Sony looks like it is about ready to shut down its failed “Dash” experiment.
The “personal Internet viewer” alarm clocks saw some popularity when they were released but horrible reviews nailed the coffin.
Reads Sony’s site: “Beginning February 29, 2012, the Sony dash developer website (http://dash.sonydeveloper.com) will close and no longer support development of new applications. This closure includes the dash developer forum and dash developer support email address (dash-support@sonydeveloper.com) which will close on March 31, 2012. Sony dash applications will remain available. Thank you for your contributions and we encourage you to continue your development activity on Sony’s other platforms available at SonyDeveloper.com.”
The original Dash machine has a 7-inch touchscreen, 800×480 resolution, a 500Mhz processor and 256MB DDR2 RAM.
What makes the alarm clocks popular is access to 1500 apps for weather, traffic, social networking, movies, music and games.
Result for: platforms
Twitter has completed their acquisition of TweetDeck, one of the most popular clients for the microblogging service.
The purchase ended for just over $40 million in cash and stock with the closing papers signed today.
TweetDeck had been previously linked to UberMedia, who was looking to purchase the client for $30 million and had an exclusive negotiating window that ran out. Uber has the top Twitter app for BlackBerry (UberSocial) and the “highest rated” Twitter app for Android, Twidroyd and has been allegedly cooking up a plan for a “Twitter killing” service.
As arguably the best Twitter client around (and accounting for 13 percent of all tweets sent on a daily basis), TweetDeck is a hot commodity for the microblogging platform and remains the top app for “power users,” those who tweet many times per day from many different devices.
TweetDeck also allows users to connect their LinkedIn and Facebook platforms to one app.
Result for: platforms
Rovio, the developer behind blockbuster sensation ‘Angry Birds,’ has raised $42 million during a round of funding led by venture capitalist firms.
One of the firms is Accel Partners, which has vested interests in Facebook, Groupon and AdMob, among other mobile or social companies.
Angry Birds currently has 40 million active players across Android, iOS and PC platforms, and downloads have topped 75 million.
Outside of game downloads, Angry Birds plush toy sales have surpassed 2 million, breaking into the mainstream retail channels.
The developer will use the money for “strategic expansions.”
