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How Do You Get a Million People to Buy a Gadget That Nobody’s Even Used Yet? [Gadgets]

Mon, 14 Nov 2011 20:22:18 +0000

The iPhone and the iPad are card-carrying members. Modern Warfare 3 is, like, the President . I’m talking, of course, about the Million-Plus Preorder Club. Now the Amazon Kindle Fire has joined the ranks. Before anyone even touched a Kindle Fire. More »

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How Do You Get a Million People to Buy a Gadget That Nobody’s Even Used Yet? [Gadgets]

SalesVu Raises $600K For Square-Like Mobile Payments Service

Mon, 14 Nov 2011 11:00:45 +0000

SalesVu , a new mobile payments application and SaaS solution designed for distributed sale teams, has closed $600,000 in angel funding, the company is announcing today. Like Square, SalesVu’s service includes a dongle that attaches to an iPhone or iPad, allowing its users to process mobile payments on the go using a mobile app. But unlike Square, the gadget doesn’t plug into the headphone jack – it uses the iPhone or iPad’s main port instead. The dongle also offers hardware encryption, something which Square’s competitors have criticized the company for not including. In addition, SalesVu takes Square head on in terms of pricing: it’s just 2.7% for all transactions (swiped or keyed in) compared with Square’s 2.75% (for swiped transactions only). To achieve these rates, the company does things a little differently than Square. For starters, it doesn’t hand out all its dongles for free. Each business customer gets the first dongle for free, but then has to pay $99 for each additional device. Of course, a company could get around this requirement if they wanted to by signing up using a separate email address for each employee in need of a device. But doing so would preclude the business from taking advantage of SalesVu’s other key feature: the cloud-based infrastructure for centralized price management, reporting and marketing. Using SalesVu’s SaaS solution , businesses can monitor mobile transactions, watching for trends by product, time of day and employee, and then make adjustments to pricing and inventory data on the fly, based on those findings. All of this happens in real-time and is presented in an easy-to-read format complete with graphs, bar charts, tables and other reports. As the pricing changes, business owners can also share those discounts directly from SalesVu to Facebook, offering a coupon code that will work to activate the deal. Because of its rich, real-time reporting capabilities, SalesVu is trying to solve a slightly different problem than Square or even Intuit’s GoPayment . That is, it’s not going after the small business or individual who could never before afford to take credit card payments – it’s going after businesses who rely on the performance of a highly mobile salesforce. The ideal customer is one whose potential bottom line can be impacted by access to real-time sales data and the ability to adjust product inventory quickly based on the analysis of that data. And as for that rate? The shockingly low 2.7%? According to SalesVu CEO Pascal Nicolas, the company had to negotiate quite a bit with its partner, Mercury Payment Systems , to get there. But Mercury sees mobile payments as a growth opportunity, so it was willing to take the risk. Austin-based SalesVu initially became available to the public on August 18th and now has around 1,000 customers worldwide. Its mobile applications for iPhone and iPad can work as standalone order processing/business management apps, but the credit card processing portion only works in the U.S. and Canada.

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SalesVu Raises $600K For Square-Like Mobile Payments Service

The Europas – The Big Night To Celebrate European Tech Startups

Mon, 14 Nov 2011 10:16:59 +0000

The Europas , the European Tech Startup Awards, will be held this Thursday, November 17, in London. As of today they are poised to sell out (there are just a handful left). And unfortunately you can’t buy tickets on the door. Boo hoo. But over 400 of you are coming already. Yay! The Europas will take take place at a ridiculously cool London venue in the heart of London’s West End. There has been a huge response from the community. There was a month-long submission process. Over 40,000 votes were cast inside a week for people’s favourite early stage European startups of the year. You can see the finalists here . And the esteemed Advisory Board also voted for their picks. The results were combined to find the best companies. READ MORE

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The Europas – The Big Night To Celebrate European Tech Startups

Gadgets Week in Review: Walkabout

Mon, 14 Nov 2011 09:00:15 +0000

Here are some of the past week’s stories on TechCrunch Gadgets: Asimo: Honda Upgrades Its Awesome Humanoid (Videos) Kickstarter: The Present Is Half Art Project, Half Meditation On Time Nokia’s Crazy Bendy Kinetic Concept Blew Your Mind? Watch This! Video: Super-Realistic HRP-4C Humanoid Walks Like Human Sharp Reaches Record Conversion Efficiency With New Solar Cell

