Placecast brings location-based retail trade signals Smartphone applications

Leena Rao is currently working as a writer for TechCrunch. She recently finished graduate school of the Medill School of journalism at Northwestern University, where she studied business journalism and videography. From 2004 to 2007 she helped lead efforts for advocacy and community relationships Congressman Carloyn Maloney in New York. She graduated from Columbia University in 2003 where it was ... ? Read More

Placecast's ShopAlerts service that provides retail and commercial offers and discounts to consumers via their mobile phones, today announces the new functionality, integration with Mobile Smartphone apps.

As we wrote in the past, ShopAlerts is a white-label geofencing platform for businesses that want to deliver the GEO work offers to its customers on their mobile phones. Consumers can sign up to receive text messages in different ways — in-store, online, via text message, mobile Web sites, or on Facebook. Geofences virtual cause around physical location; When the user selected in the geofenced area, it receives a message from the business, including discount, sale, shop or other content.

With the new feature, retailers have deployed mobile applications can allow users to obtain from the nearest store, retailer or other appropriate location, location-based communication without the app being open in the same way as ShopAlerts programs work on any phone, this new feature works on any Smartphone platform.

Once a retailer integrates with ShopAlerts, clients (who are in receipt of alerts) will have location-based push notifications when they are in the area of geofenced. Retailers can also use the preferences expressed by the consumer, such as loyalty or past purchase data to improve the relevance of the message or transaction. Time of day and weather can also be taken into account for the creation of added value, and brands could also enable location-based notification when a particular product is available in a nearby store.

Placecast says that he will work directly with retailers to integrate ShopAlerts into their applications, helping them to develop a programme and a messaging strategy, choose the number and size of geofences and activate the field.

Integration with retail Smartphone applications makes a lot of sense for Placecast. With the increase in offline and online commerce Placecast gives retailers another way for consumers and offer relevant transactions and information. The aim is to bring the user in the repository, and messages sent via the Smartphone app can help do that.

Placecast is already used by a number of high-profile brands such as North face and even AT&T.

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Apple's "Inaccurate evidence" fiasco, part 2: Smartphone Edition

Jordan Crook studied English literature at the University of New York before entering the tech space. Prior to joining TechCrunch Crook dabbled in mobile marketing and mobile apps, as well as doing reviews for MobileBurn and MobileMarketer. Kruk, fascinated with the production of alternative sources of energy and greentech. It is currently a writer for CrunchGear. ? Read More

Apple introduced again that the blogosphere is calling "inaccurate evidence" in this case against Samsung. Photo on page 77 complaints Apple in the District Court of the Hague in the Netherlands shows the Samsung Galaxy S next to the iPhone 3 G and guess what! Apple once again screwed with.

But don't freak out. This may not be as big a deal as everyone makes it to be.

Here's the thing: the battle moved to the Netherlands, the only country in the EU as not yet affected by the fight. Apple recently filed a complaint (which is only available for screening in the Hague Court, but saw Weberwerld. nl) the company requests that the EU ban on almost all galaxies devices including s Galaxy, Galaxy S II Galaxy Galaxy tab tab 7 and 10.1. Apple also asked that all remaining inventory pulled from retail shelves.

This time it is not only the speech, and that makes all the difference. When Apple first introduced that Crazy picture 10.1 Galaxy tab in Germany, the suit was fully involved in the design, so there is really no obvious reason to mess with the images. This is not to say that he was some crazy-handed move by Apple, but it makes it a little harder to justify the modified aspect ratio. However, the BBC reports that the German judge then inspected the hand device and does not base its decision only on the images provided by Apple.

In the case of the Netherlands Apple complaint is much more achievements and refers to the violation of patent rights, not only on the same design community of the EU (the iPad), but other European patents dealing with mobile photography management, interpretation of the touch events and Apple swipe to unlock. In other words, we have moved the software that makes things more complex by 100%.

In the image (the image is Weberwerld's rendering above), the Samsung Galaxy S is scaled the same proportions as the iPhone 3 G in reality, the Galaxy s longer and wider than the iPhone 3 G, Samsung Galaxy S measures 122.4 mm x 64.2 mm, while the iPhone 3 G sports dimensions 115.5 mm x 62.1 mm. But the figure supplied by Apple, was changed in the Galaxy s approximately 6 per cent, making it similar in size to the iPhone. Unlike the situation with the GalTab ratio has not been significantly modified.

Since we cannot actually get our hands on court documents, it is difficult to say the side-by-side comparison, but weberwerld. nl reports that Apple is s Galaxy "-identical elements, such as a slightly larger size (at p. 77). Most likely, if Apple actually saying on the same page as the Galaxy s is more likely to have a good reason for scaling images.

Of course, the Galaxy s design is controlled by its similarity to the iPhone 3 G, but there are other aspects of the device in question as well. It's quite possible that the image of the Galaxy s size so that the judge may investigate something not related to the design. Then again this is only a side-by-side comparison photos s galaxies with iPhone 3 G, which makes me wonder why was not presented a comparative analysis of more realistic, too.

To add to the confusion, Samsung lawyers argue that Apple manipulated evidence, since that time the Samsung actually got to be part of the trial. "[Apple was] the manipulation of Visual evidence that makes the Samsung devices appear more similar to Apple," said Berghuis Ba Simmons and Simmons law firm. Because we're going to hard to be sure of the translation, but it looks like Mr. Berghuis evidence were not sufficiently important to convince the judge. Google translate, weberwerld .nl in reporting the following: "but this claim was from Samsung at the meeting is not supported by the evidence."

I can't imagine will claim Mr. Berghuis Apple manipulation of evidence without submission of the false testimony in court. So Apple filing images probably is changed for good reason. In addition, if Apple is trying to intentionally deceive the judicial systems of the false testimony, the company will likely be abandoned this plan as soon as the original photo GalTab was discovered.

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Voxy Snags $ 2. 8 M to help people learn the language through Smartphone

Alexia Tsotsis currently works at TechCrunch as a writer. She is also a blogger who attended the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, California. She majored in writing and art, moved to New York shortly after the end of the work in the entertainment industry and media. After four years of his life in New York and to attend courses in New York. ? Read More

Finalist of the TechCrunch Disrupt Voxy announces new series a investments today, $ 2.8 million from investors Seavest Inc. and outline of the enterprise. Relatively new investor Seavest recently education portfolio company, school, sell for $ 230 million education publisher Pearson.

In addition to financing, Voxy launches its newest product, who teaches English to Portuguese users iPhone app (so far, all of its proposals were English Spanish user).

In the same space as live Mocha Voxy distinguishes itself through the selection of content from every day life material like magazines and mobile first.  "We believe that in many developing countries, people will break Web applications for mobile devices» founder Paul Gollash tells me. Voxy offers both free and premium services — from $ 2 per month for users who want the added features, such as lessons via SMS.

Gollash plans to use new funding to hire more engineers, product scale and the improvement of existing technology. His future plans, including offering English for the Spanish version of the service and expansion into other languages and markets. "We are going to continue to use mobile in order to meet the needs of users who do not have enough time, money and access to use the traditional methods of browser-based and online," he says.

Gollash also tells me that one day after the launch on the Brazilian market, Voxy already top 10 app in the category of education. The population of Brazil is 193 m.

Voxy is a new way to learn a language that is designed to seamlessly fit into our daily lives. Voxy in integrated platform of web/mobile/SMS uses relevant, contemporary, real-world content.

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