2013

Bump and Flock, the file sharing apps Google acquired last fall, will be shut down by the end of this month. Both apps will stop working and be removed from…

Google To Close Bump And Flock, Its Recently Acquired File Sharing Apps

A site called SnapchatDB.info has saved usernames and phone numbers for 4.6 million accounts and made the information available for download. SnapchatDB says that it got the information through a…

Confirmed: Snapchat Hack Not A Hoax, 4.6M Usernames And Numbers Published

Congratulations, Planet Earth! We made it another 365 days without crashing into the sun. Go team!    It’s the end of the year, and that means three things: booze, ridiculous…

The Best iOS And Android Apps Of 2013

The story of Dell is business legend: How a kid starting in his dorm room, hiding computer parts in the bathroom when his parents visited, managed to build a computing…

Dell Looks To Set A New Tone For Its Private Life

I, Spammer

2:00 pm PST • December 31, 2013

As I approach the half-way mark of my crowdfunding project, I wanted to address the thing that makes me feel the worst about this whole process: the spam. As I…

I, Spammer

As the co-fathers of the Internet, Vinton Cerf and Robert Kahn tend to be pretty protective of their digital masterpiece. Both were early Defense Department engineers of the communications architecture…

How the Internet’s Founders Feel About The NSA Scandal

2013 was a heady year: a time of hope; a time for sadness; a time for twerking; and a time for doge. But it was also a time for gadgets. As…

The Best And Worst Gadgets Of 2013

According to The Information, Sony could release a Windows Phone device, diversifying its mobile device lineup, bolstering Microsoft, and perhaps demonstrating a growing wish among hardware firms to hedge against…

Sony Rumored To Be Considering A Windows Phone Handset In 2014

CES 2014 is — amazingly enough — just around the corner, along with enough new gadgetry to fill several lifetimes. Last year we saw a glut of activity trackers pop…

LG May Be Taking Another Stab At The Wearable Activity Tracking Formula

Why 2014 Is The Year You Change

10:00 am PST • December 31, 2013

I stopped going to classes. I had a scholarship that paid all my living expenses ($1,200/month) so I didn’t want to quit (ugh, and get a job?). So I stayed…

Why 2014 Is The Year You Change

Apple has contacted TechCrunch with a statement about the DROPOUTJEEP NSA program that detailed a system by which the organization claimed it could snoop on iPhone users. Apple says that…

Apple Says It Has Never Worked With NSA To Create iPhone Backdoors, Is Unaware Of Alleged DROPOUTJEEP Snooping Program

BitTorrent has been pitching itself as a legitimate way for content creators to promote their works,  and now the company is announcing what may be its most noteworthy partnership yet…

Makers Of Oscar-Shortlisted Documentary “The Act Of Killing” Turn To BitTorrent For Promotion

Remember Qwikster? Wall Street doesn’t. The AP is reporting this morning that the Netflix CEO will get a healthy pay raise in 2014. According to a regulatory filing, Reed Hastings’…

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings’ Salary To Get 50% Bump To $3M In 2014

Touchscreen publishing company Onswipe has good news for Samsung. As Onswipe’s Chief Marketing Officer Jason Baptiste put it in an email, “Samsung clearly won Christmas when it comes to tablets.”…

Samsung Got A Bigger Tablet Boost For Christmas Than Apple, According To Onswipe

It was only six months ago that Sprint decommissioned and shut down the Nextel iDEN network, and while the carrier has no plans to bring that legacy network back, the…

Sprint Wants To Revive Nextel As A Business Brand, Merge Boost + Virgin Mobile Into ‘Sprint Freedom’

Choosing an obstetrician can be extremely stressful for expectant parents. Additive Analytics, a new startup, hopes to help patients find trustworthy providers with MaternityCompare, its first product. The site pulls…

MaternityCompare Helps Expectant Parents Find Healthcare Providers

This year, several notable apps that connect users with house cleaners have launched or gained traction. These include Homejoy, Exec and laundry service Prim. There are a lot of benefits…

These Apps Will Help You Make 2014 Less Filthy

Thanks to a series of high-profile exits and a generally frothy financing environment, it’s not unusual to see successful entrepreneurs spending money at will. But the story of MotionLoft founder…

Silicon Valley Hustle: Former Motionloft CEO Accused Of Defrauding Investors

The fine folks at AdDuplex have provided Paul Thurrott with an early look at their final Windows Phone market data for 2013, giving us in the public a final look…

Nokia Closes Out 2013 With 92% Of The Windows Phone Market

Teckler is a site where users get a share of the revenue for the articles, photos, and other media that they post. And with the recent launch of the Teckler…

Revenue-Sharing “Knowledge Community” Teckler Launches Its First Mobile App

New NSA revelations out this weekend detailed precisely how the NSA’s methods lean on malware and employ cyber attacks in their “snooping,” to use Microsoft’s term. Thus, the NSA’s surveillance…

Microsoft Was Right To Worry That Government Snooping Constituted An ‘Advanced Persistent Threat’

In this three-part series, we hosted Medallia, an enterprise company that offers customer experience management software, and Sequoia partner and board members Doug Leone in the studio. Co-founder and President…

Y Combinator co-founder Paul Graham just published a blog post about what he did and didn’t say during a widely-discussed interview with The Information (if you don’t have a subscription,…

Paul Graham Responds To Critics, Says Y Combinator Is Planning An Event For Female Founders

Twitter has had a rough few days in the markets, slipping from north of $74 to just over $60 at the end of trading today. That’s not even half the story, however:…

Twitter’s Recent Market Correction Doesn’t Mean Its Sky Is Falling

Netflix has informed TechCrunch that it is indeed testing a $6.99 single-stream plan to new users as part of a test. The option appears to some new users after selecting…

Netflix Says It’s Testing New $6.99 Single Screen Streaming Plan, But It May Never Roll Out To Everyone

Facebook may be currently facing question marks over how well it’s faring with younger users, but among those over 18 in the U.S. it remains the social network king. According…

73% Of U.S. Adults Use Social Networks, Pinterest Passes Twitter In Popularity, Facebook Stays On Top

Fitbit has just released a major update to its iOS app for iPhone 5s, allowing the smartphone itself to track steps, distance and burned calories. These are basic features, and…

The FitBit App Now Turns The iPhone 5s Into A FitBit

Business Insider’s Joe Wiesenthal today published an interesting piece on Bitcoin, partially responding to Paul Krugman’s somewhat inscrutable recent blog post that called the cryptocurrency “evil,” and partially answering the…

Divining The Underlying Value Of Bitcoin

There are already quite a few drones in use in U.S. airspace, but given that commercial drone usage remains off-limits, most of them are either operated by government agencies or…

FAA Selects 6 Sites For Civilian Drone Testing

It may be the holiday season, but Gavin Newsom, California’s tech savvy Lieutenant Governor, is as mad as hell. And he’s not going to take it any more. The fury…

Keen On… The 2013 Debacle: Why Gavin Newsom Says The Government Is On A Collision Course With The Future