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Foursquare Will Bring 250,000 Restaurant Menus to Your Phone

Foursquare on phones


Check-in enthusiasts can embrace creative eating (read: eat something other than lunchtime burritos) thanks to a new integration of SinglePlatform to the Foursquare mobile app and Foursquare Explore, the location service’s desktop app.

SinglePlatform is a start-up that helps local businesses market themselves online, and it has more than 250,000 menus in its database. Thanks to that database, Foursquare desktop users will now have access to over 13 million individual food items in major U.S. cities. The official Foursquare blog tells us there’s more to come.

Menus aren’t available yet on the Foursquare mobile app, but users can access them by going to foursquare.com and m.foursquare.com on their mobile browsers.

SEE ALSO: Foursquare Brings Explore Tab to Desktops

The menus option will be a feature that will holds Foursquare above locale-based review sites including Yelp, Urbanspoon and Google-acquired Zagat, at least for now. Currently, none of these websites have a menu option. Other online menu directory resources include Menupages — which was acquired by Seamless — has over 35,000 menus. Seamless competitor GrubHub also recently acquired Dotmenu, which carries over 250,000 menus.

For now, Foursquare users may click through to the menus section of the right-hand side of venue pages. There’s also a price-filtering action available.

Tell us what you think about this new Foursquare integration of menus? How will mobile access to menus help you in your day to day?

More About: applications, foursquare, Google, iphone apps, Mobile, Social Media


from Mashable! http://mashable.com/2012/01/19/foursquare-menus/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_me...

#ScotchOClock with Dave Balter (@DaveBalter)

He has built companies.  He has sold companies.  He has angel invested in a ton of Boston startups.  But what future generations will remember about Dave Balter has nothing to do with the previously listed accomplishments.  Dave will long be remembered as the namesake of Dave Balter Tech Prom.

Dave is one of Boston’s best and most accessible startup mentors.  Even though he is the CEO of BzzAgent, serves on the Global Executive Team of dunnhumby, sits on the advisory boards of the Wharton Future of Advertising Project, MITX and the Boston Boys & Girls Club Marketing and Communications Committee, is a mentor with Tech Stars, is Executive Chair of Smarterer, Venture Advisor at Boston Seed Capital and is an investor and/or advisor to startups including FitnessKeeper, Promoboxx, Relay Rides, eLaCarte, ProctorCam and HelpScout… He makes tons time to help startups!

Feel free to get in touch with Dave if you need any help or are looking to get a great angel investor involved with your project.

Dave’s Contact Info:

Twitter
LinkedIn
Smarterer
About.me

 

from BostInno http://bostinno.com/channels/scotchoclock-with-dave-balter-davebalter/

Card.io reaches out to devs, offers up credit card payment accounts to Joe normal

Who needs extra hardware to add mobile payments to iOS and Android? Not Card.io, who's unveiled a new SDK for it's visual card processing system alongside a payment app allowing anyone to accept payments from other users. Having already launched its scanner software development kit last year, the new SDK will open up the company's payment process to third-party developers. The new payment app works across Android and iPhone platforms, with no need to register as a merchant to access the feature. Although there are no registration charges, payments made through either PayPal or your bank account will have an additional 3.5 percent plus 30 cents nudged on top of each transaction. Going dutch has never been more (begrudgingly) easy.

Continue reading Card.io reaches out to devs, offers up credit card payment accounts to Joe normal

Card.io reaches out to devs, offers up credit card payment accounts to Joe normal originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 19 Jan 2012 12:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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from Engadget http://www.engadget.com/2012/01/19/card-io-reaches-out-to-devs-offers-up-cred...

TED Takes on SOPA: Why it Would Create a ‘Consumption-Only Internet’ [VIDEO]

TED has posted an “emergency” TED Talk called “Defend Our Freedom To Share (Or Why SOPA is a Bad Idea)” by Internet writer and NYU professor Clay Shirky. Shirky gave his address yesterday at the New York offices of TED, the company that produces a popular series of conferences and lectures about “ideas worth spreading.”

Shirky begins the 14-minute video with a story about a bakery that printed children’s drawings on sugar plates for their birthday cakes. This became a problem because kids like to draw cartoon characters such as Mickey Mouse.

