Redbox, the company behind those now-ubiquitous $1 movie rental kiosks, has finally announced its plans for Blu-ray rentals. The company is rolling out $1.50 Blu-ray rentals to 13,300 kiosks over the next few months, and it plans to offer them at all of its 26,000 kiosks across the US by fall.
Redbox’s initial Blu-ray titles include “The Book of Eli”, “Green Zone”, and “Brooklyn’s Finest.” As always with Redbox, the selection will differ depending on the kiosk, and new movies are added weekly. The company has created a new section of its site at www.redbox.com/bluray for customers to check for Blu-ray capable-kiosks near them.
Currently, there are no Blu-ray kiosks at my Brooklyn area code, but then again there aren’t many Redbox kiosks near me in general. It could just be that many of Redbox’s kiosks aren’t yet reporting their Blu-ray availability properly.
Redbox will still delay new releases from Warner, Fox, and Universal by 28 days — just like DVDs.
In a keynote speech at the Entertainment Supply Chain Academy Edge conference in June, Redbox president Mitch Lowe said that 16.9 percent of its customers owned Blu-ray players, reports Home Media Magazine. He believes that the company’s 23 percent slice of the rental market will help overall Blu-ray adoption. The company recently surpassed 750 million total rentals, and currently rents nearly 40 million DVDs every month. Lowe also mentioned that the company plans to eventually offer disc purchasing through its kiosks for $5, $7, and $9.
Blockbuster’s rental kiosks that compete with Redbox (dubbed “Blockbuster Express) currently only offer Blu-ray discs in a handful of locations.
Now that Redbox is offering high-definition films in its kiosks, Netflix has yet another reason to fear the rental company — which caters to impulse movie-watching decisions far better than Netflix’s discs. Then again, as Netflix’s streaming offering continues to expand both in scope and popularity, maybe it won’t matter if Redbox becomes a more popular choice for disc rentals.
via Engadget
Companies: Blockbuster, Netflix, Redbox
People: Mitch Lowe
Microsoft held a meeting for financial analysts today to present the company’s strategy for its consumer, enterprise and small and medium business markets. A clear theme ran throughout the presentations: Microsoft’s continued emphasis on the industry transformation taking place around cloud computing.
During the past year, Microsoft’s message focused on providing customers choice. It was the customer’s decision as to whether they preferred cloud computing solutions or traditional “on-premise” solutions. Nevertheless, Chief Operating Officer Kevin Turner admitted that sending this message to customers was a mistake. From now on, Microsoft would be “leading with the cloud.”
Although Microsoft CEO, Steve Ballmer, took the stage today to present the company’s consumer market strategy, he has been promoting the company’s commitment to the cloud. During a recent speech at the University of Washington, he affirmed that Microsoft is “all in” when it comes to cloud computing.
Turner touted the company’s experience and strength in enterprise computing when comparing itself to competitors such as Google and VMware. He spoke of a number of cloud computing wins with companies such as Coke Enterprises, McDonald’s and others. And he highlighted that 70% of the company’s cloud computing wins during the latest quarter were new customers. (The company reported a 22% increase in revenue in the fourth quarter over the same period last year.)
Many analysts, investors and entrepreneurs believe that the move to cloud computing is momentous and on a par with previous industry transitions such as the move from mainframe computing to desktop computing. Also, most agree that the transition is still in the early stages. According to research firm Gartner, worldwide cloud services revenues should grow from $56 billion in 2009 to $150 billion in 2013.
Although most IT providers such as Salesforce, Rackspace and Google have their own cloud initiatives, a recent report named Amazon’s cloud computing division, Amazon Web Services, and IBM as “cloud champions” with other vendors (including Microsoft) relatively close behind. Judging from Microsoft’s rhetoric during today’s meeting, cloud computing will be a consistent theme for the company in the future.
[Full disclosure: I recently did some work as a contract lecturer on technology trends for Microsoft.]
Companies: microsoft
Be prepared to be scared about your cell phone privacy. Two security researchers showed today how they can track down cell phone numbers, identify the person who owns the phone, and then track the whereabouts of that person. And they can do it with technology available to ordinary civilians.
