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Raptr Launches 1337 Gaming Network To The Public
Raptr, the social network that revolves around gaming, has launched in public beta. The robust site allows users to keep tabs on what their friends are doing throughout the gaming world, and also offers gaming recommendations, accomplishment updates, and a host of other features.
The site is designed to appeal to casual and hardcore gamers alike. In fact, Raptr avoids using the term “gamer” entirely, instead choosing to describe itself as a “social platform for people who like to play and discover games” - founder (and former competitive gamer) Dennis Fong says that many people associate the word “gamer” with a hardcore audience, but Raptr is for everyone.
Gamer Buddy List
The feature that will likely see the most use on Raptr is its buddy list, which allows users to see what games their friends are playing across a variety of platforms. While this can already be accomplished on a number of gaming networks, including Xbox Live and Steam, there isn’t a comprehensive service that keeps track of this information across multiple networks. The site offers downloadable clients for both Mac and Windows, which will track what games are being played and update the server accordingly (users can also use a Facebook Chat-esque interface from within the browser).
If Raptr can become the de facto standard for gaming buddy lists, it will be a huge success. Though it may come as a surprise to some, one of the most important facets of modern gaming is the social aspect. Gamers often align into Clans, and will readily boot up a game whenever they see a familiar screenname pop online. Unfortunately, existing networks are proprietary and only allow users to see who’s logged on to a single network.
Phat Lootz Newsfeed
Another impressive feature on Raptr is its news feed, which allows users to keep track of their friends’ activities thoughout many of the site’s supported games. The site keeps tabs on a wide variety of data, including in-game achievements from Xbox Live and high scores from Guitar Hero. Some games (particularly those with a supported API), allow the feed to get very detailed - you could conceivably use the site to track all of your quests for loot in World of Warcraft. Others send updates with more generic messages, like “Jason Has Just Played Chess”.
Gamers can also use the site’s profile section to display a list of their achievements, including the Gamer Badges seen on the current generation of consoles. While this may seem a bit silly, many gamers are extremely enthusiastic when it comes to earning in-game trophies and awards, and will value any opportunity to display their merits to a broad audience.
Automatic Game Updates
When we first wrote about Raptr in February one of its biggest selling points was its ability to automatically update PC games, saving users the hassle of hunting them down themselves. Since then, the feature seems to have become less important to Raptr, in part because automatic updates only apply to native PC games, which only constitute a fraction of Raptr’s game database.
At launch the site includes support for thousands of games across platforms including the console systems, native PC games, and web-based Flash games. Unfortunately, many of these games don’t make their data accessible - Raptr has to rely on a number of different methods to keep gamers’ activity status up to date, though some developers have made this easier than others. The issue is best demonstrated by today’s consoles: Microsoft has given Raptr access to Xbox Live backend, allowing the site to efficiently monitor user progress across all games. Conversely, Sony has yet to implement an accessible API, which means Raptr can only support select games.
In the long run, we’ll likely see gaming networks become more open, as cross-platform gaming buddy lists and accessible rankings can only help the industry. Raptr is positioning itself as a central hub for these services to play nicely, which would make it immensely popular. But as a casual gaming site, it may have some issues - I have a hard time picturing a casual game player taking the time to download one of the service’s clients or fill in a profile.
Raptr’s social networking shares a number of features in common with Rupture, Napster-founder Shawn Fanning’s startup that was aquired by EA for a reported $15 million. EA apparently aquired Rupture for its technology - the site, which was originally developed as a social network for World of Warcraft players, never launched to the public.
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Giving Google Chrome A Spin. This Thing Moves Fast.
Google announced Chrome yesterday and the company has already offered Windows XP and Vista owners the opportunity to try it out. And although I’ve only been able to use it for just a little while, Google Chrome is not only one of the fastest browsers I’ve ever used, it’s easily one of the best.
The Google Chrome install was quick and easy. In a matter of seconds (literally), I downloaded the application from the company’s site and installed it on my PC. Once up, Chrome asked to import the data from Firefox and I was off.
The first thing that will strike you about Chrome is its soft, yet elegant interface. Unlike other browsers, which sport clutter, Chrome doesn’t do anything of the sort. Instead, it makes tabs the primary element of the software, which can be dragged around and moved as needed on the fly. You can already do that in Safari, but in Chrome, it’s simply much easier.
Chrome also offers the “Omnibox”, which lets you input a web address or search the web in the address bar. You can do that now with Firefox, as well, but if you’re visiting a specific site like Amazon and you want to search that site, it features smart search engine detection to let you search Amazon instead of Google. I did just that on Amazon.com and it worked extremely well. In fact, it was much easier to search through sites and pages than any other browser I typically use.
