Category: Tech news

TechCrunch TV is using a LiveU mobile pack provided by our partner Ustream for our live streaming coverage from CES. Our camera connects to the pack via a HDMI connector cable. But at the end of our evening Showstoppers coverage, the HDMI plug snapped and broke. At 10pm in Las Vegas, how do you find a replacement HDMI plug? Actually, of all the places in the world to have this happen, we were in the right place.

John Biggs suggested we look around the exhibit hall. So, I spied a large monitor at one of the booths that was using a HDMI cable. I offered to buy it from the exhibitor after the event. They suggested an even better solution.

The exhibitor at the booth next to them was Perfect Path. They were showing what they claim was the industry’s first Locking HDMI Connector. The company says their patented plug has four times the holding retention of our regular HDMI connector. They happily provided us one for free. And the locking feature really does make make the connection much more solid. If you pull lightly on the cable, it won’t come out.

Problem solved. Thanks guys.

Boxee is one of the rare success stories of a software company making the leap to consumer electronics. The formula is simple: a clear message combined with a solid product. Having smart and passionate people help too. And as shown by this video shot at TechCrunch’s CES booth, Boxee has both.

Boxee’s Avner Ronen, CEO & co-founder, sat down with John Biggs to talk about Boxee’s upcoming releases but also the emergence of smart TVs.

Boxee has a very unique perspective having participated in the smart tv platform before it was called such a thing. Boxee hopes to be there to the end. As Avner explained, the future of TV is not apps. TV is a passive device and the challenge is to get real content to the consumer. That’s where the Boxee Box comes in.

Starting yesterday, January 11th, Boxee is accepting pre-orders for the ATSC USB tuner. Just plug this guy into a Boxee Box and connect an antenna to add OTA stations to the Boxee Box. As Avner says, it’s great for cable cutters. But as a Boxee Box owner myself, the device is perfect to supplement live TV as well.

“I’m flattered Facebook was inspired by turntable.fm and created a listen together feature” says co-founder Billy Chasen about Facebook’s new synchronous music listening and chat feature Listen With. Chasen tells me “I look forward to seeing how they interpret what social music means as we seem to have different core philosophies about it (such as the importance of discovering new music from strangers and not just friends).” Chasen seems to think that only listening to what your friends enjoy won’t provide discovery as adventurous as Turntable.fm’s public rooms.

When Turntable.fm first started in January 2011 (or even when it started rolling out in May), it probably didn’t see Facebook at a competitor. At the time Facebook had no official music partnerships. Turntable.fm’s approach facilitated both private listening amongst friends and big public rooms of strangers exposing each other to new artists.

At f8, though, Facebook launched music partnerships with Spotify, Rdio, and other services to share their users’ listening activity with friends. Turntable.fm began looking dangerously close to the synchronous listening experience many speculated Facebook would launch, and today they were proved right. Suddenly, there’s a much easier way to listen with friends through the ubiquitous Facebook’s ever-present Chat. Listen With’s integration with on-demand music streaming services mean users can not only discover songs through friends, but go back and play them on their own.

Listen With only works with friends, though, leaving an opportunity for Turntable.fm. Your friends may have music tastes too similar to your own to help you find truly new music. That’s surely what Turntable.fm is hoping. However, I think close friends can still have relatively diverse tastes, or at least know about musicians you’ve never heard of from within your favorite genres. Additionally, Listen With offers more intimate chat rooms that trigger notifications. These make it easy to discuss new music with the person introducing it to you, thereby providing a richer experience.

Turntable.fm will still be able to trade on its gamification, where users earn points to spend on cooler avatars when people think their song choices are ‘awesome’.  It doesn’t require a complicated signup and is entirely browser-based, streamlining the onboarding process. Also, the slick graphics make it more fun as a primary experience.

Still, when it comes to sustained use in the background, those elements don’t matter much. Facebook’s Listen With lives where people and their friends already spend their time, so I don’t think Turntable.fm will be able to compete on social listening.

