It’s not often that Internet companies last 10 years, but Moonfruit in the UK has proved pretty resilient. It survived the dotcom boom the first time round, launching with VC-backing, growing to 65 staff and cutting back to two staff in the space of a couple of years. It’s a wonder why they didn’t exit [...]

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Japanese band Sour has made a music video for the ages. Shot with actual fans performing concerted actions on webcams, this had to be one of the most difficult editing jobs in history. My mind blew a couple times. Utterly insane on Yooouuutuuube as well, as a commenter points out. This’ll be a great thing to [...]

The beta testing stage can be the cornerstone to the successful development of a new site. And many startups have to conduct and implement beta testing of sites, surveys and analytics internally, which can be an daunting task when you are launching a site. Prefinery lets startups outsource the whole beta invite process, from start to finish. Prefinery is offering 100 TechCrunch readers with beta invites to test the site. You can sign up here. Use the invitation code "TECHCRUNCH" when signing up for the service. Prefinery's ambition is to create a valuable first experience for beta testers and to help startups in collecting and organizing information that will result in a better product. Prefinery will do anything and everything when it comes to the beta testing process. The service will create a splash page for your product, generate an HTML sign-up form with fields and survey questions, create an automatic welcome e-mail/message, take signups into a queue, approve users, and trigger invite e-mail. The service will also generate invite codes and assign quantities.

A woman was shot today at an Arlington Apple Store, for no one knows what reason. She's in serious but stable condition and the guy is at large. I'm surprised this hasn't happened before: iPhones are expensive little buggers and jacking a pallet of them would be a real score.

In a somewhat belated move calculated to "give potential developers insight into the Atari?s gaming platform so they may possibly build upon the 7800 series," Atari has released the source code to several awesome but rarely-played Atari 7800 games, including Dig Dug, Centipede, Joust, and Pac-Man. I'm not sure the 7800 is really competing these days, Atari, but we appreciate your contribution nonetheless.

In addition to a Mylo-esque physique and UMD-less guts, it seems that the PSP Go has a significantly improved CPU. What a pleasant surprise! Of course, this isn't leading to some games having a "turbo mode" or any other crazy ideas you might have — it's just making the whole PSP experience that much more responsive.

It's not easy to launch a successful WebEx competitor. Most businesses have long since established their "system" for dealing with web meetings, using old standbys like WebEx or GoToMeeting. And those businesses that are willing to venture into the unknown have had plenty of cheaper alternatives to choose from, like DimDim, for quite a while. But that isn't keeping CallWave from launching one of its own, dubbed Fuze Meeting. And while it's not going to be an easy space to compete in, Fuze Meeting doesn't disappoint. As far as startups go, the history of the company is pretty unique. CallWave was founded in 1998 and went public in 2004, trading on NASDAQ under the ticker symbol CALL. After reaching a peak soon thereafter of over $15 per share, the stock dropped steadily, dipping as low as 50 cents early this year. Deciding to cut its losses, the company delisted itself from NASDAQ on Monday after buying back shares from public shareholders at a 44% premium over the current market value and paying out a total of $10 million. CMO Patrick Moran says that the company did this on its own accord, and that its hand wasn't pushed by any banks or VCs. CallWave will soon change its name to Fuze Box to reflect its new position as a startup.

Despite our best intentions, it looks like the DEMO v. TechCrunch50 war will continue, even with DEMO under new management. In 2007 we launched the first TechCrunch50 event - a place where companies can launch to rabid fans and tech press. These launching companies are the stars of the show, and they don't pay a cent to attend. We thought DEMO's longstanding policy of forcing launching companies to pay a $20,000 fee was ridiculous, and led the conference organizers to make decisions based not on the merits of the startups but simply on who was willing and able to pay. Not only do we let startups launch for free, we give the top one a $50,000 prize. Our conference has grown rapidly - nearly 2,000 people attended TechCrunch50 last year while DEMO languished in San Diego with a paltry few hundred. To be fair, our events were on the exact same dates, so they were hit doubly hard. This year we moved our dates to give them some breathing room. We thought we were done battling DEMO. But today DEMO announced that they're giving away a "massive" prize - $2 million in advertising credits - to the top two startups at the event. The press is eating it up, saying that TechCrunch50 looks paltry in comparison. Of course, there's a catch. The "advertising" is remnant stuff on IDG properties (IDG owns DEMO) and will certainly be priced at rate card. They'll also charge for creative and other expenses. Meaning there is very little actual value. I'm guessing that the amount of advertising actually delivered would be in the tens of thousands of dollars of value, at best. And, of course, every startup launching still needs to pay to launch. But whatever. You want adverting? We'll give you advertising.