My favorite feature so far in Chrome is the homepage. Unlike every other browser on the market, Chrome gives you a list of all the most-visited pages you’ve been to. I found this to be extremely useful. Instead of wasting time sifting through favorites or trying to find a specific page, I had all my most visited pages at my disposal when I opened Chrome up.
But perhaps more than anything, you’ll notice just how fast Chrome is immediately. After just ten minutes of jumping from site to site, I was amazed by how quickly I was able to get around. And unlike some browsers (I won’t mention any names), opening a slew of tabs doesn’t matter — it’s just as fast with or without tabs.
For those that want to shop for their girlfriend’s engagement ring without them knowing or just want to do, um, other things, Chrome also features an incognito mode, which will stop the browser from recording your activity. I tried it out and it works as advertised, and was delighted to see that I could turn it on and off in a flash.
One of my biggest problems with Firefox is that I have a tendency to lose my downloads when I get a little overzealous in my software tastes. Granted, you can go to the “Downloads” tab and find everything there, but Chrome makes it easier: it has a download box at the bottom of the screen that lets you access your downloaded files and put them where they need to go. I doubt I’ll lose anything again.
But not everything is perfect in Chrome. It’s still not available for Mac OS X and Linux users and it’s missing an easy method for organizing bookmarks. Worse, it currently doesn’t offer any way to email links. Google claims it’s just a beta release and these functions will be added in subsequent versions, but I still would have liked to see them in the first iteration.
All in all, Google Chrome, after just a little time using it, is superb. It’s not only fast, but it’s useful. It’s not only elegant, but it understands what you really want to do with a browser. And although it suffers from some setbacks that shouldn’t be overlooked, it’s still a highly-capable browser. Download Chrome. You won’t regret it.
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Yep, We Redesigned
As many of our readers have noticed (and noted) already, we rolled out a new design for TechCrunch yesterday evening.
We’ve been watching as the initial feedback has rolled in through Twitter and in the comments to our other posts. And while we’re still making lots of small changes, we wanted to take a second to write a proper post explaining our intentions and soliciting your feedback.
Our overarching goal was to clean things up, both on the surface and under the hood. TechCrunch had become bloated in many ways, with the homepage taking way too long to load and the scroll bar going on forever and ever.
So the first step entailed switching over to an “excerpt” format with which readers could get a taste of our posts on the homepage before diving in to read them in full. By cutting down on the amount of content on the homepage, we’ve reduced load times and made it easier to skim our headlines for the news and editorial you care about most.
We’ve also taken a minimalist approach to design that uses lots of whitespace and gives priority to our main content with a wider post width and a larger font size (no more squinting on that high resolution monitor).
As far as particular features go, a new “featured posts” box sits adjacent to the second post on the homepage and in the sidebar of every single post page. It’s intended to highlight some of the content you might otherwise overlook, with a tab for the most recent posts and another for those that garnered the most comments in the past few days. We’ve also started to measure the traffic to our individual posts more closely and will add a tab with the most popular posts as well.
So what’s next? We plan to roll this design - with minor customizations - across most of the other blogs within the TechCrunch Network (CrunchGear, MobileCrunch, TechCrunch UK, etc). We’re also going to launch a new search implementation using Yahoo BOSS Custom that lets you search by keyword across our entire network of blogs, plus CrunchBase.
But before we get too far ahead of ourselves, let us know what you think in the comments below.
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Redesigning For A Reason: Towards Better Conversion Rates
Mint, an online personal finance site, has gotten a facelift. The new site sports a much cleaner design than the previous iteration, and appears to be focused on describing what Mint actually does rather than presenting pretty (but somewhat overwhelming) graphics. For now the improvements are mainly on the external portion of the site (for non-members), with the members’ portion switching to the new design in the next few weeks.
That normally isn’t big news, but what caught my attention is that Mint has been bucket testing various redesign formats with some users and is seeing conversion rates increase by 20% over the current site.
That equals “hundreds of thousands” of more registered users over the course of a year given their current growth rates, says CEO Aaron Patzer. When we last checked in with them, they had 350,000 registered users and were tracking $11 billion in assets. Those numbers are likely substantially higher now.
Most startups have very limited resources and are so busy building and maintaining core features that they can’t spend too much time doing user testing on various concepts. Sometimes it makes sense to just take a step back and think about usability, though. It can pay off in the end.
Since the site’s launch last year, it has added a number of new features including loan tracking and investment tracking. However, most of these functions haven’t been readily apparent to most users - something the new design is looking to remedy.
Mint allows users to keep track of their finances, presenting spending history with attractive graphs and typically requiring much less effort compared to programs like Quicken. Unfortunately, while the site serves its purpose well, it is currently unable to actually transfer any funds to pay bills - you’ll have to go to your bank’s website to do that.
As part of the update, Mint is also releasing a handful of new guides to personal finance, ranging from “reducing credit card debt” to the seemingly obvious “saving money while dining out”.