If discovering new music from strangers is Chasen’s philosophy, Turntable.fm will need to ramp up features to support it. That means courting celebrity DJs and charity DJ battles. Also, improving how users browse and select a public room to enter. It could ask users to categorize their rooms by genre or mood, or detect a room’s beats per minute average. That way those bored of their friends’ music and seeking something really fresh to listen to will make Turntable.fm their destination.

As part of the ongoing trend of coding literacy among a more mainstream audience, Treehouse, a startup that teaches people how to program online has developed Code Racer, a game that teaches people how to code by pitting them up against other people  also learning how to code, building, appropriately enough, some kind of race car related website.

To start Code Racer either move straight into “Play” or watch a video tutorial with the basics beforehand. Users can play up to four opponents, and can toggle the “Help” button whenever an exercise gets too hard for them. The objective is to be fast, “It’s the game mechanic that makes the game fun,” says Treehouse co-founder Ryan Carson, “You’ll get beat quite a few times as a newbie, but you’ll learn the code along the way.”

And yes, you can mute the horrible music by pressing the “Mute music” button at the top of the game.

“We feel that a lot of services are starting too advanced,” says Carson, “You have to learn basic HTML/CSS before you can learn JavaScript. Code Racer helps you learn how to build a very basic web page. You can then move on to basic programming.”

So far I’ve gotten my ass kicked playing it, but have also learned a couple things — like how the hell your code gets pushed to the Internet in the first place (Yeah, I didn’t know that. Thanks Ryan). Apparently Treehouse students learn this key fact in Lesson one.

“To become a decent designer/developer [through Treehouse] it’d probably take about 3-6 months,” says Carson, “It depends how quickly you could get through our curriculum.” When students are finished with the program, Treehouse then tries to place you at a job or internship with partners like Facebook, LivingSocial and WordPress.

The Treehouse crew built Code Racer in three days and documented the entire process on Vimeo (below). Curriculum on Treehouse costs $25 for the Silver plan or $49 for the Gold monthly and the company has already 2 million in revenue — unsurprisingly increasing by a rate of $1 million every three months.

My normal process for reviewing audio gear is about a two-week routine: Listen to a wide range of music, take notes along the way, and then bang out a pithy review. When I put the Beyerdynamic T5p headphones on, I knew that the normal routine wouldn’t suffice. Give these cans back after a mere two weeks? Fugetaboutit. One summer and fall later….

The T5ps reek of quality right out of the box. There’s the high-grade, sturdy aluminum frame with slick design details throughout. The cables are perfectly supple. The super-cush leather earpads and headband feature intricate stitching that’s done by hand in Germany. Did Mercedes-Benz start a headphone factory?

In a nutshell, the T5p is a luxurious full-size, high-quality headphone that can handle portable music devices such as iPods and iPhones, but also performs great as an everyday headphone for home or office use.

The T5p comfort factor is as good as any headphone I’ve put on, and the pressure is perfect — enough to give you a tight seal, but not too much that it causes fatigue. With the closed-back design, the T5p also minimizes audio leakage, and helps filter out ambient sounds. It won’t compare to a noise-canceling rig, but does the job in most cafes and outdoor spaces. The accessories include a compact felt storage case, gold-plated mini stereo jack plug (3.5 mm), a ¼-inch adapter, and a 10-foot extension cable.

With just about any type of music you put on, the first thing you notice about the T5p is the outstanding midrange clarity. In particular with acoustic music, the separation between instruments and transparency is remarkable, even when an iPod is providing the power. When you throw on something more demanding — say a Radiohead or TV On the Radio album — the T5p is able to perfectly control the balance between instruments so that nothing is overemphasized or lost in the mix.

If you want to nitpick, the T5p might a touch bright for some tastes, favoring the treble and high end. But this clarity and transparency is also an attribute — it helps bring out the depth and detail in music, and adds to the vividness that these cans have in spades. The bass is good or great, depending on the source — hooked into my home amp, the T5p produced some deep, tight bass response, whereas with the iPod it was solid, but not quite as impressive.

