Sunday, October 31, 2010

PayPal Beats Google Checkout To The Local Payments Market But Will It Work? (TCTV)

PayPal Beats Google Checkout To The Local Payments Market But Will It Work? (TCTV): "


In conjunction with the company’s developer conference, PayPal announced a slew of news and product releases this week, including a new micropayments product and an apps platform for businesses. But tucked away in a release was another piece of news from PayPal that could be huge. PayPal just released a new version of its popular iPhone app that allows users to find businesses near their immediate location that accept PayPal as a form of payment. Launching in San Francisco initially, the feature encourages merchants to attract nearby customers to their stores by posting deals and promotions to the app as an incentive for customers to visit their businesses.


Customers can search by category and location, and find and select stores, services, or special offers. Users can pick up the goods or services in person, but pay the merchant using their PayPal app. Users can also use tags from Bling Nation, a startup that has partnered with PayPal to use the startup’s mobile payment chips to deduct funds from a PayPal account.


One of the big selling points around using PayPal for merchants is the ability to offer deals as an incentive to drive buyers to a store or restaurant. Whether it be Groupon-like daily deals or just ordinary coupons, there’s no doubt that deals do help drive online to offline sales.


PayPal President Scott Thompson tells TechCrunch (see video below) that eventually this local feature will have “ubiquity,” meaning you’ll be able to access these merchant listings and pay with PayPal wherever you are in the world. Local is one of the key parts of PayPal’s future strategy, says Thompson. He’s confident that has the world becomes more connected, eventually all local merchants will accept PayPal as a payments option for in-store purchases.


For PayPal, local payments certainly makes sense. Online to offline sales is a big part of local commerce, and if PayPal can become a payments mechanism in the local market, it could be pay off in revenue for the company.


One competitor worth noting in the local payments space is Google Checkout. While Google Checkout doesn’t have as extensive of a reach as PayPal, Google Checkout has an ace in the hole when it comes to Google Places. Google Places allows local businesses to claim and edit a page, post realtime updates (eg, “happy hour tonight”), post reviews, create a custom QR code, and even offer coupons. And Google indexes and highlights these pages in search results, most recently launching a more integrated placement of Places page within Google search.


Google could easily turn on a transaction (such as a daily deal) for these merchants, and use Google

Checkout as the payments mechanism. The same experience could extend to mobile phones.


The advantage Google has over PayPal is that with Places, these relationships with local merchants are already built into the search giants business. At last count a few months ago, Google had Places pages in place for over 4 million businesses but I’m sure this number is higher. PayPal on the other hand will have to forge new relationships with all these local businesses to get them on board with their payments platform. Not only do they have to find the businesses, but PayPal has to teach them how to use their mobile apps as a payment mechanism. Scaling PayPal’s local feature will be a huge endeavor for the company, which is why PayPal is testing the feature out in a limited market in the San Francisco.


This why it makes sense for PayPal to form partnerships on its local endeavor. Google is an unlikely partner considering that the company already has its own payments platform. Facebook Places could be a potential partner (PayPal is already a micropayments partner for the social network’s virtual currency platform Credits). Facebook is rumored to be turning on a deals feature for Places and PayPal could be a way to process these payments. And Groupon is rumored to be brokering a payments deal with PayPal as well.


So while Google Checkout still doesn’t have the sort of users numbers that PayPal does in the payments area, Google has much more in the war chest in terms of local. With local up for grabs, the battle between the two payments platform just got a whole lot more interesting.







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thedailywhat: Magnificent Murals of the Day: S. Rivas painted a...

thedailywhat:

Magnificent Murals of the Day: S. Rivas painted a...
: "

thedailywhat:



Magnificent Murals of the Day: S. Rivas painted a bunch of Calvin & Hobbes murals in the playroom of the Reynolds Home — a shelter for women and children in crisis.


Rivas says:



Working on this mural, staring at every minute detail of wattersons work, i gained a greater appreciation for [Bill Watterson’s] beautiful creations. i tried to respect the original works as much as possible, giving my full attention to even the smallest detail and trying to get the colors just right. attempting to recreate the look of watercolors using only latex paint proved to be quite difficult. i hope i did ‘em justice.



[reddit.]


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Suspended sanctuary - Nestrest hanging lounger by Dedon

Suspended sanctuary - Nestrest hanging lounger by Dedon: "

dedon nestrest 2


German furniture firm Dedon has earlier impressed us with the stunning Summer Cloud beach chair, and this time they have the Nestrest. The Nestrest hanging lounger transforms your regular garden sofa into a small architectural piece. An ideal place for relaxation, meditation and conversations, the Nestrest lounger is made from specially created 4cm wide DeDon Fiber. Thanks to the special fiber, the person sitting inside can look out, but the outsider cannot peep into the privacy.



Designed by Daniel Pouzet and Fred Frety, the distinctive hanging lounger offers you a quiet, suspended shelter. No word on pricing, but the Nestrest is definitely something I personally would love to see hanging in my backyard.


dedon nestrest 7dedon nestrest 3dedon nestrest 4

dedon nestrest 5dedon nestrest 6


Via: Contemporan

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Vending machines of the ancient world

Vending machines of the ancient world: "Back in 2006, the Smithsonian talked to John Humphrey, University of Calgary professor of Greek and Roman studies, about the lost inventions of the ancient world, including this Holy Water Vending Machine from the first century AD:



World's First Vending Machine


Inventor: Hero (busy man)

Date: First century A.D.