Mint, which has now raised $17 million in venture capital, was the overall winner of the TechCrunch40 event in 2007.
The new designs are below. In the first image the old is on left, new is on right.
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Nesting: A PageFlakes For Moms
Back in 2005, Michael wrote that the user-configured AJAX homepage space was getting crazy crowded, with prominent competitors including Netvibes, PageFlakes, and iGoogle, along with a host of others. Each of these services offer an array of widgets that allow users to tailor their homepages to suit their tastes, but for the most part they do it exactly the same way and do little to differentiate themselves.
Nesting, a new startup that launched this week, is taking a shot in the crowded space by combining the traditional AJAX homepage with a basic social network. To further separate themselves from the rest of the pack, they’re going after one audience: moms.
The site sports a very soothing look that is well suited to its target demographic, with lots of pastels and rounded corners. The widgets themselves are also well designed, presenting an adequate amount of information without becoming overwhelming or cluttered. At launch, the available widgets include weather, news, and a photo-sharing “Memory Manager”, with a calendar on the way in the next month.
Beyond the widgets seen on other homepage services, the site also includes some basic social networking functionality, including support for Friends and Groups. Data from the social network can be drawn into the widgets - for example, your child’s soccer team could create a group, which could then automatically update your calendar wiget with game dates and information. For the time being calendars can only pull data from within Nesting, but the site plans to support importing from iCal and Google Calendar soon.
In terms of customization, Nesting can’t compete with the likes of PageFlakes and iGoogle - there simply aren’t very many widgets available. But many moms may not care if they can’t embed the latest Digg posts or sports scores, provided they have access to more personal content like their child’s soccer schedule. Nesting may fill this role well, but there is no shortage of sites geared towards mothers that it will have to compete with, including Maya’s Mom and CafeMom.
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Regator, The Social Blog Aggregator, Launches To The Public
Regator, the blog aggregator that acts like a mix between a standard RSS reader and Digg, has launched in public beta.
We initially covered Regator in July when the site launched in a limited private beta. At the time my biggest concern was the inability to add your own RSS feeds to the site, which restricted you to the approximately 3,000 blogs handpicked by Regator. CEO Scott Lockhart says that the site has been updated to allow users to upload their own feeds, but these won’t be visible to other users until they have been approved by Regator’s editors.
The site has also expanded on its sharing functionality to include Twitter and Facebook, with plans to introduce further integration with social networking sites in the future. There are a number of similar sites that combine news aggregation with social voting, including Socialmedian, which we covered last week.
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We Know How Many Kindles Amazon Has Sold: 240,000
Ever since Amazon launched the Kindle last November, we’ve been wondering about just how successful it’s been. The electronic book initially sold out and supplies have been tight. The Kindle is such a small part of Amazon’s overall business that the company does not break out how many it’s sold. But we found out anyway: 240,000 Kindles have been shipped since November, according to a source close to Amazon with direct knowledge of the numbers.
Doing a little back of the envelope math, that brings total sales of the device so far to between $86 million and $96 million (the price of the device was reduced to $360 from $400 last May). Then add the amounts spent on digital books, newspapers, and blogs purchased to read on the device, and you get a business that has easily brought in above $100 million so far. (Each $25 worth of digital reading material purchased per Kindle, add $6 million in total revenues).
These numbers gel with what Wall Street analysts have been predicting. And if a new Kindle comes out targeted at the textbook/school market, sales could ramp up higher.
Scott Devitt, an analyst at Stifel, Nicolaus & Co., predicts that Amazon is on track to sell 500,000 to 750,000 more Kindles over the next four quarters (including this one). He estimates that Kindle owners will buy an additional $120 to $150 worth of books and other content for each device, bringing the total revenues over that time period to somewhere between $225 million and $355 million. Based on that, he values the Kindle as a $1 billion business for Amazon.
Back in May, Citi analyst Mark Mahaney was estimating that total sales of Kindle’s this year would only reach 189,000. That number may have already been surpassed (depending on how many of the 240,000 units Amazon sold before January). His estimate called for 467,000 units to be shipped next year, and 2.2 million in 2010, resulting in total revenues going from $60 million in 2008 to $741 million in 2010. It might be time for him to revise those numbers upward. (Below is his model from May):
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Google To Launch Venture Fund
The WSJ is reporting that Google is set to launch a venture fund to give it the option of investing in startups instead of just flat out buying them. The fund will be led by Google’s SVP Corporate Development David Drummond and Bill Maris, a long time business friend of Anne Wojcicki, Sergey Brin’s wife. Maris is a tech entrepreneur with a degree in neuroscience and worked with Wojcicki at a San Francisco-based for-profit company called Catalytic Health.
