Friendticker location app lets you reward customers for checking-in

Berlin-based Friendticker, which helps brands create location-based loyalty programs, just went into public beta with its iPhone application (currently only available in France, Spain, Germany, Austria and Switzerland). The app lets businesses reward users with virtual “items” when they check-in at a particular location (a restaurant or retail location, for example). And users can then trade in these rewards for real goods or services.

A restaurant chain could, for example, give a customer a “free … Continue Reading

Twitter revamps homepage with dynamic features to entice new users

Today Twitter unveiled the latest iteration of its homepage, which puts dynamic content front and center. It also does a much better job of conveying to new users exactly what the service has to offer.

For some reason, Twitter has historically had trouble with its homepage design. The site originally featured a sparse and static homepage, which contained only a quick blurb describing the service and pushed new users to sign up. Last year, Twitter … Continue Reading

CODA ramps up electric car manufacturing in China with new $394M

CODA Automotive, one of the lesser gabbed-about electric car companies, just got a big break. Along with its joint venture partner, battery maker Lishen Power Battery, the company has just taken in $100 million in direct capital, with the promise of $294 million more down the road from China’s Bank of Tianjin Joint Stock.

Based in Santa Monica, Calif., the company has been anticipating support from China’s government and banks for a while, airing earlier … Continue Reading

Nissan Leaf undercuts rivals with $33,000 price tag

With both the Nissan Leaf and General Motors’ Chevy Volt slated to launch before the end of the year, 2010 is quickly becoming a barometer for how the market will receive plug-in vehicles — and which brand will take the lead. But now Nissan has preemptively pulled ahead, announcing today that its fully-electric Leaf will retail for $32,780 before federal tax credits — undercutting many of its competitors.

Its chief rival, the Volt, has yet … Continue Reading

SharedDoc brings its conversation tools to PowerPoint

A service called SharedDoc already makes it easy to collaborate on Microsoft Word documents by building a conversation in the annotations around a text. Now SharedBook, the company behind SharedDoc, is expanding the service to include something trickier — Microsoft’s PowerPoint presentation software.

What SharedDoc is carrying over to PowerPoint is its focus on comments and conversation. Compared to a simpler service like Crocodoc, SharedDoc focuses on the idea that you can have an extended, … Continue Reading

Intel launches new chip for everything from low-end servers to supercomputers

Intel took the server chip wars up a notch again today in its competition with Advanced Micro Devices. The world’s biggest chip maker launched its new Xeon 7500 series chip that can be used in everything from two-chip servers to supercomputers with thousands of processors.

The new chips come with four, six or eight cores — or computing brains — on a single chip. The Santa Clara, Calif.-based chip  maker announced the new chips in … Continue Reading

Why Silicon Valley needs the Unvarnished truth

After 15 years of covering Web startups, it’s not often that one strikes a chord in this jaded journalist’s heart. But one new Silicon Valley company strikes me as not just timely, but necessary. It’s called Unvarnished, and it aims to collect reviews about people.

This has caused predictable alarm among people who have reason to worry about their reputations. Michael Arrington hinted at the existence of the startup Sunday, calling it a “Yelp for … Continue Reading

Game-based marketing takes off from frequent flyer programs to social media

Gabe Zichermann coined the term Funware to describe the use of video game mechanics in everyday, non-game applications. It was a big idea that has now become a rallying cry for the spread of video games beyond their traditional borders into industries that seem remotely related to games.

What Zichermann, chief executive of beamME and a 12-year game industry veteran, realized was that games motivate people to do things that they wouldn’t ordinarily do. The … Continue Reading

Google, ACLU, AT&T and other tech giants team up to reform privacy law

Google, Microsoft, Intel and other tech companies have teamed up to overhaul privacy laws enacted more than 20 years that define how the government can access user data.

The law the companies are targeting, the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, is 24 years old and was created ages before the Internet became mainstream. As a result, there isn’t a lot of clarity about whether documents stored in the cloud or location data from cellphones are protected … Continue Reading

iPod godfather Tony Fadell leaves Apple for good, moving on to green tech

Tony Fadell, the man who brought the idea of a portable audio player to Apple, has now cut all of his ties with the company, according the New York Times. He initially stepped down from his role as senior VP of Apple’s iPod division in November 2008 for “personal reasons”, but remained close to the company as a special advisor to Steve Jobs.