In short, you will be hard-pressed to find a better all-around headphone than the T5p. Hooked into your home system, it brings out the full expression in most any type of music, and makes it sound more realistic and compelling with its convincing soundstage. On the road, you get high-quality sound, comfort, and the feeling of being awfully spoiled when you’re surrounded by earbud nation.

Now here’s the rub: The T5p will set you back a cool $1,300. I know, I know, you’re saying, “For 1,300 bills, I could buy a used El Camino, possibly one with a cassette deck.” True enough. But serious hi-fi gear never comes cheap, friends, and the Beyerdynamic T5p is most definitely a serious set of cans. Given the build quality, it wouldn’t surprise me if this set of T5ps lasted a good 10 to 15 years before showing its age, whereas most cans start to fall apart after five years of use. And given the state of the stock market these days, maybe investing in high-end stereo gear isn’t such a crazy idea after all.

WIRED In a class of its own for portable cans. Build quality is top notch — these will be durable for decades, not just years. 32 ohms of impedance makes them plenty loud on portable rigs, so there’s no need for a headphone amp.

TIRED Errrrm, uh, the carrying case isn’t gold-plated?

Photos by Jim Merithew/Wired

Armed with one of Apple’s video-out adapters, you can connect your iDevice to any projector and cobble together a poor-man’s home theater. Or you can connect your iDevice to Epson’s MegaPlex MG-850HD and enjoy an awesome-man’s home theater.

This 720p projector turns your iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad into the hub of your entertainment center, plastering movies, YouTube videos, photo slideshows and other visual content onto the nearest screen or wall.

Sound familiar? You might be thinking of the Optoma Neo-I and Wowwee Cinemin Slice pico projectors that debuted earlier this year. But the MegaPlex is no wussy pico; it cranks out 2,800 lumens worth of brightness using a 3LCD light engine. It also comes with a surprisingly robust pair of 10-watt speakers. This is a big-boy projector.

But not necessarily a business one. The MG-850HD stands 4.6 inches tall and weighs 8.6 pounds, so it’s not carry-on-friendly. No, this is a mobile cinema for the home, one that can easily take turns between sleepovers in the basement, movie night in the living room and Californication marathons in the bedroom.

Like many projectors, this one sports top-accessible focus and zoom wheels, plus a manual keystone correction control. And it supplies inputs aplenty, including HDMI and component video, so you can feed it anything from a cable box to a Roku box to an Xbox. But the big attraction is the iThing dock, which conveniently recharges your device while sucking the sweet, sweet videos from it.

Keep in mind, however, that the rear-facing dock leads to a rear-facing touchscreen, which can make it difficult to interact with your device, depending on where you place the projector. The included remote, which drives Epson’s simplistic menu system, obviates the need for some screen interaction, but if you’re running an app like Netflix, the menus and remote are as ineffectual as Congress before a vacation break.

Speaking of Netflix, that’s currently the only non-iTunes app that can play video on the MegaPlex. Crackle, HBO Go, Hulu Plus — they’re all unwilling to share. It’s the app developers’ fault, not Epson’s, but it’s still a disappointment. On the flip side, you can use the MegaPlex as a speaker dock with apps like Pandora and Slacker, as well as with your own music library.

Of course, a projector is made for projecting, and the MG-850HD does a stellar job of it. On my review unit, colors looked rich without a trace of oversaturation, and dark and brightly lit scenes alike demonstrated strong black and white levels, respectively. And audio? It booms. No, it’s not 5.1-channel surround, but it gets the job done.

For not much more than the price of a typical 720p projector, the MegaPlex MG-850HD provides a complete and satisfying home theater experience powered by your favorite iDevice.

WIRED Docks Apple devices and plays all the media within. Movies sound great and look even better. Simple controls on both the projector and its onscreen menus. Clever “coffee break” button pauses the video but turns the image white so you can find your way in the dark. Carrying handle makes for easy transport between rooms.