This hasn’t been confirmed by Google, and it’s clear they’ve been thinking about a fund off and on for years. From the article:
The move would make Google the latest technology giant to take on a more-formal role in seeding start-ups. Intel Corp. has had a large venture-capital arm for years, as have Motorola Inc., Comcast Corp. and many others. In the consumer-Internet area, Walt Disney Co.’s Steamboat Ventures has invested in a number of Web start-ups. So has Amazon.com Inc., which has funded a number of young companies without structuring a formal fund.
Their track records have been mixed. Corporate venture-capital arms have been hampered by challenges that traditional venture-capital businesses don’t face. Venture capitalists invest in private start-ups at an early stage, usually in hopes of a big payout if the company is sold or if its stock goes public.
Many start-ups fear that taking corporate money limits their options and comes with strings that could turn away other potential investors — such as a right to buy the company at a later date. Some funds with less competitive compensation have struggled to retain managers, and corporate venture funds often don’t allow senior employees to invest personal money in their funds, while other venture funds typically do.
This wouldn’t be the first time Google started a fund to invest in other companies. In June 2007 they launched Gadget Ventures, a pilot program that, in part, invests seed money in companies looking to develop for the gadgets platform. They have also previously invested through Indian VCs.
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Moondo Fuses Casual Gaming With Massively Multiplayer Games
One of the biggest draws for massively multiplayer online games (MMO’s) is the satisfaction that comes from earning in-game items and abilities. Unlike simple Flash games where your accomplishments vanish the moment you step away from your computer, MMO’s allow you to acquire virtual goods and work your way up a skill ladder, in the hopes of eventually becoming powerful enough to dominate over everyone else. Unfortunately, many people simply can’t spare the hundreds of hours a game like World of Warcraft takes to finally reach this leet status.
Today sees the launch of Moondo, a new gaming “world” that is trying to merge the best parts of MMOs and the casual games that litter the web. The Moondo world is comprised of a number of multiplayer minigames that feature 3D graphics that rival those seen on most MMOs. Each minigame is intended to require only about 15-20 minutes, though they include multiple levels that should keep gamers satisfied for hours at a time.
What differentiates Moondo from most other multiplayer minigames is the introduction of persistent goods and a leveling system. For example, a shield that a user might acquire during the course of a shooting game could later be used on the platform’s driving game. As gamers continue playing, they progressively acquire more goods and skills, and the platform’s matching system ensures that they are only pitted against players of comparable experience. At launch, there are two games available (an FPS and a racing game), but that number should grow quickly, as Moondo says that the platform is designed so that it can pump out a new game every 8 weeks.
Moondo’s biggest challenge lies in making the powerups and levels acquired by each gamer seem worthwhile. It’s one thing to be known as a powerful wizard or knight in a persistent world like World of Warcraft - everyone knows you’ve earned it. But when such advantages are carried over to smaller minigames, it might just make them unbalanced and less fun.
For the time being Moondo is only available as a standalone client on Windows, but the company plans to roll out browser support (so that it should be platform-agnostic) by October. The game is the first product from Funtactix, a Benchmark and JVP-funded company that has spent the last eighteen months developing the platform that powers Moondo. Another company that is introducing persistent accomplishments to casual gaming is CasualCafe which we covered here.
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Redlasso Shuts Down In Response To Fox/NBC Lawsuit
Redlasso, the video site that allows bloggers to post clips of television content, has shut down its beta in response to a recently filed lawsuit by Hulu-backers Fox and NBC.
In May, Fox, CBS and NBC issued Cease and Desist notices to Redlasso for copyright violation, which the company largely ignored. In June the company established a “Media Advisory Board” headed by a number of ex-studio execs that they hoped would help smooth things over with the networks.
Since its launch eight months ago, Redlasso has seen exponential growth amongst bloggers, and can be seen on a number of top news, gossip, and political blogs. The site allows users to watch recorded feeds of a number of television shows, and “clip” potions of them for playback on their sites. Among the channels available are ESPN, Fox News, and CNN.
Redlasso records and serves all of this content from its servers, without legal license for any of it. The company has long held to the belief that it is protected by the first amendment, and that the snippets that bloggers distribute qualify for fair use (the embedded clips can only be 10 minutes long). Fair use may apply to the snippets, but the site is still hosting entire episodes, even if they are only available to approved bloggers.
The site will continue to operate for its Bussiness and “Radio to Web” clients.
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Zimbra Releases Version 3 Of Open Source Email Client, And It’s Awesome
Yahoo’s Zimbra launches version 3 of its open source desktop email client this morning that is designed to compete with Outlook, Mozilla Thunderbird, Mac Mail, etc. This is a new iteration of their browser-based offline product announced in March 2007.
