SEO Werkt!

Just in time for Halloween, artist Pete Townshend of The Who has branded Apple’s music business a “digital vampire,” suggesting that iTunes profits from music without giving popular artists all the benefits they enjoyed under the record labels and music publishers.

Anyone who has ever used a MacBook Pro can tell you that they can get awfully toasty after a little while. Countless laptop cooling solutions have hit store shelves over the years, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen one quite as handsome as the TILT by madMINDS.

Designed by Clinton and Spencer Yee, the TILT is a cooling pad designed specifically for use with the unibody Macbook Pros. To their credit, using a TILT with a Macbook Pro looks completely natural thanks to the cooling pad’s slim profile and the faux-aluminum look of the TILT’s polycarbonate body. Setup is both simple and secure — just latch your MBP into place with the TILT’s patent-pending locking mechanism, and plug a cable into your USB port. Easy peasy.

There’s a lot to like about the TILT, but my favorite feature is probably the most easily overlooked. Flip the thing over and you’ll find a tiny screw hole that fits a standard tripod mount. The TILT’s locking latch is apparently robust enough to keep the whole package stable and usable even if you lash to the the top of a tripod. It’s a thoughtful if minor addition that’s sure to please videographers and fans of standing desks alike.

The Kickstarter project currently has 77 backers, and those looking to get in on the ground floor need only pitch in $45 to score a TILT when they’re released. Be warned though: the brothers Yee have only seen fit to design the TILT for the 15-inch model, so 13 and 17-inch users will have to look elsewhere for their well-designed cooling fix.

It hits you when you least expect it. It slips away under a mask of dormant inactivity. And it can ruin your entire day.

It’s your iPhone 4S battery life, and it sucks.

It’s been 17 days since the iPhone 4S was released — 19 since iOS 5 — and just like the madness that was Antennagate, complaints are churning out left and right. As Erick so clearly pointed out, the iPhone 4S is meant to offer 8 hours of talk time, or “up to 6 hours” of Internet use on 3G. For so many of us — including iPod touch and iPhone-not-4Ses running iOS 5 — that simply isn’t the case. But there may be hope.

To start, there are a few possible bugs in iOS 5 that may be sucking an inordinate amount of life out of your battery: a calendar bug and a time zone bug (one of which can be summarily blamed on location services, as can most of the other battery life killers in iOS 5/iPhone 4S).

The calendar bug is still somewhat unclear, but has been reported in Apple forums. Basically, when your calendar app is turned on in the Notifications Center, events are “re-ordering themselves near-constantly,” which sucks the life straight out of the phone. The only fix as of now, unfortunately, seems to be disabling the calendar app within the Notifications center.

The Time Zone bug, however, seems to be solved (although again, by disabling things). Oliver Haslam over at iDownloadBlog noticed, like many of us, that iOS 5 was sucking his iPhone 4 battery dry. He realized that by going into Settings > Location Services > System Services (all the way at the bottom) > Setting Time Zone, and toggling off the location services, his battery life nearly doubled. According to Haslam, iOS 5 probably has a bug that constantly pings the servers to update location, and thus update time zone settings.

When it comes down to it, iOS 5′s location services are most usually the culprit in cases of random battery life drainage for no apparent reason. It allows your apps and other services to ping for your location way more often than before, but in many cases it’s totally unnecessary (like TapTap Revenge, for example). Just head into Settings > Location Services and browse through the various apps using the phone’s location. The option to turn it off for some apps but not others is there for a reason; use it.

Don’t forget to dip back into System Services (yep, all the way at the bottom), and disable anything you deem unworthy. Diagnostics & Usage should fall into that category, as it merely sends back information to Apple about the way you use your phone and where. And, any one of the services you turn off can always be turned back on. No harm done.

Email, especially with certain settings, can really wear on your battery since the Mail app can be set to ping mail servers almost constantly. An easy way to help spare some green bar is to really take a look at your account(s) and what you need out of them. If most of your emails tend to be about daily deals or new book releases, do you really need them pushed immediately to your phone? Axe push if you can, and if your accounts don’t support it anyway, play with your update timings and try to find the right balance between being in the loop and being able to use your phone.

Siri uses up a lot of processing power, but I wouldn’t kill her for it. Siri is one of the iPhone 4S’s best features, and other sacrifices can be made to save her.

Then, of course, the basics: turn off Wifi and Bluetooth, turn down screen brightness, and keep the phone out of the sun and/or heat. Oh, and if you have such crappy service that you’re not really able to use your phone much anyway, you might as well just switch it to Airplane mode. It’ll stop the phone from working so hard to connect and maintain that connection, and should last you much longer once you’re in a place you can actually use it.