Jotly Creator Swears He’s Not Making Fun Of Oink

Mon, 14 Nov 2011 07:55:48 +0000

So Nosh founder Alex Campbell came up with and shot a promo video of this parody app that allows you to review anything in the world, “launching” it on October 3rd. This is doubly hilarious because a week after the world met Jotly, superfounder Kevin Rose launched Oink , which is also an app that allows you to review anything in the world EXCEPT IT’S REAL. And really noisy. When I tweeted out a link to this Jotly video earlier, SimpleGeo co-founder Matt Galliga n tweeted back to me,”uh. @Oink much?” whereas Foursquare hiring director Morgan Missen responded with the more tempered, “There’s a legit white space between yelp, twitter & 4sq; voila the mobile social short-form review-anything app onslaught.” True. Which begs the question, why haven’t any of those three companies tried to fill that hole? Especially Foursquare. While the “mobile social short-form review-anything app onslaught” is like a thing, Campbell insists that any similarities between Jot.ly and Oink are purely coincidental, “I was directly making fun of the proliferation of absolute ridiculousness when it comes to apps and startups these days. I tried to think of every cliché and trend I could, roll it into one, and create one app to rule them all,” he said, “The goal being: a fun parody … What just made the whole thing even crazier, was yes, seeing Oink launch one week after Jotly ’launched’ with the exact same (seemingly absurd) feature set. What we came up with, as a joke one weekend (Jotly), was all of a sudden a real app in Oink.” Still, the apps are so similar that watching these two videos in succession continues to set me into convulsive fits of laughter. Namely because Erick seriously says stuff like, “I’m oinking a lot,””mainstream version FOR YOUR MOM”?, “invite ON-ly,” and “granular” without any irony while Biggs manages to slide the phrase “best head” in without notice. See what I did just there? (That’s what she said.) I honestly don’t know which video is funnier, even after watching them each like 15 times. Enjoy.

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Jotly Creator Swears He’s Not Making Fun Of Oink

Up Close With Nest: The World’s Coolest Thermostat [PICS]

Wed, 09 Nov 2011 15:06:32 +0000

Nest Thermostat Box Probably some of the nicest-looking thermostat packaging you’ll ever see. Click here to view this gallery. Nest is just a thermostat — a wall-bound device capable of helping you manage the climate in your home. That’s it. It doesn’t travel with you, play music or make calls. It simply does what thermostats have been doing for decades, and yet Nest is something more, and that fact becomes all the more clear when you, as Mashable did, see it in person. Why is the Nest so special? First of all it was designed by Tony Fadell , the former Apple employee who oversaw the design of a dozen Apple iPods. Second, it’s gorgeous. Third, at $249, it’s considerably more expensive than most competing devices. There are other differences. Though it shares its shape with many traditional round thermostats, Nest is larger. Its body is covered in brushed chrome and features a large, round, colorful LCD screen. Up close, the screen is bright, highly readable and far more changeable than your run-of-the-mill home climate control device. Nest also learns. There are a lot of programmable thermostats on the market, but with them you decide exactly what they’ll do throughout the day and on every day of the week. Nest is designed to learn your temperature preferences and then create a climate schedule for you (Nest execs say it takes about a week). We only spent 10 minutes with Nest so, for now, it’s hard to tell just how smart Fadell’s baby really is. On the other hand, working with Nest is easy. We turned the outer ring to raise and lower the temperature. Large numbers appear on the screen (along with how long it will take to reach the target temperature and a Leaf for when you’re saving energy), and when you’re cooling your home, the screen turns blue. When you’re warming it, the screen turns red. There are other screens hidden below this that you access by pressing in the control ring. There you can set your own schedules and, among other things, learn details about energy consumption for the previous day or even dive way into your weekly temperature schedule and historical temperature settings and energy usage. There are also screens that explain your energy savings. We also got a quick look at how to install Nest in the home. The chrome cover pulls off to reveal a mount disk that also includes the power connectors. In the demo, just two wires were connected, not by screws, but by sliding stripped wires into small channels. There are even labels for your wires so you don’t forget which connection goes where when you upgrade from your old thermostat to Nest. Nest may turn out to be just another expertly designed thermostat and not the game-changer some expect it to be. Even Fadell seems aware of the hype. According to a Nest press representative, when a nervous Fadell first introduced the device to an enthusiastic crowd he had to remind them, “We’re talking about a thermostat here.” Check out our gallery and video for more details on Nest and tell us what you think about replacing your old thermostat with a $249 learning device, which goes on sale this month. More About: Gadget , Nest , Thermostat

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Up Close With Nest: The World’s Coolest Thermostat [PICS]

As Magazines and Retail Converge, Where Will the Editorial Line Be Drawn?