Zimbra Desktop, which is built on Mozilla Prism, is available for Windows, Mac and linux machines. It weighs in at 40 MB, about double the size of Thunderbird. The product promises the robust features of Outlook, which are lacking in Outlook Express and Thunderbird. Users can access Yahoo mail accounts, Zimbra accounts, or any Pop/IMAP supported email boxes. Zimbra Desktop also includes a calendar, contact list and other features.
Based on limited testing (I set it up with Yahoo Mail only for now), the product is a winner. It’s responsive and quick, which is the most important feature for a desktop email client. I like the ability to tag items, collapse conversations, and perform web and local searches via the search bar in the top right corner of the app. If I wasn’t all Mac across the board to keep things synced properly, I’d use Zimbra permanently. Screen shots below.
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MedPedia Is Wikifying the Medical Search Space
The medical industry is one that thrives on innovation and evolution. New procedures, medicines, diseases, and theories are released practically every day. In such an environment, the need for a website to reflect and allow for documentation is apparent.
MedPedia is a new project, currently in development, that will offer an online collaborative medical encyclopedia for use by the general public. In order to keep the content accurate and up-to-date, content editors and creators have to have an MD or a PhD. Several highly-esteemed medical colleges will be contributing content to MedPedia, including Harvard Medical School, Stanford School of Medicine, UC Berkeley School of Public Health, and University of Michigan Medical School. Medpedia is also receiving support from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), the Federal Drug Administration (FDA) and many other government research groups. The content from these organizations will then be edited by MedPedia’s community of medical professionals.
MedPedia is currently in closed beta with a live preview site, where contributors can apply to be included, and users can submit feedback and suggestions. They plan on opening up their beta in late 2008.
The site will feature content about diseases, anatomy, procedures, medications and medical facilities in two ways. The topic front page will be written in easy-to-understand language for the general public, but there will also be a more technical page where medical professionals can discuss more in-depth with a clinical tone. With more than 30,000 known diseases and conditions, more than 10,000 drugs prescribed each year, thousands of medical procedures being performed and millions of medical facilities around the world, they have their work cut out for them.
There is obvious competition with established medical resource sites like WebMD and MayoClinic. Those sites have done really well, but there’s always room for disruptive technology like this. Look at what Wikipedia did to Britannica, a 250-year old encyclopedia publisher. The advantage MedPedia has is its large range of medical professionals who create content based on their specialties, rather than having several in-house doctors creating content on a range of topics they aren’t formally familiar with.
This system is advantageous both to MedPedia and the medical professionals. MedPedia benefits from their knowledge and experience, and the doctors are able to promote themselves in their specific field of expertise. MedPedia contributors will also be able to form committees and boards in specific areas like “Childhood Obesity” and “Skin Cancer.” Each professional that specializes in that field will be able to join the committee (five of whom will make up the board) and will oversee the content generated and edited in that field.
MedPedia was founded by James Currier, a seasoned Silicon Valley entrepreneur. Currier founded Tickle, a quiz and personal test site in 1999, which sold to Monster in 2004 for about $94 million (though it recently lost a hefty portion of its staff and was said to be shutting down). After taking some time off to spend with his family, he started an incubator called Ooga Labs. He is also known for singing in the Here Comes Another Bubble video, from the group The Richter Scales. Currier is one of three co-founders for the group, which was surrounded by some controversy (they also performed the song live at The Crunchies). He got the idea for MedPedia when he found himself constantly searching for medical information online, like if his three-year old son needed to go to the emergency room for a fever.
The Advisory Board includes Gilbert S. Omenn, M.D., Ph.D., Professor University of Michigan Medical School; Linda Hawes Clever, M.D., M.A.C.P., Clinical Professor University of California San Francisco (UCSF) Medical School; Joseph B. Martin, M.D., Ph.D., former Dean of the Faculty of Medicine at Harvard University; and Mitch Kapor, philanthropist and founder of Lotus Development Corporation, designer of Lotus 1-2-3, Chair of Board of Directors for Linden Lab (creator of Second Life), Chair of Mozilla Corporation, and a member of the Advisory Board for the Wikimedia Foundation.
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Apple Launching App Store Beta Program
Apple’s App Store has seen an unprecedented amount of success and exposure since its launch, with millions of total downloads and 909 applications already available. Unfortunately, Apple has been unable to keep up with the influx of submissions from developers (each app must be approved before it appears on the store), leaving many companies frustrated and confused as their apps sit in limbo.
Adding to the frustration has been the difficulty associated with testing an application. As Craig Hockenberry, one of the people behind the popular app Twitterific explains:
The big problem here is that the only way to install software on an iPhone or iPod touch is with the App Store. There are also no provisions for beta testing… The only way to “test” a fix is to release the changes to tens of thousands of users. It’s the developer equivalent of playing Russian roulette.”
