Twitter Buys Messaging Startup ZipDial, Expands in India
We’re very pleased to announce we’ve reached an agreement to acquire ZipDial (@zipdial), a product partner based in Bangalore, India, to make Twitter even more accessible to people around the world.
This acquisition significantly increases our investment in India, one of the countries where we’re seeing great growth, and also brings us a new engineering office in Bangalore.
Interesting & obvious move by Twitter.
Google Is Working on Investing Billions In SpaceX
Jessica Lessin on The Information:
The purpose of a deal, which is still in the works, is to support the development of SpaceX satellites that could beam low-cost Internet around the globe to billions who don’t have it.
[…] Google has agreed to value SpaceX north of $10 billion and that the size of the total round, which includes other investors, is very large.
Tiny satellites powering internet for billions of people sounds awesome.
Twelve South, makers of some of my favorite accessories for Mac & iOS, today announced the SurfacePad for iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus. The SurfacePad is a premium quality leather jacket of sorts for your iPhone. It’s designed to be super light and super thin, so it doesn’t add a bulk of mass to your iPhone. It covers both the front & back of your iPhone and includes pockets for two cards on the inside-front, so you can store your credit card or ID card there. It also works as a quick, hands-free display stand when you want to watch a video or movie with friends.
Over the years, Twelve South have released some of the most beautiful, premium class accessories for Mac & iOS devices and each of their products is just as good as the others. I personally own a BackPack for iMac, HiRise for iMac and BookArc for MacBook Pro. I’ve been wanting to get the HiRise Dock for my iPhone for a while now, but the high shipping costs to India aren’t helpful at all.
SurfacePad for iPhone 6 costs $39.99 while the iPhone 6 Plus version costs $49.99. Both are available for purchase directly from Twelve South or from Amazon.
Google has announced a new feature that will be available via the Hangouts app available for iOS and Android devices. Users will now be able to make international voice calls to phone numbers outside of India.
Using the Hangouts app for iOS (App Store Link) and Android (Google Play Link) as well as the web, users will now be able to make free calls to phone numbers in the US and Canada as well as to any other Hangouts users. Calls to any other regions are charged, but at really low rates.
This feature will be welcomed by millions of people in the country who most likely have a family member, friend or a relative currently living in US or Canada. Additionally, with the launch of Android One handsets in the country, Google is already pushing Android to the masses.
Bharti Airtel calls off Rs 700-crore deal to acquire Loop Mobile
Airtel’s proposed deal with Mumbai-based Loop had been awaiting clearance for over eight months. The scrapping of the pact will affect some 120,000 subscribers of Loop as the operator’s licence is set to expire this month.
New 2014 Mac Mini Has Soldered RAM, Not User Replaceable
Juli Clover writing on Mac Rumors:
Many have speculated that the Mac mini also includes soldered RAM, which has now been confirmed by Macminicolo’s Brian Stucki. According to Stucki, the RAM in the Mac mini is “not user accessible,” which means those who purchase Mac minis are limited to 16GB of RAM that must be upgraded when purchasing the machine from Apple.
All three Mac mini models can be upgraded to a maximum of 16GB of RAM, with the upgrade priced at $300 for the base model and $200 for the mid and high-end models.
The Mac mini was not only an excellent choice as an entry-level desktop Mac, but it also worked as a great upgrade-later machine. I’ve recommended the Mac mini to many of my friends who bought it as their first Mac and went on to upgrade the RAM & HDD after purchase.
Now, not only can you not do any upgrades after purchase, but you can’t even order configurable options in India, so you’re stuck with the three standard models as your choices.
How App Store’s ‘Complete My Bundle’ Pricing Works
Panic’s Cabel Sasser clears the mystery around the pricing of the ‘Complete My Bundle’ option on the App Store.
Complete My Bundle takes whatever money you’ve paid for the individual apps and applies that towards the bundle’s fixed price. So, if you buy an app on sale, or use a promo code, your Complete My Bundle price can be different than someone else’s, and in some situations it might be cheaper to buy the remaining app(s) individually.
Apple today introduced a stellar new 27-inch iMac with Retina 5K Display that offers a resolution of 5120×2880 pixels, making it the highest resolution display ever with 14.7 Million pixels. On the inside, this iMac features a 3.5GHz Intel Core i5 processor with Turbo Boost speeds up to 3.9GHz, AMD Radeon R9 M290X graphics, 8GB Ram and 1TB Fusion Drive along with 2 Thunderbolt posts and ships with OS X Yosemite.
The iMac with Retina 5K Display has been priced at Rs. 1,79,900 in India.