Wed, 09 Nov 2011 14:21:50 +0000

Lauren Indvik, David Granger, Alexis Maybank and Maureen Mullen on stage at Mashable’s Media Summit . According to Forrester research, Americans will spend nearly $200 billion online in 2011 , which accounts for about one-tenth of what U.S. consumers will spend on products and services all together this year. That figure is expected to grow by nearly one-third in the next four years. As ecommerce explodes, businesses, brands and retailers are looking for new methods to attract customers and increase repeat business. Using a model called “content and commerce ,” magazine-like editorials, photo spreads and videos integrate into the online shopping experiences to inspire, instruct and, ultimately, to sell products. “If you looked at how product and travel were being sold online [in the early days], you saw very matter-of-fact photography. It wasn’t inspiring,” Alexis Maybank, co-founder and chief marketing officer of Gilt Groupe, noted before taking the stage at Mashable ‘s second annual Media Summit last week. From the time of Gilt’s 2007 launch, Maybank says she and co-founder Alexandra Wilkis Wilson wanted to merge the desirous magazine imagery with the immediacy of purchase. Lately that imagery — under the supervision of editors like Ruth Reichl, former editor in chief of Gourmet , and Josh Peskowitz, former editor of Esquire.com — has taken more of an editorial tone . Park & Bond, Gilt’s full-priced retail site for men’s clothing, now offers editorial features and style advice alongside its shopping catalogs. And Gilt’s gourmet site, Gilt Taste , entices shoppers with a handful of beautifully photographed turkey recipes before notifying them that a Fresh Amish Heritage Turkey ($79.99 for a 12 to 14-pound turkey) is just a few clicks away — voila! Investment in editorial has been considerable, but Maybank says it’s already paying off. The segment of customers that spends time with Gilt’s editorial content is also spending more money with the company. It’s also helping drive new customer acquisitions: Existing customers are sharing Gilt content with their friends, who are then signing up to the site to get access and, in some instances, becoming customers as well. Those trends match luxury think tank L2′s own data, says Maureen Mullen, research and advisory lead at L2 . “A very small fraction of visitors — typically between 3% and 10% — are actually interacting with the content portions of a [brand's or retailer's] site, but those visitors visit more frequently and convert at a higher rate,” she notes. “The question is, of course, whether the user in question is naturally more engaged, or whether brands and retailers can drive users to their content and get the average user to exhibit the same behaviors.” Time, she says, will make that more clear. Magazines Meet Ecommerce Clad, a JC Penney men’s retail site collaborating with Esquire , launches Wednesday. As brands and retailers become more magazine-like, it’s not surprising that magazines, in turn, are becoming more deeply involved in retail. Several magazines have incorporated 2D barcodes into their print editions; the barcodes send readers to branded websites to purchase the goods originally showcased in editorials and advertisements. A section of Park & Bond called GQ Selects displays items printed in GQ also available for purchase on the site. And around New York Fashion Week in September, Vogue sold merchandise directly from Vogue.com through a partnership with fashion retail startup Moda Operandi . Esquire will introduce Clad , its own ecommerce venture with JC Penney, on Wednesday. Esquire ‘s editor-in-chief David Granger says that he was looking for a way to get into ecommerce when he learned that JC Penney’s growth brands division was looking for an editorial partner for a men’s retail site. “[JC Penney's team] thought it was important to have some editorial integrity behind it, or editorial knowledge of men’s style and what men want — something that would establish their brand,” Granger explains. Granger describes the relationship between Esquire and JC Penney as less of a partnership than a consultancy on Esquire ‘s part. Of the magazine’s two primary responsibilities, one is promotion. In August, Esquire not only sent out a letter to subscribers offering a discount and other incentives if they signed up for Clad, but also included an insert dubbed “The Clad Report” in its September issue. The latter, produced by Esquire /Clad liaison Seth Howard, will be produced and printed in Esquire four times per year, showcasing a number of the publication’s favorite products.. Clad will also enjoy “preferred vendor status” on Esquire.com — i.e., if an item mentioned on the site happens to be available on Clad, Esquire will link to Clad’s product page over another vendor’s. That will, in fact, bring Esquire into direct competition with the retailers that advertise in its pages. Granger says thus far it hasn’t been a problem with advertisers. “I do think retailers realize it’s part of the modern marketplace, that editorial enterprises are beginning to explore commerce online,” he says. Maintaining Editorial Integrity Men’s retail site Mr Porter dispenses style advice and weekly editorial features. But magazines aren’t just risking their relationships with advertisers; they’re taking a risk with readers too. How will magazines maintain readers’ trust as they push products they have a clearer, more vested interest in? Granger acknowledges that that is indeed a risk, but that Esquire has taken pains to preserve the editorial/business divide. “The reason we hired Seth [Howard] is that he’s a buffer. He has access to our fashion department’s understanding and knowledge of men’s fashion and trends, but…we [won't] allow what’s on Clad to affect editorial judgment.” Beyond promotion, Esquire ‘s second duty is to develop the editorial environment at Cladmen.com . A section titled “Damn Good Advice” will feature original editorials developed by Howard, as well as an archive of useful style advice in the manner of Mr Porter ‘s and Park & Bond ‘s. (Mr Porter’s editorial offerings are, incidentally, helmed by former Esquire UK editor in chief Jeremy Langmead.) Where will consumers turn to look for advice on, say, what to wear to an interview in a casual work environment, or what pieces to invest in for fall? And as retail sites integrate editorial, and magazines make their website and pages shoppable, how will they distinguish their content? “People really understand the nature of media properties that they’re reading or using or viewing,” Granger contends. “They know when the primary goal is to entertain and inform. I think some people might be delighted if they go to a commerce site and are entertained; they might be pleasantly surprised, but I don’t think they’ll be confused.” Gilt Groupe’s Maybank agrees. “Consumers are looking for advice [at retail sites],” she says. “It’s not the same thing.” “If I go into a Restoration Hardware store, for instance, I understand they’re selling that product,” Maybank explains. “But I’m not just interested in seeing rows of lamps on shelves. I want to be shown how to set up a room and create a look. That’s what I’m craving: the ability to see a product, understand how to use it, and be given the tips and tools to imagine how that might change my interior. Consumers are very savvy.” Still, I personally can’t help feeling that as more top-quality, magazine-style content is made available freely and conveniently at retail sites — from the same (and better paid) talent once at magazines, no less — consumers will have less of an incentive to purchase and interact with that content going forward. What real incentive is there for someone to go to Esquire over Mr Porter or Park & Bond for style advice? Granger’s response: “We’re better than they are.” More About: Advertising , content and commerce , esquire , features , gilt , gilt groupe , magazine , mashable media summit For more Business coverage: Follow Mashable Business on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Business channel Download our free apps for Android , Mac , iPhone and iPad

