By Andrew Liszewski I’ve stated it before and I’ll state it again. If you need a surefire way to sell anything, just find a way to make it Star Wars themed. In this case it’s a Poker set, but I have to admit they’ve actually done a pretty good job with the Star Wars conversion. It features […]

By Andrew Liszewski

I’ve said it before and I’ll state it again. If you need a surefire way to sell anything, just find a way to make it Star Wars themed. In this case it’s a Poker set, but I have to admit they’ve actually done a pretty good job with the Star Wars conversion.

It features a chrome dealer token that looks like the Death Star, as well as a set of translucent chips illustrated by artist Russell Walks. The set includes 50 blue Luke Skywalker chips, 50 blue Obi-Wan Kenobi chips, 50 green Yoda chips and of course 50 red Darth Vader chips. The case even includes 72 LEDs that make the chips glow like lightsabers when they’re stacked in their respective slots. There’s even 2 casino-quality card decks that come in their own foil boxes and I can only assume include custom Star Wars graphics.

You can find it at the Sharper Image for $149.95.

[ Star Wars Poker Chip Set ] VIA [ Nerd Approved ]

Gaming, Novelty

Via [Ohgizmo]

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One reason we endorsed Barack Obama as our Democratic nominee for TechPresident earlier today is because he has made an effort to understand technology and create a comprehensive technology platform. Not only is he Web-savvy, so are his constituents. A site called YouBama that launched a few days ago is a case in […]

One reason we endorsed Barack Obama as our Democratic nominee for TechPresident earlier today is because he has made an effort to understand technology and create a comprehensive technology platform. Not only is he Web-savvy, so are his constituents. A site called YouBama that launched a few days ago is a case in point. Designed by two Stanford grad students, Christopher Pedregal and Eric Park, to drum up grass-roots support for Obama, the site lets supporters upload videos explaining why they are going to vote for the candidate. The videos can then be voted up or down Digg-style. Pedregal explains to me:

The idea was to make it personal and individual. Everyone says this will be the YouTube elections. This can democratize the campaign process. It is an experiment. We don’t know if voters have a lot to say.

It is a simple but sophisticated site that will appeal to the YouTube generation, and an effective way to distill the most powerful messages with the broadest appeal. (The video at the top right now is a clip of George Clooney endorsing Obama on the Charlie Rose Show). The best part about the site is that it has nothing to do with the official Obama campaign. Says Pedregal:

There are a lot of things the Obama campaign can’t say or can’t do. There are a lot of sensitive issues regarding race or gender or attacks the candidates might use, and voters will want to react to that.

YouBama isn’t trying to be more than a grass-roots marketing vehicle for the Obama campaign. Pedregal and Park are both Obama supporters and they want to drum up more votes for his campaign. Their attitude is that supporters of other candidates can create their own sites. But they also feel that creating this site is “most applicable” to the Obama campaign because of its efforts to reach out to younger voters and speak to their aspirations. In other words, they feel they have the best chance of getting good videos from Obama supporters as opposed to those of the other candidates.

Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.

Via [TechCrunch]

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UK-based Huddle, an Enterprise 2.0 startup which is now clearly positioning itself square-on against Basecamp, launches a well-featured Facebook application at the DEMO 08 conference this week. The Facebook integration will make your boss think you are working even when you’re on Facebook - as it allows full access to all Huddle’s tools [update: the […]

UK-based Huddle, an Enterprise 2.0 startup which is now clearly positioning itself square-on against Basecamp, launches a well-featured Facebook application at the DEMO 08 conference this week. The Facebook integration will make your boss think you are working even when you’re on Facebook - as it allows full access to all Huddle’s tools [update: the app launches Wednesday] . And the new Huddle Desktop application will let you drag and drop new documents between the desktop and Huddle’s service. Also included is OpenSAM Integration where you create, view and edit documents in Word, PowerPoint and Excel within Huddle through embedded Web Office tools from iNetWord, EditGrid and Preezo.

The free version of Huddle includes three team workspaces, one Gigabyte of document space and unlimited team members (Basecamp doesn’t go this far on either count storage). After that there are more paid-for options. In November last year Huddle announced $4m in series A funding from Eden Ventures in London. Companies using Huddle include Reuters and PR group Edelman and UNICEF. Competitors include Centraldesktop, Weboffice, Projectspaces, Wrike and Goplan.

Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.

Via [TechCrunch]

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Ever since Google options finished vesting, people have been wondering what will become of the Xooglers after they take their money and jump into something new. Google’s former Product Management Director for AdSense, Gokul Rajaram has decided to take a position on the board of Tumri, a display advertising startup that delivers dynamically targeted ads. […]

Ever since Google options finished vesting, people have been wondering what will become of the Xooglers after they take their money and jump into something new. Google’s former Product Management Director for AdSense, Gokul Rajaram has decided to take a position on the board of Tumri, a display advertising startup that delivers dynamically targeted ads.

Rajaram served at Google from January 2003 to November 2007 and played a major role in developing AdSense in early 2003 and on. According to his bio:

He also helped drive a number of Google’s acquisitions, including DoubleClick, AdScape, and dMarc. Earlier in his career, Rajaram worked as a technical architect at Juno Online, where he developed the back-end advertising system that drove much of Juno’s revenues and helped it go public in 1999. Rajaram has an M.B.A. from MIT Sloan, a M.S. in Personal Science from UT Austin, and a BTech in Computer Science from IIT Kanpur where he received the President’s Gold Medal for being Class Valedictorian.

No doubt Tumri is excited to have him on board. Their current products include Adpod and Publisher, which let website owners pair relevant offers with their content. Rajaram’s experience at Google couldn’t be more relevant.

Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.

Via [TechCrunch]

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Google has announced that Blogger will now be officially available in Arabic, Persian, and Hebrew, bringing the number of languages supported by Blogger to 40. More significantly, Blogger now supports right to left writing as well for Arabic, Persian, and Hebrew. Blogs in Arabic and Persian have been hosted by Blogger from its pre-Google days, so it’s […]

Google has announced that Blogger will now be officially available in Arabic, Persian, and Hebrew, bringing the number of languages supported by Blogger to 40.

More significantly, Blogger now supports right to left writing as well for Arabic, Persian, and Hebrew.

Blogs in Arabic and Persian have been hosted by Blogger from its pre-Google days, so it’s surprising that the service is only now officially supporting the languages.

The Middle East presents strong growth opportunities for Google and other companies as younger generations embrace the internet. Even in more closed countries such as Iran, blogging has long been popular and Blogger has often been the platform of choice. Bloggers in many Middle Eastern countries blog at their own risk, with sites regularly becoming blocked or as is the case in countries such as Saudi Arabia, bloggers are arrested and jailed.

Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.

Via [TechCrunch]

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By Andrew Liszewski When I consider it, I spend more time playing with the NintendoDS than all the other consoles in my apartment. (As is evident by the newly discovered crack in one of the hinges.) I think it’s mostly because it’s the easiest system to just pick up and play, so I’m fairly intrigued […]

By Andrew Liszewski

When I consider it, I spend more time playing with the NintendoDS than all the other consoles in my apartment. (As is evident by the newly discovered crack in one of the hinges.) I think it’s mostly because it’s the easiest system to just pick up and play, so I’m fairly intrigued by this piece of software called XtenDS which allows anyone to design their own ‘homebrew’ game thanks to an easy to use GUI interface.

The software includes support for sound effects, music, sprites, backgrounds, menu and option screens and even has more advanced functionality like a fully working collision system and an advanced scripting language. Just keep in mind you’ll need to have a homebrew cart like the CycloDS in order to load your creations onto your DS. (Or an emulator on your Computer.) And there’s a good chance if you already have one of these carts, you’ve probably already found a way to get cheap games. But if you’ve had an idea brewing in the back of your head for the next great DS title, but lack the necessary programming skills to bring it to fruition, XtenDS could help make it a reality.

[ XtenDS ] VIA [ ALBOTAS ]

DIY, Gaming

Via [Ohgizmo]

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John from CrunchGear, here. We’re heading to CEBIT this year and we’re trying to find acceptable accommodations. Do any TC readers have any ideas of a good place to stay in beautiful, sunny Hannover? Drop me a line at john at crunchgear dotter com. Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.

John from CrunchGear, here. We’re heading to CEBIT this year and we’re trying to find acceptable accommodations. Do any TC readers have any ideas of a good place to stay in beautiful, sunny Hannover? Drop me a line at john at crunchgear dotter com.

Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.

Via [TechCrunch]

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Keyword search gets you pretty far when looking for pure information, but doesn’t help much on more qualitative searches like trying to find the hippest restaurant in SOHO. Searches like the latter rely on the opinions of people, not webmasters, which is one of the reasons Circo’s has launched their new qualitative search engine. The […]

Keyword search gets you pretty far when looking for pure information, but doesn’t help much on more qualitative searches like trying to find the hippest restaurant in SOHO. Searches like the latter rely on the views of people, not webmasters, which is one of the reasons Circo’s has launched their new qualitative search engine. The engine currently lets users search for hotels and restaurants by qualities like size, ambiance, or other qualities pulled from reviews from around the web. They have plans to expand to other categories in the future.

Circos is categorized under the ever expanding umbrella of semantic search engines, which currently includes the likes of Hakia, PowerSet, Kosmix, SemantiNet, and TrueKnowledge. However, the engine is most like Kango, which has also taken on the task of categorizing hotels based on user reviews. VibeAgent also has a search engine for its own site that will search hotels based on qualities.

While Kango auto-generates tags after pouring through user reviews, Circo lets users search for any qualities they’re interested in. The engine then grades and ranks the results by each quality on an “A” through “F” scale based on how well the description fits for reviewers. For example, a hotel reviewers feel is spacious would rate highly if searching for openness, but poorly if you’re looking for a little room.

As with most search engines, Circos’ real test will be whether its application draws users away from other hotel and restaurant sites with less sophisticated search engines. Currently there are a bunch competing in the space. However, Circos states their technology can easily be extended to other categories since their algorithm does all the tough work of pulling the most relevant qualities from reviews. If hotels and restaurants don’t appeal, another category might hold their home run.

Circos is angel funded, based in San Mateo, and has eight employees (4 in Singapore).

Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.

Via [TechCrunch]

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Amazon has made the important, if vague, announcement that its DRM-free MP3 downloads will be made available internationally starting in 2008. Taking its content from all four major record labels internationally will strengthen its position as a better DRM-free music provider to Apple’s iTunes Store, which doesn’t even offer content from all the major labels […]

Amazon has made the important, if vague, announcement that its DRM-free MP3 downloads will be made available internationally starting in 2008.

Taking its content from all four major record labels internationally will strengthen its position as a better DRM-free music provider to Apple’s iTunes Store, which doesn’t even offer content from all the major labels yet. Amazon currently provides 3.3M songs from 270,000+ artists, encoded at 256kbps, and priced anywhere between 89 and 99 cents each. Things are similar with iTunes Plus, Apple’s DRM-free music collection: songs are 99 cents each and encoded at 256kbps. However, Apple only provides “up to 2 million iTunes Plus songs” in comparison to Amazon’s 3.3M, giving the latter company a substantial edge with its scope.

Amazon’s MP3 store launched in September and signed up the last major label just this month. The company is declining to provide a “specific launch timeline for individual Amazon international websites.”

Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.

Via [TechCrunch]

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Pay-Per-Play Media is offering a new style of advertising that most people won’t like: audio (only) ads that play immediately when you visit a site. Publishers insert the code on the website they want the audio ad to play on, and each time someone visits the page a 5 second audio ad is played, seemingly without […]

Pay-Per-Play Media is offering a new style of advertising that most people won’t like: audio (only) ads that play immediately when you visit a site.

Publishers insert the code on the website they want the audio ad to play on, and every time someone visits the page a 5 second audio ad is played, seemingly without any ability to turn the ad off. Pay-Per-Play claims that the ads are contextually delivered. Visitors only hear one audio ad for each three minutes on each site, meaning that if you’re on a website long enough, you’ll get to hear regular audio ads.

Pay-Per-Play claims there’s now “huge demand by major branding advertisers all over the world” for the service, and that they have a network of over 6 million websites playing these ads. The sample audio played on the site was an ad for Tacobell.

Jeremy Schoemaker notes that the site comes with a pyramid scheme and promoters of services such as Agloco have been spamming forums and any other place they can to promote it. Oh, and according to Jeremy, the ads pay less than 1c per pay.

Don’t want.

Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.

Via [TechCrunch]

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