Now we’re hearing from an app developer that Apple is finally going to start rolling out a new beta program in the next few days has released an Ad-Hoc program. Details are slim, but it seems like Apple is capping the total number of beta participants at 100 per app. In order to download a beta app, users will need to submit their iPhone’s UDIDs number to the developer, who will then need to flag its eligibility in the store itself. All betas will still be distributed through the App Store - you won’t be able to download one on an external site. The apps will be directly distributed by the developer.
It sounds like developers that haven’t had their apps approved yet will still be able to participate in the beta program. This should alleviate some of the developers’ anxiety (at least they’ll know their app will work once it goes live), but it still doesn’t address the the delays and lack of communication that many developers are complaining about.
Update: Our source was misinformed. This program, as a number of commentors have said, is Apple’s Ad-Hoc program that is already operational. Erica Sadun of TUAW writes:
Developers and users need not use the App Store for testing. Ad Hoc distribution goes directly between the developer and the user. The user needs to supply their iPhone’s unique device identifier. The developer then sends a specially compiled version of their app along with a mobile provisioning file. Users drop these into iTunes and they’re good to sync.
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Favtape: Full Playback For Your Favorite Last.fm And Pandora Songs
One of the most frustrating things about online music services like Last.fm and Pandora is that they don’t allow users to play back songs in their entirety on demand. The sites have made some progress in the last few months (Last.fm introduced full-song playback for some labels in January and iLike implemented it this morning), but for the most part these features are still limited by the agreements each site has forged with record labels.
Today sees the launch of Favtape, a new mashup that mixes Pandora, Last.fm, Seeqpod, and Slinkset to offer full playback of your favorite songs on demand, without any limitations. The site was created by Ryan Sit, one of the developers behind blog/lifecasting service Swurl.
Favtape pulls your Favorites (or “Loved”) list from Pandora and Last.fm and generates a playlist that contains full versions of each song. The interface is overly basic at this point - you can start and stop the song by clicking on its title, but there’s no way to rearrange them to create a new playlist. Below each song is a list of related links that allow users to purchase the song, view lyrics, and see a list of similar artists. Favtape will initially generate revenue through the links to iTunes, Amazon, and Ringtones displayed under each song.
The site also features a Digg-like “Discovery” option that allows users to vote on the best playlists. Unfortunately, there’s no way to actually tweak your playlists to make them more appealing without modifying your “Favorites” from Last.fm or Pandora. This lack of playlist customization is frustrating, but will likely be added soon.
Favtape makes heavy use of the Seeqpod API, which it uses for song playback and recommendations. While this presumably will help Favtape avoid any legal trouble (it isn’t actually hosting any music), it is also making it totally reliant on a service that is on shaky ground. Seeqpod isn’t hosting any music either (it crawls the internet searching for files hosted on other servers), but that hasn’t stopped the lawsuits from coming. For the time being, though, Favtape offers a great way to listen to your favorite songs without paying a cent. A simialr site that relies on Seeqpod (but doesn’t auto-generate playlists) is Streamzy, which we covered earlier this month.
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Minted Launches Competitive Stationery Store
Mariam Naficy, co-founder of failed beauty startup Eve.com (which went belly up when the bubble burst in 2000), has launched her latest venture: Minted, an online stationery store with a competitive marketplace reminiscent of the one found on custom t-shirt store Threadless.
The site offers graphic designers a community to showcase and (hopefully) sell their designs, which are voted on by customers. The best designs are printed and sold, with about 5% of the retail price going to the designer (this may sound small, but Naficy says it is near double what a designer might get from a traditional card company like Hallmark). On top of the revenue sharing, the site will also hold regular competitions, with winning entries winning on the order of $1000. To further sweeten the deal for the designers, all cards have the artists’ name emblazoned in fine print on the back (another thing you won’t see on typical greeting cads).
The store will sell a mix of designer-submitted cards and cards from established independent card companies. While Minted is starting with stationery, it will likely expand to other products in the future. Minted will initially only sell its cards through its online storefront, but Naficy says that there ample opportunities for partnerships and alternative distribution channels down the line. If the site is going to succeed, it will need to establish these ties quickly - few people are going to buy from a stationery store they’ve never heard of, giving designers little reason to submit their designs in the first place.
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Start Streaming: Qik Opens To The Public
Qik, the video service that streams live feeds from your mobile phone, has finally launched its public beta. The site has also introduced a number of new features to the service, including support for restricted group access to videos, self-service event streams, and a new embeddable player.
The beta will support a wide variety of phones on AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon, and Sprint, including support for software on the Windows Mobile platform that began testing in June. Qik says that it will be continually adding new phones to the supported list, which you can view here.
The site has also implemented support for Groups, which allow users to select who can upload and view selected clips. Among the included privacy options are allowance for public groups, which anyone can post to, restricted groups, which allow anyone to view (but only select users to post), and a private view, which restricts viewing and uploading to a specified group of users.
