Posts Tagged ‘iPod Touch’
Tango brings its cross-platform video chat app to the iPod Touch
Mobile video chat company announced today that it has updated its iPhone OS app to support the fourth-generation iPod Touch, which features front and rear-facing cameras like the iPhone 4.
With this update, Tango is now a bigger threat to Apple’s own FaceTime video chat, which is built in to the iPhone 4 and fourth-generation iPod Touch. The big difference with Tango is that users can also video chat over 3G (FaceTime is restricted to WiFi only), and they can video chat with friends on Android phones. Tango’s interface is as simple and easy to use as FaceTime, and it’s also easy to find your friends on the service as the app automatically combs through your phone’s contacts.
We reported in October that Tango’s iPhone and Android apps were wildly popular, in a mere 10 days after they launched. Tango by the end of November. The company tells me that its usage doubled over the Thanksgiving holiday.
Tango says that 70 percent of its members perform spontaneous video calls with their friends and family, and they do so more than once a week. I argued earlier this year that , and we’re clearly seeing that happen with Tango’s apps.
In a video chat interview, Tango’s executives mentioned that the service is using peer-to-peer (P2P) technology to handle the video calls. That means the service is highly scalable and doesn’t rely entirely on the speed of the company’s servers. Tango has six patents pending surrounding its video chat technology, three of which are related specifically to its P2P technology implementation.
A recent Android update allows Tango’s app to take advantage of Cloud to Device Messaging (C2DM) technology, a feature of the Android OS that lets push notifications get sent for Tango calls without having to run the app in the background — saving precious battery life in the process.
Based in Palo Alto, Calif., Tango has raised $5 million in funding from individual investors including Bill Hambrecht, Michael Birch, Bill Tai, and Daniel Scheinman.
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Week in review: Oracle wins huge verdict against SAP
Here’s our roundup of the week’s tech business news (shorter than usual due to the Thanksgiving holiday). First, the most popular stories VentureBeat published in the last seven days:
— Piracy doesn’t pay … at least not for SAP.
— What we seem to have here is a citizen revolt in progress, aided and abetted by the Internet, with word spreading on social networking tools such as YouTube and Twitter.
— It’s time to get updating: Apple rolled out iPhone OS (iOS) 4.2 for the iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch, bringing with it some long-awaited new features like multitasking support on the iPad, and a surprise reveal that its “Find My iPhone” device location service is now free.
— Just a month in, the first model in a new series of Android-based tablet computers is already losing to Apple’s market-defining iPad. We talked to consultant Tim Bajarin about where things are going from here.
And here are four more posts we think are important, thought-provoking, fun, or all of the above:
— Our top picks were easy. Apple or Apple or Apple.
— News broke Tuesday that Lance Tokuda is stepping down from his role as chief executive of social game- and app-maker RockYou. Coming barely more than a month after the company announced substantial layoffs, we started wondering where RockYou is headed.
— Plugs. They’re, like, so 2008.
— Microsoft seems to have a new mantra: When all else fails, shoot for a bigger audience.
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iPhone OS 4.2 lands: Brings multitasking to iPad, free Find My iPhone service
It’s time to get updating: Apple today rolled out iPhone OS (iOS) 4.2 for the iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch, bringing with it some long-awaited new features like multitasking support on the iPad, and a surprise reveal that its “Find My iPhone” device location service is now free.
While recent iPhone and iPod Touch models have since the iOS 4.0 update earlier this year, this update marks the first time the feature — which lets you run apps in the background — is available for the iPad. Other iOS 4.0 updates, like folder support and a unified Mail inbox, are also hitting the iPad for the first time, as well as .
iOS 4.2 is more than just a catch up patch for the iPad. The update also brings new features to iOS devices, including AirPlay, a way to easily stream media from the iOS devices to the Apple TV, and AirPrint, Apple’s new wireless printing standard.
It’s not too surprising that Apple has finally made its “Find My iPhone” service free (it previously required a subscription to Apple’s $99 a year MobileMe service), as similar features are also available on Windows Phone 7 and some Android phones. The service lets you locate your iPhone 4, fourth-generation iPod Touch, or iPad through a web interface, or on a friend’s iOS device. It also lets you lock your device remotely with a passcode and wipe out the device’s data.
Clearly the iPad gets the most benefit from this update, but that’s only because Apple hasn’t issued as many updates for its tablets as it has for other iOS devices. The update comes just in time for the holiday season, and may make the iPad extra appealing to consumers.
The iOS 4.2 update is available for all iPhones except the original 2G version, for the second generation iPod Touch and newer. Just as with the 4.0 update, some features like multitasking are only available on newer devices.
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Video ad startup YuMe goes mobile
, a well-funded video advertising startup, announced today that it’s bringing its technology to the mobile world.
Specifically, the Redwood City, Calif.-based company said it’s releasing two new mobile ad units, Mobile Connect and Mobile Billboard, as well as software development kits that will allow the creators of iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch apps to integrate YuMe’s ACE for Publishers ad platform. The ads can run as full-screen video, and they include buttons that can direct users to things like an advertiser’s Facebook Page or a downloadable coupon.