That last part is the shocking part. Government investigators and police can do this. But Don Bailey and Nick DePetrillo (pictured) showed they were able to do it by collecting bits of information and then amassing them into a powerful tool that can invade your privacy. They showed off working code and other proof from Project Carmen Sandiego (named after a computer game where you tracked somebody down as part of a geography lesson) at the Black Hat security conference today in Las Vegas.
“This is intelligence gathering for civilians,” said Bailey, speaking to a roomful of security researchers and hackers. “We can find out where you are, who you talk to, where you are most vulnerable.”
Bailey and DePetrillo joked that they could get actress Megan Fox’s cell phone number and sell it to the highest bidder. But they said the point of doing this isn’t to get the cell phone numbers of celebrities or executives like Apple’s Steve Jobs. They wanted to show how security should be stepped up for cell phones and how shockingly easy it is to do. If they could do it, they reasoned, then the bad guys with evil intent have probably already figured out how to do it. In effect, Bailey and DePetrillo said that they have enough information to put together a White Pages for cell phones, with home numbers for everybody’s cell phone.
Governments can pretty much afford the technology to do this now. But ordinary civilians can’t. One of the tools they exploit is a central database called a Home Location Register, which records the phone number of every SIM (subscriber identity module) authorized to use the cell phone network based on the GSM (Global System for Mobile communications) standard, which is the standard used in about 80 percent of the world’s phones. You can access HLR data through various third-party resources, Bailey said. You can cross reference that with Mobile Switching Center information that determines where you are, generally.
That data tells the researchers what city the user is in. They reverse engineered this data to get more information. In other countries, the MSC data has zip code data embedded in it, making it much easier to find someone’s location. U.S. data isn’t that easy to figure out. But the researchers say that can take a given MSC number and find out its location and its cell phone provider.
“That information should be privileged, but it isn’t,” Bailey said. “I shouldn’t know that you switched from AT&T to T-Mobile.”
You can buy CallerID information from companies such as Targus, which gets data from Verizon and other carriers. They add your name to the CallerID database with phone number data. If you buy a cell phone in the U.S., your name will wind up in a CallerID database. With this data, the researchers were able to reverse engineer the data to create a White Pages for mobile phones, which means they can put a name to a cell phone number. With the name and phone number together, the researchers can assemble other information.
“It’s extremely easy to build your own database,” DePetrillo said.
The databases are more expensive if you want to get the most current data, but older data is cheaper, costing only 0.0024 cents per name looked up. One of the things they can do with names is piece together who your co-workers are, because they will be using company-purchased phones with similar phone numbers.
Some of the techniques they use to glean information include backspoofing. But if you don’t want to do that, you can buy databases from Bulkcname.com for around $100 per 1,000 name lookups. The researchers say they can get 10,000 names identified for just $30. You can verify the data by cross referencing it with HLR data, which tells which carrier is associated with certain phone numbers.
During the talk, the researchers showed slides of text that showed phone numbers, names, locations and company affiliations. They can even make educated guesses about which banks of phone numbers are assigned to prepaid phones, which are phones bought at stores and can generally disguise their owners. The researchers say they can pinpoint people 99 percent of the time. With Google, Facebook and other tools, you can often then put a face to the name. You can find out if there are multiple phone numbers associated with one person.
“Our intent is to get people thinking about their actions and their vulnerabilities,” Bailey said. “You can target people. You can locate private individuals. You can locate groups of individuals. You can track where people are traveling. That’s a lot of information. It can be scary.”
Added DePetrillo, “This is simple stuff to understand. I have information I shouldn’t have. I didn’t do any crazy, insane hacker tricks. It requires very little intelligence.”
Tags: BlackHat, Carmen Sandiego Project, security
People: Don Bailey, Nick DePetrillo
Google today announced on its Mobile Ads blog that it has launched location-aware display advertisements for mobile phones. Through Google’s “location extension” feature, advertisers can now include their location and phone numbers to appear in display ads on iPhone and Android mobile websites.
The feature, previously available only on search ads, will appear as banner text advertising and will pinpoint business locations on a small map as well as a “click-to-call” phone number. Consumers will also have the option for generate directions if needed.
Giving consumers the option of viewing businesses in their area increases Google’s chance that the consumer will call the business or click to its website, which are the two ways Google makes money on the service. The move shows Google’s increased investment in mobile and display advertising, two areas that have traditionally played second-fiddle to regular search advertising.