“It turns out to be illegal to print a child’s drawing of Mickey Mouse onto a plate of sugar,” he says.

SEE ALSO: Why SOPA Is Dangerous

Shirky then summarizes the evolution of online content law leading up to the Stop Online Piracy Act and its sister bill, the Protect Intellectual Property Act (PIPA). He tells how the two controversial bills were preceded by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 and Audio Home Recording Act of 1992.

The video not only explains what SOPA and PIPA want to do, but also serves as a call to action for opponents of the legislation to preserve their ability to share, remix, and discuss.

“Because the biggest producers of content on the Internet are not Google and Yahoo — they’re us –we’re the ones getting policed,” he tells the audience. “The real threat to the enactment of PIPA and SOPA is our ability to share things with one another.”

In a column written for the Guardian, Shirky argues that the bills would create a “consumption-only” Internet.

Many websites are protesting SOPA and PIPA today by going dark, while SOPA’s author, Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas), has scheduled a debate for February and called out Wikipedia for participating in the blackout.

What do you think about Shirky’s TED Talk? Let us know in the comments.

More About: PIPA, SOPA, TED, Video

from Mashable! http://mashable.com/2012/01/18/ted-takes-on-sopa-why-it-would-create-a-consum...

Huffington Post to Launch 24-Hour Online News Network


Shortly after Reuters announced its web TV programming iniative with YouTube, news emerged that AOL’s Huffington Post Media Group is developing an even more robust online video offering for its own website.

According to Forbes — and our own source confirms this — the Huffington Post is planning to launch a 24-hour live programming channel called the Huffington Post Streaming Network, or HPSN.

Think of it as the Huffington Post‘s cable news network, minus the cable subscription. Whether the content will be up to cable news quality remains to be seen.

The Huffington Post‘s existing editorial staff of 300+ will offer live commentary throughout the day, and the footage will later be cut into clips to be embedded throughout the site. Presumably we can expect to access the stream through the Huffington Post‘s apps as well. Viewers will also be privy to editorial meetings to see the newsgathering process at play, Forbes says.

At present, both the Wall Street Journal and Fox News offer live online programming in the style of cable news, but only during the workday.

Bloomberg also makes its live broadcast available for free on the iPad 24 hours per day, but most cable news operations only share short clips of their TV programming on the web.

Mario Ruiz, VP of communications at AOL, did not confirm any details about the video channel but said that further information would be announced at a press event in New York City on Feb. 2.

More About: aol, cable, Huffington Post, Media, TV

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from Mashable! http://mashable.com/2012/01/18/huffington-post-streaming-network/?utm_source=...

YouTube Launches Action Sports Channels, Starring Tony Hawk


YouTube just got more gnarly, bro.

Fans of skateboarding, surfing and BMX biking have a variety of new ways to feed their addictions to the extreme after the video sharing site introduced a set of action sports channels on Wednesday.

According to the official YouTube Blog, the added channels won’t just show the coolest kick-flips, grinds and ollies, though. Many will take viewers behind the scenes with some of the genre’s biggest stars, offering how-to demonstrations, special glimpses of the professional competition circuit and other lifestyle features.

One channel sponsored by action sports icon Tony Hawk even turns the spotlight back on fans with a series called “One in a Million,” in which amateur skateboarders will compete with one another for sponsorships from major brands. Hawk’s RIDE channel will also feature daily tips on pulling off successful tricks, as well as tutorials on photography and videography techniques. In another series, called “Dissent,” Hawk will leverage his celebrity for interviews with a variety of musicians, artists and actors.

Meanwhile, Red Bull: The Red Bull Channel will add more than a dozen shows looking at the the day-to-day lives and competitions of some of the world’s most popular athletes from a variety of sports. Motocross legend Travis Pastrana, skateboarder Ryan Sheckler and trial bike star Danny MacAskill will be among those followed.

Alli Sports and Network A round out YouTube’s group of new channels that focus on the extreme. Alli Sports will bring a variety of tips, profiles and analysis. Network A plans to focus on the personalities behind the tricks.

