Evernote Market’s sales of physical goods now accounts for 30% of monthly sales
Will Microsoft use Windows RT or Android for low end devices?
Spotify music streaming finally available for iOS and Android for free
Instagram Direct lets you share your photos and videos privately
U.S. Government may never know how much Edward Snowden stole
Two tech geeks.
In case you missed it: Viber Out, Instagram Direct, Spotify on mobile for free, and more
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Uber releases new Uber Lost update
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Matthew Panzarino reports for TechCrunch about Uber’s new version of Uber Lost.
The system is nothing complex, it just provides you with a simple list of your recent trips, with beginning and end points to help you figure out where you were when you lost the item. Each ride entry contains the driver’s name and phone number so you can ring them up directly to ask them if they’ve found your item.
With the Uber system you’re presented with a way to call the driver back directly, rather than wading through the call center of a cab company and trying to cross reference time, location and cab availability.
What Medium is for
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Noah Nelson explains what Medium is for after John Gruber wrote that he does’t get what Medium is.
Sometimes, however, it doesn’t pay to view the world through a macro lens. The forest can be missed for the kerning on the font that spells out t-r-e-e-s. This is what I believe is happening here with those who look at Medium and go “Huh?”
Ev Williams lays the case for Medium out succinctly. He calls it “a new publishing platform.” That’s pretty succinct right there. Williams elaborates on the point this way:
One of our goals was to make it dead simple to write and present a beautiful story without having to be a designer or programmer. We also sought to help great ideas quickly find the right audience — no matter who they came from.
Medium is beautiful. If you haven’t seen it, go take a look now. It is so gorgeous that I feel compelled to write and post on Medium. It is immensely satisfying to simply to see my writing appear on Medium.
Facebook’s News Feed update hurting social media marketers
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Business Insider reports that Facebook’s News Feed algorithm update is hurting social media marketers.
When the change went down, lots of people assumed it would be terrible news for publishers that write a lot about “memes” and publish other “viral” content – publishers like Buzzfeed and Upworthy. Then AllThingsD’s Mike Isaac reported that the Facebook executive in charge of News Feed, Chris Cox, has a personal distaste for those two sites. It seemed like their doom was imminent.
However, that was not the case.
A week or so after Facebook made its changes, one social media marketing agency, Ignite, analyzed 689 posts from 21 brand pages. Ignite found that in just one week, the number of people who saw posts from those brands declined by 44% on average, “with some pages seeing declines as high as 88%.”
Seems like Facebook doesn’t want companies to look for social media marketers to promote their brands on Facebook. Instead, they want businesses to use Facebook ads and pay to promote their posts.
Social media marketers will not be going out of business. They just need to include the cost of Facebook ads and post promotion in their services.
Appsfire kills its app discovery service
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TechCrunch reports that Appsfire will cease to be an app discovery service within a week. It will focus on mobile ad technologies instead.
Says CEO Ouriel Ohayon, it’s “something we should have done a while ago.”
But the company’s data base of App Store data, called “App Genome,” is not going to waste. It will power AppsFire’s ad engine instead. This means AppsFire will not serve ads for those apps already installed on a user’s device. “So what we did with the app was totally useful to what we’ll do now,” Ohayon tells us. “It’s more than useful. It is what we believe will make us unique.”
Technically, it will still be helping users discover apps through ads.
72% of prospective tablet buyers want an iPad
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Apple Insider reports on a November study by Changewave showing 72% of respondents want an iPad within the next three months.
Apple’s 72 percent share represents a 17-point jump since the agency’s August survey, conducted before the introduction of Apple’s new iPad Air and iPad mini with Retina display.
All other tablet brands garnered only single-digit shares.
iPhone 5s tops all four major US carriers ever since launch
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Apple Insider reports that Canaccord Genuity’s survey data showed that iPhone 5s has been the top selling smartphone at all four major US carriers since its launch in September.
US carriers agree to standard set of rules for unlocking mobile devices
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Apple Insider reports that US carriers have agreed to a standard set of rules for unlocking mobile devices.
We believe this agreement will continue to foster the world-leading range of devices and offerings that Americans enjoy today,” CTIA President and CEO Steve Largent said in a statement. “The robust and differentiated technological ecosystem has brought unparalleled and world-leading benefits to American wireless users, in the form of high-end and affordable devices, post- and pre-paid options, and with the world’s most advanced devices being launched first in the United States.
I never had problems because I live in a place where phone-locking is forbidden. Good to see that the big four in the US are finally coming to their senses.