5 Tech Stories Worth Reading

1. Steve Jobs Confirms Discontinuation of iWeb in iCloud Transition
Since last week's unveiling of Apple's new iCloud service and the transitioning of the company's existing MobileMe service into iCloud, many users have been wondering about the fate of some of the MobileMe services that were not mentioned in the transition discussion. In particular, users have been concerned about iWeb, Apple's website creation software included with iLife that can be integrated with site hosting via MobileMe.

2. DIY U: The Future Of Learning [Video]
The future of learning is open--and it's in your hands. This video series, based in part on my book DIY U, explains that while the higher education bubble may be overblown, there is an explosion happening in the edu-world, with technology and openness transforming content, social learning, and accreditation all at once. Part One explains what's happening and why the old models no longer apply.

3. Bunchball raises $6.5M, doubles down on gamification
Bunchball, the social gaming software company, has raised $6.5 million in a new round of venture capital. The San Jose, Calif.-based startup plans to put the funds toward growth initiatives such as hiring, new product development, and international growth, CEO Jim Scullion told me in an interview last week.

4. Sony Knows Cross Game Chat is a Huge Thing
No, Sony is not talking about PlayStation LifeStyle’s podcast, “Cross Game Chat.” Andrew House of Sony Computer Entertainment Europe is talking about cross game chat for the PS3.

5. Apple iCloud Not Supporting Windows XP
We strongly suspect all the support Apple has shown the venerable Microsoft OS with iTunes and Mobile Me has mostly been a way of keeping people from buying shiny new copies of Windows 7, but that’s all coming to an end with Apple’s music-streaming iCloud, which won’t be featuring Windows XP support and will need either a Vista or Windows 7 PC to run.

BONUS

6. Use Binder Clips to Replace Broken Keyboard Feet [MacGyver Tip]
They make great cable organizers and phone stands, but the humble binder clip can also fix things that are actually broken, too. In this case, it's those little flip-out "feet" on the bottom of most keyboards. Just take the metal wings off two clips, and replace the feet by squeezing the those wings into their place. If nothing else, it's a lot cheaper than replacing the keyboard.

7. iOS 5 Allows For 1080p Video Exports, Confirms iPhone 5 8 Megapixel Camera
The iPhone 4 features a 5 megapixel camera, and it is capable of recording video in HD at a resolution of 720p, we have been hearing rumors that the iPhone 5 will feature an 8 megapixel camera, possibly a Sony CMOS sensor, which would mean it would be capable of Full HD Video in 1080p.

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5 Tech Stories Worth Reading

1. PlayStation Branded 3DTV Announced, Coming Bundled With A Copy Of Resistance 3
Do you like the idea of all this new-fangled 3D technology in games but can’t stump up the cash for a new TV and 3D glasses? It seems like you aren’t the only one, and Sony has been listening to your pleas.

2. Google Maps can now tell you when your bus or train is late
Google has offered travel information in Maps for quite some time, but now it’s going real-time – in a handful of cities, at least.

3. Square Raising New Round, Joining Billion Dollar Valuation Club
There are a bevy of startups in the process of raising big rounds of capital at billion dollar or higher valuations – something that was a rare occurrence even a few months ago. We’re tracking most of these deals (and have written about the ones we’ve confirmed). Now, we’ve confirmed via multiple sources, is payment startup Square’s turn.

4. Tribalfish may just change the way you have discussions online
Tribalfish wants to solve the difficulty involved in conversations on the Internet. Twitter has helped us to solve part of the problem by allowing us to reach a wide variety of people, but it’s still a one-to-many conversation. Internet forums have been the better answer for longer, deeper conversation but they require you to go to a different destination for nearly every topic.

[ I have a few Tibalfish invites if you woud like one ]

5. Snapseed for iPad: Photo editing at the swipe of a finger
The iPad is quickly transforming itself into the photographer’s smorgasbord for quick photo editing. The list of free and paid photo editing apps keeps getting longer and longer, and if you’re anything like me, you’re probably grateful that more developers are coming up with new and exciting apps to edit your photos on the go.

BONUS

6. The game theory of discovery and the birth of the free-gap
It all started because of the discovery problem.

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5 Tech Stories Worth Reading

1. Juniper: NFC Payments To Reach $50 Billion Worldwide By 2014
We know Google has made a big bet on near field communications (NFC) as a payments system with the launch of Google Wallet, but does the technology have the potential to be the future of how money is transacted? Juniper Research seems to think so. The company is releasing a new report that forecasts that global NFC mobile contactless payment transactions will reach nearly $50 billion worldwide by 2014.

