the jump, the poem so far hints at a November 3rd Verizon release, along with stating the next Nexus would be a world phone. And he might be right. @tfleming223
This isn’t the first time unannounced details were revealed through a Twitter poem. @black_man_x, aka The Panda King and the supposed creator of this latest poem, played the same silly game with surprising accuracy concerning the then-named HTC Incredible HD. The details were spot on and pegged the phone, later named the Thunderbolt, as Verizon’s first LTE device — although simple logic could have done that as well. The same user later tweeted another poem about the Droid Bionic and stated that the release date would be in the later part of April. “Till after Passover,” he said. While the Bionic just recently hit the shelf, the phone did suffer numerous delays, some of which likely hit at the last moment. This guy is clearly familiar with Verizon Wireless’ road map. It’s hard to say whether this latest poem correctly names November 3rd, the death of Batman’s creator (his “real father”) Bob Kane, as the phone’s release date but that date does fall in line with previous rumors and Google’s own timetable. Also, the next Nexus would of course be a worldphone as previous incarnations where only available in GSM form. The last two came unlocked, but it’s unlikely that the US’ Verizon edition would follow that precedent. Of course more could still be revealed by our poetic friend. Apparently there’s more to the poem, which will be revealed sometime today. Blame Jay Cutler: per one of @tfleming223 last tweets yesterday, he was going to reveal the rest if the NFL’s Chicago Bears pulled out a win against the Saints. However, Cutler couldn’t complete a pass last night and the Saints proceed to roll the Bears 30 to 13. (But how about those Lions!?) Even if this guy doesn’t know what he’s talking about, Google will likely announce the next Nexus and Ice Cream sandwich in a few weeks. It’s unlike Google and its hardware partners to do a reveal and then immediately sell the device. My money is on an October announced, November release, and the Detriot Lions to go deep in the playoffs.
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