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When Will The Post-PC Era Arrive? It Just Did.

Administrator — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 23:49:06 +0000

There has been much debate about what the post-PC era is, when it will arrive, or whether it’s already here. But key pieces of new data, emerging last week, are making the case that we crossed the imaginary line from the “PC” era to the “post-PC” era at the end of 2011. According to analysts at Canalys, two major computing milestones were achieved at the end of this year: smartphone shipments outpaced PCs for the first time ever, and Apple became the world’s largest PC maker, if you count iPads as PCs (as well you should). Combined, what these numbers tell us is that the post-PC era is happening now. Right now. And maybe we need to think about how we define “PC.” In Q4 2011, vendors shipped 158.5 million smartphones, up 57% on the 101.2 million units shipped in Q4 2010. For the year, there were 487.7 million units shipped, up 63% on the 299.7 million units shipped in 2010. Meanwhile, the global PC market grew just 15% in 2011 to 414.6 million units. The smartphones have won. The funny thing about that PC shipments number is that, on its own, it doesn’t paint the most accurate picture of today’s PC landscape. There weren’t 414.6 million desktop, notebook and netbook computers shipped in 2011 – those were at 112.4 million, 209.6 million and 29.4 million, respectively. The 414.6 million number includes 63.2 million in “pad” shipments, Canalys’s preferred term for tablets. That means 15% of the “PC” shipments in 2011 were tablets, largely Apple’s iPad. In Q4, tablets were 22% of the total PC shipments. And the tablet segment of the market grew 274.2% year-over-year. Also in Q4 2011, Apple became the leading worldwide “PC” vendor (if you count the iPad as a PC) with 15 million iPads and 5 million Macs shipped, representing 17% of the total 120 million client PCs shipped in Q4. It overtook HP (now #2), Acer, Dell and Lenovo in the process. Overall, the PC market grew 16% year-over-year, Canalys noted last month. Without tablets, it declined 0.4%. Of course, there’s still the question of whether or not tablets should be broken out into their own computing category, positioned against the traditional “PCs” when tracking device shipments. For what’s it worth, I think it’s fine to count tablets as PCs – after all, PC means “personal computer,” not “machine running Windows.” The fact that we still equate the word with a desktop, monitor, keyboard and mouse combo is a testament to the empire Microsoft built, and is now losing. Case in point: netbook shipments dropped 25.3% from 2010 to 2011. Desktops grew a paltry 2.3% and notebooks grew just 7.5%. This is end of the “PC” era in action. While the 209.6 million notebook shipments still make that the largest category of “PCs,” the growth trends here, if sustained, dictate that’s its only a matter of time before the shift to tablets becomes even more pronounced. Think about it: what’s the first “PC” you’re going to buy for your kid, as a new member to the post-PC computing generation? If you respond “ notebook ,” I’d say you’re lying. That kid is getting an iPad, even if they end up stealing yours. If not an iPad, then they’re getting a phone. And smartphones are PCs, too. The most affordable ones. This past quarter, smartphone shipments overtook PCs, a hugely important milestone that speaks volumes about the state of modern-day computing. The computer-in-your-pocket has moved from being “a niche product segment at the high-end of the mobile phone market to becoming a truly mass-market proposition,” explains Canalys of the change. In Q4, Apple broke records by shipping 37 million iPhones – the most ever shipped by a single vendor in a quarter. Previously, Nokia held the record with 28.3 million phones shipped in Q4 2010. What a difference a year makes. But Canalys cautioned that it expects to see smartphone market growth slow in 2012, as vendors exercise “greater cost control and discipline” to focus on profitability. This is the only discordant note to the report. Smartphone growth slowing? No offense to the analysts, but I’ll believe that one when I see it. Just watching Apple’s sales alone, it’s clear you can’t underestimate its power to deliver record-breaking numbers. In addition, just because vendors like HTC and Motorola are going to launch fewer smartphone models in 2012, that doesn’t (necessarily) mean they’ll sell fewer overall phones. If anything, the companies are hoping that their increased focus on “hero” devices will help them increase sales. One thing is clear, however: that post-PC era everyone’s been talking about since the day the phrase slipped off Steve Jobs’ lips has arrived. We’re living it. Anyone who wastes their time debating its existence (tablets are PCs! phones are PCs!) is arguing semantics. The shift itself, whatever you want to call it, is happening. So perhaps “post-PC” isn’t the best terminology. If everything’s a PC, then maybe what we’ve achieved is something more akin to “PCs Everywhere.” Not as catchy, though. Photo credit top: Lokesh Dhakar , flickr; bottom: agirregabiria , flickr

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When Will The Post-PC Era Arrive? It Just Did.

