1. Sources: PopCap In Late Stage Acquisition Discussions With EA For $1 Billion+
PopCap Games is in late stage acquisition discussions for a sum of over $1 billion — we’ve now heard from two sources that the buyer is Electronic Arts.
2. Google Invests $102 Million More Into California’s Alta Wind Energy Center
According to an official company blog post today, Google is increasing its investment into California’s Alta Wind Energy Center (AWEC) by $102 million, bringing its total investment in the renewable energy facility to $157 million.
3. Tips for taking good handheld photos at night
The problem with taking photographs in low-light situations is that the camera has little alternative but to leave the shutter open longer to soak up more light. These tricks and tools will help you take better nighttime photos, without having to pack a tripod.
4. Music Discovery Platform exfm Goes Mobile With A Killer App For iOS
The artist formerly known as Extension Entertainment, now known simply as exfm, has officially gone mobile today, releasing its first mobile app for iOS. I’ve been enjoying exfm for a few months now through the startup’s Chrome extension, so I’m very excited to be able to finally bring that experience with me on-the-go.
5. A New Mobile Social Games King In The U.S.? Former Facebookers Take Storm8 To 210 Million Downloads
On the heels of PopCap’s billion dollar acquisition comes some interesting news from the social games front: Game developer Storm8 is today announcing a few impressive stats. Among other things, the company is claiming that it has become the “largest mobile social games developer in the U.S.”, boasting over 210 million downloads across iOS and Android. While those numbers are certainly impressive, with Angry Birds raking in over 200 million downloads, I think Rovio, Zynga, PopCap, Outfit7 and quite a few others might have a thing or two to say about that, each of which has fairly sizable user bases in the U.S. Then again, Rovio is in fact Helsinki-based and Outfit7 is international as well so Storm8′s claim to American soil likely stands — at least in relation to the Angry Birds and Talking Tom Cat makers, respectively.
BONUS
6. Google Launches New DOM Snitch Chrome Extension To Keep You Safe From Malicious JavaScript
Google has this week announced via its security blog a new tool its created called the DOM Snitch which is an experimental Chrome extension that enables developers to identify insecure practices commonly found in client-side code.
7. Amazon’s “state of the cloud” — it isn’t stacking up
When it comes to the cloud, just forget about the stack. Cloud computing is evolving beyond the data structure of interchangeable layers, said Werner Vogels, Chief Technology Officer and Vice President at Amazon, during his “state of the cloud” address at GigaOm’s Structure conference.
1. Five years from now, there’ll be no such thing as a webpage
Every time Facebook changes its interface, an outcry erupts in my News Feed. Without fail, my network transforms into a village and Mark Zuckerberg is our Frankenstein. Minor tweaks send us into an outrage, and we want Facebook’s head on a platter for our momentary confusion. But then a few days pass, and instead of anger, we see adaptation. The voices of dissent subside and we’re back to business as usual. After all, you’d be hard pressed to find anyone who can recount exactly what the first Facebook profile was like. Furthermore, it’d be difficult to find someone who cares.
2. HP Working On Cloud Music Service For webOS
It seems that another company is in discussion with the record labels about bringing a music streaming service to their tablet and smartphone operating system, according to a recent report by Billboard, HP is in discussion with a number of record labels about launching their own music streaming service for webOS.
3. Mozilla gets tough on Firefox memory leaks
Mozilla will try to plug more memory leaks in Firefox with a new, aggressive approach that relies on weekly bug triage meetings.
4. Skype Is Coming To Your TV Through Comcast
Comcast will begin offering Skype video calling to customers next year. The two companies announced the deal this afternoon ahead of the National Cable and TV Association's annual conference tomorrow.
5. Angry Birds looks to conjure some location-based Magic [Video]
Rovio is looking to take Angry Birds local with location-based integration, which will now enhance the game play for users when they visit real-world locations. The feature, called Magic, builds off a previously announced NFC feature for certain Nokia phones, which allows a very limited number of users to unlock additional levels when they tap two NFC phones together or tap an NFC tag at a location.
BONUS
6. Google Mobile Search Now Featuring Places Integration
The Google Search mobile landing page got a change overnight that deeply integrates Google Places, making it easier to find nearby restaurants, coffee shops, and bars directly from the front page. Other Places directories, like ATMs, fast food, and gas stations, can be searched locally with just one more tap of the finger.
7. Appcelerator Launches Titanium Studio: Mobile, Desktop & Web Development in One
Today, cloud platform provider Appcelerator is expanding beyond mobile and Web with a new offering designed for developers looking to build cross-platform applications. Now, in addition to building for smartphones, tablets and the mobile Web, developers can use the new Titanium Studio to build, test and deploy to desktop platforms including Windows, Mac and Linux as well as build HTML5 Web applications, all in one single development environment.
