Written on May 7, 2008 – 7:41 pm
Boris Veldhuijzen van Zanten,
The Next Web Blog covers start-up news from all over the world (not just the Valley), exciting new technologies and inspiring entrepreneurs. If you're new here, you may want to read our '
About' page and subscribe to our
RSS feed.
If you came here from Digg it would be great if you could actually Digg us too! Do you have a start-up that we should write about?
Contact us! Thanks for visiting and hope you come back again!
When the iPod was becoming popular a few years ago and other manufacturers started to realize they were missing out on a huge opportunity there were frequent (daily!) reports of the next ‘iPod Killer’. Eager to find out what innovations were being made we checked them all out. Generally it didn’t take more than a few seconds to realize that the moniker ‘iPod killer’ was born more out of wishful thinking than true product innovation. The Zune, and countless other iPod rippoffs, came and went. But as we know now, nothing could kill or replace the iPod.
Then came the iPhone. And yes, again there are several companies announcing their own ‘iPhone killer’. Research in Motion, maker of the Blackberry, is secretly (but not TOO secretly) working on something they call their iPhone Killer. The Verizon Voyager is another example of a phone branded as the iPhone killer. But one look is enough to know it isn’t. And HTC was rumored to be working on their own ‘iPhone killer’.
Yesterday HTC unveiled their HTC Diamond. And I must admit: it looks pretty cool.
You might even say that the interface looks slightly cooler and more futuristic than what the iPhone currently offers. The interface is completely dynamic and fluid. Screens blend into each other with great effects. The weather screen doesn’t just display a static image of the sun or a few clouds but actual moving images of clouds or even a thunderstorm.
I’m not claiming that this will be an iPhone killer but I can image a lot of Windows users who don’t want to switch to Apple products being very happy with this gadget. Check it out yourself:
Written on April 23, 2008 – 8:02 am
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
We love scoops and we know you do as well. So here’s one: Swiss RSS service Dixero is going to launch tomorrow. Yet another RSS service, you ask. Yes! But this one is doing something new. It allows you to aggregate your favorite feeds and moreover, it transforms posts into audio by using different computer-generated voices. That means you can put the latest post of this blog on your iPod and listen to the audio version while traveling or working out. How time-saving and efficient is that?
Luca Mascaro (ceo Dixero.com) & Dafne Gobbi
One little doubt here though: will the technology behind Dixero manage to recognize names, especially the weird 2.0 ones like blurb? I mean, the idea of the service sounds good, yet if I only get non-understandable audio files I won’t use Dixero.
So according to chief strategy officer Lucas Mascaro and Dafne Gobbi we can test that out tomorrow. They’ve traveled all the way from Lugano, Switzerland to launch the service under the eyes of the Web 2.0 attendants. For now, watch this informative video featuring Luca:
Update: Frederic Martin left a comment saying this kind of service already exists. Check it out.
Written on January 15, 2008 – 1:04 pm
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
I don’t know what it’s like in the rest of the world, yet in Holland the wireless Internet coverage still isn’t very good. It even seems like that when you’re in desperate need of some entertainment - in the train or bus stop in the middle of nowhere -, the feeling of disappointment is stronger than the satisfied feeling when it IS available. And I’m sure I’m not alone in this.
So it’s not too surprising that developers world-wide work on applications that make the off line live just a little bit easier. Tooble is a recent result of those ambitions: ‘YouTube comes to iPod’.
Tooble automatically downloads, converts and imports any YouTube video to play on your video iPod, iPhone, AppleTV, or even on your computer with iTunes. Of course you could already watch videos on the iPhone and iPod Touch using GPRS/EDGE, but the only joy that comes from that is making up original ways of swearing about the damn lack of speed.
Google won’t be amused about this service. They’re probably working behind the scenes on some sort of YouTube function for off line applications service Google Gears. And now this small start-up called Gridlock LLC came up with it first.
Thank you guys, for entertaining me during those awful hours of no Internet connection. Want to meet these heroes from Gridlock/ Tooble? You can shake their hands at stand S-1338 at the Macworld Conference in San Fransisco this week.
Email
Twitter
Facebook
Netlog
Linkedin
The Next Web Blog is closely associated with The Next Web Conference which is held annually in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. At this event speakers from all over the world come together to talk about, and show of, the future of the Web. (