What in the hell is LG Mobile?s president smoking because this is the most absurd thing I?ve ever read. Becoming the #2 mobile phone maker in three years is one thing considering the fact that Samsung could and would destroy them at any time. But a new Black Label device to compete with the iPhone? Or a luxe brand on par with Nokia?s Vertu? Keep dreaming, Ahn.

When we reported on Kiva.org's decision to open up its micro-lending platform to U.S. entrepreneurs, Kiva CEO Premal Shah told us he was concerned about backlash in the community. Shah acknowledged that the decision to open lending to U.S. recipients may draw criticism because it goes against the idea on which Kiva was founded?lending to help development in third world countries where credit options are limited. It looks like Shah's prediction was correct. There is now a lending team on Kiva's community platform titled "Unhappy Kiva Lenders." The members, which total 375 lenders from around the world, are angry that Kiva is extending loans to U.S. entrepreneurs. The team's page states that "including borrowers from the USA has undermined the very core of what made [Kiva] so unique and special; small, impactful contributions to entrepreneurs in impoverished situations in developing countries."

Local reviews startup TrustedPlaces has partnered with Northcliffe Media to power the regional newspaper publisher’s experimental hyperlocal web strategy. News of the deal comes six months after its founders stepped back from speculative sales talks to focus on building revenue and cash flow. LocalPeople beta-launched 20 community sites targeted at small towns and neighbourhoods across south-west [...]

In principle, any advance in any field of technology is welcome, but I have my doubts about this new service developed by a Japanese company called DSS. It's basically aimed at establishing a "big brother"-like control system [JP, PDF] within factories.

What’s black, red, wears a Verizon badge, and looks just like the Samsung Glyde? The Samsung Glyde 2, of course! Presumably in hopes of losing a friend or getting someone fired, HowardForums user StandardsDT waited for his in-the-know buddy to leave the room before going camera crazy. Here’s what we know so far: It has a physical QWERTY [...]

The microKORG has been the world's best selling synth. The new microKORG XL has the same great features as it's predecessor plus a more capable effects processor, improved key response and a gooseneck microphone for some vocoding out of the box. So here's a video of the XL for you to check out.

Tip #1: If you’re going to be a huge wanker and rob a retail store, don’t rob an Apple store. You know those little fancy handsets they carry around? Thats so they can avoid doing much with cash. Tip #2: Don’t friggin’ steal stuff or shoot people, unlike this guy at the Arlington, Virginia Apple Store. One [...]

Start Mobile has managed to get 18 separate iPhone applications approved by Apple. So you'll imagine their surprise when one of them was recently rejected. But you may be even more surprised to find out why. Apparently, Apple doesn't like the way one piece of art in the app depicts President Obama. Is it out of line or tasteless? Well, you can determine for yourself, because you've undoubtedly seen the art in question before: It's Shepard Fairey's famous "HOPE" image of Obama that was everywhere during his Presidential campaign. So why on Earth would this be rejected? Well, here's the wording in the rejection:

It contains content that ridicules public figures and is in violation of Section 3.3.12 from the iPhone SDK Agreement which states: "Applications must not contain any obscene, pornographic, offensive or defamatory content or materials of any kind (text, graphics, images, photographs, etc.), or other content or materials that in Apple's reasonable judgement may be found objectionable by iPhone or iPod touch users."

"Ridicules public figures"? This image is hanging in the National Portrait Gallery at the Smithsonian ? yet, Apple apparently finds it inappropriate.