The location aware advertisements might be just what local businesses need as well. According to TechCrunch, “Google says that mobile ads that offer a location generally see an average 8 percent increase in click-through rates over plain-vanilla mobile ads, and click-to-call mobile ads see a 6 percent increase in clicks.”
Advertisers have to opt-in to the Google Ad Network and make sure they check the “Display Network” option. From there, the advertiser includes its number and address as well as the option to upload a logo. The last step is to check the box for iPhones and other mobile devices will full Internet browsers.
Tags: geo-targeting, location aware, mobile advertising
Companies: Google
The biofuel market is turning into a diverse romp of venture-backed companies auditioning different microbes, catalysts and feedstocks, all with the same goal: to quickly, efficiently and cheaply transform renewable, non-food products (ranging from sugar cane to switch grass to carbon dioxide) into viable forms of fuel that can work in today’s gas tanks.
The problem is, almost all of these players hit the same ceiling: they can’t figure out a way to inexpensively scale with the technology they have. But biofuel startup LS9 may have just changed that.
The company’s scientists have published a paper, academically titled “Microbial Biosynthesis of Alkanes,” claiming that they can now implant genes into E. coli that allow the bacteria to directly churn out alkanes — otherwise known as the hydrocarbons in car and jet fuel — in one step. This is a major breakthrough for the field, one that has been chased for years.
The discovery could eliminate the need for other, pricier methods to derive alkanes. It could also jumpstart the green sector’s focus on biofuels as a viable business. Before now, many of the companies in the industry, including Codexis, Synthetic Genomics and others, were focusing on creating more lucrative, renewable chemicals to replace petroleum in plastics, pharmaceutical development and other processes.
LS9 itself has been pursuing the low-volume chemical market for a while, teaming with Proctor and Gamble last spring to jointly develop chemicals to be used in consumer goods.
Because the new LS9 process consists of only one step, it also requires less feedstock to begin with, lowering costs and increasing efficiencies across the board. Prior conversion technique entailed dangerous inorganic catalysts, hydrogen, high pressures and temperatures, and a lot of intermediate steps.
In addition to being renewable, biofuels also burn cleaner than traditional fossil-fuel sources. Because they can be used in standard, internal-combustion engines, biofuels seem to have a bigger market ahead of them than electric vehicles — the other strategy to achieve cleaner, greener transportation. It’s going to take a while for plug-in cars to catch on, and very little roadside infrastructure exists today to support them. If biofuel companies can successfully scale, they have the potential to slash emissions more significantly.
These advantages have attracted the attention of venture capitalists interested in incremental clean energy innovations, rather than radical changes. For example, Khosla Ventures, one of LS9’s backers that also invests in biofuel makers Coskata and Amyris Biotechnologies, is major proponent of this category of startups.
Based in South San Francisco, LS9’s investors include CTTV Investments, Flagship Ventures, and Lightspeed Venture Partners in addition to Khosla.
Tags: biofuels
Companies: Ls9
When SeatGeek launched its ticket search service last fall, it had a compelling hook — users don’t just see tickets from reselling sites like StubHub, they also see SeatGeek’s predictions (based on things like the weather and the team’s record) about whether the price will go up or down. Now the New York City startup is taking that approach a step further with new team pages.
Previously, SeatGeek focused on individual events, including sports games and concerts. But sports fans might want to make buying decisions for more than one game, say if you’re deciding which game you can get the best price for out for the next four or five. So the new team pages track ticket prices over time, across games. It’s almost like you’re tracking a stock for a company. The page shows data like average price, highest price and lowest price during the current season, and a list of the most expensive games. To see it for yourself, you can check out this page for the San Francisco Giants.
This should have the additional benefit for SeatGeek of increasing its rank on search engines. In fact, Compete’s data shows SeatGeek’s traffic increasingly steadily over the past month, and even overtaking its more-established and better-funded competitor FanSnap.
We chose SeatGeek as one of the most promising startups to launch at the TechCrunch50 conference last fall. It has raised $1.5 million in funding, most recently in a $1 million round led by the Founder Collective.
Companies: SeatGeek
Earlier today, a Google status page which publicly tracks access to its services in China, reported that there was full blockage, or that search was unavailable between 67 and 100 percent of the time. But now Google says access to its search properties is normal and hasn’t been blocked.