How it works: A person puts a coin in a slot at the top of a box. The coin hits a metal lever, like a balance beam. On the other end of the beam is a string tied to a plug that stops a container of liquid. As the beam tilts from the weight of the coin, the string lifts the plug and dispenses the desired drink until the coin drops off the beam.

Proof of complexity: Early modern vending machines actually used a similar system, before electrical machines took over.

Quirk: It was devised to distribute Holy Water at temples, because 'people were taking more Holy Water than they were paying for,' Humphrey says.


Old World, High Tech

(via Kottke)




"

Saturday, October 30, 2010

MSI intros 15.6-inch FR600 3D laptop, complete with embarrassing eyewear

MSI intros 15.6-inch FR600 3D laptop, complete with embarrassing eyewear: "

If there's a party, MSI's going. And if there's a bandwagon, MSI's onboard. It's with this knowledge firmly entrenched in our brains that we present the FR600 3D. If you'll recall, Intel actually tossed this name out awhile back when trumpeting its latest integrated graphics chipset, but now it's the proud papa's turn to make things official. This 15.6-incher is equipped with the expected 3D support, a Core i5 processor, up to 8GB of DDR3 memory, HDMI / VGA outputs, a 320/500/640GB hard drive, DVD SuperMulti drive, two USB 2.0 sockets, a 4-in-1 card reader and Bluetooth 2.1+EDR. You'll also get 802.11b/g/n WiFi, a gigabit Ethernet socket, inbuilt webcam and a six-cell Li-ion battery, not to mention a bundled set of 3D glasses to really get immersed in whatever it is you're doing. Per usual, the company's keeping quiet on the pricing and release front, but surely it'll be out by Christmastime. Surely.

MSI intros 15.6-inch FR600 3D laptop, complete with embarrassing eyewear originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 30 Oct 2010 08:18:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | sourceMSI | Email this | Comments"

Android This Week: Sprint Does Droid; NOOKColor; HTC

Android This Week: Sprint Does Droid; NOOKColor; HTC: "

The rapid growth of the Android platform has been a good thing for many companies, and Sprint as much as any. The carrier has ridden the popularity of smartphones such as the Evo 4G and Epic 4G to add 644,000 new subscribers hot to get the phones. This month, the company unveiled the new Sprint ID feature, which is basically a pack of Android apps designed to customize Android phones to fit the customer. The ability for customers to use these Android phones as mobile hotspots allowed Sprint to take advantage of the hot iPad sales, as CEO Dan Hesse told Om Malik in an interview this week.


Book retailer Barnes & Noble announced the next iteration of its e-reader this week, the NOOKColor. It may be promoted as an e-reader, but the NOOKColor is essentially an Android tablet complete with touchscreen and apps. The 7-inch e-reader hits the market at only $249, a price that isn’t competitive with the latest Kindle from Amazon, but is very competitive with Android tablets. In addition to handling Nook bookstore content, the NOOKColor can play music and video. Who knows? Maybe it will end up competing with the iPad.


The Samsung Galaxy Tab is likely going to be one of the most popular Android tablets when it goes on sale, and it’s going to be sold in a lot of places. Five phone carriers will be selling the Tab in the U.S. alone, along with retailer Best Buy. All of these outlets will be offering the Galaxy Tab at different prices, and with data plan options that vary in price, as well. Wading through all of the prices and options is a daunting task, so this week we did that for you. Our Galaxy Tab roundup lists all of the places that will sell the tablet, and along with the device prices also breaks down the data plan requirements.


Smartphone maker HTC is the largest producer of Android phones, and this week, announced it expects to ship 8.5 million smartphones next quarter. They won’t all be running Android, as the company’s new line of Windows Phone 7 phones will factor into that number, but the lion’s share will be packing Android. HTC’s promotional campaign to bring its brand in front of the consumer has played a successful role in the company’s growth with Android.


Related content from GigaOM Pro (sub req’d):



"

Friday, October 29, 2010

Trendspotting: What’s Up With Fashion People Wearing Jackets Like Capes?

Trendspotting: What’s Up With Fashion People Wearing Jackets Like Capes?: "

Wearing a coat or blazer draped over your shoulders isn’t exactly a new trend. It’s kind of a fussy dignified old lady look. Cardigan clips existed in the late ’50s and ’60s (and Glee’s Emma Pillsbury is bringing them back) to facilitate wearing your button-downs draped instead of arms-in and buttoned-up.

But if you follow the big street style blogs, the ones that follow the fashion crowd over fashion month like Tommy Ton, Garance Dore and the Sartorialist, you’ve probably noticed that the fashion elite have taken to this trend like gangbusters. Most notably, Marie Claire’s Taylor Tomasi Hill and Zanna Roberts and Elle’s Kate Lanphear seem loathe to put their arms in their blazer sleeves.

It’s a styling trend that has hit the runways, too. At Banana Republic’s spring show this past week, one of the model’s was styled with her jacket draped cape-style. Of course, it’s hard to keep a jacket on when your stomping the runway and your arms aren’t in the sleeves, so they buttoned the coat at the neck, which just makes her look a bit like she’s being strangled.

Do you or would you wear a jacket like a cape?

All these people are. Take a look.
**All photos via Tommy Ton for Style.com and the Sartorialist.
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