TIRED iPad use requires a clunky plastic bracket. Remote doesn’t work with apps like Netflix, and only some of its buttons are backlit. Some of the best third-party video apps aren’t compatible.

This morning, Google began rolling out a major change to its core search engine that intertwines results from Google+ (and Picasa) with the ‘normal’ algorithmically-generated results we’ve come to expect. There have been plenty of critiques of the news, including John Battelle’s discussion on how this isn’t actually integrating ‘Your World’, as Google calls it, but rather just its own social network.

And now there’s another critic that’s coming out swinging: Twitter.

Earlier today the company’s General Counsel Alex Macgillivray, who was a top attorney at Google prior to making the jump to Twitter, called it “A bad day for the Internet”, and stated that some of his former colleagues were likely upset by the decision to “warp” Google’s results. And now Twitter itself has followed up with a statement denouncing the feature — and rather relying on the wishy-washy PR speak big companies are fond of, it’s very direct.

Here’s the full statement:

For years, people have relied on Google to deliver the most relevant results anytime they wanted to find something on the Internet.

Often, they want to know more about world events and breaking news. Twitter has emerged as a vital source of this real-time information, with more than 100 million users sending 250 million Tweets every day on virtually every topic. As we’ve seen time and time again, news breaks first on Twitter; as a result, Twitter accounts and Tweets are often the most relevant results.

We’re concerned that as a result of Google’s changes, finding this information will be much harder for everyone. We think that’s bad for people, publishers, news organizations and Twitter users.

Now, some context. Google used to have a deal with Twitter whereby Tweets would appear as part of Google’s real-time results. These would sometimes appear baked into the results page for a timely query on Google, about, say, breaking news or a sporting event, and were also accessible by going to a dedicated real-time search section. That partnership terminated in July 2011, and was not renewed.

Twitter is obviously upset about today’s launch for a few reasons. For one, it made money off of its deal with Google. It wants Google to need its data. And there’s the potential that today’s launch may incentivize publishers and users to pay more attention to Google+ when it comes to sharing breaking news — after all, it’s the only service that’s going to pop up in Google search results. Which would reduce Google’s reliance on Twitter.

As for Twitter’s assertion that with these changes, finding information will be “much harder for everyone”: if people are looking to access the real-time data that is shared on Twitter (which, to Twitter’s credit, is definitely more likely to include breaking news than most of the stuff being shared on Google+), then they can obviously still head to Twitter’s own search product. Which could potentially be a very popular search portal itself, but, in my experience, is still pretty cruddy.

But Twitter does have a point: people trust Google to serve up the most timely, relevant information possible. And without Twitter’s data, it’s going to have a hard time doing that. Of course, Google probably already has its own answer to this drafted, and I suspect it reads something like, “if Twitter wants people to find tweets in Google, they can open up their API.”  I’m reaching out to them for their official response now.

The hottest and coolest thermostat on the market this year was clearly the Nest. This intelligent hunk of steel looks great on a wall and, more important, helps save energy in the home. The Nest learns as you use it, ensuring your home is comfortable year-round.

We sat down with Matt at CES 2012 and he ran through the product and, more important, gave us some great advice on starting your own hardware start-up and how sensors are going to be everywhere soon – in the home and on our bodies.

As Semil showed back in November, social travel sites are all the rage these days among the entrepreneurs, offering plenty of interesting approaches to offering recommendations on where and how to travel. You may not have heard of HipGeo, but if you’re a traveler, this is something that will likely pique your curiosity. HipGeo has developed a location-aware platform that records and displays the places users go and how they get there, and today they’ve released a new app that is essentially a travel diary for the modern Web.

The app offers a unique and snazzy interface that is designed to let mobile users post text, places, and photos that are recorded, organized, and displayed around a user’s travels — the places they’ve visited, all in pursuit of the “places graph”. To get a better, more granular picture of HipGeo, you might see it as a product of some of the best features of services with which we’re already familiar.

