As part of the deal struck between the companies earlier this year, Starbucks is now accepting Square’s mobile payment application at almost 7000 stores around the nation.
Starbucks customers are already quite familiar with app payments, having been able to use Starbuck’s own app for the better part of two years on their iPhones or Android devices.
There are some glaring differences between both services, however.
The Starbucks app requires you to have a Starbucks card, with pre-loaded money on there, whether done online or with an actual card. Square’s service allows you to pay with a linked debit card or credit card. The Square Wallet can also obviously be used at places other than Starbucks.
Square is available for free on Android and iOS devices.
Result for: online
Encyclopedia Britannica has announced it will stop producing its classic multi-volume book sets after 244 years in print.
The company printed a new set every two years but has announced there will be no 2012 edition, leaving 2010 as the last in the series. Into the future, the company will continue to update the encyclopedia digitally and produce education tools.
Says Britannica president Jorge Cauz: “Everyone will want to call this the end of an era, and I understand that. But there’s no sad moment for us. I think outsiders are more nostalgic about the books than I am.”
While the 32-book sets are what come to mind when the word Britannica is said, Cauz says the printed sets account for just 1 percent of overall revenue. 85 percent of revenue comes from education products including online learning tools and curriculum products
The digital phone and tablet app of Britannica costs $2 per month.
Result for: online
RedLynx, a Finnish video game developer that was purchased by Ubisoft last year, has denied this week that it leaked its own game to torrent sites.
Their latest game, Trials Evolution, recently made its public debut via The Pirate Bay, and immediate blame was thrown back on the developers, who have been known to be pirates.
In 2009, CEO Tero Virtala admitted that the company put the first “Trials” game online, “taking advantage” of piracy: “What we did actually, on day one, we put [the PC edition of Trials] immediately on all the torrent networks ourselves.”
Virtala was quick to deny this leak, however: “We want to be clear that [leaking Trials Evolution] is not something we did ourselves.”
