The Latest from TechCrunch |  |
- Geodelic Raised $3.5 Million For Location-Aware Recommendations
- Bing Mobile Concept Screenshots Surface, Looks To Be A Simple Rebadging
- Apple Touts Over 1 Million iPhone 3GS Devices Sold, Quotes Steve Jobs
- Is Privacy An Illusion? Facebook ‘Fans’ Claim Hack Exposes Private Profile Information
- FitOrbit Launches With Heavy Backers, Connects You To Real Personal Fitness Trainers Online
- YCD Multimedia Raises $12 Million For In-Store Digital Media Solutions
- Celeb Blogger Perez Hilton Assaulted By Artist will.i.am, He Tweets
- When It Comes To Search Trends, Google Is Lagging Behind Bing
- T-Mobile Will Drop Its Second Android Phone, The myTouch 3G, This August For $199.
- 2tor Raises $10 Million To Help Universities Manage Online Degree Programs
- Social Media Payment Platform oneTXT Scores $2 Million And Former iVillage Exec As COO
- Oyster Hotel Reviews Provides Detailed Reviews By Travel Writers
- Apple Rejects Commodore 64 emulating iPhone App That Coulda Been A Contender
- Facebook Admits Click Fraud Problem, Says Fix Coming Today
- Apple Stuck Apologizing For AT&T Yet Again With A $30 iTunes Credit
- CNN Loves Twitter, But Doesn’t Seem To Always Know How To Use It
- Colabolo Takes Another Stab At Team Task Management
| Geodelic Raised $3.5 Million For Location-Aware Recommendations Posted: 22 Jun 2009 08:18 AM PDT
On a mobile phone, the more you can automate search, the more likely people are to use it. Or at least that is the principle which seems to be guiding Geodelic Systems, a startup which is creating a “search-less search” experience for mobile phones. Today in a press release, it revealed that it raised $3.5 million in an earlier round possibly in 2008 from Clearstone Ventures (where it was incubated) and Shasta Ventures. The company was founded by Rahul Sonnad, who previously founded thePlatform, a Web video publishing service he sold to Comcast in 2006. Geodelic is creating a location-aware search engine for restaurants, movies, stores, flights, hotels, and local attractions which recommends results based on their distance from you. A “location carousel” brings up nearby results on a map by category and it learns from you behavior which places, stores, and brands you like the best, and will target you accordingly. The app is designed to be as passive as possible, eliminating or minimizing the amount of typing required. However, it doesn’t go as far as some augmented reality tagging apps such as Layar or Sekai Camera, which add a data layer on top of the view through a phone’s camera. T-Mobile’s next-generation Android phone, the myTouch 3G, will feature an app created by Geodesic called Sherpa. And, judging by all the iPhone screenshots on its site (two of which I’ve pasted below), an iPhone app is also in the works.
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| Bing Mobile Concept Screenshots Surface, Looks To Be A Simple Rebadging Posted: 22 Jun 2009 08:01 AM PDT  Microsoft just launched Bing a few weeks ago with lots of fanfare and media coverage. Already the service has gained market share, but it seems that Microsoft is ready to the mobile field as well. But, unlike the Internet site which received an extreme makeover, the mobile client might simply be a rebadging if these screenshots are true. These screenshots come from an April-build of the Bing mobile app. (Kumo was the codename for Bing, btw) It should look familiar as, well, it's basically Live Search. That's not all bad though. Live Search isn't a bad app. In fact it had voice search and location-based services a while before Google's app did.
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| Apple Touts Over 1 Million iPhone 3GS Devices Sold, Quotes Steve Jobs Posted: 22 Jun 2009 06:00 AM PDT
Remarkably, Apple CEO Steve Jobs is quoted at the beginning of the press release - something we haven’t seen for quite a while and this after a weekend during which it was uncovered the man had a liver transplant a couple of months ago - saying:
As a reminder, Apple also sold 1 million iPhone 3G devices on its first weekend back in July 2008. I’m not entirely sure if this is new, but the press release also mentions that MMS on the AT&T network will be available in ‘late summer’ (it was ‘later this summer’ in all other communication about the launch date as far as I can remember). Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.