HipGeo is trying to do with GPS and location what Facebook is doing with time on the much-talked about Timeline, more specifically with the new “map” feature Facebook has incorporated into Timeline based on the aggregation of “Places” check-in data. HipGeo is, in a sense, the smaller, third-party app version of that, which is now usable by other developers thanks to the launch of its API in November.

Or you might see HipGeo as Banjo that goes beyond the Foursquare API, or doing for location what Path does for time (and location), but only for the people you really want to connect with. Imagine seeing all the photos and comments at an arena or stadium, as well as the users who uploaded them from last night’s concert or game — that’s what they want to make possible. And do so by using place history and tracking to do a lot of the content discovery heavy lifting, or really fellow traveler discovery, in an attempt to create the kind of “serendipity” Catherine Cook talks about in this recent TC post.

HipGeo initially launched as a way for users to create animated slide shows of their activities, but HipGeo Chief Product Guy Rich Rygg says that users requested more of a blog-like display to share their travels and trip journals, so the team responded with this new app in an attempt to create a lovechild between Tumblr and Foursquare.

HipGeo was founded by GeoCities alumni, who are well-familiar with location and content sharing, and they’ve built a platform that is centered around delivering location and travel information. With this tech at its core, HipGeo can make easy modifications in terms of features and the “top layer”, responding quickly to user and developer requests, just as they did in adding the app’s new blog features.

But for the user, all he or she has to do is travel and record those experiences on their phones. HipGeo then builds a timeline around photos and location, dropping them as points on a map. From there, you can decide who to share your travel information with, if anyone, or just flip on passive tracking to let the app record the goings-on (photos, comments, and locations) of your day in a realtime diary.

It’s a way to solve check-in fatigue, as the startup offers a crowdsourced blog for location, allowing you to see what route others are taking to get to their destinations, where they’re going, and what they’re saying about it when they get there. This becomes a source of realtime recommendations and you don’t have to check in one million times from every location, because geotagging is inherent to all of the content you’re producing. You just have to make sure you’re keeping your phone active as you travel, which shouldn’t be a problem for most smartphone users out there, judging by the level of activity in our Foursquare and Instagram feeds.

For more, check out HipGeo at home here, or on the App Store here. (Android is on the way.) Let us know what you think.

After the onslaught of media that is CES, who wouldn’t want more CES? We definitely do, which is why we’re running the TC Gadgets Webcast live at 4pm Pacific/7pm Eastern straight out of our posh studio on the CES show floor. Our goal? To recap the day’s news, interview cool people, and give away amazing prizes.

Today we’re giving away a real, live Sony Vita to one lucky winner – details during the broadcast – but watch this space for some great content and be sure to watch our daily live streams from the show floor. We’ll be running these webcasts every day at 4pm Pacific, giving away great prizes in the process.

Do you have questions or concerns? Tweet us @techcrunch with the hashtag #CESCrunch. We’ll do our best to answer your questions on the fly. Something you particularly want to see at the show? We’ll aim our camera at it for you. Need a Nathan’s hot dog? Our Intern David will get it for you. That’s why they call TechCrunch Gadgets the most servile name in news.

IK Multimedia unleashes a plethora of new hardware this week at CES 2012 within their iRig line. This triumvirate of products look to make it easier than ever to use iOS devices, live and inline, with analog musical instruments like guitars, bases, vocals and regular DJ consoles.

I have used several of their devices in the past with excellent results, so I am stoked to see how this new group of products perform.

First up, the iRig MIC Cast

This miniature microphone looks to be a smaller, more compact version of their previously released iRig MIC (which I have to say I love). I have the older, larger version right here in my computer bag and use it constantly for recording interviews and voice overs. The tight pattern noise cancellation on the original iRig MIC is excellent and is extremely useful in loud situations (like CES).

The new, smaller iRig MIC Cast promises similar noise canceling, in a smaller more compact package. If matches the original in that arena, it stands to be an excellent in-the-field microphone for mobile devices. Check back for updates after I get my hands on one.

