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Digital minister’s app lands on data watchdog’s radar after privacy cock-up
UK digital minister Matt Hancock, who’s currently busy with legislative updates to the national data protection framework, including to bring it in line with the EU’s strict new privacy regime, nonetheless found time to launch an own-brand social networking app this week. The eponymously titled: Matt Hancock MP App. To cut a long story short,…
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A traveling frog exposes concerns within Apple’s Chinese App Store
An app about a frog that likes to travel has exposed worrying signs that Apple isn’t doing enough to prevent fake apps from entering its App Store in China, the world’s largest smartphone market and Apple’s single largest country for app revenue. The story centers around ‘Tabi Kaeru’ — or ‘Travel Frog’ — a Japanese…
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Apple’s $1T dreams are on hold as it misses on iPhone sales in the holiday quarter
Apple’s dream of becoming a $1 trillion company will have to wait — at least for a little while. But while iPhone sales this year were about flat (down about 1% to be exact), revenue from the iPhone rose 13% year-over-year. That means Apple is finding ways to get more revenue out of the same…
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Alphabet is tumbling after a fourth quarter whiff and names John Hennessy as new board chair
Google parent company Alphabet’s big run over the past few months came to a screeching halt today after it came out with its fourth-quarter results, which fell beneath expectations set by Wall Street for the advertising giant — sending the stock down around 5 percent and shaving off billions in market cap. While Google owns…
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Snapchat’s new Snap Store teases in-app commerce potential
Snap Inc. just launched a merchandise store. The goal isn’t to make money yet, but it proves the potential for an in-app commerce platform for other brands. Today the company opened the Snap Store, which lives in the Snapchat app’s Discover section and lets you buy Snapchat merchandise, like a $20 Dancing Hot Dog Plushie…
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CanvasPop dips into first VC, taking $3.3M for growth and product dev
Print service CanvasPop has been making money inking photos onto all sorts of substrates, from canvas to cushions, for years. But the largely boostrapped, Canada-based, 2009-founded company has just announced its first VC round — taking in $3.3M. The funding (call it a seed I guess?) is led by Celtic House Venture Partners and BDC’s…
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Google’s data-friendly app YouTube Go expands to over 130 countries, now supports higher quality videos
YouTube Go, a mobile version of YouTube built for emerging markets with features like offline viewing and nearby sharing, is today expanding to over 130 countries worldwide. This wider rollout will make YouTube Go available to a large number of people who want the ability to watch YouTube videos, even if they don’t have a…
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YouTube TV’s app arrives on Roku & Apple TV
The YouTube TV app is at last available on Roku devices and Apple TV, starting today. Google had announced earlier that YouTube’s live TV service would be coming to Roku and Apple TV in the first quarter of 2018, following a delay that saw it pushing the launch date back from year-end 2017. Until now,…
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Nintendo is bringing Mario Kart to mobile
In news that will excite every Nintendo fan on the planet, the Japanese gaming giant just announced that it will bring its hugely popular Mario Kart series to mobile. Nintendo teased the upcoming development of ‘Mario Kart Tour’ which it said will be released sometime before March 2019. A long wait, indeed, and for now…
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WhatsApp hits 1.5 billion monthly users. $19B? Not so bad.
Facebook’s $19 billion acquisition of WhatsApp sounds smarter and smarter. CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced on the Q4 2017 earnings call today that WhatsApp now has 1.5 billion users and sees 60 billion messages sent per day. That’s compared to 1.3 billion monthly users and 1 billion daily active users in July. The massive growth makes…
