By Paul Thomson :: 1:19 PM
Zipcar, the Cambridge Mass.-based membership carsharing company has been purchased by rental car giant Avis for $491.2 million.
The notion of carsharing, an alternative to traditional automobile rentals in cities and densely populated areas, allows members to reserve a vehicle for short trips. Zipcar, was founded in 2000 by Antje Danielson and Robin Chase, and currently boasts more than 760,000 members. The company went public in 2011 and reported a net income of $850,000 in the first half of this year.
By joining forces with Zipcar, Avis hopes to “significantly increase our growth potential, both in the United States and internationally,” said Avis Chairman and CEO Ronald Nelson in a prepared statement.
Adding the strength of the large fleet of Avis vehicles should help Zipcar address demand issues, an area it has had problems with, especially on college campuses where it has cars, and in all city areas on the weekends.
Avis expects to retain a few members of the current Zipcar management team, including Zipcar’s Chairman/CEO Scott Griffith and its President/COO Mark Norman.
“We are delighted to announce our intention to join the Avis Budget Group family of companies, and we believe this combination is a win across the board for our members, shareholders and employees. We will be well positioned to accelerate enhancements to the Zipcar member experience with more offers and additional services as well as an expanded network of locations,” said Griffith.
By Gilbert Falso :: 12:55 PM
Snapchat, the smartphone app that allows users to shoot and send short photos and videos with a limited viewing window has been a hit on Apple’s App Store, ranking in the top 10 applications over the past few months. The appeal is in the short-lived nature of the images – they can only be seen by the recipient for a few seconds (up to 10), and the sender controls how long.
Not one to be left behind, Facebook saw how quickly the Snapchat app took off, and jumped on the bandwagon itself, releasing its Poke application with great fanfare last month. However shortly after Poke released, it seemed as if the hoopla died down pretty quickly. If anything, the interest that Poke’s release generated actually sent users in search of the original app, Snapchat. Snapchat is currently ranked number 4 in the App Store, and Poke hasn’t even cracked the top 100 apps leader board.
Snapchat came about in 2011, created by Evan Spiegel and Bobby Murphy, two 20-something creatives living in Los Angeles. Taking an obvious stab at Instagram in a blog post last fall, they said, “it’s not all about fancy vacations, sushi dinners, or beautiful sunsets. Sometimes it’s an inside joke, a silly face, or greetings from a pet fish. Great conversations are magical. That’s because they are shared, enjoyed but not saved.”
Although usage of the app has jumped sharply -Â in December 50 million images were shared every day, a rise from October’s 20 million – the company has yet to generate any revenue. Now, despite the popularity, questions are beginning to appear about the true fleeting nature of the shared images on both services.
If a recipient tries to take a screen capture of the image they have received, both Snapchat and Poke will alert the sender. However, tech-savvy users can beat the applications. By connecting phones to a computer and running the files through a program such as iFunBox, users can retrieve sent images before the application displays them. They are then able to save them off to view however long they want – as well as pass them along to others.
Spiegel was quoted in Buzzfeed saying that “there will always be a way to reverse engineer technology products.†The company is working on a way to address the security breach. In addition, Facebook has reached out to Poke users and reminded them to consider what they’re sending with the application.
By Gilbert Falso :: 7:19 AM
The ink is barely dry on the iPhone 5Â unveiling, and now it looks like its successor, the iPhone 6, as well as a new operating system, iOS 7, may be well under construction.
According to some published reports on The Next Web and VentureBeat, developers and website managers are seeing references to the new hardware and software in their analytics logs. The new phone is showing up as “iPhone6.1” and the operating system as “iOS 7” – all from IP addresses in Cupertino, Calif., home of Apple.
This is not too out of the ordinary – hardware and software manufacturers would have to test apps and surf the web with these devices and operating systems as they are being built and tested. What is a little strange, however, is that Apple isn’t cloaking or hiding the identity of the devices, as it has usually done in the past. Perhaps with Steve Jobs gone, things are just being run a little differently at Apple?
By Cynthia Herbert :: 5:16 AM
It looks like the cable television industry might see itself receiving a big shake up pretty soon, if the rumors and tips about the technology Intel is working on come true.
According to reports published in Forbes, the company known for semiconductor and computer chip manufacturing may soon be in the television content business, with its own set-top box paired with an unbundled-channel cable service.
The new hardware will be offered first as a limited beta to a select group of customers some time in March. Content will be delivered to televisions via an Internet connection, regardless of Internet service provider. Users will be permitted to subscribe to content on a per-channel basis, unlike current cable company offerings. It has also been noted that Intel may allow users to subscribe simply to a show within a channel, and not to the entire channel.
Intel’s set-top box will provide access to Intel’s application marketplace for apps, games, and videos/movies on demand, and will also feature a “Cloud DVRâ€, that will allow subscribers to watch any  TV show already broadcast at any time, without needing to record it ahead of time.
Similar rumors were circulating last year around a service like this that Apple
With news breaking this time of year, the big question is always, “will we see this at CES?” CES, the Consumer Electronics Show held annually in January in Las Vegas, is often a site for such debuts. Unfortunately, it looks like Intel may be skipping a CES unveiling for this new technology – but, like everything else at this stage – that’s just a rumor, and we might see them at the Las Vegas Convention Center after all. Stay tuned.
By Gilbert Falso :: 11:56 AM
A prime source for pirated versions of Apple iOS apps went offline on New Year’s Eve – looking like it will be gone for good.
The development team behind Installous, Hackulous, posted about the closure on their web site:
Goodnight, sweet prince.
We are very sad to announce that Hackulous is shutting down. After many years, our community has become stagnant and our forums are a bit of a ghost town. It has become difficult to keep them online and well-moderated, despite the devotion of our staff. We’re incredibly thankful for the support we’ve had over the years and hope that new, greater communities blossom out of our absence.
With lots of love,
Hackulous Team
The pirate app store now displays this error message when users try to access it: Â “Outdated version. Installous will now terminate.”
For several years, the Installous app offered access to a full library of paid iOS apps for free to users who had jailbroken their iPhones, iPads, or iPod Touches. Many standard pay applications could be found for free in Installous’ collection. During its heyday, even expensive App Store offerings were coming to Installous within hours after they were released on the official App Store site.
Though the shuttering of Installous will likely inconvenience many who had come to rely on the service, there are still alternatives out there, including Appcake, which had been touted as an Installous alternative.