Here are the detailed specs straight from the press release:

• Features a stereo mini-jack headphone output which enables real-time monitoring of what is being recorded using headphones or speakers.
• Offers a mini-switch that provides two different sensitivity settings to record close-up or distant sources.
• Includes an adjustable desktop stand for convenient iPhone/iPod touch positioning during recording.
• Has a bumper-friendly mini-jack connector that fits the majority of iPhone/iPod touch cases.
• Has an ultra-compact profile that can be carried anywhere with ease.
• Like other IK Multimedia microphones, it includes 2 free apps: iRig Recorder, an easy-to-use voice recording/editing app, and VocaLive, a multi-effects processing app for singers.
• Works with all regular phone calls and any Voice-Over-IP app.
• Is compatible with iPhone/iPod touch/iPad.

Offering live monitoring is a nice touch and very useful for interviews. You definitely don’t want to record a whole conversation only to find out you had the microphone too far away, etc.

iRig MIC Cast costs $39.99/€29.99 (excl. tax) and will be available in Q1 2012 from electronic and music retailers around the world.

For more information: www.irigmiccast.com

Next up, the iRig STOMP

This interface for using IK Multimedia’s excellent AmpliTube guitar modeler, finally makes it practical to use your iPhone as a tone source for live guitar or bass use. The form factor of the iRig STOMP is that of a traditional Stompbox guitar pedal, which allows for “hands free” use.

More press release specs:

• Compact, durable yet lightweight, aluminum-cast enclosure integrates easily into any traditional pedalboard.
• Can be used inline with other effects pedals, or directly connected to amplifiers or PA systems using regular ¼” guitar cables with no need for adapters.
• Allows precise adjustment of the signal for perfect guitar and bass levels with its large input gain knob.
• Active battery-powered output circuit improves headroom, especially when used with high-gain amplifiers in the AmpliTube app reducing feedback and crosstalk when recording.
• The bypass switch allows engaging or bypassing the AmpliTube app chain of effects –like a traditional stompbox – for seamless integration into any existing rig.
• Ultra-compact form-factor can be easily carried on the road.
• Features a 3.5mm/1/8” jack for silent practicing with headphones.
• Includes AmpliTube FREE app and can be used with any other guitar processing app that uses the iOS mini-jack

I’ve toyed with the idea of using AmpliTube as the sole source for playing upright bass at small gigs, but the inability to truly “bypass” was always a deal-breaker for me. This could enable that scenario. We’ll see.

iRig STOMP costs $59.99/€44.99 (excl. tax) and will be available in early Q2 2012 from electronic and music retailers around the world.

For more information: ??www.irigstomp.com

And lastly the iRig MIX which the makers tout as “The first mobile mixer for iPhone, iPod touch, iPad for DJ’ing anytime, everywhere.”

Again, IK has developed hardware that mimics traditional setups for DJing, yet added an easy way to use iOS devices as the source, enabling compact setup.

I doubt this will ever actually supplant the true sounds and art of vinyl DJing, but surely anyone that has shlepped a huge stack of records to a show could appreciate the smallness going on here. In any event it looks like it could be one part of a DJ setup.

Pricing and availability is as follows:

iRig MIX costs $99.99/€74.99 (excluding taxes) and will be available in February 2012 from electronic and music retailers around the world. Pre-orders are already available from the IK Multimedia online store and other selected resellers.

For more information: ??www.irigmix.com

Corel’s new AfterShot Pro software runs on Windows, Mac, Linux(!) and offers a $99 package for managing photos including RAW handling, image editing, and quick library management.

AfterShot is a digital photography workflow app like Aperture and Lightroom. It’s chock full of goodies like a complete RAW workflow, flexible management, advanced non-destructive editing, robust metadata tools, batch processing, and integration with the image editor of your choice.

Corel is claiming breakthrough performance with the software being fully multithreaded and optimized for multi-core and multi-CPU machines. A fully functional demo is available at Corel.com, the full product is priced at $99.99 which puts it in between Aperture and Lightroom in terms of price – a nice place to be.

Update: We’re eating lunch! Back at 2:20 Pacific time to see Canon, LG, Polaroid, and more.

