Category: Tech news

 For a split second, Alphabet was the most valuable company in the world. Not so much any more, however, with the company’s market cap continuing to slide after it reported its first-quarter earnings. Relatively speaking, shares of Alphabet are only down around 5 percent in extended trading. But for a company worth more than $500 billion, that’s erasing tens of billions of dollars… Read More

 GE’s gadget-invention partner FirstBuild is launching Pique, a cold-brew coffee maker for the home.
Coffee has turned from a daily routine into somewhat of an art form in the last few years, with drip makers, the French press, single-serve cups, pour-over and an endless supply of the latest hi-tech machines that will whip up any bean-flavored concoction to your liking.
Note most of… Read More

 Home loans are the Holy Grail of online lending. They come with high loan balances, steady returns and hefty fees. There also is a healthy liquid market for the securitized loans, and the debt is asset backed, which reduces risk and opens up the investor pool. On top of that, “establishment” mortgage lenders are not leading the pack with innovation, which means there is a lot of… Read More

 A lot of people live with the idea that life is about experiences rather than things. A firm subscriber of that philosophy is Honeyfund — a company whose new Honeyfund app helps newlyweds bankroll their honeymoon, rather than stocking their house with half a dozen different bread makers. Read More

 The Norwegian chapter of writers’ rights organization PEN International is suing its own government in an attempt to make it safe for Edward Snowden to accept the prestigious Ossietzky Prize in person — without fear of extradition to the United States. Read More

 One for those of us with a lead foot: Ford is rolling out a new Speed Limiter feature. The car uses a camera to read the speed limit signs before giving you a heads up if your velocity is making you a police-magnet. For now, the technology is only being rolled out on the company’s European line of cars, but that market is a particularly good match: There are more than 35,000 speed… Read More

 Gillmor Gang – Dan Farber, Frank Radice, Keith Teare, Kevin Marks, and Steve Gillmor. LIVE recording session today at 11amPT/2pmET.
Gillmor Gang LIVE chatroom during live show recording
Gillmor Gang on Facebook HERE Read More

 A new iPhone application launching today called Plastiq lets you pay any bill with your credit or debit card just by snapping a photo. The goal with the app is to offer something designed for mobile, that’s also more convenient than using a bank’s online bill pay feature. And more importantly, it allows bills to be paid with plastic – hence the name – as opposed to… Read More

 Yes, there were some new fitness devices, a phone, and a gaming desktop (complete with its own giant piece of luggage), but the real news at Acer’s One World Trade Center-adjacent press conference (aside from some notably stunning views of lower Manhattan) was notebooks. And notebooks and notebooks. Hard to say precisely which device was top dog here, but seeing as how we kicked things… Read More

 Google and Sony today announced that the Android N Developer Preview is now available on Sony’s Xperia Z3. This marks the first time the next version of Android — which is currently available in its second beta — is available outside of Google’s own phones and the 4G Android One from General Mobile, which also runs stock Android. Sony isn’t typically all that… Read More

The Danish company Bang & Olufsen has released a new Bluetooth speaker, the Beoplay A1, which comes pre-accessorized with a quaint little leather strap. The post Review: Beoplay A1 appeared first on WIRED.

 Apple today is unveiling an overhaul to its App Store developer website, a resource available to the 11 million registered developers worldwide who have helped to grow the App Store to now over 1.5 million applications. The updated site will include new articles and videos which are aimed at helping developers better understand how to grow their businesses and engage users. For example, some… Read More

 We aren’t done yet. We’ve got some more new faces for you here at TechCrunch, and they’re good ones. First up, Brian Heater has worked at a number of tech pubs, including PCMag, Laptop and Engadget, where he served as the Director of Media. Most recently, he was as the Managing Editor of TechTimes.com. His writing has appeared in Spin, Wired, Playboy, Entertainment Weekly,… Read More

Facebook 86’ed The Shade Room from its platform today for unknown reasons. The celebrity gossip and news publisher attracted about 4.2 million followers on Facebook. We reached out to The Shade Room and to Facebook to learn why its page disappeared. Facebook did not yet reply to our inquiry, but we’ll update this story as it develops. Angie Nwandu, The Shade Room founder, and… Read More

 Many of the world’s legendary tech companies got started just as the public markets were cooling off; Microsoft, Apple, HP, IBM, Oracle, FedEx, etc. The most recent case in point is the startup class of 2008-2009: Dropbox, Airbnb, Pinterest, Uber and Tiny Speck (Slack) all got their early funding in those dismal years. And, while not everyone agrees that there is a massive downturn in… Read More