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Twitter still might save Vine by selling it
Vine may survive after all. Twitter is currently vetting multiple term sheets from companies offering to buy Vine, and hopes to make a deal soon, multiple sources tell TechCrunch. After announcing its plan to shut down Vine last month, Twitter received a large number of bids, including several from Asia. It’s now working to decide who should run the short-form video app. While… Read More
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WhatsApp adds GIF support in iOS app
Amid increased competition from Apple’s iMessage, Snapchat, and Google’s new entry Allo, Facebook-owned WhatsApp has now rolled out support for sharing GIFs in its messaging application on iOS. According to the app update text in iTunes, the new feature will allow users to send and receive GIFs, including Live Photos and shorter videos, both of which can be now converted to… Read More
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Google’s Firebase developer platform gets better analytics, crash reporting and more
Google today launched the first major update to its Firebase backend-as-a-service platform since it first announced its plans to turn the service into its unified platform for developers six months ago. While Facebook decided to shut down its competing Parse service earlier this year, Google decided to double down on Firebase (which it acquired in 2014) as its flagship development platform… Read More
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Why iRobot’s Colin Angle thinks the smart home starts with a robot vacuum
Robots — and the smart home in general — are a hot topic, and it’s one where an enormous amount of investment is happening right now. There are many companies like Nest and Ring that are trying to target segments of the home in the hopes of making everything smarter. But it’s easy to forget that the home is still a physical space, and in order for everything to… Read More
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Facebook Messenger is testing “Instant Games” like this one from King
Facebook Messenger is preparing to launch a new “Instant Games” platform that will let people play lightweight games against friends. Candy Crush maker King.com is already testing one of these Instant Games called “Shuffle Cats Mini” in New Zealand, TechCrunch has discovered. And other studios including Big Viking also appear to be prepping for the Instant Games… Read More
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Now it’s Periscope cloning Snapchat with augmented selfie masks
Periscope is following Snapchat and Facebook’s lead by creating its own animated augmented reality selfie masks. The first ones can make you look like Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump, and will be available for the next week for the election. If you broadcast in selfie mode with the iOS app’s latest version, you’ll see them docked at the bottom of the screen. Tapping them… Read More
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Google brings RCS, the next-gen upgrade to SMS, to Android phones on Sprint
As promised earlier this year, Google is bringing RCS – Rich Communications Service, an upgrade to the SMS standard – to Android devices. Its first carrier partner on the initiative is Sprint, which is rolling out RCS messaging to its customers with Android devices, starting today. Once enabled, RCS will offer Android users an enhanced messaging experience over SMS, with features… Read More
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Indus, the startup building an Android OS for India, targets deals with Chinese OEMs
Indus OS, the startup developing a localized version of Android for India, is now going after international OEMs after it clinched a deal that will local giant Intex sell smartphones powered by its operating system. Read More
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Facebook video pays off
Mark Zuckerberg’s drive to “put video first” is also putting money in Facebook’s pockets. The more organic videos Facebook users watch, the more high-priced video ads Facebook can slip into the feed. Now Facebook’s strategy around auto-play video, paying Live content producers and offering more creative tools is helping to propel its massive revenue growth. Read More
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Gfresh raises $20 million to transform the way seafood is bought and sold
Seafood consumption is soaring in China, along with increases in average disposable income there. But live, edible fish and shellfish are challenging to buy, sell and transport across borders within and beyond China. As a result of the complexities in shipping live fish, and complying with health and customs regulations, tons of seafood are wasted each year, at a time when our oceans are… Read More
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Mic launches a news app that you might never need to open
With its latest app, millennial-focused publisher Mic said it’s hoping to give you a full newsreading experience from your iPhone lockscreen. The app is an updated version of the MicCheck app, now simply called Mic. Anthony Sessa, the company’s vice president of product and engineering, told me that one of the big goals was to take advantage of the new rich notifications in iOS… Read More
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Hollar snags another $30 million for its fast-growing dollar store app
Hollar, a startup offering dollar store-like finds in the form of a mobile app, has raised another $30 million to continue to grow its business. The new Series B round of funding was led by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, and included participation by Comcast Ventures and Greycroft Partners, as well existing investors Lightspeed Venture Partners, Index Ventures, Forerunner Ventures… Read More
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Photo app Ever removed its spammy SMS feature after Apple banned it
Score one for the consumer against the indefatigable force of growth hacking. Ever, the photo storage app that we called out in September for spamming SMS contact lists (it rebranded from Everalbum shortly after), has found its way back into Apple’s App Store after getting temporarily banned for its practices. Ever has had a lot of negative feedback — and even a couple of… Read More
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Jack Dorsey gets another break with a strong third quarter from Square
While Jack Dorsey’s other company Twitter might be struggling, Square continues on a roll that’s keeping Wall Street happy. There’s going to, as always, be a big question mark for Square because of Dorsey’s tenure at Twitter — which is hardly going well. While the company’s latest quarter showed a flash of optimism, the company’s efforts to close a… Read More
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Gigster’s crafty plan to give freelance developers equity
Gigster is launching the Gigster Fund, comprised of $700,000 raised from Bloomberg Beta, Felicis and China’s CSC as LPs, plus 1 percent of Gigster’s own equity. Each month it will invest $50,000 cash in one of Gigster’s top clients in exchange for 1 percent of that company at a $5 million valuation. Gigster will also provide them with advice, connections… Read More
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Google’s Daydream View VR headset arrives in stores November 10
Google has announced exactly when you’ll be able to get your hands on Daydream View, the new headset it created for Daydream-ready Android phones, including the Pixel and Pixel XL. The View headset will arrive in the Google Store online, and at retailers in the US, Canada, the UK, Germany and Australia on November 10 for $79 US. Pricing in the other countries varies, but is mostly in… Read More
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![Instagram goes down [update: crisis averted]](https://cdn.statically.io/img/web.archive.org/web/20161107221357/https://tctechcrunch2011.files.wordpress.com/2016/11/instagram-is-down.png?w=210&h=158&crop=1&quality=85&strip=all)
Instagram goes down [update: crisis averted]
Instagram’s app and website were struck by a short service outage today. At around 11:06am, users in the US, Europe, India and elsewhere began a downpour of “Is Instagram down?”. Instagram confirmed the downtime with the statement on Twitter: [Update: However, Instagram soon deleted that tweet as it managed to get its app and site back online quickly at around 10:35am… Read More
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Post-App Store developer platform Blackstorm launches a games studio
Whenever a new developer and compute platform comes along — whether that’s the mobile phone or a VR headset — games are quick to follow as one of the first ever use cases. That’s the case now with Blackstorm, a development platform that’s geared toward different platforms like Messengers and the browser that can easily be accessed without having to download a… Read More
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Hello launches a voice-enabled Sense bedside sleep tracker for $149
With Alexa and Google Assistant are gunning for control over the general voice-driven experience with technology, that might open doors for some more targeted verticals that are centered around voice. It’s not an unheard of strategy — building services and tools around specific experiences rather than trying to do it all at once has been an effective approach for many startups… Read More
![Instagram goes down [update: crisis averted]](https://web.archive.org/web/20161107221357/https://tctechcrunch2011.files.wordpress.com/2016/11/instagram-is-down.png?w=210&h=158&crop=1&quality=85&strip=all)
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