The truth is there isn’t some quick fix or magical solution to this problem. It’s a question of priorities. Which apps, which notifications, which location services are worth a speedier death for your iPhone? In the end, it’s your decision. At least until Apple rolls out an update to iOS 5 and squashes a few of these issues.

Sensitive to privacy issues surrounding ad targeting, Google is opening the kimono to consumers about why certain search and Gmail ads are targeted to certain people. The company is launching an additional section to its ad preference center — where users can already manage targeting criteria…



Please visit Search Engine Land for the full article.

Met de komst van Siri wordt stembesturing van apparaten weer wat actueler. Soms kan het echter ook tot vervelende, maar ook grappige, problemen leiden Zoals je in onderstaande video kunt zien.
De stemherkenning van Jack ’30 Rock’ Donaghy’s TV is ……

Mac: HUDTube is not your standard web video downloader as it focuses on eliminating the wait time and just making it more pleasant to watch the videos you want on your desktop or laptop. All you do is drag the video URL from your browser to HUDTube’s dock icon and it’ll instantly open it up in a minimalistic video player for immediate viewing. More »

All too often, Silicon Valley is considered the premier place to launch and grow a technology-based company.  And, no doubt, the Valley has certainly earned its reputation as a hotbed for innovation, entrepreneurship and venture capital. One can’t deny the long list of successes including Hewlett-Packard, Apple, Intel, Oracle and Google, to name only a few.But look around today and you’ll note many technology companies, especially start-ups, experiencing success outside of the Valley.

Thriving start-ups are sprouting up across the United States in cities like Dallas, Chicago, Miami and Atlanta, (which is home to my company, Vitrue). These cities are providing start-ups with an environment for success and producing additional benefits along the way. How exactly? And why does it matter? A few thoughts come to mind…

Big Businesses Are Nationwide, Not Valley-Centric.

Technology start-ups are doing business with big brands and the vast majority are not located in the Valley. The Fortune 500companies are diversely spread throughout the U.S. – to name a few: Texas boasts 51, Georgia has 14, Michigan hosts 22 and Virginia and Minnesota have 20 each. This is extremely beneficial for start-ups as proximity to these larger organizations will greatly impact resources available, open doors for new opportunities and support a larger business community.Let’s look at the Dallas area to start. This region is home to an important economic community supported by large, global companies and brands like Southwest and American Airlines, Kimberly-Clark, AMR and Exxon as well as more tech-focused companies like AT&T and Texas Instruments. And start-ups in these areas have access to a whole community of business opportunities. Match.com has certainly been able to find success with their roots in Dallas.

By being close to the action, start-ups are on the pulse of what works for businesses – and thinking of B2B companies in particular, they’re also creating demand for many of the start-ups’ services. I specifically recognize a huge growth area in social media and cloud computing. Companies are grappling with if and how they should incorporate it into their business processes, from CRM to marketing to customer support, and there is a ton of innovation in this space. Zooming in on Atlanta, thriving B2B companies like Red Hat and start-ups, such as MailChimp and Scoutmob, can leverage potential opportunities presented by neighbors like Coca-Cola, Home Depot, UPS and Delta.

Avoiding Valley Tunnel Vision.

The Bay Area is well-known for its counterculture, protest spirit and an environment that embraces new ideas and risk-taking. But with the growth of the Valley as the hub for technology companies, perhaps we are experiencing a bit of tunnel vision when it comes to innovation and creative thinking. Start-ups that grow in the Valley are surrounded by some excellent mentors and success stories, but maybe they are lacking the real-world perspective about solutions companies truly need. Many start-ups are moving beyond this Valley Vision into other major markets, and creating objective product pipelines and offering a holistic mindset with the ‘general public’s’ enterprise needs in tow. These start-ups understand that not all customers are interested in the new coolest gadget, but are instead looking for technology solutions that meet critical needs and effective ROI. And this broader perspective works.We’re even seeing B2B start-ups not headquartered in major metropolitan cities finding tremendous success outside the Valley’s zip code: look no further than Salesforce’s acquisition of Radian6, a social monitoring solution, located in New Brunswick, Canada, or the recently acquired RightNow Technologies by Oracle, headquartered out of Bozeman, Montana.

Even this past weekend, Mark Zuckerberg acknowledged that if he were to start Facebook today, he would’ve started it in Boston… “In Silicon Valley, you get this feeling that you have to be out here. But it’s not the only place to be.”

Believe it. Talent is Abundant Outside of The Valley.