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| Is Privacy An Illusion? Facebook ‘Fans’ Claim Hack Exposes Private Profile Information Posted: 22 Jun 2009 05:45 AM PDT
Think FBHive is touting this hack simply to draw attention to the new site? Think again. As a challenge, I asked them to tell me some things about me that they could only find on my Facebook account, which is protected from public viewing and should only be accessible to my networks and friends. Almost immediately, they replied with my birth date, the name of my hometown, the name of my fiancé and my political views. That’s scary (and more proof is available if you click the link below). In their first blog post, FBHive mentions that a similar hack - using the search function to uncover private information - was reported by The Register back in 2007, but that their process is ‘much more simplified and specific’. Moreover, they also claim the bug has already been reported to Facebook several times since June 7th, but that so far response has been virtually non-existing. The FBHive team is giving the Facebook team - which we’ve also alerted about the claim - about 24 hours to finally respond to their reach-out, and will post details on how exactly one can obtain basic private profile information from protected accounts should the company fail to respond adequately. This is yet another blow to Facebook: yesterday Michael published an article about a weeks-long issue with click fraud on the social networking service, which the company acknowledged almost immediately with a promise for a quick fix. (Image found on the blog of Pino Bruno) Crunch Network: CrunchBase the free database of technology companies, people, and investors
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| FitOrbit Launches With Heavy Backers, Connects You To Real Personal Fitness Trainers Online Posted: 22 Jun 2009 04:57 AM PDT
Today sees the launch of FitOrbit, a service that aims to remove the disadvantages associated with working with real life personal trainers for one-on-one fitness and meal plans. FitOrbit, which comes with both a web and iPhone application, boasts the support of a number of big names in both the financing and health industry. The newly formed startup behind FitOrbit, dubbed Global Fitness Media, is backed by people like angel investor Ron Conway, John Brown (President of Time Inc’s Health franchise), Dr. Jeffrey Weisz (Medical Director of Southern California Permanente Medical Group), Kathy Kaehler (’trainer to the stars’) and Jake Steinfeld (Founder, Body by Jake, Exercise TV and Chairman of the California Governor's Council on Physical Fitness and Sports). Private investment company Polar Capital Group is also participating. When you register for a FitOrbit account, the first thing you want to do is take a short quiz to determine which real life personal trainer you would want to connect with based on your profile and current lifestyle. You can also opt to pick your own trainer, but it makes more sense to indicate what type of fitness plan you’re most interested in and why, what your gender is, whether you’re living alone or with a big family, and so on.
I signed up and picked Rachel C as my personal trainer, and she said: “I will create a customized, personalized, fitness and meal plan for you. I’ll be on hand to give you feedback, edit your plan, and give you timely motivation and encouragement.” That’s exactly what you’d expect from a real life personal trainer, so I was interested to learn how she aimed to do that over the Internet. But this comes with a price tag that you’re only going to be able to live with if you’re really serious about your plans to achieve better fitness: prices range from $9.99 per week for a 6-month package to $29.99 per week for just one week. In return, you get an instant channel to your personal trainer (who also gets the majority of the fees that you pay), who besides providing you with adequate training and nutrition plans also helps you stay motivated. Here are some funny but helpful actions that can be part of the feedback loop (see this video for more clarity on that one):
If you’re a trainer looking to sign up for FitOrbit, be prepared to do some homework yourself: apart from submitting identification and other documents, signing an NDA and a contract, trainers who want to be accepted must quality for the program by attending a special webinar and pass a ‘Trainer Test Week’, among other things. And even then, anyone who chose you as their personal trainer has the right to disagree with you on meal or workout plans and even file a concern that he or she doesn’t ‘like you’. All in all, I think the FitOrbit model makes sense in a modern world where people are increasingly growing accustomed to getting what they would usually have to leave the house for and pay a premium for real life interaction over the wire. For those interested in contracting a real life personal trainer, it’s definitely worth comparing the costs and effectiveness of FitOrbit to the real deal. If you do, let us know how it went and how both stacked up.