Jaja: A Pressure Sensitive iPad Stylus With A Clever Twist

ACMAir — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 01:43:48 +0000

“Who Wants A Stylus?” – Steve Jobs, MacWorld 2007 As it turns out, plenty of people do. Not for navigating around the user interface, mind you — Steve (et al.) was absolutely right about that. But for the artists of the world looking to use the iPhone or iPad as their newfangled portable glass canvas, the stylus wins over the finger any day. And yet, the myriad iPad styluses floating about generally lack something that artists have come to expect of their digital pens: pressure sensitivity. Dubbing itself “the world’s first pressure sensitive stylus for iPad”, a successfully Kickstarted project called “jaja” looks to change that. And for that last bit of bonus flare: they’re trying to do it all without using WiFi or Bluetooth for wireless connectivity. So how does it communicate with the iPad? Sound . As you probably know, the world is just full of sounds that we can’t hear. Generally speaking, the human ear can hear sounds between 20 and 20,000 Hz. According to the guys behind jaja, the iPad’s mic can pick up frequencies well beyond that, giving them a bit of space on the high-end to pass signals as sound without driving everyone around you crazy. (But what about the dogs? Won’t someone think of the dogs?!) In addition to pressure sensitivity, the jaja will also have two built-in buttons meant to be used as hotkeys (for switching brushes, for example, or one-click undo/redo functionality.) Of course, any iPad app you’re hoping to use this with (beyond the basic, non-pressure-sensitive stylus functionality) will need to pack support for jaja’s in-progress SDK. Your favorite drawing apps probably aren’t currently using the microphone for anything right now, much less for parsing out high-pitched whining. One thing I’m left curious about: what about ambient sound? Take airplanes, for example. Without reliance on WiFi/Bluetooth, it’s noted that the jaja can be used safely on a plane. But plane engines generate an absurd amount of sound — much of that in the higher ranges. Might that cause interference? Whatever the case, the jaja is well past its original $25,000 goal on Kickstarter , so the odds of it making it to the real world are pretty solid. $40 gets you one of the first 500 jajas, 471 of which have already been snatched up.

For Those About To Rock, WooThemes Launches A WordPress Theme For Bands

Budowniczy425 — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 01:43:40 +0000

WooThemes has just announced a new theme for musicians called Unsigned. To build the theme, the company worked with band managers and promoters as well as real, actual musicians in order to make a “rockin’” theme that is both “classical” and “jazzy” with a little but of “afro-beat” thrown in. The theme includes modules for events, discographies, and SoundCloud comparability for uploading music. You can also use a sales widget to sell music and merch instantly. The theme supports “tours” and events separately, so you can plan your cross-country van trip and your tour of the Baltic states using the same system. Sure you could use services like Bandcamp but this offers a bit more customization, allowing musicians to “riff” with their designs while “playing a mean licorice stick” in the CSS. Most important it gives musicians quite a bit of control over their online presence and because it’s a WordPress solution service providers can offer a one-stop-shop for up-and-coming bands. Now they just need a way for the site to split up into multiple sites when the bassist sleeps with the singer and breaks up the band and the drummer wants to do some solo trance work. Here’s the full feature list for your edification: Artsits have full control over the technical nature of their exposure (functionality developed to anticipate artists needs w/out any extra coding) Almost completely controlled by widgets, making it hugely flexible (something users have been asking for) Events module — completely custom, can be grouped into categories, status automatically determined by its start and end date and time, custom display options Actually comprised of three different widgets + a custom “tours” page template Venue listing + links to online ticket sales available Discography module — albums can be displayed and sorted into categories w/ cover image, unique catalog ID and release date Each album has an audio player and the tracks can be managed using native WP lightbox windows WooCommerce functionality — WooThemes knew it’s one of the most important needs of an artist, letting fans listen and then immediately buy if they want, we think this seals the deal for most bands Photos — easy management of multiple galleries, sorted into your categories complete w/ cover images Actually comprised of two different widgets specifically designed for the musician use case Videos — easily embed videos from YouTube, Vimeo, etc. w/ optional posterframe (standard WooThemes video widget allows for seamless switching between videos) Band Profile — easily add in each member, role, biography and order in which all images are displayed This is the “About.me for bands” piece Soundcloud integration — automatically connects to SoundCloud and pulls in the user’s tracks and playlists (this is your one-stop shop!) Data is cached for a month to avoid speed issues and high load And of course, a customizable look — change to a light style, change your logo, update your background image, all in a matter of minutes You can check it out here and get a 12% discount on the them until February 2 with the coupon code UNSIGNED12.