Qik has also introduced support for special Event sites, which are essentially temporary groups that are focused on a single event or conference. In the past users who wanted to create specific event pages would have to go through the company itself. Now, users will be able to create self-serve pages with custom logos where they can aggregate all of the content from a single event.
We’ve been using Qik for the last few months, and for the most part we’ve been pleased with the video quality and the convenience that comes from having a portable video camera that can stream directly to the web (although there have been some troubles with upload speeds that are largely the fault of network carriers). There are a number of very similar services in the space, including Kyte and Flixwagon. You can see a general comparison of some of the services here.
Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.
Tesla Motors Unveils Jaw-Dropping Menlo Park Showroom
Tesla Motors, the automobile startup with backers that include Sergey Brin and Larry Page, held a party tonight to mark the launch of its Menlo Park storefront. The store, which is the company’s second, will be open to the general public beginning this Tuesday.
Despite Tesla Motors’ well deserved reputation as a high-end car manufacturer, it is still very much a startup - the company’s $150 million in funding pales in comparison to coffers held by large automobile companies like Ferrari. As a result, Tesla has strived to create a atmosphere of style and sophistication at its showrooms without breaking the bank.
The new dealership is situated in Menlo Park, about 5 minutes away from downtown Palo Alto and Stanford University. The interior of the building is designed to be “industrial chic” - a strange mix of luxurious furniture (white leather sofas, marble tables) and the trimmings of a basic garage (concrete walls, exposed wooden ceilings). It works surprisingly well, keeping the store’s high-end customers at home without distracting from the showroom’s main attraction: the cars.
Ah, the cars. Tesla has half a dozen of their Tesla Roadster electric car on display, and they don’t disappoint. It’s hard to put into words how ridiculously sexy the Tesla Roadster is in person, so we’ve grabbed a lot of pictures. Suffice to say, as soon as you walk in the store, you’re going to want one.
Unfortunately, actually buying a Tesla Roadster is an involved and lengthy process. To reserve a car, first you’ll need to make a $5,000 deposit, which is mostly just to show you’re serious. To actually get a place on the 1,100 person long waiting list, you’ll need to pony up another $55,000 - making a grand total of $60,000. Of the 1100 people on the waitlist, 600 are for the 2008 model, which had a base cost of $98,000. The remainder of the list is for the 2009 model, which has been upped to a $109,000 base value, mostly to account for the weakened dollar.
Tesla is currently telling customers that the waitlist is one year long, but production is only just ramping up so that time frame may slip a bit. By weeks end there will be around 12 cars on the road, most of which are owned by company boardmembers and investors. For the time being, cars are being assembled at a rate of about 4 a week, with expectations that the company will be able to finish 40 a week early next year.
Unsurprisingly, you won’t be able to just waltz in and test drive a Roadster. To get the keys to one of these beauties, you’ll need to prove that you’re serious (namely, pay the initial $5000), or otherwise convince the dealership that you mean business. At least you have these pictures.
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Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0
Joi Ito, Chad Hurley and Loic LeMeur Join TechCrunch50 As Startup Judges. Early Bird Pricing Ends on July 15th.
Its hard to believe, but TechCrunch50 is less than two months away. We’re knee-deep in the applications right now, and I can tell you it is hard to cull them down. It is really impressive how many good new startup ideas are out there.
Today, we are announcing our latest line-up of TechCrunch50 Experts: Joi Ito, Chad Hurley and Loic LeMeur. They will join Marc Andreessen, Marc Benioff, Mark Cuban, Chris DeWolf, Marissa Mayer, and others on our panel of experts in judging and advising the presenting TechCrunch50 startups.
If you want to come to the conference (and, admit it, you do), I’d encourage you to buy tickets now, as we are expecting this year’s conference to sell out as it did last year. Here are some details:
EARLY BIRD PRICING ENDS ON JULY 15 (this saves you $1,000). Visit the TechCrunch50 web site for information on all aspects of the conference. We are hearing that hotels are starting to fill-up for the second week in September. Planning ahead will save you from having to ask to sleep on Mike’s couch . . . (anyway, that’s probably where I’m sleeping).
For companies that do not meet the criteria of a TechCrunch50 entrant (basically, your company is already launched), we are offering Exhibitor Packages. These are interactive sponsorships for relevant companies or products that want to showcase their brand and services to the TechCrunch50 attendees and media.
We look forward to seeing you in San Francisco, September 8-10.
Joi Ito
Joichi Ito is the CEO of Creative Commons, and founder and CEO of Neoteny, a venture capital firm focused on personal communications and enabling technologies. He has created numerous Internet companies including PSINet Japan, Digital Garage and Infoseek Japan. In 1997 Time ranked him as a member of the CyberElite. In 2000 he was ranked among the “50 Stars of Asia” by Business Week and commended by the Japanese Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications for supporting the advancement of IT. In 2001 the World Economic Forum chose him as one of the 100 “Global Leaders of Tomorrow” for 2002.
