Techmeme: American Eagle, Target, and other retailers follow Wal-Mart in opening labs in Silicon Valley (Anne D'Innocenzio/Associated Press)

Open Links In New Tab

Mobile Archives Advertise Site News Contact Editors

November 17, 2013, 12:25 PM

Top News

Mark Gurman / 9to5Mac:

Apple Stores to implement iBeacon location technology to improve service, boost sales — iOS 7's flashy launch earlier this year with an entirely new design and streaming music functionality overshadowed a breakthrough new feature: iBeacons, a location-based technology with profound implications for industries such as retail.

More: iMore, iPhone in Canada Blog, iPhone Hacks, App Advice, MacRumors, I4U News, iDownloadBlog.com and iClarified

Tweets: @howardlindzon, @markgurman and @markgurman

Chris Davies / SlashGear:

Apple reportedly acquires PrimeSense, company behind original Kinect 3D sensor tech, for $345 million — Apple reportedly buys Kinect tech-creator PrimeSense — Apple has reportedly acquired PrimeSense, the motion-tracking company responsible for the technology in the original Xbox 360 Kinect …

More: MacRumors, The Verge, The Next Web, VentureBeat, iMore, Business Insider, GeekTime, Forbes, TechnoBuffalo, Reuters, 9to5Mac, iPhone in Canada Blog, everythingiCafe, iDownloadBlog.com, Yankee Sabra Limey, Softpedia News and App Advice

Tweets: @markgurman and @joshblake

PR Newswire:

PlayStation 4 Sales Surpass 1 Million Units In North America In 24 Hours — Gamers Immerse Themselves In a New Era of Gaming and Entertainment Only Available on the PS4 system—Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. (SCE) today announced that the highly anticipated launch of the PlayStation®4 …

More: The Verge, HotHardware.com News, Joystiq, Softpedia News, IGN and destructoid

Tweets: @yosp and @amboyes

Adario Strange / Mashable:

Some PlayStation 4 Owners Reporting Defective Consoles — Sony's PlayStation 4 has been widely praised by reviewers as a significant step up from its predecessor, but some early consumers are reporting major problems with the console — Most of the reports are popping up as reviews on Amazon, as well as on Sony's own support forum.

More: The Verge, SlashGear, Tapscape and The Next Web

Anne D'Innocenzio / Associated Press:

American Eagle, Target, and other retailers follow Wal-Mart in opening labs in Silicon Valley — Retailers Take On Silicon Valley — SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Software engineers wearing jeans and flip flops test the latest smartphone apps. Walls and windows double as whiteboards where ideas are jotted down.

Tweets: @andreawass and @qthrul

Nick Wingfield / New York Times:

Case of Georgia Tech professor illustrates risks in taking university research commercial — Reaching for Silicon Valley — Joy Laskar was not what you'd typically think of as a threat to public safety. — At the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, where he was a professor …

Tweets: @nytimesbusiness and @xamat

Glenn Peoples / Billboard:

Rap Genius and Sony/ATV Reveal Licensing Deal (Exclusive) — Rap Genius, the online lyric site with financial backing from Silicon Valley heavyweights, has signed its first licensing deal. Billboard has learned the Brooklyn-based startup has a licensing agreement with Sony/ATV Music Publishing.

More: NME, A.V. Club, Paste Magazine, Los Angeles Times, Rolling Stone, The Trichordist, Digital Trends, The Verge and hypebot

Anand Lal Shimpi / AnandTech:

Apple iPad mini with Retina Display: Reviewed — I suppose there's only one way to start this review, and that's by looking back at last year's iPad mini review. In that review I had a section dedicated to the possibility of an iPad mini with Retina Display.