While we’ve been running around Vegas like mad to cover all of the pre-CES happenings, the main event starts… now.

We’re streaming live from the Las Vegas Convention Center, where the biggest companies in the world have gathered to show off their best and brightest new toys. All of the chaos of the show floor, beamed right to your house. Live! Oh, how wonderful the future is. Talk to us live using #cescrunch!

Flashpoint, a startup accelerator program based at Georgia Tech in Atlanta, Georgia, just had its first Demo Day at the Georgia Tech Research Institute. The newly launched incubator follows the typical format for programs like this, offering seed funding, mentorship, support, shared workspace and more, in return for a 6% share of the startup.

This accelerator is especially interested in investing in early stage startups in the technology, medical device and biotech industries. With its $1 million fund, the organization typically provides between $15,000 and $25,000 in funding to the companies accepted into the program. The first Demo Day saw over a dozen in the graduating class, including one which already received funding from Andreessen Horowitz pre-launch.

The complete list of new companies presenting today includes the following:

• Badgy: provides a Social SEO platform for digital marketers and consumer brands that increases the ROI of social media marketing.
• Billfold: Billing system for web hosts. Its SaaS offering combines drastically improved security, extensive automation, and a powerful user interface to save customers time, money and stress.
• BISmark: Provides business intelligence software for home routers.
• CodeGuard: A Time Machine for websites that backs them up to the cloud, and lets users roll back to previous versions.
• CollectorDash: Delivers integrated community marketplace and commerce platform.
• eCommHub: Web-based fulfillment platform for online stores that don’t keep their own inventory, but rely on third-party vendors, distributors, suppliers, or fulfillment centers.
• IdeaString: Offers social business software to increase the speed and reduce the cost of innovation and business optimization by transforming the expertise, passion and knowledge of internal and external networks into actionable opportunities.
• Lucena Research: Provides hedge fund technology to retail investors. Its web-based decision support software enables traders to find market opportunities and reduce risk in their portfolios.
• N4MD: Provides a content aggregation publishing platform that empowers corporate communicators to “automagically” blend local news, social media and corporate content into e-books and Flipboard-like e-magazines for niche audiences within their organization.
• Pindrop Security has developed technology that hopes to stem the growing problem of phone fraud. Its patent-pending solution identifies key attributes of any phone call including the device used, call path and geographic point-of-origin to create a unique “phone fingerprint” that helps banks and financial institutions identify and isolate fraudulent calls and authenticate legitimate user phones. (This company recently received investment from Andreessen Horowitz).
• SavingGrace: A Groupon for church fundraising, the company offers new methods of fund-raising to churches at no cost, by bringing together merchants and congregations for everyday purchases.
• Simmer: Uses technology to help parents and teens ease conflicts at home.
• Social Fortress: Enables enterprises with sensitive data to leverage the cloud by eliminating traditional cloud security risks.
• Soket: A SaaS-based, customer engagement platform for local businesses that struggle to manage customer relationships online. Soket’s command center provides a single content management system to orchestrate their entire online presence – from various social networks to their own websites..
• SportsCrunch: (No association with TechCrunch!) Gives athletes and coaches control of their online presence.
• Trimensional: Brings 3D scanning technology to smartphones, giving consumers the easiest, fastest, and most affordable way to create 3D models of their faces and other objects. Trimensional has already been the iPhone’s #1 paid photography app in 25 countries.

Zomm’s latest creation is called Lifestyle Connect, a small Bluetooth device that acts, in short, as an emergency alert system for folks who might have some health issues and live alone. If you fall or injure yourself in the home, the Lifestyle Connect will signal your phone to call the proper authorities as well as your friends and family. The system locates you – whether you’re at home or outside – and handles everything with voice control.

The device costs $199.99 and comes with a sort of personal emergency concierge service that will help you while you’re down. It’s surprisingly small and light and the battery lasts two straight weeks on one charge.

It’s less expensive than competitors and, more important, it works with the cellphone you have so it can be used everywhere. Check the video above for a video hands-on.

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