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| YCD Multimedia Raises $12 Million For In-Store Digital Media Solutions Posted: 22 Jun 2009 03:16 AM PDT
YCD Multimedia software integrates with existing retail and communications applications, and delivers a range of digital media - music playlists, visuals, etc. - to on-site digital signage. This allows traditional retailers, banks, hotels etc. to run digital promotion and advertising campaigns on screens and video walls throughout physical locations. Founded back in 1999, YCD Multimedia boasts offices in the US, UK and Israel and an international reseller network. The company is headed by CEO Barry Salzman, former President of DoubleClick’s global media business. Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.
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| Celeb Blogger Perez Hilton Assaulted By Artist will.i.am, He Tweets Posted: 22 Jun 2009 02:52 AM PDT
Renowned celebrity blogger Perez Hilton (real name Mario Armando Lavandeira) was apparently assaulted by artist will.i.am, frontman of The Black Eyed Peas and his security guards, according to messages posted to his Twitter account. We’re pretty sure this really happened, although you never know. Follow-up tweets read that the bleeding had stopped, the police had arrived and would investigate the case further, and that today would be a normal day at work for Lavandeira without any mention of the incident on his wildly popular blog until the authorities close up the investigation. Update: will.i.am’s video response Update 2: and Perez Hilton’s video response It’s remarkable that he chose to tweet out a message for help rather than contact the police directly (he has over 1 million followers on Twitter). From the looks of it, he needed to effectively ask people to stop calling the police because the department got flooded with incoming calls from his fans. Or how Twitter can be both a way for people to call for help in real-time, but also a way for them to order a mob. Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
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| When It Comes To Search Trends, Google Is Lagging Behind Bing Posted: 21 Jun 2009 09:15 PM PDT
As Microsoft tries to take away market share from Google with its new search engine, Bing, it is battling Google feature by feature. One feature where Microsoft seems to be edging out Google is with displaying recent search trends. This may not be a major feature, but it shows a weakness in Google’s armor. On Google, you can create charts showing the popularity of keywords using Google Trends. On Bing, this feature is called xRank. For all but the most popular terms, Google Trends shows a lag of about three days, whereas xRank shows data that is up to date as of today. For instance, you might want to see how many people are searching for Ricky Barnes, the golfer who came out of nowhere to lead the U.S. Open this weekend. Bing’s xRank shows the spike in interest you’d expect to see over the past two days, whereas Google Trends shows no data whatsoever. The terms “do not have enough search volume to show graphs.”
Or try “Neda,” the name believed to belong to the Iranian woman who died tragically during a protest march in Tehran, and whose dying image and video is spreading around the Web. Bing’s xRank shows the burst in interest today, along with thumbnails of related news videos. It is also a trending topic on Twitter search. Yet the Google Trend graph is three days old. It only goes up to June 18th. In cases such as these, the fact that Google is not showing the search data from today and yesterday means that it is completely missing the trend.