Part of the reason we are seeing such great traction with start-ups outside the Valley is because the qualified talent pool is in no way limited to the Bay area. Although Silicon Valley might be praised for hoarding top engineering talent, non-Valley start-ups receive their fair share of talent too, often establishing relationships with renowned engineering and entrepreneurial school programs around the country: think Georgia Tech, Emory and Georgia State in Atlanta; University of Illinois and University of Chicago; University of Texas in Austin; and the quadruple punch of N.C. State, UNC, Duke and Wake Forest in Raleigh’s metropolitan area. These non-Valley companies draw in a young, entrepreneurial and passionate workforce, bubbling with innovative ideas. And hey, with the cost of living in these regions, start-ups have an advantage of operating at a lower cost and still offering employees a high quality of life in a cool, urban living environment.

Spreading the Wealth is Good for Our American Economic and Innovative Engines.

The parity of technology companies and hotbeds spreading across America, as opposed to only one location, is beneficial to not only start-ups but to American innovation and economics. According to the Kauffman Index, which ranked the U.S.’s top 15 states with high entrepreneurial activity, New York City was listed as number one, Chicago was not far behind in third place, Dallas in fourth and Atlanta listed as number nine (San Francisco was trailing behind at eleventh).

Since its birth, the United States has been a pioneer in industrial, business, and technological advancements for society: Henry Ford and the automobile; Thomas Edison and the light bulb; and Alexander Graham Bell and the telephone. But in today’s global and increasingly competitive world, many have voiced concerns that America is falling behind with innovation. Although I disagree with that — hello iPad, iPhone — it is now as important as ever to promote and foster technological innovation and production across numerous cities and locations to help prosper our innovation, technology and economic output worldwide.  And that’s good for everyone.

I certainly don’t discount the importance of Silicon Valley. At Vitrue, it’s a priority to stay connected to the latest technology innovations and companies to keep our product best-in-breed, and many of those connections take place within the Valley. But start-ups don’t have to be “headquartered” in the Valley to grow and thrive. Countless young companies are proof positive you don’t need a Silicon Valley zip code to be a success.

This was a guest post by Reggie Bradford, founder and CEO of Atlanta-based Vitrue, a SaaS social marketing platform for global brands and agencies. He enjoys speaking about his experience starting a technology company outside of the Valley.

Filed under: VentureBeat

Google has been investing heavily in their social network, Google+, by adding features. Today Google rolled out integration with Google Reader to make it easier to share news articles and comments on Google+ and they released an update to the Google+ Android app. The new version of Google+ for Android includes a user interface update, navigation improvements, battery life improvements, and more.
continued…

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Outfit7, creators of the “Talking Friends” mobile games, announced today it has seen 225 million downloads only 5 and a half months after announcing 100 million.

Talking Friends is a set of mobile applications catering to children. These friends come in a variety of animals and fantasy creatures that “listen” to what the child says and repeats the statement. You can make recordings, play with each character’s unique features and buy outfits.

Since the launch of Talking Tom (pictured right) in July 2010, Outfit7 hired on talent agent Ari Emanuel to take these characters out of the smart phone and on to the silver screen, among other media channels. The company is trying to take a Pixar-like approach to their characters, making them appealing for children of all ages. Also since launching, chief executive Andrej Nabergoj left Outfit7 and remains quiet about his endeavors. But the company, with its new executive chairman Narry Singh, believes its latest numbers will boost its growth beyond the mobile grid.

“These numbers are getting us into a very different stage and kind of company,” said Singh in an interview with VentureBeat. “Our users lives are obviously not just on the smartphone.”

With Emanuel on board, Outfit7 is executing plans to extend the characters into books, television, movies, and more. At the same time, Singh believes the next wave of children’s entertainment may not go from big screen to small, but the other way around. Specifically, we’ve seen Angry Birds creator Rovio team up with streaming television set-top company Roku to bring the popular mobile app to TV.

“We fundamentally believe that for the next Harry Potter…the likely hood of it coming from the mobile market will be much higher than traditional ways,” said Singh.

Outfit7′s growth adds to their prediction. The company has seen monthly active users triple to 60 million and revenue continues to grow. It has users in over 100 countries, 51 percent of their audience has downloaded 2 or more apps, and 20 percent have downloaded 4 or more. Indeed, the end goal is to have the Talking Friends take on a Pokemon-type model: Gotta download ‘em all.

Outfit7 hopes these numbers will help it reel in more attractive partners in the entertainment sector and expects to make more announcements about its progress with Emanuel as well as which new media channel the Talking Friends will appear in first in the coming months.

Filed under: games, mobile, VentureBeat

There’s a new rumor that Apple is considering killing off the Mac Pro soon. No further info is provided, and an Apple spokesperson recently told Ars that the current lineup won’t change before Christmas, but we wouldn’t be shocked to see such a thing happen in the next couple years.

Read More:
AppleInsider

Read the comments on this post