2. Salesforce Invests In Video Messaging Startup (And Skype Rival) VSee
VSee, a video collaboration service provider, has received a capital injection from Salesforce, TechCrunch has learned. The amount was not disclosed, but we’ve been informed that the investment amounted to ‘multiple millions of dollars’.

3. Apple tries to tighten its grip on media with Newsstand
Slowly but surely, Apple is trying to convince more media companies to play in its sandbox, and the latest move is an iBooks-style digital news stand for iPhone and iPad. As part of the raft of new features and services it announced at its annual Worldwide Developers Conference on Monday, Apple launched the Newsstand — a single interface for all of a user’s subscriptions to newspapers and magazines. Whether the new offering will convince more publishers to sign up and hand over 30 percent of their subscription revenues to the company remains to be seen.

4. Movie & TV streams still missing from Apple’s iCloud
Here’s one feature you won’t find in Apple’s new iCloud service: video syncing. The cloud-based media storage service introduced at Apple’s WWDC conference in San Francisco on Monday offers the ability to sync your personal music library with the cloud without uploading any of the actual files, making it possible to access thousands of songs on any of your devices in a matter of minutes. Apple calls this feature Music Match, and charges users $24.99 per year to instantly access their personal music library online.

5. Apple Didn’t Tell Mobile Carriers About iMessage
When Apple announced iOS 5 yesterday, one of the new apps that was unveiled it called iMessage, it is basically a messaging app that will let you send and receive messages to other iOS devices similar to BlackBerry Messaging.

BONUS

6. RIM acquires Scoreloop to take social gaming to a whole new level
RIM has just announced that it has acquired Scoreloop, one of the pioneers in mobile social gaming.

7. Sorting Through Apple’s Many Announcements
Yesterday, at Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC), Steve Jobs took the stage to reveal what the company’s been up to. Turns out the answer is: a lot.

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5 Tech Stories Worth Reading

1. i’mWatch The Android Powered Wristwatch
We have seen quite a few different watches that can be used with your smartphone here at Geeky Gadgets, but I think this may be the first one that is powered by Google’s Android OS, the i’mWatch.

2. Instagram Turns Your Likes Into Photo Albums
Social photo app Instagram pushed out a new update today on the iPhone. The first thing you notice is that uploads are a lot faster. Speed, quite frankly, is one of Instagram’s competitive advantages. But the update also includes some new features, the most important of which is the ability to see all the photos you’ve liked in the past.

3. Clouds Are Like Buses: Public Isn’t Always Better
Since the concept of “private cloud” was introduced, there have been efforts by certain people to prove it “wrong” or show that it doesn’t make sense when compared with the public cloud. This seems like a silly crusade, not because I’m a supporter of private cloud (which I am), but because both provide tremendous value if you actually understand the value that “cloud” has delivered to the industry.

4. Spending More Time Outdoors May Help Prevent Nearsightedness
Playing outside is one of the great joys of childhood, and studies now indicate this sun exposure may also help prevent kids from developing myopia, a.k.a. nearsightedness—if they spend enough time outdoors.

5. The Power Of Online-To-Offline Is Moving Beyond Local Commerce
While the idea of ‘online to offline’ for purchasing is proving to be powerful in the local commerce world, the trend of linking the physical world to the web is producing a number of startups that are innovating beyond just purchasing from local merchants or finding a product nearby. Many of the most interesting startups that have emerged over the past year or so are making our lives in the real world better; using data, location and curation as their competitive weapons.

BONUS

6. 6 Free E-Books and Tutorials on HTML5
HTML5 is popular for building rich Web sites as well as cross-platform mobile applications. And it looks like with Windows 8 Microsoft is embracing using HTML5 and JavaScript as a paradigm for building desktop applications as well. With everyone from Apple to Microsoft embracing HTML5 as "the future," if you don't know it yet, you should probably get started.

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Pulse Ups The Ante On Mobile News Consumption

Pulse, an iPhone app that presents news and blog feeds in a grid fashion has upped the ante with their latest release.

So far I think Pulse is the best iPhone app on the market. And now you can access the app on any web enabled device using their new website, pulse.me. This is huge. Another feature that rocks this app is the ability to save an article for future reading. In the past I've had to email the link to myself so I could read it when I had time.

And Pulse now allows you to send article links to Instapaper and Evernote. Again, this is huge on many levels. The ability to send content to Evernote is great for me because I use It throughout my day.

Take some time to check out Pulse, you'll be glad you did.

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