|
TechCrunch
|
TechCrunch is a group-edited blog that profiles the companies, products and events defining and transforming the new web.
|
|
-
YC-Funded Cloudant Launches Its NoSQL Cloud Database Platform
 YCombinator-funded Cloudant, a database platform built around Apache’s open source CouchDB framework, officially launches after three years of hard work.
Cloud-based like Cloudera and Amazon Web Services and part of the NoSQL movement, Cloudant scales your database on the CloudDB framework but also provides hosting, administrative tools, analytics and support so "You don't have to think a lot up front about what your database is going to look like."
Going up against Goliaths like Oracle, Cloudant focuses on scalability, flexibilty, and high availability. Its method of data storage is ideal in any situation in which data is generated in a distributed way, such as with sensor networks, web servers, and mobile device services, in essence "small companies with big data."
-
Important: Gmail Priority Inbox Should Now Be Available To All
 It's hard to remember a product I've become so dependent on quicker than Gmail's new Priority Inbox. I'm so addicted, that the few times I've accidentally clicked on the old "regular" Inbox view in the past week have really annoyed me. So much so that I actually moved that view into my "more" drop down (you can drag any sidebar item in there). And now I have good news: you can all share in this addiction.
While it began rolling out to users on Monday, Google is now saying that Priority Inbox should be available to all users (including Google Apps users) today. Look for the "New! Priority Inbox" message in red in the top right corner of your Gmail account to activate it. There's a slight learning curve with it, so you'll still probably want to watch Google's official video. But once you get started, it's unlikely that you'll go back.
-
Six Apart’s Vox Heads To DeadPool
When Six Apart launched Vox, a blogging/social network platform with strict privacy controls, in 2006, investor David Hornik had high hopes. Vox is an "amazing blogging platform," he said, because "Finally I have a place where I can post pictures and video of my kids without concern about who is looking at them."
Vox will be shut down on September 20, says Six Apart.
What they're not saying is why. Part of it is likely cleanup for a merger that the company continues to flatly deny - CEO Chris Alden will have fun explaining his way out of that one if it actually happens. 
-
How Tagged Found A 100 Million User Path Post Facebookocalypse (Video)
 Heard of Tagged? Back in 2005 it was a teenager-only social network, catering primarily to U.S. high school students as Facebook charged through the college crowds. By 2007 they were profitable and worth over $100 million.
Just one problem though. Facebook eventually started letting high school students in, and then everyone else. Tagged responded by opening up to everyone, too. But by mid 2007, CEO Greg Tseng tells me, Tagged knew it was in trouble.
"Facebook beat us," he said. "We were just another social network...but not in the top five."
-
Visual Website Optimizer: Another Way To Run A/B Tests On Your Site
 A/B testing, which entails running multiple versions of a site at once and tracking which one performs best with users, is a key part of launching a new version of any website.Visual Website Optimizer, which I'll just call VWO from here on out, helps users manage this often complex process. The service shares some similiarities with a Y Combinator-funded startup called Optimizely, which launched in July.
Among some of VWO's features are multivariate testing (you can adjust more than one item on your site and VWO will run them in various combinations to determine which ones have a positive effect), heatmaps showing off where users are clicking (which are useful for visualizing where your visitors are clicking for different variations of a site), and split URL tests, which gives you the option to redirect traffic to two alternate versions of your website. 
|