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As Magazines and Retail Converge, Where Will the Editorial Line Be Drawn?

Yelp’s $2 Billion IPO to Hit in Early 2012 [REPORT]

Wed, 09 Nov 2011 14:10:19 +0000

Yelp has hired Goldman Sachs and Citigroup to lead its $1.5 billion to $2 billion IPO in the first quarter of 2012, according to a report. Yelp is expected to file its prospectus by the end of this year, reports The New York Times , which cites “several people briefed on the situation.” Yelp could not be reached for comment. The company, which is known for its online reviews of local businesses, announced plans to go public in April. Previously, Yelp CEO Jeremy Stoppelman had said he wouldn’t consider an IPO for “several years.” Yelp also turned down a $500 million takeover bid from Google in early 2010. Yelp’s planned public offering comes after a series of social media IPOs. LinkedIn’s May IPO was considered successful, and though Groupon pushed back the timing of its public offering a couple of times before going public last week , that IPO was also well-received. Zynga, another social media company looking to go public, also delayed its planned IPO, though the company is now said to be preparing to offer shares to the public the week before Thanksgiving . Meanwhile, the biggest social media IPO of them all, Facebook’s, is now set for late 2012 , according to a report. More About: Facebook , groupon , ipo , yelp , Zynga For more Business coverage: Follow Mashable Business on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Business channel Download our free apps for Android , Mac , iPhone and iPad

