Android and Me |
- Google Music brought to you courtesy of Spotify?
- HTC Flyer pre-sale starts April 24 at Best Buy carrying a $499 price tag
- Social gaming merger giant: Gree acquires OpenFeint for $104 million dollars
- T-Mobile’s G-Slate promo code gets you an additional $100 off the price tag
| Google Music brought to you courtesy of Spotify? Posted: 22 Apr 2011 01:13 PM PDT According to Cnet, Google is considering using Spotify for its Google Music service. Will Google be buying Spotify or simply partnering with it? Nobody knows, but fingers are crossed for “buying”. Google seems to be having a lot of trouble signing deals with record labels and it’s trying other ways to launch its long-waited music service. The Mountain View-based company wanted to launch the service by the end of last year, then it got delayed to March, and now it looks like Google has hit yet another roadblock with record labels. Yesterday, AllThingsD reported that Apple had reached an agreement with record label and was almost ready to launch its music streaming service. So why is Google having such a hard time trying to do the same? Well, it might have something to do with that rumor we heard a few months ago. Google plans to make it easy for users to upload all their songs to the cloud and then let them stream, share, or download them at will. Obviously, that idea didn’t win Google many friends at record labels, who shiver at just the idea of consumers doing whatever they want with their music. Thus, Google Music is stuck on legal red tape because Google wants to make it easy and cheap for people to manage their media.
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| HTC Flyer pre-sale starts April 24 at Best Buy carrying a $499 price tag Posted: 22 Apr 2011 12:42 PM PDT We’ve known that the wifi-only Flyer was coming exclusively to Best Buy for awhile now, but as with many of the Android tablets the exact date remained somewhat elusive. While we are still short an actual shipping date the pre-sale will begin this Sunday and typically that means the device will be in customers hands in the next couple weeks (Thunderbolt notwithstanding). The Flyer has been a bit polarizing due to its lack of a dual-core processor in the face of largely Tegra 2 fueled competition and probably more significantly its lack of Honeycomb. The latter is due in large part to HTC’s heavy skinning with Sense to support both the N-Trig digitizer and the array of pen-based functions that come with it. If you are at all curious about the Flyer and never took a look at this video from HTC that I posted about last month I would highly recommend going back and watching it. As an old Windows tablet user I can’t help but be tantalized by the promise of what HTC is doing with the Flyer and I can’t wait to get one in my hands. Anyone else planning on getting their order in for a Flyer this Sunday or are you content to let someone else play guinea pig for now?
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| Social gaming merger giant: Gree acquires OpenFeint for $104 million dollars Posted: 22 Apr 2011 11:04 AM PDT If you have been using your device to play games, you have probably heard of OpenFeint. OpenFeint is the largest mobile social gaming network in the U.S., with over 75 million users, counting both, Android and iOS. Well, this gaming giant has been acquired by Japan’s social gaming leader, Gree, which currently has over 25 million users. Gree is investing $104 million dollars in this acquisition, and that is without counting the capital they will be using to improve OpenFeint, in order to satisfy the 100+ million users that this merger will have. Gree’s idea is to improve OpenFeint’s ecosystem, in order to "socialize the next evolution of games," making this merger a social gaming monster worldwide. An acquisition can bring changes that will discomfort the consumer, since different companies usually have different ways of dealing with people, as well as working with their product. OpenFeint is actually keeping the same team that raised this company to its respected position, including CEO and founder, Jason Citron, which should make this big change feel like a small bump. Though this merge can bring a massive improvement to the consumer, it can also be considered an attempt to monopolize the social gaming world. We can take AT&T and T-Mobile as an example; though AT&T could theoretically bring many advantages to T-Mobile customers, very few are actually supporting such possible acquisition because a monopoly would harm competition, hence hurting the consumer. Check out the official press release after the break, and hopefully it all turns out better for us! What do you guys think about this? Excited? Worried? Show Press Release GREE Puts Over $100 Million into OpenFeint to Drive Global Expansion with 100M users Acquisition to Help OpenFeint Accelerate OpenFeint Platform Adoption and Scale SAN FRANCISCO – April 21st, 2011 – GREE, Japan's leading mobile social gaming platform, today announced its entrance into the global market with the acquisition of OpenFeint’s outstanding securities for US $104 million, plus additional capital for accelerated growth of the OpenFeint platform. OpenFeint and its team will remain with long-term incentives, including CEO and founder Jason Citron, who grew the company to 75 million users and 19,000 game developers in two years. Working together, GREE and OpenFeint will build a global ecosystem of distribution channels for game developers. Combined, the GREE and OpenFeint gaming ecosystem will reach 100 million users worldwide. As the fastest growing technology company in Japan, GREE will use its social gaming and platform expertise to accelerate OpenFeint's growth, and take mobile social gaming to the next level. GREE and OpenFeint are rapidly expanding internationally, soon opening offices in Beijing, Singapore and London. The companies are aggressively hiring, with OpenFeint planning to double in size in 2011. "At GREE, we are socializing the next evolution of games and, as the best-in-class US-based mobile social network, OpenFeint is the ideal partner for us to offer the best mobile social games to the largest global audience," said Yoshikazu Tanaka, founder and CEO of GREE. "This acquisition further emphasizes GREE's commitment to providing the first and best global gaming ecosystem, with both the developer and consumer in mind," says Naoki Aoyagi, CEO of GREE International, the subsidiary that recently opened an office in San Francisco. OpenFeint manages the world's largest cross platform social gaming network for smartphones. Over 19,000 traditional and free-to-play game developers take advantage of the network's features to acquire, retain, and monetize users. "We are excited that GREE shares our belief in the OpenFeint network and are ecstatic to partner with a renowned global leader to build a multi-billion dollar business," says Jason Citron, CEO and founder of OpenFeint. "Together, we will deliver the strongest global ecosystem of gaming networks to our combined 100 million users." Over 5,000 games use OpenFeint, including #1 Apple App Store and Android Marketplace hits such as Fruit Ninja and Tiny Wings. OpenFeint has also established partnerships with leading mobile carriers that hold over half the US market share. Overview of acquisition GREE will acquire OpenFeint through a triangular merger. A new subsidiary was established in the US under GREE International for the 100% acquisition of OpenFeint. GREE contributed to GREE International funds for the acquisition and subscribed for additional shares in GREE International, and the new subsidiary merged into OpenFeint. GREE International will pay cash consideration to OpenFeint shareholders and warrant/option holders in connection with the merger. The execution of the merger agreement and completion of the merger occurred on April 21st, 2011.
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| T-Mobile’s G-Slate promo code gets you an additional $100 off the price tag Posted: 22 Apr 2011 09:13 AM PDT Still planning on picking up the T-Mobile G-Slate? Full retail price for the Honeycomb tablet is $750, but if you're willing to sign up for the data plan with a two year contract, T-Mobile is willing to cut the price down to $530. Definitely a nice discount (if you need mobile data), but that price can get even lower. T-Mobile's Twitter account has been promoting an additional discount for those who signed up for email notifications about the G-Slate. It turns out that T-Mobile isn’t keeping track of who they sent the promotional code to, so anyone can us the $100 discount code to purchase the G-Slate. The only catch is that you need to call T-Mobile rather than placing your order online or picking up a G-Slate at your local T-Mobile store. Simply call T-Mobile at 1-866-464-8662, select option 3, and reference the G-Slate promotional code (GSLATE100). If the G-Slate is the tablet you've been waiting for and you simply must have a 4G data plan, we suggest you call right now to place your order. The promotional code only lasts until April 27th, so what are you waiting for?
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