By Gilbert Falso :: 7:26 PM
If you’ve been on Twitter at all in the past two days, you may be wondering, what is all this chatter going on about Vine?
Vine is Twitter’s new video sharing application for the iPhone. It was released yesterday, and has quickly climbed the app charts, now ranked number 14Â in the top free app overall category. Twitter acquired the company in October, and made the official launch announcement yesterday.
The application is not built into Twitter, but operates alongside it as a standalone app. Vine videos are fully integrated with Twitter so that they will show up in users’ Tweet streams like pictures shared through Twitter-approved image providers do. Users can also follow and participate with Vine videos in the Vine app itself, outside of Twitter.
It is designed for the sharing of short videos – those that run only a few seconds, and will loop the videos back to the beginning after they end, continuously. Video length is limited to six seconds.
Facebook, it seems, will not be playing friendly with Twitter and Vine. Facebook today has blocked Vine from allowing users to be able to find Facebook friends with the app. This is a similar move to howTwitter shut off Facebook’s Instagram from access to user data a few months ago. Tit for tat.
By Cynthia Herbert :: 6:31 PM
Research in Motion (RIM) announced earlier today that it will be launching BlackBerry Enterprise Services 10 today for all users. The service was originally developed with BlackBerry 10 handsets in mind, but it will work with all current BlackBerry phones and tablets in the marketplace.
BlackBerry Enterprise Services 10 is a new iteration of of RIM’s mobile management suite designed for business use, and features tools like BlackBerry Balance to help customers keep their separate work and personal accounts on the same device for emails, apps, and contacts.
In addition, the suite includes BlackBerry World for Work, a corporate dashboard for businesses that will enable them to manage apps on phones issued to their employees. For example, an IT department could set the dashboard to automatically upgrade or install required apps onto certain employee handsets.
The most interesting new feature with this tool, however, is the fact that it can go cross-platform and will allow the management of both iOS and Android devices. This will be useful as formerly BlackBerry-only shops open up and support users who are bringing their own devices to the workplace.
RIM is pulling out all the stops to increase adoption of the new platform, and making it available for download today with a 60-day free trial. The free trial is only applicable for new customers, however. Existing enterprise subscribers will be given a free license upgrade, which users can sign up for through the end of the year.
The company is still on track for the unveiling of BlackBerry 10 hardware at the end of the month on January 30th.
By Katherine McClosky :: 10:05 PM
With the recent changes to the terms of service for photo sharing social site Instagram, many people are wondering how protected and private their images really are. This is of greater concern now that Instagram has opened up a web portal for viewing users’ photographs, and in the wake of the acquisition of the service by Facebook, a company well known for its transgressions against user privacy.
The good news is that, for the most part, Instagram users have fairly good control over who can view their photos on the service. All privacy settings and controls are set within the mobile application itself, both on the iPhone platform and on the Android platform.
By default, anyone can view your account profile on Instagram. If you would like to change the setting so that only your approved followers can see your profile, follow these steps:
- Go to your profile by selecting the far right address card icon at the bottom of the Instagram app
- Tap the settings icon in the upper right
- On Apple iOS, scroll down to “Photos are private” and flip the switch to ON to turn on privacy. On Android, tap on “Photo privacy” then tap within box to enable profile privacy
Once you turn on this privacy setting, anyone who wants to see your photos, followers, or who you are following, will need to send you request. To approve or deny a request to follow you, just tap on the username that appears in the request. You will then be directed to that person’s profile page, and have the option to approve the follow request, or ignore it.
Instagram has also taken steps to limit the amount and type of private personal information shared on their service. It is a violation of their terms of service to post private and confidential information. Instagram considers private and confidential information to be credit card information, social security numbers, private address and/or location information, non-public phone numbers, and non-public email addresses. For reporting such privacy breaches, Instagram has made a comment form available on their website.
By Gilbert Falso :: 4:35 PM
Apple is currently releasing its quarterly earnings report. Here is what we know now.
Revenue is $54.5 billion in Q1, with net profit at $13.1 billion, with a gross margin of 38.6%. The company expects Q2 revenue to come in around $41-43 billion, which is way below analysts’estimates of $45-48 billion.
The company sold 47.8 million iPhones in Q1, and international sales accounted for 61% of revenue. Analysts had thought Apple would sell 50 million iPhone handsets.
Shares of Apple took a nosedive, down about 5% on this news. Apple had closed at $514.17, and at 4:40 pm, after hours trading pegged the stock at 488.64.
By Paul Thomson :: 4:15 PM
The long awaited appearance of the Samsung Galaxy S4 smartphone finally has a date – March 22.
According to an article in Asia Economic News, that is that date for Samsung’s official announcement about the new handset. Although an exact location for the announcement event has not yet been given, signs in the report point to somewhere in the Silicon Valley, near Apple’s headquarters.
Customers shouldn’t start lining up at stores just yet, however. Although the announcement will take place in late March, the phone will probably not go on sale until April 15th.
Also, the model number, s4 or SIV may not hold either, as a website dedicated to Samsung news notes that the number four is considered to be bad luck in South Korea and other Asian countries. An alternative model name or number has not been suggested, but the code name for the phone at Samsung is Altius.
The image above, found on Picasa, shows what the Galaxy S4 will look like. It is taller than the current model, the Galaxy S3
The Galaxy S4 will likely feature a 1080p full-HD display, with an 1.8GHz 8-core Exynos 5 Octa processor under the hood. It will have a 13-megapixel rear camera, 4G LTE connectivity, 2GB of RAM, wireless charging capabilities and run Android 4.2.1 Jelly Bean as the OS.