By the numbers: the 2012 plug-in Prius

Over six days of driving—limited to around-town trips—we put about 103 miles on a fleet-test Toyota Prius Plug-In, averaging 90.8 miles per gallon. In that time, we gave the Prius Plug-In five full charges and two partial ones, and according to the trip computer, we covered 77.7 miles in EV mode.

As we’ve reported in prior driving impressions, the Plug-In, which won’t go on sale until spring of 2012, will move on—or primarily on—electric power … Continue Reading

DesignPax enlists AdRoll and Retargeter for faster, cheaper design

A startup called DesignPax says that it’s creating a new way for small businesses to work with designers — and now it’s bringing that model to ad retargeting companies AdRoll and Retargeter.

Chief executive and co-founder Ayal Ebert compared the DesignPax model to LegalZoom, a site that simplifies the process of creating legal documents. DesignPax customers submit their order and any relevant media (such as the company logo) on the DesignPax site, receive their designs … Continue Reading

ShareSquare’s QR codes helps brands connect the offline world to the mobile Web

ShareSquare, developers of a mobile platform that uses 2D barcodes, dubbed “QR codes,” to connect offline media like posters to the mobile Web, is formally launching today after proving wildly popular at this year’s South By Southwest conference.

The big difference with ShareSquare, compared to other QR code competitors, is that it also offers a content management system to lets brands easily link QR codes to a customized mobile Web app. The company also offers … Continue Reading

FCC official: AT&T’s T-Mobile deal will face “steep climb”

AT&T’s $39 billion deal to purchase T-Mobile won’t be entirely smooth sailing for the carrier — not that we expected any less.

Speaking off the record on Wednesday, an FCC official said there’s “no way” the FCC will “rubber-stamp” the deal, adding that AT&T will likely face a “steep climb,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

Ever since the T-Mobile acquisition was announced last week, AT&T has been bending over backwards to prove how the deal … Continue Reading

Total Immersion gets $5.5M to expand augmented reality

Augmented Reality (AR) company Total Immersion just received $5.5 million in funding.

Augmented reality overlays digital information on your view of the physical world through a camera or other viewer. The new funding will be used to further develop the company’s D’Fusion platform and expand operations in Asia and in the US.

This latest funding round was led by Intel Capital and including existing investors Partech, iSource and Elaia Partners.

Total Immersion has solutions for … Continue Reading

MeMap app lets you track Facebook friends on one central map

MeMap launched a mobile app today that aims to bring together all of your Facebook friends’ location data from various location-based networks and put it on a single map.

That includes data shared with Facebook and Facebook Connect by third-party location-based social networks like Foursquare, GoWalla, Buzzd and others.

The San Francisco-based startup said the new app puts Facebook on one central app accessible by mobile devices. The app is available only on the iPhone, … Continue Reading

Legolas Media raises $5M to expand audience marketplace

Legolas Media, a next generation audience marketplace, has raised $5 million in a second round of funding.

The mission of Legolas Media is to provide insights to allow for more precise advertisement targeting. The company does this by providing a marketplace where buyers and sellers of digital advertising space can trade audiences similar to how stock investors trade futures. Companies construct audience segments and target them across a number of publishers.

The funding was led … Continue Reading

Google and former French minister help find the missing in Japan

Nicole Guedj was in charge of repatriating the French victims of the 2005 South East Asian tsunami. She started the Red Helmets Foundation to apply new technology to help the victims of natural disasters.

The foundation just launched the Missing web site which enables search teams and families search for missing people. It’s initially aimed at helping locate those missing in the Japanese earthquake and tsunami but the idea is that the site can be … Continue Reading

Bubbling under: Samsung's Bada app store hits 100M downloads

It’s easy to forget that there are other app stores—indeed, other operating systems—which are making headway outside of iOS and Android. To remind us, Samsung just announced that its mobile and TV app store for the Bada operating system, Samsung Apps, has hit 100 million downloads.

If you look at Samsung Apps’ numbers, they are impressive — despite being nowhere near as stellar as Apple’s or Google’s. Opened in June 2010 with the release of … Continue Reading

Is Motorola gearing up to abandon Android for its own OS?

