Facebook Tagtile Acquisition Hints At Social Commerce Play

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Although there was much coverage of the Instagram acquisition by Facebook , there was also another purchase during the same week that had much less coverage. Tagtile, a mobile marketing and loyalty rewards service targeted at small businesses and merchants, was acquired by Facebook last month for an undisclosed amount of cash and stock but is said to be in the millions.

Tagtiles technology allows mobile phone users to tap a receiver in physical stores in order to receive rewards, discounts and loyalty points.

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Google TV: Heres How Were Going To Fix It

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Google TV manager, Rishi Chandra, explains why Google TV is just getting started.

Google is shipping 47-inch and 55-inch TV sets from LG, this month. Followed shortly by standalone Google TV boxes from Sony and Vizio. Although, It isn’t clear what these devices will have that past devices haven’t.

Risha states the following lessons were learned about Google TV:

ARM chipsets. The first version of Google TV was designed for Intel-type microprocessors, which are used in most personal computers, but Google quickly figured out that the architecture wasn’t working. The new version runs on ARM processors, which should make them run cooler and more efficiently. It should also make Google TV hardware easier to produce, meaning lower prices: “Android is very much aligned around ARM in general. Switching to ARM significantly simplifies … implementation and onboarding on devices.” [Note: the LG TVs will run their own processors built by LG, but expect a bunch of ARM-based devices to follow this year.]
Live TV emphasis. The first version of Google TV seemed like a Web-for-TV add-on — a product type that has never worked. With the new software, Google has added a “Live TV” icon, and made live TV more prominent throughout. “Customers told us ‘I do not want my Netflix right next to live TV programs.’” Eventually, Chandra believes, customers will stop distinguishing between sources of video. But for now, people still think of TV differently — and want a product that reflects that.
Personalization. The old way of finding video — looking through channel numbers — no longer works when there are so many different sources. Search is one way to fix this, but Google TV will also offer personalized recommendations. Those recommendations will come not only from your Google TV activity, but from things you do elsewhere on Google, like searches, YouTube videos you watch on your computer, and content you download from Google Play. (You have to be signed in for all this to work.) Chandra told us that there’s tons of room for improvement in this area. For instance, when you call up the Sports section, it should show your favorite teams first, and alert you which games are going on now and how close they are.

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Apple Has A Blowout Weekend and Sells Over 3 Million iPads

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The new ipad 3 went on sale at Walmart at midnight 3/16 according to  reports and in Apple Stores at 8 am. In the opening weekend, three million units were sold.

Tablet sales are expected to increase to 326 million by 2015 with Apple largely dominating the market, according to research firm Gartner, rivalling sales of desktop computers, which Gartner expects to total 368 million units this year.!

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Wikipedia Will Go Dark On Wednesday In Protest Of SOPA/PIPA

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Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia, tweeted in regards to the fact that the wikipedia.org website would be shutdown on Wednesday 1/17/2012 in protest of SOPA (Software Online Piracy Act) and PIPA (Protect Intellectual Property Act). The English version of Wikipedia.org will be joined by Reddit and more than 50 other sites.

But the Internet giants say the bills could require your Internet provider to block websites that are involved in digital file sharing. And search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Bing could be stopped from linking to them — antithetical, they say, to the ideal of an open Internet.

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The Most Popular Android Apps by Age

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Nielsen conducted a study of Android applications used by age groups. 18-24, 25-34, 35-44 based on usage going back 30 days from. What I find interesting is that all of the the most commonly used top 6 applications, with the exception of Facebook all belong to Google across all of these age groups.
Nielsen findings:

Nielsen analyzed usage data from its proprietary device meters on the smartphones of the thousands of consumer panelists who agreed to be part of Nielsen’s ongoing Smartphone Analytics research.
Staying Social
Facebook’s popular app is the most active among Android owners 18-24 and 25-34, who both hover at around an 80 percent active reach. Additionally, more than three quarters of users 35-44 used the app recently as well.

 

Google’s YouTube app gets heavy usage from Android smartphone owners 18 -24: 64 percent have used it in the past 30 days, compared to 56 percent and 51 percent of 25-34 and 35-44 year olds. A preference for media apps with a social dimension (e.g. Words with Friends) among the 18-24 set is also reinforced by their sizable usage of music and video apps (e.g. Pandora) compared to older demographics.

 

Play Time
Not just for the kids, the ubiquitous game, Angry Birds, appeals more to those 35-44 when compared to other age groups: 35 percent of them have used the app in the last 30 days, while only 22 percent of those 18-24 and 29 percent of 25-34 year-olds launched the game.

 

Apps and More for Sale
Apart from gaming, the 35-44 segment demonstrates a greater inclination to shop using the Amazon AppStore: 24 percent of them used the app in the last 30 days, while only 14 percent of those 18-24 did the same. Groupon appeals more to those 25-34, not even making the top 20 ranking for those 18-24. A similar trend was found on Google+: active reach was higher for those 25 and older when compared to the 18-24 demographic.

Source – Nielsen Wire.