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| T-Mobile Will Drop Its Second Android Phone, The myTouch 3G, This August For $199. Posted: 21 Jun 2009 08:58 PM PDT
How do I know? Well because I’ve actually had a unit for a few weeks now. You see, the myTouch 3G, which will be available in early August for $199 with a 2-year agreement, is actually the same device as the Google Ion phone that was given to everyone who attended the Google I/O conference a few weeks ago. And technically, both are really the HTC Magic, which was released a few months ago in Europe, and more recently in Canada. But for the myTouch 3G, T-Mobile is offering some other bells and whistles to differentiate it. The biggest thing T-Mobile is trumpeting for this device is a deep level of customization. Users will be able to customize the menus, wallpapers, icons and a range of other things on the device with the use of themes and skins. This is a sharp break from a device like the iPhone which has a completely un-customizable look and feel. And the device itself will come in three colors: black, white and what it calls the “distinctive” merlot. (Which only makes me think of Paul Giammati in Sideways, “I am NOT drinking any fucking merlot!”). But there will also be the option to completely customize the shell of your phone too. The other key point T-Mobile is touting for the myTouch is something called Sherpa, which T-Mobile worked with startup Geodelic to create. Basically, Sherpa is an application that claims to learn from a user’s actions. So, for example, if you’re searching a lot of Thai food, Sherpa should recognize that as something that you like in the future. And it uses your location information to give you tailored results for what it believes you will want based on what you’re around.
The Hardware But how does the actual hardware of the myTouch stack up against the G1? Very well. The first thing you’ll notice is that it’s substantially smaller than that G1. This is all thanks to the removal of the physical keyboard. Because myTouch uses the Android 1.5 “Cupcake” software, it utilizes a virtual keyboard. While this will undoubtedly annoy some users, from a design perspective, it was a very good move. It allows for a device that is not only smaller, and lighter (it’s about an ounce and a half lighter), but it looks a lot nicer too. And it’s gotten a little bump in its specs. While it features the same processor, the myTouch has double the internal memory of the G1 (now 512 MB), which makes applications load and run much more smoothly. The screen size and resolution remain the same (3.2-inch TFT-LCD 320 x 480). And, unfortunately, while the display is capacitive, it still does not support multi-touch which is a key feature of the iPhone and the new Palm Pre. The myTouch also has the same 3.2 megapixel camera with autofocus that the G1 had. And the device also comes pre-installed with a 4GB microSD card, but this is user-upgradable to any size. But the most noticeable difference has to be the battery life. In my experience, the G1 had very poor battery life. The myTouch offers a huge improvement in that regard. How much? Well just in everyday use with a couple applications running in the background, my G1 battery would be gone in a few hours. The myTouch battery easily lasts all day in the same environment. The iPhone
Before I get to that, I will say that the biggest factor for which one you’re likely to enjoy more will be if you’re a bigger fan of the more open Android platform, or the more tightly controlled approach Apple is taking with the iPhone OS. In terms of hardware, there is still no question in my mind that the iPhone is still much nicer. HTC managed many solid improvements over the G1, but when holding the two hand in hand, the myTouch still feels plasticky, and as a result, cheap, compared to the iPhone. If you have the original iPhone or the iPhone 3G, you’ll appreciate the 3.2 megapixel camera and the ability to shoot video with the myTouch, but the just-released iPhone 3G S matches both of those features now. In terms of speed, it’s a bit hard to compare the two since the platforms run different applications. The myTouch, like the G1, features a 528 MHz processor which is a faster processor than the original iPhone and the iPhone 3G had. But again, the new iPhone 3G S meets that speed and even pushes past it, in terms of raw processing power. I’ve only played with the iPhone 3G S for a few days, but I think it’s safe to say that for day to day use of any application and browsing the web, the new iPhone blows past the myTouch in terms of speed. But again, the myTouch seems noticably faster in many regards then the original iPhone and the iPhone 3G. That’s not the say that the myTouch has no advantages against the iPhone. It has a huge one: It can run third-party applications in the background. Apple has been toying around with the idea, but the Android phones have done this since day one. And as I noted above, while this severely hurt the G1’s battery performance, the myPhone performs much better even with applications running in the background. Price But in a move that still isn’t being talked about all that much, Apple may have dropped a bomb on devices like the myPhone 3G not with the iPhone 3G S as much as with the $99 iPhone 3G. At $199, the myTouch is the same price point as the entry-level iPhone 3G S, but I can see a lot of new smartphone buyers opting for the older iPhone for $100 cheaper. Pre-orders for the myTouch will take place for existing T-Mobile customers on July 8. The device will be $199 with a 2-year agreement, and generally availability is set for early August.