In:
5Tech,
Angry Birds,
Appcelerator,
Facebook,
Google,
HP,
Mozilla,
Skype,
Technology,
Titanium
Twitter is something I know pretty well. I've been a user for 2 years. While I don't have tens of thousands of followers, I understand the power of Twitter. When I learned Josh Peters wrote a book out on Twitter, titled TwittFaced, I thought I would give it a read. I gave Josh my money and off I went.
Changing the way Facebook handles the Beacon system was inevitable based in user concern. While they are trying to calm the waters with this change, they still need to take a few more steps. At the very least they need to provide a page of companies using the Beacon system and let Facebook users choose who they want to share data with. This is what Facebook has chosen to do:Users must click on “OK†in a new initial notification on their Facebook home page before the first Beacon story is published to their friends from each participating site. We recognize that users need to clearly understand Beacon before they first have a story published, and we will continue to refine this approach to give users choice.
The guys over at Lonely CEO pointed to a blog post of mine where it mentions I'm a Utah Facebook Developer. First, as I've said before, there was a reason I mentioned I develop Facebook applications and I live in Utah. But second, it is extremely important people know what community you live and work in. Do I expect being from Utah will make a difference, perhaps not, but I am trying to help build a community and I want people to know where I am. Does a company in New York or Florida care I'm in Utah, probably not, but companies in Utah care, and so its important they know I'm here.
One thing I've learned over the years is building a network is very important to a successful business. You may have killer technology but if you are unable to find the right investors it will be a short lived venture. Utah has a growing tech community. There are a number of companies who look for skilled workers with various new media and social media backgrounds. Are they finding you?
The truth is, as my friends at the Lonely CEO say, you can build software anywhere. So what we really need to do is market our services as Social Software or Community Software Developers. If your focus is on Facebook, or MySpace, or any number of other platforms, people that need your services will be searching for it under those terms, so its important search engines find you there. But I think it's equally important companies in your own backyard know you're there and are capable of fulfilling their needs.
So whether its important or not I'll continue to make sure my neighbors know I develop Social and Community Software and consult on other new media technology, and I'm right here in Utah.
Joyent has announced a new hosting service specifically targeting Facebook applications. Facebook doesn't host third party applications, that's up to the responsibility of the application developer. If an application becomes popular that can really put a strain on the applications server and the developers pocket book. Joyent, a start up web hosting and on demand computing services provider based in California, will be offering developers a place to host their Facebook applications for free. Yes, you read that right, free. Read the whole article on GigaOM here.
Yesterday was the second Utah Facebook Developer Garage and we had a decent turnout. We talked about a couple new features of the Facebook API, Mobile capabilities and the new Invitation screen.
I want to thank Tim Stay of Know More Media for letting us use his conference room at the last minute. We had munchies, discussed the viability of Facebook and Social network applications, and future Garage events. I think fun was had by all.
I posted a couple of pics on the Facebook group, but I also posted them here for those not a member of Facebook.
Also, thanks to Jess Stay for making sure this whole thing happened.
Are you a Mormon? Proudly display your beliefs with this Facebook application! The "LDS" application adds a random scripture verse to your profile, selected from the 4 standard works of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. This verse also links back to http://scriptures.lds.org so visitors to your profile can see the context of the scriptures you are sharing.
Jesse Stay asked if he was the only Facebook developer in Utah. And one of the comments he got on his blog asked "why is that important?" The statement was framed around the notion that anyone anywhere can develop applications, why is geographical locations important.
From my perspective its mostly for support and networking. When I am looking to refer work to someone I naturally look to my close local associates first. It's just natural. If no one there can help then I look to my extended network. I've just always done this. I hope my network in return does that for me.
But after having a short conversation with Jesse about writing Facebook application it appears the number of people actually doing it is small. Sure there are a lot of applications available on Facebook, but honestly, there are a lot of duplicate "I can do better" applications.
So yeah Jesse, I live Utah and I develop Facebook applications.
If you're looking for someone to write an application that integrates with Facebook, you can contact me here.
If you're a SplashCast and Facebook user *bling* you're in the money. By adding the SplashCast application to your profile, you can build media content right in Facebook using video, audio and images. Check it out.
If you use Facebook, Flickr and YouTube, you will want to try the Facebook applications zuPort: Flickr and zuPort: YouTube.
I was looking for a way to share my Flickr photos without having to upload them to Facebook, or send a Friend to Flickr just to view the pictures. zuPort does all I wanted. New photos show in my mini-feed, and if you click on one of the thumbnails in the feed, it takes you to a viewer in Facebook, not Flickr. Seamless in my view.
zuPort: YouTube accomplishes the same thing, seamlessly integrating your YouTube videos into Facebook. It's great not having to leave Facebook just to view content. That's what makes Facebook applications so cool.
Try these applications out. They are one of the reasons I continue to use Facebook.