Chad Hurley
Raised near Birdsboro, Pennsylvania, Hurley received his Bachelor’s degree in Fine Art from the University of Pennsylvania. After graduating, he joined eBay’s PayPal division, primarily focusing on user interface. It was there that he met Steve Chen and Jawed Karim with whom he founded YouTube, a video sharing website, in 2005.
YouTube quickly became one of the web’s fastest-growing sites, and was ranked as the 10th most popular website just a year after its launch. There are reportedly 100 million clips viewed daily on YouTube, with an additional 65,000 new videos uploaded every 24 hours.
Hurley currently serves as Chief Executive Officer and was voted 28th on Business 2.0 magazine’s “50 people who matter” list in 2006. That year, he and Chen sold YouTube to Google, Inc. for $1.65 billion in stock.
Loic LeMeur
Loic is the CEO and visionary behind Seesmic, founded in 2007, with the goal of transforming online video into a medium for threaded, interactive video conversation. Prior to Seesmic, Loic incubated several other start-ups including four French companies: Ublog, (merged with Six Apart in 2003) and RapidSite, (acquired by France Telecom in 1999) two popular blog companies, B2L, an interactive agency in 1999 (acquired by BBDO) and LeWeb, one of Europe’s leading web conferences for businesses and web 2.0 innovators in 2005.
Loic serves as a board member on the RSS Advisory Board. He is also an active investor and mentor to entrepreneurs and contributes to the World Economic Forum blog, which he founded. Originally from the South of France, Loic lives in San Francisco, California.
Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0
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AOL Implements Vidoop’s OpenID-Based Authentication
As of yesterday afternoon, AOL has implemented Vidoop’s visual authentication system as part of its OpenID initiative, which was formally launched in February 2007.
Vidoop, a startup that replaces usernames and passwords with image grids, partnered with AOL to provide its OpenID users with an extra layer of security. This delivers Vidoop a potential user base of about 100 million users.
Unfortunately, AOL is still just an issuer of OpenID accounts - not a relying party. So users can’t actually use the same Vidoop-protected OpenID accounts that AOL has given them to actually sign into AOL services. AOL and other big internet players have yet to step up and become relying parties, a move that will be necessary to push OpenID into the mainstream.
Vidoop offers an alternative to the traditional username/password login system by displaying images in a grid with associated letters. Upon initial registration, users define 3-5 image categories (cars, dogs, flowers, houses, etc). When they sign into a site, a variety of images appear in a randomly-generated grid, and users enter the corresponding letters to their pre-defined categories. Because this visual system requires a higher level of intelligence, it’s harder to steal someone’s login information and use it to access all OpenID-enabled sites with it.
The implementation of authentication security can be cost-prohibitive, but Vidoop actually tries to help its partners make money. Advertisements are randomly dispersed throughout the image grid, and revenue from them is split in two ways.
Vidoop has also partnered with Charles Schwab Retirement and hopes more financial organizations will follow suit. Clickpass, a popular OpenID initiative covered here, partnered with Vidoop this past March. The startup brought Scott Kveton, the Chairman of the OpenID foundation, onboard in February.
Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.
Browse Del.icio.us Bookmarks Visually With FavThumbs
While we’ve waited with bated breath for the release of Delicious 2.0 (Yahoo’s been teasing us for months), Ryan Sit, the creator of Swurl, a recently launched startup that offers a lifecasting aggregator for web activity, has been toying around with the Del.icio.us API to bring us FavThumbs. FavThumbs offers a visually-pleasing web application to view screen shots of your bookmarks.
Through the site, users can input their Del.icio.us ID, and then browse their bookmarks in a grid or a coverflow-like display. Sit hopes that the site will offer a much better alternative to the out-dated Del.icio.us list. A similar app that was we covered last year is Fichey. Fichey acts like a microfiche for headlines from social bookmarking sites. Users can flip through the pages like a magazine, but they are only the headlines, not user-specific.
Another similar service is SearchMe, a visual search engine we covered in June. SearchMe offers the ability to drag and drop sites to bookmark into “stacks.” The bookmark stacks are shown in a coverflow-style display, similar to FavThumbs. A similar Del.icio.us coverflow display is seen with the Fluid Del.icio.us Site Specific Browser plug-in (mentioned here).
Sit says that he was inspired by the desktop client Delish, a graphical bookmark desktop client. Another app created by Sit is ListPic, an application to browse local classified pages through a calendar-like display. Both ListPic and FavThumbs are both experimental applications from his company Freestyle Labs.
Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.
Before the App Store “Opens”, it has already made Apple $55,000
Tucked away on the iPhone 2.0 version of Apple’s Application Store