How to Build a Successful Startup From App Idea to IPO
When the founders of AirBnB pitched their idea to Paul Graham at Y Combinator, he wasn’t initially impressed. On top of being late, the applicants had an idea that sounded, in his Graham’s own words, “weird.” But at the last second, he decided he saw grit in the group, and offered to help them turn […]
What “Anti-Smartphone” Products Have To Teach Developers
App fatigue is an epidemic, and smartphone users feel more overwhelmed by technology than every before. The proof is in the market — and KickStarter has demonstrated widespread public interest in a series of unique “anti-smartphone” products that strip down the phone until it’s basically a flip phone in a smartphone shape. Case in point: the […]
Dogtown Media and Congressman Ed Royce Present 2016 App Challenge Winners
Dogtown Media’s commitment to tech education continues, as CEO Marc Fischer spoke on a panel alongside California Congressman Ed Royce at the awards ceremony for this year’s Congressional App Challenge. The presentation featured incredible app designs from some of the brightest elementary, middle- and high-school students in the 39th district of California. This isn’t the […]
Hackers Wreak Havoc Using IoT Exploits
This past Friday, much of the United States’ internet access came to a crashing halt. Services like Twitter, Spotify, Reddit and Netflix were rendered inaccessible because of a Mirai botnet attack on servers owned by Dyn (the source code was actually released a few weeks ago and the creator of the code, a hacker dubbed […]
Resumes Fail Developers: Stack Overflow Seeks to Fix It
App developers and the recruiters looking to hire them can agree on two things. One, job hunting is a headache. Two, paper resumes are virtually useless in determining a coder’s relative skill, commitment, and quality of work. Thankfully, Stack Overflow just came up with a great workaround to the paper resume problem. “Developer Story,” a […]
For Twitter CEO, A Turnaround in a Cul-de-sac
Twitter stock is up to over $23 at the time of this writing — but that doesn’t mean the road ahead looks bright for the beleaguered social media giant, even under leadership from celebrated founder Jack Dorsey over the past year. Los Angeles iPhone developers tend to see the rising price as more indication of […]
Hult Prize Awards $1 Million To App For Bus Issues in Africa
This year’s Hult Prize has gone to a startup created by students from who originate in Africa, designed to solve a huge problem with African infrastructure: unpredictable bus schedules. The app is the latest in a series of innovative startups from app developers tackling transportation issues among the working poor, including success stories like India’s […]
Facebook Messenger Opens Native Payments to Bot Developers
There’s been a lot of chatter about the “bot revolution” the past few months, but the spread of bot app usage among mainstream mobile app users has been slow at best. Part of the reason behind that, at least on go-to messaging platform Messenger, is the limitation on payments. Specifically, in order to make a […]
What the Last.Fm Security Breach Says about Mobile Privacy
“We are currently investigating the leak of some Last.fm user passwords. This follows recent password leaks on other sites, as well as information posted online. As a precautionary measure, we’re asking all our users to change their passwords immediately.” This statement was released way back in 2012, but it’s just this week that the full […]
FAA Forecasts 600,000 Commercial Drones Airborne Within 2016
According to a statement released by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), commercial drones are skyrocketing into the mainstream. Some 600,000 are expected to be registered within a year period. (For context, about 20,000 are registered as of this post. That’s steep growth even by iPhone app developer standards.) But don’t call in the eagles or […]