Sports videos — from highlights of world-class pros to grainy shots of future phenoms — have long been among YouTube’s most popular content. Now action sports will add to the fun.

Which new channels are you excited about? What are your favorite sports-centered YouTube channels already? Let us know in the comments.

Image courtesy of RIDE

More About: sports, YouTube

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from Mashable! http://mashable.com/2012/01/18/youtube-action-sports/?utm_source=feedburner&u...

SnapStream TV monitoring now lets OSX users keep tabs on amusing video-blunders

The Daily Show and Colbert Report famously rely upon SnapStream's high-power Windows DVR software to monitor the insanity at the fringes of America's cable spectrum. The media-monitoring software is also used by news services, educators and shadowy government agencies to keep tabs on the subjects discussed on TV. The latest edition (version five) opens the platform up to OSX users, enabling them to run it in Firefox without messy virtualization. The OSX web player comes with a plugin to watch MPEG-2 streams that'll happily sit on top of Snow Leopard or Lion and will even let you set up customized alerts for whenever inappropriate euphemisms emerge from Oprah's mouth.

SnapStream TV monitoring now lets OSX users keep tabs on amusing video-blunders originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 18 Jan 2012 20:38:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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from Engadget http://www.engadget.com/2012/01/18/snapstream-coming-to-mac/

New Facebook Cover Designer App Takes Photos With Your Profile in Mind


Most standard photos don’t fit Facebook Timeline’s cover photo slot, but a new app that launched on Tuesday creates images sized specifically for that purpose.

Dropico’s free Facebook Cover Designer provides a landscape viewfinder for composing shots with Facebook in mind. Users can also pull photos from their camera roll, Facebook, Picasa, Flickr, Photobucket or Instagram to edit within the app.

Once the desired photo is loaded, they can crop, rotate, scale and add filters before uploading it directly to Facebook.

Aside from customizing the photo size, the app’s most noteworthy feature is an effect that creates a cover photo and profile photo from the same image — making the timeline cover look like one image with a highlighted square instead of two photos. Unfortunately, however, the feature is only available with a $.99 upgrade.

For more tips on how to make the most of your Facebook Cover photo, click here.

More About: apps, Facebook, facebook timeline, Photos

from Mashable! http://mashable.com/2012/01/17/facebook-cover-designer-app/?utm_source=feedbu...

Google, LG to team up on 'Google TV Nexus' edition for next release?

While not all of Google's aims to change cellphones with its Nexus brand program may have been achieved, it has created some admirable devices in cooperation with HTC and Samsung (way to pass on that one Sony Ericsson). According to Bloomberg, its next step may be to do the same with LG for TVs. As product manager Rishi Chandra mentioned in an interview with us, the next focus for Google TV will center around increasing its ability to personalize the user experience and further enhance content discovery, and anonymous sources indicate LG could get first crack at it later this year. What's odd about this development is that on TVs, so far the two versions of hardware that have debuted already featured software largely free of manufacturer customizations, unlike phones. At this year's CES LG, along with Vizio, is among the first to show a custom skin for the software, along with its new remote. However, the original aim of the Nexus was to work "even more closely with our partners to bring devices to the market that are going to help showcase very quickly the we're working on" so if this can help cut down the long window we saw before the last Google TV update, we're all for it.

Google, LG to team up on 'Google TV Nexus' edition for next release? originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 13 Jan 2012 13:48:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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from Engadget http://www.engadget.com/2012/01/13/google-lg-to-team-up-on-google-tv-nexus-ed...

How Social Media Is Changing Consumer Electronics, and CES

facebook twitter tv 360


LAS VEGAS — CES 2012 is almost over, and so is the nonstop avalanche of cutting-edge products, amazing concept technologies and goofy celebrity appearances. The show is supposed to be a beacon for the industry to predict trends, and if you analyze the haze surrounding the thousands of product unveilings and company announcements, some figures start to emerge from the fog: tablets and slim laptops, smart TVs, fitness gadgets, power efficiency.

But for me, the thing that stuck out most at this CES was an exchange I had with another member of the media after Panasonic’s whirlwind press conference (with a surprise cameo from Justin Timberlake). My friend emerged from the scrum of press and analysts swarming the stage in the post-event mob, greeted me, and asked, “Did they show any TVs?”

