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Facebook Paper brings elegance to your timeline
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Smartphones, Internet, Software,
Facebook has released its new Facebook Paper app, a free version of Facebook that introduces new ways of interacting with the social network. Similar to the popular Flipbook app, Facebook Paper is centered around eye-catching, full-screen images, and gesture-based navigation, bringing the topics and people you care about most to the forefront.
A product of Facebook Creative Labs, Paper looks great, and could likely replace the default Facebook app for most users, what with its magazine-style layout. To get users acquainted, Facebook Paper launches with a gesture tutorial, helping you become familiar with the new way of interacting with Facebook. It's a bold move, but it works. Facebook needs to constantly monitor the pain points that its users experience when using the service, especially on mobile. Paper solves a lot of those issues that the common Facebook user encounters in the more bloated full app, bringing a simple elegance and sense of ease with it.
Give it a shot, and let us know what you think in the comments. You can grab Paper now, for free.
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TigerDirect is the latest retailer to announce that it will accept Bitcoin as a payment method. The company specializes in selling computer hardware, accessories, gadgets, and similar kit. The company will use BitPay as its Bitcoin payment processor, making it the largest BitPay client. If you've got some Bitcoin that you'd like to spend on some tech, you can do it now at TigerDirect--online only though, as the retail locations aren't down with virtual currency just yet. Hey--maybe you can buy yourself some Bitcoin mining hardware with your Bitcoin. Spend money to make money, right?
Top 10 most read Gear Live stories in 2013
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Apple, Smartphones, Wearables, Features, Internet, Mods / Hacks, Music, Portable Audio / Video, Software,
Sure, we've given you a list of our top 10 most popular stories of 2013, but we figured we'd go a bit more broad than that. We also thought it would be interesting to give you a look at the top ten most read stories on this site this year, period, regardless of what year they were posted. We must say, we're just as surprised as you are at what did (and didn't) make the list! For example, you guys seem to really like Apple. Here we go:
- Sleeptracker Watch review: This one focuses on a watch that tracks your sleep data and aims to wake you up when you are in your lightest phase of sleep. The result is that you wake up feeling more rested, and more refreshed.
- Flash on iPhone is just around the corner: This five-year-old article made it's way back after being linked to by John Gruber of Daring Fireball. Since then we've learned that just because it's in testing behind closed doors, doesn't mean that it's going to make it's way to public release. Also, John, why couldn't you have linked to when we broke what was the biggest Apple software leak of the decade?
- Mod your Xbox without a mod chip: This is an all-time favorite of our readers. It dropped out of the top 10 last year, but has reappeared for 2013.
- Apparently that Xbox 360 Red Ring of Doom issue hasn't been fixed
- OS X 10.9 Mavericks Developer Preview 3 now available
- How To Mod Your iPhone on Windows Using iBrickr
- Apple releases iOS 7 beta 2 with iPad support: iOS 7 beta 1 supported the iPhone and iPod touch only. When beta 2 arrived with iPad support, many were excited.
- TiVo out-of-home remote streaming arrives on Roamio Plus, Roamio Pro DVRs: We'd been waiting for this feature for a long, long time, and it is finally here.
- Exclusive details on the next Nike+ FuelBand: We got exclusive details on the new Nike+ FuelBand months before its release.
- iPhone 5s review: Our review of Apple's flagship smartphone for 2013.
Any surprises? For a trip down memory lane, check out the top ten most-read stories in 2012, 2011, 2010.
We've also compiled a list of the stories that have dropped out of the top ten between 2012 and 2013, which you can check out after the jump, and don't miss the ten most popular Gear Live videos of 2013 either!
Click to continue reading Top 10 most read Gear Live stories in 2013
Latest Gear Live Videos
PayPal looks to become your digital wallet with latest update
Posted by Reza Malayeri Categories: Internet, Software,
PayPal has recently released a slew of updates to its mobile app, bringing with it numerous features aimed at carving out a place in our digital wallets. With more and more people moving their life into the digital realm, companies like Square, Google, and PayPal are moving swiftly to gain the first mover advantage in the financial app market.
Some of the most notable features of PayPal’s latest’s updates include, the ability to find shops around you via GPS, the ability to order products and services before you arrive at said shops, and special promotional discounts and coupons, which apply automatically during your checkout process.
Click to continue reading PayPal looks to become your digital wallet with latest update
Use ShopRunner for free shipping on all your holiday gift purchases!
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Hot Deals, Internet, Family, Women, Men, Techies, Under $100, Under $250, Under $500,
We wanted to highlight one of the services we love in our 2013 Holiday Gift Guide: ShopRunner. We're big fans of shopping at Amazon due to the benefits of Amazon Prime with free two-day shipping. However, sometimes you want to shop at another store online that may offer a better deal than Amazon, but you're used to not paying for shipping. That's where ShopRunner comes in. ShopRunner is a members-only service for online shoppers that provides unique benefits across hundreds of the best online stores.