It’s common for companies to pay former executives as “advisors” or “consultants” … Continue Reading

Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 map pack launches with glitch, competition from Bad Company 2

The modern combat brawl started anew today as multiplayer map packs arrived for both Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 and Battlefield Bad Company 2.

Gamers can download the map packs via Xbox Live. Early reports suggested that the Modern Warfare 2 Stimulus Pack wasn’t working correctly for users who bought it early this morning for 1200 Microsoft Points, or $15 on Xbox Live. Activision Blizzard, which publishes Modern Warfare 2 (right), hasn’t yet responded.… Continue Reading

Vodpod's new Groups feature lets you easily collect and discuss online videos with others

Online video discovery and sharing site Vodpod has announced a new “Groups” feature that will help you collect videos around a specific topic, and easily share them with others.

Vodpod has allowed you to collect your favorite online videos on its site for some time now, and you can also vote up videos submitted by others in a Digg-like fashion. Groups adds a collaboration layer to the site that will make it even more useful … Continue Reading

Reply.com lands $1.08M following IPO filing

Reply.com, the advertising marketplace targeted at local and niche companies, has raised $1.08 million in options, securities and debt financing, according to a filing with the SEC.

The San Ramon, Calif., company made big news at the end of last month when it filed for a $60 million initial public offering.

Reply distinguishes itself from other ad networks, claiming to convert 50 to 100 percent of customers who click on an ad into buyers, because … Continue Reading

Payvment puts $1.1M in its basket to power online shopping carts

Payvment, a service that lets you add a fully-functional shopping cart to your web site or Facebook Page using PayPal as the payment mechanism, has just landed $1.15 million of a targeted $1.7 million round of equity and preferred stock sales, according to a filing with the SEC.

Payvment uses PayPal’s Adaptive Payments API to let anyone set up an e-commerce site and start selling their goods or services online and the popular social network. … Continue Reading

Landis+Gyr to supply smart meters to British Gas on way to IPO

British Gas, the major electrical and gas utility in the United Kingdom, has decided to go with Landis+Gyr to build the 1 million smart meters it plans to deploy throughout its coverage area. This is a big victory for the Swiss meter maker, which is racing against American contenders like Itron and Echelon.

Landis+Gyr builds meters that are capable of wirelessly transmitting energy consumption and pricing data in real time between utilities, their customers, and … Continue Reading

Roundup: Two new iPhones coming, one on Verizon; Sims creator does TV show?

Here’s the latest action:

Two new iPhones coming, one on Verizon — The Wall Street Journal reported that there are two new iPhone models coming this year, including one that will launch on a non-AT&T network — Verizon — for the first time.

Morgan Stanley predicts 6 million iPad unit sales this year — Analyst Katy Huberty expects that Apple will sell more units than the 3 – 4 million predicted. She says that manufacturing … Continue Reading

Tesla extends Roadster's lifespan with new Lotus deal

Tesla Motors‘ Roadster was all set to be discontinued (at least temporarily) early next year. But the electric car company just struck a deal with manufacturing partner Lotus to keep the vehicle in stock till at least the end of 2011, giving it more runway to launch its highly-anticipated Model S sedan.

Tesla has been pretty candid about how its Roadster’s primary function is to generate money and hype for the more practical and affordable … Continue Reading

Energy Dept. earmarks $37.5M for joint energy research with China

The U.S. Department of Energy announced today that it is investing $37.5 million in joint research initiatives with organizations in China over the next five years. After this sum is matched by private organizations, about $75 million will go toward U.S. efforts to improve energy efficiency, clean coal technologies, carbon sequestration and green vehicles.

Specifically, the money will be used to construct a U.S.-China Clean Energy Research Center, which will have branches in both countries. … Continue Reading

iPads shipping now, available at Best Buy April 3, plus Apple's new video tutorials make us drool

We’ve got only a few days until the release of Apple’s iPad this Saturday, April 3, and as expected we’re seeing a deluge of information about the tablet. This is usually the point in a new product’s release where any snippet of information will end up being analyzed a hundred different ways — and we can expect this to last all week.

First up, we learned early this morning that Apple is now shipping out … Continue Reading