One of the most effective ways to amplify your message on Twitter is to get your followers to retweet it to their followers. Retweeting is also becoming a popular way to pass links around Twitter. They are becoming the new currency of the Web because of the power of passed links. One service in particular, Tweetmeme, is cornering the market on retweets by making it easy for blogs and other sites to add a retweet button to every page. You can see one at the bottom of this post. Just click on it, and it will take you to your Twitter account and populate a message with a "RT," the headline, and a short link. Go ahead, do it now. Do it again. Okay, thanks. Lots of sites use Tweetmeme's retweet button, and it drives a lot of its overall traffic. Nick Halstead, the CEO of Fav.or.it (Tweetmeme's parent company) says that the buttons are so widespread right now that they are generating 196 million impressions a week month. In other words, that is how many pages load with the buttons every month week, and some portion of those result in actual retweets. Halstead is making some improvements to the retweet buttons. Before each retweet generated by the button would include a promotional "via @tweetmeme." That has now removed to make more room for the actual headline and link. Next week he is going to introduce an image button which can be included in RSS feeds and emails to spread the retweet love even further. And sites will be able to embed a retweet counter to show how many overall retweets they get every week.

What in the hell is LG Mobile?s president smoking because this is the most absurd thing I?ve ever read. Becoming the #2 mobile phone maker in three years is one thing considering the fact that Samsung could and would destroy them at any time. But a new Black Label device to compete with the iPhone? [...]

Okay, it's not exactly the Camp David Summit that took place in 2000 between the Israelis and the Palestinians, but sometimes the littlest gestures can go a long way. A couple of days ago, upon hearing that Microsoft had officially joined Twitter, the official Linux account sent out a tweet welcoming them. "Welcome to Twitter, @Microsoft!," they said. The tweet sat unanswered for over a day, and it seemed like Microsoft may never answer. But about a few hours ago, they did. "@Linux thanks, nice to be here," they replied.

George Hotz, the 20-year old hacker who originally unlocked the iPhone, has released a jailbreaking application for the iPhone 3GS codenamed "purplera1n." It's currently Windows-only (Windows 7 not supported), and requires the latest iTunes installed, and an iPhone 3GS with the 3.0 firmware. Hotz mentions in a blog post that the jailbreak for Mac is "coming soon." The iPhone Dev Team did release a unlock for 3.0 which did not work on the iPhone 3GS, but Hotz's version does (although it doesn't free you from your current carrier).

I don't recall how the YouTube user Pruane2Forever, aka "Sexman", came on my radar, but I definitely remember a few of his videos from a couple years ago. (Here's a old favorite ? Not Safe For Work.) Basically, it's this kid who does movie and new media reviews that are (or at least used to be) unintentionally hilarious. These days, he apparently has quite the following on YouTube, as he has over 150 videos that range in popularity from tens of thousands of views to over a million. One of his most popular ones was a video from 4 months ago in which he calls out rapper 50 Cent. Sexman wonders how 50 still has "street cred" after doing endorsements for Vitamin Water, makeup and dildos (I'm not kidding). "What else is he gonna do? 50 Cent diapers for your little gangsta?," Sexman wonders at one point. He concludes that 50 Cent is "just a media whore!" Well, 50 Cent has responded. Yesterday, the rapper posted a video alongside Sexman, who apparently flew from Canada to New York to meet up at the rapper's request.

comScore has aggregated some data based on its World Metrix audience measurement service and put together a study on social networking worldwide. Surprisingly, it appears that the Russians are more engaged with social networking than the rest of the planet (or the biggest slackers at the office, depends on how you look at it). The study found visitors in Russia to spend 6.6 hours and viewing 1,307 pages per visitor per month on average, at the same time - once again - confirming Vkontakte.ru's leadership in terms of popularity with 14+ million monthly visitors. To put that level of 'engagement' in perspective: the average world-wide is 3.7 hours and 525 pages per visitor. Among the 40 individual countries reported by comScore, Brazil ranked closest to Russia at 6.3 hours, followed by Canada (5.6 hours), Puerto Rico (5.3 hours) and Spain (5.3 hours). The United States is ranked number 9, with 4.2 hours and 477 pages per visitor per month.