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For Those About To Rock, WooThemes Launches A WordPress Theme For Bands

SkyGrid Debuts iPad App Touchtv To Allow Users To Watch Content On Demand

kram412 — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 17:00:30 +0000

SkyGrid, a startup that offers a powerful news aggregator to consumers is venturing into the TV content and media business with the launch of Touchtv, an iPad app that allows viewers to watch recent programs from popular sports, entertainment, politics, and news channels. Custom designed for the iPad, Touchtv, which is a free app, aims to give viewers their own personal TV via the iPad to watch their favorite channels. SkyGrid has partnered with a number of networks including Fox, CBS, ABC, NBC, ESPN, OWN, E! and others to show specific content and programming. You can simply launch Touchtv on your iPad and “touch” any channel to start watching. From the Home Screen viewers can watch their channels and personalize their TV. As SkyGrid CEO Kevin Pomplun explains to me, Touchtv aims to replicate an identical experience to watching TV and flipping through channels. Unlike Hulu, Netflix, or others, Touchtv not trying to provide full sitcoms or games, but instead is trying to give users the channel watching experience. In addition, LG has selected the Touchtv experience to be embedded in 40 million of their TVs which will be in market in the next year and a half. The aim of this could be to give cord cutters the ability to watch network programming without cable. Touchtv still faces competition from Hulu, Netflix and even the individual iPad apps offered by cable operators and networks for the leanback experience. Pomplun says that SkyGrid will continue to operate independently from Touchtv.

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SkyGrid Debuts iPad App Touchtv To Allow Users To Watch Content On Demand

Vodio Brings Personalized Video Recommendations To The iPad

A D M I N — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 20:44:47 +0000

Vodio is a new iPad app that’s somewhat along the same lines as iOS app Shelby.tv . Like Shelby, it also brings you videos being shared by your friends on social networks. But where Shelby.tv only focuses on those “socially shared” videos, Vodio instead uses its social features to bring “a dash” of personalization to its video recommendations. In Vodio, you get to see what the crowd is watching too. To get started, you configure the app around your interests, by telling it which categories of videos you like to watch. For example, Comedy, Entertainment, Movies, Music, News, Science, Sports, Tech, etc. You can even drill down into these categories further to select the sub-categories that match your interests. So in Sports, you could choose Basketball, Football, Soccer, Tennis, etc. But you can also customize your favorite content sources. Yes to Fox Sports, perhaps, and no to the UFC. Great idea, in theory. In practice, Vodio seemed a little buggy. You can check the content sources you want to include, but good luck un-checking them. Tapping the categories again does nothing. Apparently, that’s by design. You don’t un-check your channel selections. You go into “Edit” mode and remove them. OK then. Maybe that seems like a minor complaint, but it’s very unintuitive to have a one-way checkbox. Try it yourself if you don’t believe me. (The company says it’s working on this). Petty complaints aside, the rest of Vodio’s user interface is attractive and fun to use. You swipe horizontally to move between channels and vertically to scroll through the videos in those channels. In addition to the personalization and (optional) social networking connections, Vodio simply shows you what’s hot on various video sharing platforms and from top media publishers. Videos come from TV shows, networks, comedy sites like College Humor, NASA, newspapers, newswires, movie trailers, music videos, blogs, and more. But for now, the only supported players are YouTube, Vimeo, AOL Video, Facebook Video and Daily Motion. Vodio Labs Ltd., the company behind Vodio, was founded in early 2011 by Jonathan Messika, Uri Twig and Ishay Weinstock in Tel Aviv, Israel. Last July, it raised a 200 Euro seed round led by Kima Ventures , with Jaina Capital and Orefa Investment participating. The company is now working on simplifying the channel set up and personalization process, adding more video-driven features like HD enabling, and partnering with premium content players. The Vodio app is a free download from iTunes here .