A spokesperson tells us:
“Because of the way we measure accessibility in China, it’s possible that our machines could overestimate the level of blockage. That seems to be what happened last night when there was a relatively small blockage. It appears now that users in China are accessing our properties normally.”
It’s a big deal because relations between the search giant and the Chinese government have been testy over the past year. Google stopped censoring its search results earlier this year after discovering that hackers had attempted to break into its data and access information related to human rights activists. When users in China try to access Google now, they reach a landing page which directs them to an uncensored version of search based in Hong Kong. China recently renewed Google’s right to operate in the country but it’s unclear how long this situation will last.
Tags: china
Companies: Google
Y Combinator cofounder Paul Graham today offered an overview of how he has seen the angel and startup world evolve in the last year. Among other trends, he argued that the traditionally structured venture round is becoming irrelevant.
Speaking at AngelConf today, the angel investing event hosted at Y Combinator’s office in Mountain View, Calif., Graham compared the traditional venture model to the classic children’s book Are You My Mother? Startup entrepreneurs raising funding are like baby birds, asking every venture capitalist, “Are you my lead investor?”
Now, however, more venture rounds aren’t being led by a single investor, and they don’t have an official close date or amount, Graham said. There may be an official lead, but that’s in name only, and they don’t dominate the process like they used to. This benefits the startups because the lead investor has less power to screw them over. Even if the investor is well-intentioned, the startup isn’t held back if the lead isn’t moving fast enough to raise money. And rather than distracting itself with intense fundraising, a startup can keep raising money in the background as needed.
Graham said this is part of a larger trend where founders have more power than investors, a trend that incubator Y Combinator “has been based on since the beginning.” Entrepreneurs who have had difficult dealings with VCs may be skeptical that this power shift is really happening. Even Graham acknowledged that the fundraising model he described isn’t happening for every startup. But that’s how the best ones are raising money.
“If the best startups are doing this, what do you care what the other ones are doing?” he said.
You can read about angel investor Ron Conway and blogger Michael Arrington’s remarks at the angel event here.
Companies: Y Combinator
People: Paul Graham
[Update: Google said its machines may have overestimated blockage to its services and that users are accessing search normally in the country.]
Google says its web search is now fully blocked in China.
A public site where Google has been documenting daily access to all of its services showed that for the first time, web search is “fully blocked” or unavailable 67 to 100 percent of the time.
It’s not clear whether the service is being actively blocked or if there is something else interfering with access.
Google and the Chinese government have been locked in a tense battle since December of last year, when the company said hackers broke into its data and targeted human rights activists. Without directly pointing the finger at the Chinese government, Google said it would henceforth not censor its web search results — something it had been doing for four years to appease government officials.
Google now sends Chinese users to a landing page, where they can click to search on a Hong Kong-based version of the site, which is uncensored.
Carriers are often the gatekeepers when it comes to deploying new services to mobile networks and devices. They can bring scale businesses in the mobile community in a sudden and dramatic way. And they are where the money is — the collection point of monthly subscription revenue from customers. Carriers will take the stage at TC3 to talk about their innovation strategies, programs, and about what solutions they are looking for from innovators and entrepreneurs.
If you’re an innovator or entrepreneur in mobile, the annual Telecom Council Carrier Connections summit, TC3, connects you with the people and ideas that are directing the innovation activities inside many global carriers. You will get an inside look at how carriers around the world are planning and executing their innovation efforts and how they seek to partner with entrepreneurs and work with new companies.
The Telecom Council of Silicon Valley is “where telecom meets innovation.” And the TC3 conference is the seminal venue for carriers around the world to bring attention to their innovative sides – to market their innovation activities throughout the ecosystem, to attract entrepreneurs and developers, and to promote innovation inside and outside their labs. This is a 1-day conference with a very senior audience from across the ecosystem – from fixed and wireless to content, apps, and infrastructure – where the speakers are the same executives responsible for the innovation strategies and activities of their respective carriers.
TC3 also has limited opportunities for other companies to get their message out to the community of telecom innovators. When you register, you will notice additional options for a demo package to display product in the showcase area, an option to buy space in the event program, and the option to join our speakers for dinner later that evening. Agenda, speaker bios, registration and marketing opportunities are available here. Join your telecom colleagues at TC3 to connect, communicate and collaborate.