I had to think. “Uh….” Then I remembered there was a brief mention. “Yeah, but they spent two minutes on them, tops.”

To be clear, there were certainly TVs in Panasonic’s presentation, but in terms of specifying the models and features — a staple of CES press conferences of yore — there was just a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it acknowledgement. Panasonic only really talked about the television in the context of larger ideas, like its eco initiatives and SmartViera connected-TV tech.

It was a telling omission, and it wasn’t the only one. All over CES 2012 I saw a shifting of focus from hyping technological achievements (Double battery life! Better color! More processing power!) to painting a picture of what those devices really offer, or more specifically, what they connect you with.


The Myth of Consumption


Various companies, particularly Intel, were in a hurry to debunk the so-called myth of consumption. That is, the idea that consumers just want to, well, consume — that they’re mere cattle using today’s tech to seek out and passively “graze” on content — is a fallacy, they say. Today’s digital customers want to create, connect and interact as well.

While that assertion feels spot-on, the raw technology can still impress. That big OLED TV from LG looks gorgeous. Parrot’s Zik headphones are an remarkable piece of design. And those Ultrabooks? Hot.

There’s no question there was some great gear on display in Las Vegas this week, but I think most would agree that the new technology they bring to the table is evolutionary, not revolutionary. Whether a TV gives you 1 million colors or 4 million, or whether a phone runs at 1.2GHz or 1.5GHz doesn’t really matter all that much to consumers. Even the lower specs are good enough for the vast majority of people.


The Real Trend From CES 2012


Besides that, to focus on specs and performance is to miss the larger trend, the one that’s really important. Consumers increasingly want their experience with tech to be social. A fitness gadget, for example, isn’t just about working out — it’s about setting goals, working toward them, sharing your progress with friends and doing it all in a way that makes you feel good about yourself.

This new way of thinking is much more than just adding Wi-Fi or integrating Twitter’s API into a product. It’s a paradigm shift for consumer electronics, and the companies that succeed are the ones who don’t focus on simply building the best TV, phone or gadget. It’s the ones who focus on the overall experience, on what they’re offering that will keep customers coming back, possibly bringing a few friends with them.

Take this one random statistic that flies in the face of conventional wisdom: When online streaming and downloading is factored in, consumers are actually watching more TV over the past few years, according to Nielsen. And this is over a time that’s seen the rise of social networks, casual games and a host of other distractions that should theoretically be keeping people from getting around to catching up on The Big Bang Theory. Why is this happening?

The answer, of course, is that these new services compete for a person’s time to a point, but they also complement the TV experience. Chatter on Twitter and Facebook can sometimes get an audience more excited about a show, or a product, than traditional marketing ever could. Would Glee be as big a hit if it weren’t for the nonstop social-media buzz around it? Could Dr. Dre’s Beats headphones have been as successful with just word of mouth?


Building the Social Experience


It’s not so much a trend as a reality: consumer electronics must go social to stay relevant. That reality was all over CES 2012 in many ways — the proliferation of wireless technology, the widespread integration with mobile devices, the creation of novel apps. Even the move toward more green technology and power efficiency is a kind of social trend, one where consumers seek to connect to their world by making it better in a small but measurable way.

But those trends are just step one. The companies that will be most successful capitalizing on them are the ones who merge all of them into an overall experience: one that’s social, open and empowering. I don’t know if Sony, Intel or Justin Timberlake will come out on top, but to find out who’s winning, just check Twitter.


BONUS: The Tablets of CES 2012


1. One Laptop Per Child


The XO 3.0 tablet includes the Marvell ARMADA PXA618 SOC processor, Avastar Wi-Fi SOC, standard or Pixel Qi sunlight-readable display, and supports Android and Linux operating systems. Unlike any other tablet on the market, it can be powered by solar energy, other alternative energy sources and even hand-cranks.

Click here to view this gallery.

More About: CES, CES 2012, Facebook, Social Media, social networks, trending, Twitter

from Mashable! http://mashable.com/2012/01/13/ces-20120-social-media/?utm_source=feedburner&...