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Vodio Brings Personalized Video Recommendations To The iPad

Watch An iPad (And GoPro Camera) Survive A 100,000 Foot Drop

ACMAir — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 05:24:46 +0000

There were doubters last time . They said a 1300 foot drop wasn’t all that much. It wasn’t a true test. It fell onto grass, they said. Well, G-Form is back with another marketing ploy. This time they sent an iPad encased in G-Form’s $45 Extreme Edge case to the cusp of space and back. The iPad of course survived. It’s an impressive feat if it really happened. When the iPad eventually touches down, there’s a bit a russling the weeds that sounds more like footsteps than a parachute crashing. Just saying.

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Watch An iPad (And GoPro Camera) Survive A 100,000 Foot Drop

iOS Closes Out The Year With 52% Mobile Web Market Share

kram412 — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 01:52:30 +0000

Who’s browsing the mobile web the most? Apparently, iPhone and iPad owners are. According to end-of-the-month data from statistics provider NetMarketShare , iOS users ended up with a 52% market share of mobile web browsing in December 2011. More simply put, that means that over half of the mobile web browsing last month took place on an iOS device. Android, meanwhile, had a 16.2% share, behind Java ME at 21.27%, which fell into second place. Trailing the top three were Symbian (5.76%), BlackBerry (3.51%) and the mysterious “Other” (1.07%) which is where Windows Phone must be hiding. iOS saw the highest numbers in October, when it reached 61.5%, but has fallen slightly since. Of course, it may not be fair to compare iOS directly with the other mobile platforms, given that the iPad accounts for a good bit of Apple’s market share in this slice of mobile data. But even when the iPad is excluded, the iPhone still holds its own with a 25.24% showing. The iPad is at 24.53% and the iPod Touch accounts for 2.32%. Android, when divvied up by versions, sees 8.92% for Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) and 4.10% for Android 2.2% (Froyo). Where are the newer versions? Barely there: Android 3.x is just a little over a 1% share and Android 4.x is a tiny 0.05%. This data may seem a little odd, given Android’s marketshare gains, both in the U.S . and elsewhere , so it could be a reflection on the service’s methodology. But NetMarketShare is fairly reliable, so it could also be a reflection of the varying habits of iOS and Android users in general. Hat tip: MobileMarketingWatch

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iOS Closes Out The Year With 52% Mobile Web Market Share

As Millions Of Consumers Unwrapped Kindle Fires Over Christmas, Mobile Ad Impressions Spiked 261 Percent

jos — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 21:22:48 +0000

In November, Mobile ad network Millennial Media reported that Amazon’s new tablet devices Kindle Fire, was seeing ad impressions grow at an average daily rate of 19% since its launch to the public in the middle of the month. Millennial says it’s not just seeing millions of impressions and the device is on a monthly run rate of hundreds of millions of impressions. But that data was gathered from a few weeks of usage from consumers in November, and as Amazon reported yesterday, December’s holiday season brought record sales for the Kindle Fire, with over 4 million Kindle devices sold in December. The Kindle Fire was the most gifted and wished for product on Amazon this season. Today, Millennial is releasing data from its ad network showing impressive growth numbers from the Kindle Fire over the holiday weekend. In November, impressions on the Kindle Fire grew an average rate of 19 percent every day. Over this past weekend, Millennial says that as consumers opened and used their new Kindle Fires, ad impressions increased even more. As millions of consumers unwrapped new Kindle Fires, Millennial saw an average daily growth rate of 113 percent. On December 24, impressions grew 32 percent; and on Christmas day in particular, impressions on the Kindle Fire grew 261 percent. The day after Christmas saw a 46 percent jump in ad impressions. Of course, the Kindle Fire wasn’t the only tablet that saw a spike from the holidays. From December 23 to 26, the iPad had a daily growth rate of 6 percent. The iPad remained the leading tablet overall on Millennial’s platform during this time period, although the massive gain from the Kindle Fire helped to significantly close the gap. The Kindle Fire’s impression growth on the platform has slightly outpaced that of the iPad when the iPad launched in early 2010. Millennial says that though the Kindle Fire has been introduced into a more mature tablet market than the market which greeted the original iPad, Amazon’s entertainment-focused platform and the lower price point have helped drive this early use by consumers. Now that the holiday gifting season if over, it should be interesting to see if consumer usage of the Kindle Fire continues to grow at such a rapid pace. For example, the release of a new version of the iPad could effect Kindle Fire growth in 2012.