ShopRunner's members save time and money with benefits including free 2-day shipping with no minimum order, free and easy return shipping, exclusive member offers, and easy 2-click check out. Participating stores include places like MacMall, Toys "R" Us, Brooks Brothers, Calvin Klein, Tommy Hilfiger, GNC, American Eagle Outfitters, Drugstore.com, Blue Nile and hundreds of others.
You can get a ShopRunner membership and save on your holiday shopping for $79 for one year--the same price as Amazon Prime, but you can use it for hundreds of other online stores as previously mentioned.
Click to continue reading Use ShopRunner for free shipping on all your holiday gift purchases!
Read More 
| ShopRunner
Rdio update brings personalized stations, revamped player
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Design, Internet, Music, Software,
Rdio is one of Gear Live's favorite things, and the recent revamping of its Stations feature has brought the music streaming service to a whole new level. Rdio users can now create up to ten different stations that focus on an artist, song, or one of 400 different sub-genres of music. Additionally, there's a custom station called You FM that takes cues from your listening history, Facebook likes, track votes, and Twitter follows to create a station that is specifically tailored to what you like. When listening to You FM, you can also choose between five levels of familiarity, allowing you to stick with what you know, or be more adventurous when you want to discover something new. A player redesign rounds out the rest of the update, which applies to the iOS, Android, and Mac apps, as well as the in-browser experience.
If you're an Rdio user (and you should be,) be sure to follow Gear Live's Rdio station.
Read More | Rdio Blog
Syrian Electronic Army strikes VoIP provider Viber
Posted by Jason Diaz Categories: Corporate News, Internet,
The Syrian Electronic Army strikes again at another VoIP provider, this time, Viber. We reported the cyber attacks on Tango, now it seems that the pro-Assad militant cyber group claims allegedly that it was able to download backups of Viber's database, which includes but it's not limited to phone numbers, device IDs and, supposedly, push notification tokens. Along with the purported intrusion, some Viber pages have been defaced. Viber has come forward and has stated that the intrusion is mostly harmless to customers of their VoIP services since they claim that the most vital user information is kept in a different database that can't be exploited by outsider threats. As always, Viber requests that 200,000 users be vigilant and report any suspicious activity with their accounts.
Today the Viber Support site was defaced after a Viber employee unfortunately fell victim to an email phishing attack. The phishing attack allowed access to two minor systems: a customer support panel and a support administration system. Information from one of these systems was posted on the defaced page.
It is very important to emphasize that no sensitive user data was exposed and that Viber’s databases were not “hacked”. Sensitive, private user information is kept in a secure system that cannot be accessed through this type of attack and is not part of our support system.
We take this incident very seriously and we are working right now to return the support site to full service for our users. Additionally, we want to assure all of our users that we are reviewing all of our policies to make sure that no such incident is repeated in the future. - Viber
Read More | Arstechnica
Apple iTunes hits 1 billionth podcast subscription
Posted by Jason Diaz Categories: Apple, Internet,
Apple is celebrating the fact that it has surpassed 1 billion podcast subscriptions in iTunes, quite an impressive milestone. Apple added podcasts to iTunes back in 2005, which has offered everyone the ability to market alternative radio and video shows for users. iTunes now has about 250,000 different podcasts in over 100 different languages, including shows like 60 Minutes, NPR, Ted Talks, NBC Nightly News, and even our own Bleeding Edge TV and Unboxing Live.
"From comedy to hard news to sports to innovative educational content and so much more, podcasting has transformed the global media landscape," - Apple
Read More | Twitter (Apple)
Apple announces iWork for iCloud with Office document support
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Apple, Internet, Microsoft, Software,
During yesterday's WWDC 2013 keynote, Apple's Roger Rosner took the stage to show off iWork for iCloud, a new feature coming to iCloud later this fall. The new cloud productivity suite, now available to Apple developers in beta, allows users to create and edit Numbers, Keynote, and Pages documents right in the web browser, regardless of browser or operating system. This gives Windows users the ability to create and edit iWork documents for the first time.
During the demo, it was revealed that the iWork for iCloud suite will be feature-rich, allowing users to drag-and-drop images right into the app, and use multitouch gestures to manipulate media. Additionally, iWork for iCloud allows users to add and edit Microsoft Office documents for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. This makes it easy for users of multiple platforms to work with documents without missing out on essential features.
Rdio brings new iOS app design to Mac and web apps
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Apple, Design, Internet, Music,
Rdio has updated its web and Mac apps with the new Now Playing view. Click the list icon at the bottom right, and the entire app becomes a stylized, blurry album cover in the background, with the actual art up front to the left, and the album tracks or playlist over to the right, allowing you to see what's coming up in your queue. We are big fans of Rdio here at Gear Live, and find it to be superior to Spotify in many ways. Rdio charges $4.99 per month for desktop and web browser access, while mobile streaming can be added, costing a total of $9.99 per month. Hit the Read More link to download the Rdio app.
Read More | Rdio Apps
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