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| 2tor Raises $10 Million To Help Universities Manage Online Degree Programs Posted: 21 Jun 2009 08:57 PM PDT
2tor, a startup that helps universities administer classes and degree programs online, closed $10 million in Series A financing round led by Redpoint Ventures, Novak Biddle Venture Partners and City Light Capital participating. Launched earlier this year, 2tor partners with universities to build, administer, and market online degree programs. The company says it will use the funding to increase resources dedicated to student recruitment efforts and marketing. Currently, 2tor has partnered with the University of Southern California's School of Education to launch MAT@USC, a graduate teaching program delivered online. Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
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| Social Media Payment Platform oneTXT Scores $2 Million And Former iVillage Exec As COO Posted: 21 Jun 2009 08:45 PM PDT
OneTXT, a social media payment platform, has raised $2 million in Series A funding from Metamorphic Ventures with KPG Ventures, New York Angels Fund, and individual angel investors participating. Former iVillage CTO and COO Richard Caccappolo has joined oneTXT as president and COO. OneTXT provides a payments processing alternative for social networks, online games to accept payments, create loyalty programs, and send marketing messages. Similar to PayPal, oneTXT takes a stored-value approach. Each account, which is filed under the user’s cellphone number, has funds sourced from a checking account, a credit card or Western Union. Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.
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| Oyster Hotel Reviews Provides Detailed Reviews By Travel Writers Posted: 21 Jun 2009 08:00 PM PDT
There are two different types of hotel reviews: user reviews and professional reviews from travel journalists. When choosing a hotel, it can be helpful to evaluate both. TripAdvisor has long been the leader of the pack when it comes to providing a database of user reviews for every hotel out there. Oyster Hotel Reviews aims to provide consumers with qualified professional reviews of hotels around the world, hoping to compete with the likes of Frommers, Fodors, Conde Nast Traveler and others. Oyster’s reviews take on a longer, more magazine-like form, and are all written by a staff of full-time journalists who travel to each hotel reviewed. There’s no doubt that Oyster’s actual reviews are comprehensive. Reviews include a snapshot summary that lists detailed pros and cons of each hotel, and extensive descriptions on the scene, service, location, features, activities, food and drinks for hotels. Because the review is able to be so lengthy, the details given about the hotel are ones that you wouldn’t normally find on other review sites, such as the thread count of the sheets on the beds or which celebs have stayed there. Each review also includes photos from when the reporter stayed in the hotel (not the fancy photos pulled from the hotel’s website), a map with nearby hotels, and user comments/reviews.  Currently, Oyster, which launches in beta tomorrow, only provides reviews for hotels in Aruba, Jamaica, Dominican Republic and Miami and plans to add New York City and Las Vegas in the near future. These lack of options are no doubt limiting and even in the current coverage areas, not every hotel is listed. For example, in Jamaica, there are only 40 hotels listed for the entire country. TripAdvisor lists over 300 hotels, in addition to lists of vacation rentals and B&Bs. To date, Oyster has raised $6.4 million in Series A funding from Bain Capital Ventures, Accelerator Ventures and angel investors in March 2008 and plans to raise a Series B round in the near future. The co-founder of Oyster Hotel Reviews, Elie Seidman, says Oyster will make money off of traditional CPM based ads from relevant partners (Jamaica’s tourism board, airlines etc.). Seidman says the site will also generated revenue from leads to bookings sites like Orbitz, Hotels.com and Expedia. On Oyster, you can click to check availability of a hotel for a given date and will be given the choice to check Expedia, Hotels.com, Travelocity, and Orbitz. Each time a user books through one of these engines from a lead created by Oysters, the site gets a cut. The online travel industry has a whole is incredibly crowded—and there are many services out there that provide reviews of hotels including TripAdvisor, Fodors, Frommers and TripKick. I think the comprehensive, journalistic, unbiased style of Oyster’s reviews are certainly useful, but the startup will need to scale its number of reviews and coverage areas to be a serious competitor. Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
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| Apple Rejects Commodore 64 emulating iPhone App That Coulda Been A Contender Posted: 21 Jun 2009 06:27 PM PDT  It's happened again. Apple has officially rejected an app that at first blush seems harmless and fun. This time it's a Commodore 64 emulator from Manomio that offered a realistic joystick and keyboard, portrait and landscape gaming, and a fully licensed C64 emulator code. It was all on the up and up. Apple seemed excited. But then Manomio got the dreaded rejection mail: Thank you for submitting C64 1.0 to the App Store. We've reviewed C64 1.0 and determined that we cannot post this version of your iPhone application to the App Store because it violates the iPhone SDK Agreement; "3.3.2 An Application may not itself install or launch other executable code by any means, including without limitation through the use of a plug-in architecture, calling other frameworks, other APIs or otherwise. No interpreted code may be downloaded and used in an Application except for code that is interpreted and run by Apple's Published APIs and built-in interpreter(s)."