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As Millions Of Consumers Unwrapped Kindle Fires Over Christmas, Mobile Ad Impressions Spiked 261 Percent

Kindle Fire Display Doesn’t Stand Up To Nook, iPad 2 In Tests

Administrator — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 02:36:30 +0000

You probably know that not all LCDs are created equal: at a given size, you can have different resolutions, lighting methods, and display-driving technologies. Apple has led the way in this regard, generally shelling out in its products for the best options available, while cheaper brands tend to take a bit off the price tag by going with a cheaper or smaller display. That’s certainly the case with the Kindle Fire and Nook Tablet , both of which are aimed at a lower price point and must make sacrifices to reach it. But an examination by DisplayMate indicates that Amazon might have cut corners just a little too much, or perhaps rushed the Fire to market without too much thought about image quality. It’s nothing truly problematic, it should be said right away, and DisplayMate notes that it’s still a good display, but it has a couple serious problems that, objectively speaking, put it on a lower tier than the competition. The “anti-reflective treatment” on the Fire appears to have backfired, as the display had the highest reflectance of any tablet they’d tested. Reflected ambient light (as in a bright room) and directed light (as from overhead lights) was significantly higher than the iPad , and more than twice as high as the Nooks, which by the by had extremely low reflectance, making it good for reading in diverse lighting situations. The reflectance also caused a reduction in effective contrast, which is bad news for reading print. The Fire also uses an outdated gallery app that doesn’t use the full 24 bits of color depth of which the display is capable, resulting in banding and apparently a washed-out look that really has no place on a premium device. The second problem may be fixed in a software update (it’s a bit like the problem Nexus Ones had back in the day ), but the poor coating or material that’s resulting in the high reflectance likely isn’t going anywhere (unless this was an early batch problem). In many ways the Fire is the equal of the Nook and the iPad 2 displays, but all other things being equal, it’s just not as good. If possible, do a visual comparison in person to see if the difference is significant to you, and of course if you find the display is not up to your standards, you should feel perfectly justified in returning it. But if it looks good to you, it looks good, and there’s no point getting caught up in a few percentage points of difference here and there.

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Kindle Fire Display Doesn’t Stand Up To Nook, iPad 2 In Tests

Tutorspree Raises $1 Million Round Led By Sequoia Capital

Administrator — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 02:07:56 +0000

Tutorspree , a startup that’s looking to pull the time-honored practice of tutoring into the 21st century, has landed a $1 million funding round from some top investors, including Sequoia Capital. The full list: Sequoia Capital, Founder Collective, Lerer Ventures, SV Angel, Thrive Capital, Paul Buchheit, Geoff Ralston, Tim Brady, Alexis Ohanian, Adam d’Angelo, Reinmkr Capital, and Bubba Muraka. The company was previously part of Y Combinator. Tutorspree is looking to disrupt the major tutoring companies, like Sylvan, by giving people a way to find highly qualified, private tutors online — without having to deal with messy (and untrustworthy) Craigslist listings. To do this, Tutorspree screens all of their tutors prior to listing them on the site — the company says that all of them have four-year degrees (or higher), or are in the process of earning them. The site also gives tutors a profile to describe themselves and list their credentials, and it lets users rate their experiences with each tutor, which is key. CEO Aaron Harris says that the platform now has three thousand tutors, with a waiting list of over six thousand hoping to get added. About half of those three thousand tutors have been contacted thus far by users. He also points out an interesting trend around who is hiring the tutors: there are plenty of students, but many of the site’s users are people who have finished school. At this point Tutorspree’s tutoring sessions are all the old-fashioned sort: one-on-one, in-person meetings. But Harris says that over the coming months that company will incorporate more technology into its service: tutors will eventually be able to conduct lessons via online video, and there will be online material as well. The company is also working on building out a repository of material that its tutors can draw from. Tutorspree isn’t the only company offering a tutoring marketplace online — competitors include TeachStreet and Skillshare (which focuses on group classes, as opposed to private sessions).

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Tutorspree Raises $1 Million Round Led By Sequoia Capital