By Gilbert Falso :: 7:22 AM
Sources close to Google this morning have confirmed its acquisition of natural language processing startup Wavii, after a bidding war with Apple.
The pricetag for the Seattle-based company was somewhere above $30 million, but exact figures haven’t been given. Apple had also been interested in the 25-member Wavii team as it looked to bolster the technology behind its iPhone virtual assistant, Siri.
Although Google hasn’t said exactly where it hopes to apply Wavii’s technology within the company, there are several areas where the language processing knowledge could be a good fit. Some of those include Google Now, Google Knowledge, Google News, and even Google Glass, according to some sources.
It is believed that most of the Wavii team, including its founder, Adrian Aoun, will initially join the Google Knowledge team after the acquisition clears.
Google’s acquisition of Wavii comes on the heels of Yahoo’s purchase of Summly and LinkedIn’s attempt to buy Pulse – the big names are all in search of the mobile news reading and news processing space.
By Gilbert Falso :: 1:58 PM
The false Tweet sent out by the hacked Associated Press (AP) Twitter account caused a shockwave in U.S. financial markets earlier this afternoon.
At 1:07 PM, the official Twitter account of the AP posted a message that claimed President Obama was injured in a pair of explosions at the White House. The news was, of course, erroneous, but the markets didn’t realize it at the time.
Immediately following the hacked Tweet, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) dropped over 100 points, but rebounded just as quickly as many news organizations quickly pointed out that the AP Tweet was a hoax.
The chart below, from Google Finance, shows the drop and rebound across the three major markets, the DJIA, the S&P 500, and the NASDAQ Composite.
By Paul Thomson :: 1:22 PM
The Twitter account of the Associated Press (AP) was hacked this afternoon.
Hackers Tweeted the message, “Breaking: Two Explosions in the White House and Barack Obama is injured” at 1:07 Eastern time.
Other Associated Press Twitter accounts quickly noted that the Tweet was false and to disregard it.
No organization has claimed responsibility for the hack yet. It is not known if it is related to the hacking attempts over the weekend of various CBS media accounts, such as 60 Minutes and 48 Hours, or to the hacks on several FIFA accounts yesterday.
Below, a screenshot of the original Tweet. The AP’s Twitter account has been temporarily suspended by Twitter while the situation is sorted out.
By Gilbert Falso :: 1:14 PM
Google has announced that its Google Maps Streetview feature now includes street level photography for 50 countries across the globe.
With the addition of Hungary and Lesotho (a small, land-locked country surrounded by South Africa), Google’s popular mapping service’s latest update adds 350,000 mile of photographed roads to its database.
Initially launched in 2007 with photography from San Francisco, New York, Las Vegas, Miami, and Denver, Google Maps quickly added city after to city to its list over the past six years.
The company’s Google Maps blog suggest a few sights from the two new countries on the list:
- Széchenyi thermal bath, the largest medicinal bath in Europe
- The wonders of Buda castle
- The Lesotho Evangelical Church
Earlier this year, Google highlighted the two-year anniversary of the Japan earthquake with maps and Streetview imagery from Namie-machi, a small city in Fukushima Prefecture close to the nuclear power plant that suffered an accident after the quake. Since the quake, over 20,000 townspeople have not been able to return to their homes. Google’s Streetview cameras offered them a glimpse into their abandoned city.
By Cynthia Herbert :: 12:21 PM
Shapeways, a 3D printing startup, has announced that it raised $30 million in financing in a Series C round, led by Andreessen Horowitz.
The round also includes funding from existing investors Lux Capital, Index Ventures and Union Square Ventures.
Shapeways sells 3D printing services and runs a marketplace for 3D creators. Last year, they claimed to print over 100,000 products a month, with 150,000 users in their community.
“We’ve come a long way with Shapeways,†co-founder and CEO Peter Weijmarshausen told TechCrunch. “We’ve made 3D printing and production really accessible. We’re making 3D printing more relevant to people.â€
In addition to the traditional plastic 3D printing medium, Shapeways also offers customers the ability to print in a variety of other materials as well. Sandstone, ceramics, sterling silver and stainless steel are all available printing mediums in the Shapeways arsenal.
The company currently does most of its printing at a plant in Long Island City, NY and plans to expand its facilities there with this round.
In March, Shapeways introduced their new API which allows developers to create applications that can interface with Shapeways’ printing network and sellers marketplace.