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| Facebook Admits Click Fraud Problem, Says Fix Coming Today Posted: 21 Jun 2009 05:28 PM PDT
In a comment to the post, Brandon McCormick says:
Advertisers on WickedFire, where the original comments about click fraud are posted, are sure to be pleased. Although they may be wondering why it took attention from a blog to get Facebook to deal with the issue, which has been ongoing since at least May. As an aside, Izea, the controversial (at best) pay per post advertising company, used this story as an opportunity to reach out to advertisers. CEO Ted Murphy left a comment on WickedFire saying “This is my first time here, I found out about this forum through the TechCrunch post. I wanted to offer up an opportunity for anyone of you to try SocialSpark CPC and put our click validation to the test. We will provide a $100 credit to any new advertiser. Drop a line to ashley@izea.com if you would like to take a spin on us.” That didn’t go over so well with members. One person suggested Murphy review the forum’s rules (linking to a pornographic image) and another said “you are unwelcome here.” Sounds like a normal day at the office for Izea. Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
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| Apple Stuck Apologizing For AT&T Yet Again With A $30 iTunes Credit Posted: 21 Jun 2009 01:06 PM PDT
To me, this is yet another indication of why Apple needs to move away from its AT&T exclusivity. While this year’s activation fiasco isn’t nearly as bad as last year’s nightmare, it’s still pretty bad considering that most of the iPhone 3G S orders were done via pre-order this time around. So AT&T knew what it was getting into ahead of time — and still couldn’t handle it. Then of course there’s the hilarious fact that MMS is not ready to go in the United States despite being launched on the device in 20+ other countries. And the same is true for tethering. Both are expected sometime later this summer. Oh, and the iPhone 3G S can handle faster data speeds then the iPhone 3G (up to 7.2 Mbps now), but that doesn’t matter because AT&T’s network can’t do the same yet — and may not be able to in most places for a couple of years. AT&T tried to do the right thing by offering some existing iPhone customers full subsidies for the new iPhone, but that was only those paying a large amount of money each month. It really should have offered it to all existing customers, just to rope them in for another 2 years of service because I’m betting that when its exclusive deal is up next year, Apple is going to ask to starting seeing other carriers. Anyone who saw the WWDC keynote (now available online), clearly heard the jeers and boos from the crowd whenever one of the Apple execs had to say that AT&T wasn’t yet ready to launch one of the new iPhone features. You can be sure Apple heard those too — and that it wasn’t happy to have to say such things during a keynote in which the majority of those in the audience were AT&T iPhone customers. Find the email below:
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| CNN Loves Twitter, But Doesn’t Seem To Always Know How To Use It Posted: 21 Jun 2009 12:00 PM PDT If you’ve tuned your TV to CNN at all over the past week, you’ve probably witnessed a sweeping love affair. I’m not even kidding when I say that I think CNN’s anchors have used the word “Twitter” more than they have uttered “CNN” during that time. And while some people hate that, I think it’s great, because the service is providing a very, very valuable service for spreading information about what is going on in Iran right now. But none of that matters if CNN cannot use its Twitter account correctly to disseminate that news. Look at the CNN Breaking News Twitter account right now. 8 of its last 10 tweets contain a broken link. This is a Twitter account with nearly 2 million followers, that CNN is promoting like no other on its shows, and it’s 404-ing millions of people. Why this matters is of course because so many people are using this account as their main means of getting news about Iran. When CNN tweets out things like “Daughter of former president Rafsanjani arrested #iranelection,” and then has a link that doesn’t work, a lot of people are obviously very upset. If you’re going to insist on basing most of your coverage around Twitter CNN, please figure out how to use it.
