-
‘Alto’s Adventure’ sequel ‘Alto’s Odyssey’ launches on iOS on February 22
The “endless runner” genre of games seems inherently stress-generating to me, since it implies running, without end. But Alto’s Adventure, the 2015 game from Toronto developer Snowman, provided an endless runner that was actively and profoundly relaxing, thanks to a mellow, immersive soundtrack and graphics that seem drawn from some kind of new-age zen meditation…
-
Snapchat’s Snap Map comes to the web, including in embeddable form
The Snap Map is a feature that received a mixed response when it landed in the Snapchat app, since it basically let you see where all your friends on the platform were at any given time – provided they were okay with sharing that info. Now, there’s a version of Snap Map available for anyone…
-
Instagram is testing screenshot alerts for stories
Instagram is testing a feature that will show users when someone else takes a screenshot of their story. Users included in the test are getting a warning that the next time they take a screenshot of a friend’s story the friend will be able to see it, as shown below: And users who are participating in…
-
How Reggie Brown invented Snapchat
Billy Gallagher Contributor More posts by this contributor Zero To One: How Blake Masters Went From Being Peter Thiel’s Student To Co-Author Mashr Resurrects A Tinder Experiment To Make You A Matchmaker Reggie Brown carefully ran his fingers over the blunt, admiring its tightly rolled perfection. It was almost a shame to smoke such a…
-
Script’s app lets parents digitally sign school permission slips and pay for field trips
Schools are often late to taking advantage of new technologies, so today still do much of their business over paper forms. One pain point in particular – for school administrators, teachers and parents alike – is handling permission forms for activities and field trips. A young startup called Script aims to help. Schools can use…
-
Snapchat almost acqui-hired anonymous app Secret
Evan Spiegel secretly tried to hire away the team at Secret, but the price was too high. That’s according to three sources familiar with the deal who spoke to TechCrunch. The information expands and clarifies a report from the new book about Snapchat’s origin story coming out next week called “How to Turn Down a…
-
Whip the llama’s ass with this Javascript WinAmp emulator
If you were an early Internet kid you’ll recall a little app called WinAmp that was, in short, the best MP3 player ever made ever. The little program looked like skeuomorphic stereo receiver with a full range of equalizer sliders and included an important MP3 that explained WinAmp’s primary mission: whipping the llama’s ass. A…
-
Facebook’s plan to build community with hiring and $10M in grants
Facebook will award up to $1 million to five community leaders and $50,000 to 100 more to fund their ideas for how to strengthen people’s online and offline connections. Facebook will also hire double the number of engineers currently working on safety-related causes in its London office. These were a few of the big announcements…
-
Toyota invests $69M in Japanese Uber rival backed by the taxi industry
This week isn’t turning out to be great one for Uber in Japan. Two of its investors — Didi and SoftBank — are teaming up to launch a rival service, while one of its existing competitors has just landed a big cash infusion and highly influential backer after Toyota backed JapanTaxi. The auto giant said it…
-
Facebook confirms test of a downvote button for flagging comments
How can Facebook promote meaningful interaction between users? By letting them downvote inappropriate comments to hide them. Facebook is now testing a downvote button on a limited set of public Page post comment reels, the company confirms to TechCrunch. But what Facebook does with signals about problematic comments could raise new questions about censorship, and…
