Category: Tech news

 Oh, you thought Elon Musk had moved on past the whole Hyperloop thing? That ultra high-speed transportation system he first started talking about back in 2013?
That’s understandable — it’s been a while since he’s said much about it.
He’s still thinking about it, though. In fact, he’s just committed to building a test track for the concept. Read More

 While smartphone users continue to be obsessed with snapping photos of everything around them/every angle of their person, developers will continue to come up with new ways to share those photos. And so the photo sharing apps keep on coming. Read More

 The Google Glass project is entering a new phase today as the company is moving it out of its Google X skunkworks and turning it into a standalone project within the company, a Google spokesperson confirmed to us today. As part of this change, Glass will now be overseen by former Apple executive and Nest founder Tony Fadell. Just like before, the day-to-day operation will be run by Ivy Ross… Read More

 This afternoon, mobile app marketing platform Fiksu unveiled new data indicating that iOS 9, the next version of Apple’s mobile operating system, is now being publicly tested. According to the company’s research, Fiksu says it has now seen 145 distinct IDFAs (Identifier for Advertisers) in 2015 which hail from iOS 9 devices. The IDFA, a marker used by mobile advertisers, is a… Read More

 Mobile startup accelerator Tandem is announcing that it has closed a third fund totaling $100 million — a big step up from its second, $33 million fund. Tandem has previously backed startups like Bash Gaming (acquired by GSN), lost-item tracker Tile, and PlayHaven (now known as Upsight). It invests $200,000 initially and also brings startups to its Burlingame, Calif. offices for a… Read More

 Tonight we might get a glimpse of the kinder, gentler Uber, but we won’t be able to talk about it. The startup has endured months of disastrous press coverage, including Uber exec Emil Michael saying the company should smear journalists that criticize it.
Now the company has emailed reporters saying “The Uber Communications Team invites you to join us for drinks” at a San… Read More

 Chances are, no venture capital pitch deck you’ve ever seen had a slide entitled “Worker Classification.” And yet, many companies in the “sharing economy” or “on-demand economy” (ODE) rely on workforces whose legal status may be in jeopardy. Read More

 An app that measures your sexual performance? An anti-drunk dialer? A set of Rorschach tests that tell you how stoned you are? Watch the video above to see if you can tell which of these absurd startups are fake and which are real…signs the tech industry has lost its mind. I played this “App Or Crap” game on stage in front of a live audience as a guest on The Kinda Late… Read More

 Tinder has just closed its first acquisition. The IAC-backed startup has purchased Chill, creators of Tappy, as part of a strategic acquihire. The terms of the deal were not disclosed. Tappy is a mobile messenger that uses photos and ephemerality to put a new face on text messaging. All messages disappear after 24 hours, and Tappy’s conversations must begin with a photo. From there, you… Read More

 For the tenth and final episode of Built in Brooklyn, we tried to do something a little different — instead of visiting another startup, we talked to the team at HappyFunCorp, a design and engineering firm that’s helped a bunch of local startups get off the ground. HappyFunCorp’s clients include New York City companies like Boxee, CoPromote, Paperless Post, and SimpleReach.… Read More

 The first week of 2015 was CES for me, which meant working out of a suitcase in a bizarre fantasy land hewn from hard desert rock, grit and little else. My home office is a veritable oasis of displays and screen real estate, while my mobile CES office most definitely is not. Luckily, this year, I had a review unit of the Ten One Design Mountie on hand, and it made a big difference in my… Read More

 At the surface, the products made with a MarkForged Mark One printer don’t look like they’d be very strong. Printed in a crude-looking white and beige filament, the wrenches and tools demoed by founder Greg Mark at CES this year looked like any other 3D-printed object – flimsy and unfinished. However, once you tried to break them, amazement set in. The wrench he built based… Read More

 Senator Ted Cruz of Texas will chair the Senate subcommittee on Space, Science, and Competitiveness, providing him with an oversight role of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, better known as NASA.
That slight twinge you felt was the proper emotion. The Senator, by way of a single example, tried to reduce NASA funding to be, in his view, compliant with a Federal spending cut. Read More

 Teddy the Guardian, unlike his animatronic cousin, Teddy Ruxpin, will not terrify your children. Teddy is actually a vital signs sensor that allows parents to check a child’s temperature and heart rate with a single tap of the bear’s paw. Because it’s also a beloved toy, the child won’t be frightened and doctors and parents can see the results inside a mobile app in… Read More

 Demandware announced today that it bought Tomax, a cloud-based point of sale company for approximately $75M in cash and incentives.
According to Demandware CEO Tom Ebling, the acquisition extends Demandware’s reach from eCommerce websites to the brick-and-mortar storefront. Ebling said that they were attracted to Tomax for several reasons.
First of all, like Demandware, they are… Read More