Update: It looks like CNN has figured it out after an hour with broken links. Whoever runs their account started using TweetDeck instead of the web, and so now all of the links are using the Bit.ly URL shortening service. But that’s interesting too. Why does CNN, which has a natural URL that is already very short, not just make its own short URLs? That way it could also guarantee they will work if a service like Bit.ly goes down. Crunch Network: CrunchBase the free database of technology companies, people, and investors
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| Colabolo Takes Another Stab At Team Task Management Posted: 21 Jun 2009 09:59 AM PDT
After installing the client (system requirements), Colabolo starts with an almost spartan interface that indeed looks like that of an email client. User can create a new task (called “issue”) in just a few seconds: Click on the “New Issue” button, name and describe the task, classify it by type, assign who is responsible and you’re done. All tasks can then be tracked (and filtered) at a glance in an inbox-like grid at the top of the screen. This is also where all updates made by team members are automatically sent to. But Colabolo isn’t only for the project leader. All issues can be scheduled, commented on and discussed in real-time by added team members. Files can be shared with drag-and drop. And Colabolo can also be integrated into existing email accounts, essentially turning it into a help desk system when dealing with external customers. An example: If an email from a customer arrives to your company’s support email address, it will not only be automatically converted into a new Colabolo-compatible support issue but also forwarded to the support team leader. The issue can then be assigned to another colleague whose comment on the issue can be used as an email reply back to the customer from within Colabolo. If the person in charge regards the task to be resolved, all team members involved get a notification in their Colabolo in-box and can move on to the next task. ImaHima CEO Neeraj Jhanji says this built-in inbox (with push notifications) helps reducing the number of conventional emails significantly. Asked what other factors are distinguishing Colabolo from similar solutions already existing on the market Jhanji says Colabolo is easy to use even for non-technical staff (which is true), efficient (because users don’t have to wait to be online) and fast (because Colabolo behaves like a desktop application while syncing changes with all team members in the background). Colabolo is free at the moment, with future pricing likely to stand at around $9.99 per month and user (in contrast to many competing products, there is no limit on projects, tasks or attached files). An iPhone app is also in development. I liked Colabolo enough to at the very least recommend downloading and trying the app out, which is true especially for start-ups looking for a simple task management tool for their team. Colabolo faces a lot of competition in the online project management field (37Signals' Basecamp, Action Method, Daptiv, LiquidPlanner, Huddle, Producteev, Clarizen, just to name a few).
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Earlier today, reports started 
Here’s T-Mobile’s spiel on it:
While this device trumps the G1 in every way, the comparison that more people may be interested in for the myTouch is likely how it stacks up against the iPhone. With the removal of the physical keyboard, the devices are more similar now.
An update to our post yesterday talking about a 
We’ve received a few tips of people saying they’ve gotten an email from Apple offering them a $30 iTunes Store credit due to the problems activating the new iPhone 3G S. Apple claims it is still working with AT&T to resolve the issue that has caused some new iPhones to still not be activated 2 days after the launch of the device. And it warns that it may be another 48 hours before it’s resolved. For those affected, check your inbox Monday for the $30 credit.
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