TechCrunch
Nudge Is Like Reddit For Social Activities
Social planning continues to be a hot topic for developers, and the latest new service out of San Francisco is taking a different approach to the whole thing. Nudge, a mobile and desktop web app, crowdsources activities from people in the area and surfaces the best ones to the top of the list.
The app is centered around inspirational and motivational activities, like bike rides, hiking trips, sunset watching, etc., as opposed to other social-planning apps that focus on restaurants and bars.
Nudge has a similar format to Reddit, allowing anyone to post an entry with a picture and a few hashtags that can then be upvoted by other members of the community. Users can search by nearby, “out there,” and “Serendipity.”
Nearby includes things that are close to the user (right now it’s only available in San Francisco), while out there focuses on travel-type activities, like climbing Mount Kilimanjaro. Serendipity, on the other hand, returns activities that are accessible to anyone, like meditation, go-karting and laser tag.
Users can save events on a list to visit later, or share them on social networks or through email, not only helping to coordinate events among friends but also to spread the app virally.
Nudge competes with a number of apps, most notably Yelp and Foursquare, but founder Al-Hassan Hleileh believes that those apps focus so much on geo-location and food that there is a huge gap for inspirational-type activities. Obviously, Sosh is also growing in the space with a highly curated experience as opposed to Nudge’s crowd-sourced strategy.
Nudge is currently only available as a web app on both desktop and mobile, with a native app launching in October.
TechCrunch Meetup. Tonight. San Diego.
We’re here, San Diego. And it is sunny. And hot. We love it.
Tonight, at 6:00, TechCrunch is taking over the Block 16 on 7th Ave. for an evening of good times and startup pitches. After sorting through over a hundred applications, we selected 20 companies to take part in a rapid-fire pitch-off competition to be judged by TechCrunch editors and local VCs.
There are still a few tickets left for the event. We will also sell a handful at the door, but by cash only. They’re $5 and include a couple of drinks. 21 and older only, please.
These meetups are part pitch-off competition and part meet-your-neighbors shindig. They are very casual. Tonight, nearly a thousand entrepreneurs, tech fans and venture capitalists will be gathered under one roof. Come with your pitch deck locked and loaded, and a pocket full of business cards. Tonight’s going to be epic. There ain’t no party like a TechCrunch party.
New Update For Find My iPhone Locks Out Non-Developers Without iOS 7 Beta
A new update for Apple’s Find My iPhone app seems to have been pushed out a little early: It changes the icon to a flatter design, which is more in keeping with iOS 7′s aesthetics. Unfortunately, it also locks out users on iOS 6 who don’t have a registered developer account or iOS 7 installed and configured on one of their devices with their iCloud account.
In other words, the vast majority of users should not update Find My iPhone just yet, unless you don’t want to be able to actually … find your iPhones, MacBooks, iPads or whatever else you’ve registered with Apple’s MobileMe service. If you’re a registered developer with iOS 7 installed on at least one device, you should be fine, even if you’re updating on iOS 6, but otherwise wait to avoid that update and Apple will likely issue a fix soon.
We’ll keep an eye on this and let you know when it is safe to update the app, since that’s kind of a big part of Apple’s cloud services on its mobile devices.
Windows Phone Takes Second Place In Latin America, Validating The Nokia-Microsoft Relationship
Microsoft announced new data from IDC indicating that Windows Phone is the second-most-used mobile platform in Latin America. It would be simple to dismiss it as a minor victory in a secondary market, but the news is in fact a validation of Windows Phone’s strategy to grow its install base and accelerate its unit shipment growth.
Microsoft, obviously proud of the silver medal, reported the data, saying that “in one year, the operating system went from fourth to second place,” and that “there was 12 percent growth compared to the previous quarter.”
The context for this is twofold: Microsoft is gunning for volume while its low-cost handsets resonate in emerging markets, and while Windows Phone’s global aggregate market share is low, the platform is able to find traction in at least one hemisphere.
The news that Windows Phone is second place in Latin America is not a surprise, given the recent and steep sales volume of the Nokia Lumia 520 handset. The cheap device has quickly become the most popular Windows Phone handset, spanking earlier title holders, and not slowing down in its ascent.
The quick shift in Windows Phone market share in Latin America mirrors closely the rise of the Lumia 520 in the past few months, during which time — according to data from AdDuplex – its sales accelerated. Without too much mental stress, it isn’t hard to lash the trends together and deduce that Lumia 520 sales are helping to drive Latin American market share.
Microsoft implies as much: “In Latin America, there are more than 20 countries where the Windows Phone range of devices is available, from low-end smartphones, such as the Nokia Lumia 520 [...].” Does this matter? Yes, and more than merely implying that Microsoft’s long, expensive, and somewhat lumpen mobile efforts are finally paying off, but also that the strategy behind its bets is sound.
Nokia, as chief OEM partner, gave Microsoft avenues to secondary markets that it could not have hoped to build or foster itself. And those secondary markets appear to be driving unit volume for Windows Phone.
So Microsoft wants to reach all markets, with devices from the Lumia 520 to the almost comically ostentatious Lumia 1020, but it appears that its cheaper phones in developing economies are for now providing it with the sort of growth it has long sought.
Top Image Credit: Vernon Chan
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