It may sound crazy, but there’s reason to believe that Motorola isn’t content to rely entirely on Android for its mobile future.

Motorola Mobility has been gathering developers from Apple and Adobe has been gathering developers from Apple and Adobe in an effort to build its own web-based mobile OS, a source tells InformationWeeek. (Motorola recently split itself into two separate companies; Motorola Mobility is the company handling consumer devices.)

If true, and it seems … Continue Reading

TechDygest for the iPhone lets you follow news like a speed reader

TechDygest for the iPhone is probably one of the most useful news reading apps you’ve never heard of.

True to its name, TechDygest offers you a steady stream of tech news from multiple sources — but the real genius is its ability to compress separate stories into a short summary that’s perfect for mobile reading.

As if by magic, TechDygest (available free on the iTunes Store) also manages to retain most key points to a … Continue Reading

Deals & More: Shiny Ads raises $500K for self-serve ad platform

Today’s funding announcements include companies focused on easy ad buys, mobile apps and market intelligence:

Shiny Ads gets $500K for user-friendly ad service: The advertising tech company has raised a round of seed funding led by Maple Leaf Angels and York Angels, two Toronto-area angel networks. Based in Toronto, the company helps small advertisers purchase ads from mid-sized and large online publishers using a simple interface.

Padopolis lands $1M for mobile software: The San Francisco-based … Continue Reading

Startup creates social marketplace for game "mods"

Olympus Games has created a social marketplace for uploading and downloading user-generated modifications to games known as “mods.”

Seattle-based Olympus Games says its Gmod market will let hardcore video game fans upload their own mods for popular games such as Elder Scrolls IV Oblivion or Portal. Mods often recast an environment for a game with a different art style or theme, or they provide new maps for multiplayer combat. If the site takes off, Gmod … Continue Reading

Chegg moves beyond textbooks with course selection, homework help

Chegg is already leading the pack of textbook rental websites, and with new features unveiled today, it’s moving closer to chief executive Dan Rosensweig’s vision of reaching college students every day of the year.

Specifically, the Santa Clara, Calif. startup is launching new features that allow students to select classes and ask for homework help on the Chegg site. These additions use the technology that Chegg acquired when it bought CourseRank and Cramster last year.… Continue Reading

The pop culture alliance of Lady Gaga, Google, Twitter — and Rebecca Black

Pop singer Lady Gaga visited both Google and Twitter today, and I’ve been wondering what that means for how celebrities are feeding off of Silicon Valley and vice versa.

Lady Gaga fans find out about her through Google and watch her music on YouTube, and she tweets to communicate with them. Technology and the internet are wholly integrated into her existence.

Her interview with Google executive Marissa Mayer showed that she is very aware of … Continue Reading

WSJ's Mossberg rips RIM, Samsung execs a new one

Top mobile device company executives obviously overestimated their ability to positively spin responses to hard-hitting questions from Wall Street Journal tech columnist Walt Mossberg, who moderated a panel discussion about new mobile device trends at the CTIA Wireless 2011 conference today in Orlando.

Far from the light, casual conversation expected from an industry driven event, Mossberg took full advantage of having business leaders from five of the largest mobile device maker on stage at the … Continue Reading

Samsung offers a peek into mobile trends of the future

The U.S. division of Korea’s Samsung Electronics took a deep dive into its mobile technologies today at its local U.S. chip headquarters in San Jose, Calif., highlighting everything from the coming flexible screens for tablet computers to dual-core processors for smartphones. The company’s marketers tried to present the idea that no one is better positioned for the future of mobile electronics than Samsung. The company competes with other integrated technology companies such as Sony, LG, … Continue Reading

4chan founder's Canv.as opens up to the world — but just a taste

Canv.as, a slightly secretive image-sharing and content creation site created by 4chan founder Christopher Poole, has opened its doors to the rest of the world — but for viewing purposes only.

Existing beta Canv.as users can link to threads within Canv.as and show threads of images created within the image-sharing site. The site is designed to streamline the content creation process by making it easy to “remix” images with additional pieces of content or create … Continue Reading