Tech News
It was another dismal week for Netflix. The stock dropped 35% after announcing that they lost 800,000 subscribers and projecting that fourth-quarter earnings would be below expectations. Henry Blodget (Business Insider) says: Sorry, but this Netflix collapse is overdone.
HP announced that it will keep it’s PC division but there was speculation that they would shut down the webOS division. The head of HP’s PC division this was an unfounded rumor.
Google announced an update to Google TV and there were rumors of a Siri-powered, integrated Apple TV coming in 2013.
The New York Times published a very touching eulogy of Steve Jobs written by his sister Mona Simpson. A must-read.
Death didn’t happen to Steve, he achieved it.
– Mona Simpson, A Sister’s Eulogy for Steve Jobs
People aren’t happy about Google’s plans to discontinue the social features of Google Reader.
Flipboard, the popular news/social reader application for tablets, is about to get some competition from Google (Propeller) and Yahoo (Livestand).
Benchmark-backed Nextdoor launches a private social network for neighborhoods.
Y Combinator held their Startup School. Mark Zuckerberg, Paul Graham, and Marc Andreessen all spoke.
Mark Zuckerberg interview at Y Combinator Startup School
Apps
- Mint finally launches an iPad app (iTunes, Mashable post)
- Scan old photos and post them to Facebook using the Shoebox iPhone app (iTunes, TechCrunch post)
- The creators of Daily Booth launch a great new photo sharing app called Batch. The buzz about this app is off the charts.
- Mike Arrington (CrunchFund) says: Batch may be the perfect photo sharing app
- Paul Graham says he was “blown away” and “this is the app everyone’s been waiting for“
- Robert Scoble says” “I have NEVER seen an app get this widely hyped“
- Soundcloud launched a new iPad app (iTunes, All Things D post)
- You can watch live TV on DIRECTV’s new iPad app (iTunes)
- Bloomberg TV launched an iPad app (iTunes)
Television / Movies
- A couple of PBS shows worth watching:
- America In Primetime (premiers Sunday, 10/20)
- Steve Jobs – One Last Thing (premiers Wednesday, 11/2)
- Cars 2 is available on DVD, iTunes
Sports
- The St. Louis Cardinals win the 2011 World Series. Game 6 will be remembered as one of the greatest World Series games ever.
- The 49ers defeat the Cleveland Browns and are 6-1 for the first time since 1998.
- Buster Posey is swinging the bat in Arizona. Hank Schulman (SF Chronicle) writes about his recovery here.
David Freese’s Game 6 walk-off home run:
The Week Ahead
The Groupon IPO is scheduled for Thursday, November 3rd. Before you consider investing, read this piece by Nicholas Carslon (Business Insider): INSIDE GROUPON: The Truth About The World’s Most Controversial Company