Italian internet giant Dada.net has acquired 51% of the assets of online gaming startup Fueps in a deal worth ?1.36 Millions. Fueps launched in 2008 and grossed over ?600k while total ebitda was ?750,000 in the red. Seems more of a rescue than an acquisition to me. Dada decided to take over the 51% stake [...]

Well, that’s a surprise. Rumors had pointed at Sprint to be the home of the Hero here in the states - but there it sits in the FCC database, packed to its big ol’ chin with AT&T-friendly 850/1900Mhz bands. [Via EngadgetMobile] Crunch Network: TechCrunch obsessively profiling and reviewing new Internet products and companies

I think the image is pretty self explanatory. VZW via BGR Crunch Network: CrunchBase the free database of technology companies, people, and investors

Following the success of AudioBoo, 4iP has unveiled another investment with the potential to completely change the face of mainstream media - though this time, it’s all about print. Newspaper Club is a tool to help people make their own newspapers using online content. The site’s in private beta, with a public launch planned for [...]

Ever since OS. 3.0, the latest operating system for the iPhone, launched on June 17, prices among the top 100 apps in the iTunes App Store have been fluctuating wildly as developers push out apps taking advantage of all the new features in the OS. Some of the new features we are starting to see in apps include push notifications, turn-by-turn navigation, cut-and-paste, embeddable maps, access to external accessories, search within apps, and subscriptions. Mobile app distribution service Distimo just put out its June iPhone App store report As you can see from the charts above, the average pricing among the top 100 paid apps was pretty steady until the middle of the month, when developers started to test different price points. The most popular price for an app remained $0.99, but the month of June saw more top apps priced at $1.99, $4.99, and $9.99 (the green bars on the chart above).

Oh, patents. Companies file you all the time, often coming to nothing, yet you still mystify us for some reason. A few iPhone-related patents have been floating around the Internet this morning; they're sure to interest you for dozens of seconds. Take this one, which describes a karaoke application.

In a sign of the growing importance of micro-blogging in communication, and let’s face it Twitter is the daddy of this, the icon of Middle Eastern TV network Al Jazeera is now integrating Tweets from its viewers into its output. During the popular Minbar Al Jazeera talk show, Twitter users can now send comments and [...]

Public voting in the The Europas, the tech startup awards from TechCrunch Europe, will close today, Wednesday July 1 at 11.59pm London time (GMT/BST). So best get your vote out now. This public vote will be mixed with voting from our advisory board of European tech luminaries to produce the final shortlist. The awards will [...]

Many of you know all about Sam Sethi, the former TechCrunch writer who left after a disagreement and then went on to create BlogNation. Two days ago Sethi filed a lawsuit against us for libel and other issues. As we always do, we’re posting the litigation threats and will continue to fight the litigation [...]

The wave of investments in “realtime” is continuing with today’s announcement from Cognitive Match that it has raised Series A investment from Dawn Capital. Terms were undisclosed but it’s understood the figure was in the ?1m+ ballpark, in tranches. The UK company applies artificial intelligence, learning mathematics, psychology and semantic technologies to match content to [...]

Sarah Lacy, the author of the book ?Once You?re Lucky, Twice You?re Good,? is thinking of doing a book tour. Start things off here in Atherton, Sarah. I’ll do the first one at my house. See my interview with Sarah on the new book here.

The ETA may or may not have a legitimate goal in demanding Basque independence, but bombing a building full of journalists is no way to win karma points or influence people.

I already picked one blog fight today. So on the other issue, I’m going with what Mathew Ingram said.

As much as it pissed me off when Microsoft’s Dare Obasanjo defaced my wikipedia page to prove some point (what he was really doing was hitting me back for criticizing Microsoft the day before), I’m sad to see him leave blogging. When he wasn’t being a total asshole he had some smart things to say. [...]

We get a lot of calls to post our traffic stats, and we’re going to start doing more of that soon. But as a response to this, here are out January uniques from Google analytics, for TechCrunch.com alone.

I’d call PC Magazine Editor in Chief Lance Ulanoff’s article about Facebook (reprinted here by Fox News) a hit job, except that it is so utterly devoid of logic and actual analysis that it really can’t be classified as anything other than a sad commentary on the state of technology reporting in mainstream media. His argument [...]