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Yelp’s $2 Billion IPO to Hit in Early 2012 [REPORT]

Touchscreen Makes Its Way Onto Keyboard of the Future

Thu, 03 Nov 2011 17:37:03 +0000

Touchscreen keypads seem to be progressively taking over the old-fashioned keys on our devices such as phones, tablets and ebooks. But the touchscreen keypad has now made its way to the computer — with the “keyboard of the future.” The Keyboard “ABC” , created by designer Iaroslav Neliubov, features a touchscreen surface that can be configured to any language with customized keys. It has a built-in CD/DVD drive, SD memory card reader and USB port to make storing files easier. The keyboard’s most appealing feature is its ability to change color with just the touch of a finger. The keyboard also has built-in sound dynamics and is supposed to work well with left-handers. Take a look at the gallery below to see the sleek, black polished device. Could this be the keyboard of the future? Built-in CD/DVD Drive, SD Card Reader and USB Port Click here to view this gallery. More About: Gadget , keyboard For more Dev & Design coverage: Follow Mashable Dev & Design on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Dev & Design channel Download our free apps for Android , Mac , iPhone and iPad

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Touchscreen Makes Its Way Onto Keyboard of the Future

New Mobile App Zoomingo Helps You Find Nearby Sales

Wed, 12 Oct 2011 19:35:10 +0000

Newly launched Zoomingo is a shopping discovery app that aims to help you find nearby sales using either your Android or iPhone. With a focus on clothes, shoes, jewelry, handbags, beauty and home products, the app appeals to the everyday bargain shopper, not the daily deal seeker or the gadget guru looking to compare prices on HDTVs, for example. Sales data for major retailers is available all across the U.S., including from stores like Nordstrom, Macy’s, JC Penney, Williams Sonoma, Target, Kohl’s, Dillard’s, Wal-Mart and more. In total, Zoomingo has compiled sales data from over 70,000 retail outlets, using a combination of automated methods, manual data-gathering and “Deal Scouts” positioned in the top 10 U.S. cities. Currently, Deal Scouts are paid by the company to help pump up its deals database, but in the future, as the community grows, everyone will have the opportunity to be a scout. At that point, deal finders will be rewarded with badges, points and prizes, like retailer gift cards. The company was founded by language learning service Livemocha’s co-founders, Shirish Nadkarni (Zoomingo CEO) and Krishnan Seshadrinathan (CTO). When Livemocha started, it initially hired language tutors to kick-start the community for the first few months of operation, before the crowd arrived. Now, they’re doing something similar with Zoomingo’s scouts. (And how we wish other services would do the same, instead of launching deserted, crowd-less wastelands!) Even though my community (lovely Tampa, Florida) isn’t typically considered a top U.S. metro area, I was pleasantly surprised to find a ton of deals in my area for everything from kid’s toys to new handbags to beauty items and much more. In the app, you can follow favorite stores and other Zoomingo users. Also, if you choose to connect with Facebook, you can follow your friends and help Zoomingo recommend better deals to you. (E.g., if your gender is “female” you might be shown perfumes, “males” may be shown men’s clothes). As the community grows, you may find other users with similar interests and you’ll be able to virtually stalk their finds using a Twitter-like “follow” model. You can share your own finds too, by snapping a photo, adding a description and sale price. A future version of the app will offer integration with check-in services from Foursquare and Facebook, instead of the in-app “check in here” option which doesn’t really do much for now. Later on, Nadkarni tells us, retailers could use Zoomingo’s check-in to push out coupons or other offers. Retailers will be able to host in-store scavenger hunts at some later date, too. Nadkarni says he had the idea for the service after he took some time off from Livemocha, and found that his wife was having trouble locating nearby sales on mobile. So many apps were focused on price comparisons and barcode scanning (ShopSavvy, Red Laser), standalone check-ins (Foursquare) or promotions (ShopKick, Groupon), but there wasn’t a simple way to just browse local sales and search for items. Zoomingo is currently self-funded. The app is live now both on iPhone and Android . Crunchbase ZOOMINGO Company: Zoomingo Website: Learn more

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New Mobile App Zoomingo Helps You Find Nearby Sales