More: PC Magazine, Engadget, Ars Technica, iPhone in Canada Blog, Daring Fireball, SlashGear, LAPTOP Magazine and MacRumors. Tweets: @drbarnard

Derrick Harris / Gigaom:

How Amazon is building substations, laying fiber and generally doing everything to keep cloud costs down — If there's anyone still left wondering how it is that large cloud providers can keep on rolling out new features and lowering their prices even when no one is complaining about them …

More: NYT Bits

Ashlee Vance / Businessweek:

Several companies race to build specialized chips for mining Bitcoins — Bitcoin Mining Chips, a High-Tech Arms Race — The easiest way to get a Bitcoin is to buy one. You can join drug dealers, speculators, and the curious by hopping onto an online exchange and purchasing one unit …

More: Valleywag. Tweets: @bw, @valleyhack and @valleyhack

Jacob Kastrenakes / The Verge:

Google opens Winter Wonderlab pop-up shops showcasing latest gadgets — Google is opening a series of pop-up shops for the holiday season to show off the Nexus 7, Chromecast, and the latest Chromebooks. The shops, called Winter Wonderlabs, are in six cities: New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Sacramento, Washington, DC, and Paramus, NJ.

More: Mashable, Business Insider, AllThingsD, TechnoBuffalo, 9to5Google, Pocket-lint, SiliconBeat and Droid Life

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:

Twitter Ditches Redesign Involving Swipeable Streams, Reverts Alpha & Beta Testers To Old, Four-Button Interface — Twitter's tests involving a new mobile interface that would do away with the app's standard four buttons in favor of a “swipeable” menu at the top, have come to a halt.

More: Softpedia News and Engadget

Sponsor Posts

Subquadratic:

Subquadratic: the LLM built for 12M-token reasoning — SubQ can reason across entire codebases and document sets in one pass with no RAG workarounds. Read how SubQ 1.1 Small holds near-perfect retrieval out to 12M tokens.

Cape:

Most carriers track everything. Cape doesn't. — Unlimited talk, text & data, 24-hr metadata deletion, network ID rotation, SIM-attack defense, and more. Switch today and get 29% off for life.

Zoho:

Cliq 7.0: Built to keep work flowing — Work feels seamless when information is available when you need it, wherever you're working, and without extra clicks. This year, our main goal was to cut through the noise …

IDrive:

Protecting your Cloud Applications Data — Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Salesforce data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.

Sponsor Techmeme

Featured Podcasts

Channels with Peter Kafka:

The $12.5 Billion Lakers, the NFL's TV Fight, and Sports Media's Big Split

Media and tech aren't just intersecting - they're fully intertwined. To understand how those worlds work, Peter Kafka talks to industry leaders, upstarts and observers.

Subscribe to Channels with Peter Kafka.

Big Technology Podcast:

Nick Bostrom: Worries About AI Existential Risk Just Became More Concrete

The Big Technology Podcast takes you behind the scenes in the tech world featuring interviews with plugged-in insiders and outside agitators.

Subscribe to Big Technology Podcast.

Training Data:

Rich Sutton and Khurram Javed: Why AI Models Stop Learning, and How to Start It Again

Sequoia Capital partners host conversations with leading AI builders and researchers to develop a deeper understanding of the evolving technologies and their implications.

Subscribe to Training Data.

Invest Like the Best:

Ben Thompson on Big Tech, China, and the AI Boom Running Out of Money

The leading destination to learn about business and investing. We do this by showcasing exceptional talent and ideas.

Subscribe to Invest Like the Best.

Lenny's Podcast:

OpenAI's Head of Design: This is the best time in history to be a designer | Ian Silber

Interviews with world-class product leaders and growth experts to uncover actionable advice to help you build, launch, and grow your own product.

Subscribe to Lenny's Podcast.

Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:

Connecting the Unconnected: Doreen Bogdan-Martin

Microsoft Vice Chair and President Brad Smith speaks with leaders in government, business, and culture to explore the most critical challenges at the intersection of technology and society.

Subscribe to Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith.

Add your podcast here

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 12:25 PM ET, November 17, 2013.

The most current version of the site as always is available at our home page. To view an earlier snapshot click here and then modify the date indicated.