Google has launched a limited version of its News Showcase in Australia despite threatening to pull Search from the nation a fortnight ago. ZDNet reports: News Showcase, Google claims, provides an “enhanced view” of articles, and aims to give participating news publishers more ways to share important news to readers while having “more direct control of presentation and branding.” The product…
Tag: branding
Lockheed Martin Acquires Aerojet Rocketdyne For $4.4 Billion
Lockheed Martin has agreed to buy Aerojet Rocketdyne for $4.4 billion in cash (including assumed debt). From a report: This reflects how legacy defense companies are racing to keep up with Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos in space, a dynamic that also helped drive Raytheon’s merger effort with United Technologies. Plus, this is the exact type of company that will be…
Pirate Bay Founder Warns US Govt Against Mafia-Esque Copyright Lobby
One of the original founders of The Pirate Bay, Peter Sunde, is warning against the power American corporations have on the internet. After several copyright industry groups reported Sunde’s domain registration service Njalla to the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR), branding it a “notorious market,” Sunde wrote a letter to the USTR, not to defend Njalla but to warn against the threat…
Mozilla Eyes Decentralized Web-Based Videoconferencing Platform ‘Meething’
Last month Techcrunch reported that Mozilla had gone “full incubator” by holding a startup lab called Fix the Internet, followed by “a formal program dangling $75,000 investments in front of early-stage companies…” Fix the Internet had many key themes, including collaboration and decentralization (as well as user-controlled data and privacy-protecting social networks). That event “drew the interest of some 1,500 people…
LG Is Ditching ‘G’ Series Branding On Future Smartphones
LG is ditching the “G” series branding on future smartphones. The company released the LG Optimus G1 Pro in 2013 and went on to release a new “G” series flagship smartphone every year since, with the most recent being the LG G8X ThinQ. 9to5Google reports: The Korea Herald and Naver have reported over the weekend that LG has decided to stop…
Windows 10 Icons Are Getting An Overdue Redesign
Microsoft is rolling out updates to the icons for Windows 10’s core apps over the months ahead, starting with the Calendar and Mail apps in a new Release Preview for Windows Insiders in the Fast ring. Engadget reports: The company’s design team explained that it wanted to break away from the flat, colorless icons you see today in favor of ones…
2000: The Year the Startup Super Bowl Ads Failed
20 years ago, 11 different startups spent millions of dollars to run 30-second ads during the Super Bowl, reports the Hustle. Within one year 8 of the 11 companies “had either gone bankrupt or been sold in fire sales.” The how-to platform Computer.com spent $3m of its $5.8m in seed funding on an ad featuring its 2 founders holding a poster…
The Snail-Mail Card is Taking on More Significance in the Age of Social Media
In the age of social media, the snail-mail holiday photo card is taking on more significance. Permanent, physical photos stand out, and families are realizing they can be used to convey important life changes — without having to put them into words. People are using the images on cards to signal major transitions, including divorce, illness and adoption. From a report:…
Two of China’s Largest Tech Firms Are Uniting To Create a New ‘Domestic OS’
The two biggest OS (operating system) makers in China announced plans last week to unite and jointly build a new “domestic operating system.” From a report: The two companies are China Standard Software (CS2C) and Tianjin Kylin Information (TKC), two of China’s largest software firms, with known ties to the Beijing government. Both companies are known on the local Chinese OS…
Sony Announces Plan To Publish PlayStation Games On Non-PS Consoles
Sony has announced plans to launch PlayStation games on “additional console platforms beyond PlayStation platforms as early as 2021.” The first announced series for the change is Sony’s long-running baseball sim series MLB The Show. Ars Technica reports: The gazillion-dollar question, of course, is which other console platforms we might expect the series to launch on. Neither Sony nor MLB had…