Nowadays, It seems like every ad company in the world is emailing me about its mobile ad units. For example, a company called . And of course .
When I asked YuMe co-founder and president Jayant Kadambi what makes his ads different, he said it’s less about specific features and more about the cross-platform advertising that YuMe can offer. Now YuMe’s 600 video publishers can also run high-quality ads on mobile devices. And advertisers can come to YuMe to purchase ad space on a website, a mobile app, and on Internet-connected TV properties. Those advertisers can build mobile-specific ads, but if they don’t want to do that, YuMe will also resize a single ad to fit different screens.
“I think everybody’s come at it from a vertical, niche-y standpoint,” Kadambi said. “It’s about the video. It’s not about the format of the video.”
from Menlo Ventures, Accel Partners, BV Capital, DAG Ventures and Khosla Ventures.
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Google Instant heads to the iPhone and Android
As promised, Google has brought its to mobile devices with support for the iPhone and Android, the company .
The service works just the same on mobile devices as it does on the desktop. After turning on the beta instant search functionality, search terms that you type on Google’s mobile website will automatically deliver results. You’ll see predictions for your search terms as you type as well.
Google says it’s “pushing the limits of mobile browser and wireless networks” with the feature. A new implementation for mobile browsers uses the HTML5 standard for Web pages and AJAX, a common Web-programming technique, to dynamically update search results, giving users a big speed improvement in the process.
Google Instant works best on 3G and Wi-Fi connections, but you can also easily turn it off without leaving the search page in case of network hiccups. It’s currently available for iPhones and iPods running iPhone operating system 4, and it’s available for Android 2.2 devices. The company says support for more devices and languages is coming in the next few months.
After playing around with Google Instant on my iPhone 4 for a bit, I’m finding it even more impressive than the desktop. Perhaps it’s because it’s a much bigger speed improvement for mobile search than it was for desktop search, but I’ve definitely found a new appreciation for Google Instant on my iPhone. Now let’s just hope we can get the feature in Gmail soon.
Check out a demo of Google Instant for mobile below:
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VLC Media Player lets you play any video file on your iPhone
Forget about the slog of converting video files to play on your iPhone. The, which was first released for the iPad in September and lets you play practically any video file, has been updated today to support the iPhone and iPod Touch.
The app is an extension of the , an effort to develop free media software that can play any video file format. Instead of dealing with multiple video and audio codecs (software that lets you interpret various file formats), VLC on desktops allows users to play videos worry-free. The iPhone OS app brings that convenience to the Apple’s mobile devices.
Previously, media-addicts had to convert their video files to an MPEG-4 video format to play on the iPhone — a process that could take hours depending on the size of the video and your computer’s horsepower. Now you can simply drop any video file — including Divx, Xvid, and Matroska (.MKV) formats — onto your iPhone via iTunes.
I tried a variety of video files on my iPhone 4, and they all played flawlessly. The software still has a few hiccups when it comes to larger high-definition files — but those aren’t ideal for the iPhone’s limited storage space anyway.
The VLC app only works on the iPhone 4, iPhone 3G S, and the latest generation of iPod Touch. There’s no word on an Android version yet, but given that the VideoLAN project is open source, I suspect it will be coming soon.
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Apple crushes earnings as usual, but misses outlook
Apple says it as it did during the same quarter last year.
The iPhone manufacturer brought in $4.31 billion in net income, up about 70 percent from $2.53 billion a year ago. Its quarterly revenue jumped 67 percent to $20.34 billion, compared to $12.21 billion the same quarter one year ago.
The lion’s share of Apple’s revenue came from iPhone sales. The company shipped 14.1 million iPhone units, and nearly double what it shipped in the same quarter last year. This was the first full quarter that Apple has shipped its newest model of the iPhone. Sales of the iPhone accounted for $8.6 billion of its revenue this quarter.
iPad sales were up 28 percent 4.19 million units shipped, compared to 3.27 million iPads shipped in its last quarter. Apple sold 3.89 million Mac computers, up 28 percent compared to 3.05 million Macs a year ago. And it sold 125 million devices that run its iPhone operating system, iOS, just last month.
iPod sales continued to fall as the iPad and iPhone have gained momentum. iPod sales were down 11 percent to about 9.1 million units shipped, compared to 10.2 million iPods sold in the same quarter last year. Apple recently refreshed its line of iPods this quarter, so it hasn’t had a full quarter with its new lineup of iPods — much like the iPhone had last quarter with the launch of its iPhone 4.
The company made the figures public today in an earnings call with analysts.
It said it has adjusted its estimates for the next holiday sales quarter ending in December and expects about $23 billion in revenue and $4.80 per share profits. Estimates from a number of analysts and financial firms estimated around $22.2 billion in revenue and $5.02 per share profits.
What this means is that Apple, a notoriously hard negotiator when it comes to suppliers, might be expecting a jump in the manufacturing price of its consumer gadgets. That could have implications for the entire consumer tech sector. Research in Motion is planning to . Investors didn’t appreciate the news, sending shares down 4.7 percent to $302.96 in extended trading today.
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