Archive for the ‘World Wide Web’ Category

The social network Facebook has been given a facelift in the past week: Almost one year after its release, Facebook announced early last week that its location-based service Facebook Places would be killed off. Later in the week, the network also announced that its online-coupon market, Deals, would also be killed off. But this doesn’t completely mean that Facebook is leaving the location-based market. The social network added that its check-in deal service will still be offered, albeit a bit different than previously. Read the rest of this entry »

Das Örtliche is making the search for telephone numbers and addresses for Mac users Germany-wide even easier. The new MacOS-App from Das Örtliche now allows its users to search locally directly from their desktop on Mac computers. The free Mac app is easy to operate and offers a clear search mask in the known Mac design. The most common search options like individual search or the backwards search can be conducted quickly and efficiently, without much effort. Mac users can also find private and business addresses and phone numbers with just a few clicks. The standard method of getting online and searching there falls away, as the MacOS app can be quickly started on the computer after installation. The download is available under www.dasoertliche.de/macos and in the Mac App Store. The app requires an internet conection and the Mac OS X operating system from version 10.6. Read the rest of this entry »

Being eco-friendly is certainly nothing new, but very few know just how much impact they really have, especially when it comes to travel. rome2rio, a search engine startup created by two ex-Microsoft engineers, hopes to change that through a new partnership with Offset Options, a company that describes itself as being “committed to environmental and social sustainability.” Now users can search for ways to travel all over the world (hence the name, Rome2Rio) and search for the most eco-friendly way to get from A to B. Read the rest of this entry »

The go-to for online shopping is expanding its marketing strategy: Amazon.com is furthering its offering of local deals through its new AmazonLocal, released in June of this year. Users can purchase deals in up to 30 cities within the US, including San Francisco, Charlotte, Austin, Orlando, and most recently New York. Read the rest of this entry »

We’re always on the lookout for new apps, and this one has definitely caught our attention: Alfred. This app, available for a free download in the iTunes App Store helps users discover new restaurants, cafés, bars, and even nightclubs, customized to the user’s personal taste. This is made possible using the Serendipity Engine from Clever Sense. Read the rest of this entry »

After a market study declared it the “strongest online brand for local search” in the German net, meinestadt.de is taking it to the next step: with about 19.5 million visits in July, the portal is now claiming the title of “leading local offering in the German internet” for itself. Read the rest of this entry »

The speculation has been going on for weeks – now it’s official: the check-in/geolocation service Foursquare, which just began expanding its coupon market with the integration of deal offerings from five new partners, has now caught the big fish, Groupon. Starting immediately, Foursquare offers its users offerings from Groupon Now!, the special platform that offers real-time coupons. Read the rest of this entry »

Windows Phone 7 (WP 7) is gradually gaining speed in the app world: Meinestadt.de just released their app for the mobile operating system, and now Poynt and its partner suchen.de are following suit.
The Canadian provider for location-based services has been cooperating with the Munich-based v, which operates suchen.de, since mid-2009. Poynt combines the local search with weather information on the spot, and addresses from cinemas and film listings in the local vicinity. The address data for the German version of the Poynt-app come from suchen.de. A special service is the restaurant search, that can be narrowed down according to culinary styles. Read the rest of this entry »

Whoa, the search engine giant is throwing another punch: not only is the social network project Google+ Facebook’s biggest competition while still in its test phase, but Google has now taken over the deal provider The Dealmap.

The goal behind this is quite clear: the internet giant can further expand its own service for deals, Google Offers, which has been in the beta phase and only available for few American cities. Google would then become a powerful player in the couponing market. The Dealmap, which went live just last November, already has two million users and is available online and as a mobile application for several US cities as well as London. Read the rest of this entry »

meinestadt.de is offering something that has been already available from the online directory Das Örtliche since the beginning of the year, and from the local ratings portal Qype since this July: an app for the Windows Phone 7. In cooperation with Microsoft, the city portal developed this special mobile application. The apps for the iPhone and Android smartphones have been available for quite some time.

The app is available in the Windows Marketplace, under http://redir.ec/meinestadt-windowsphone7, to download. The developers have chosen the most popular categories from the vicinity radar for the app, according to allesklar.com. Users that are on-the-go can search for restaurants, cafés, hotels, or ATMs for all German cities and municipalities. Users also receive weather information, events, and film times in the vicinity. The smatphone’s localization is automatically conducted using GPS.
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