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Does the Mobile Web Need a Yahoo-Style Directory? —

Do you remember the days when Yahoo was a yellow pages-like directory of websites? Back in the early days of the Internet, a number of companies created vast, human-edited databases that aimed to catalog all the Web - and some even sold these as printed books. According to mobile search engine Taptu, the mobile Internet is at a similar point today, where a directory is simply the easiest way to discover content. While Taptu's main focus is still on its crawler-based mobile search engine for mobile sites, the company also just launched a Yahoo-like directory of touch-friendly websites.

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The Mobile Web is Going Through Its "Yahoo Phase"

Earlier this year, AdMob's CEO and founder Omar Hamoui argued that the mobile web is going through its "Yahoo phase," as it is still possible to find mobile apps using directory-like app stores instead of having to rely on more advanced search engines. While Hamoui was mostly talking about apps, the same could be said about the mobile web in general. The number of touch-friendly mobile sites is still relatively small when compared the the Web as a whole, and services like Taptu new directory still make sense at this point.

Taptu's Directory

To help its users find the best touch-friendly sites for mobile phones, Taptu decided to create a directory of touch-friendly sites. Taptu notes that phones with touchscreens are quickly becoming mass-market devices, but a lot of these devices don't feature app stores. For Taptu, the top five traffic-generating phones include the Samsung Caliber, the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic and Samsung Finesse.

Thanks to Taptu's focus on touch-friendly sites, the directory turns out to be a fun way to find interesting sites on the go, without the hassle of having to deal with sites that don't work well on small screens. To access Taptu's directory, just head over to the company's mobile site and look for the Categories icon at the top of the page.

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The Story of LOST Told by Cats —

The Story of LOST Told by Cats is a post from Chris Pirillo

The people over at Tremendous News are going to miss the popular television show LOST. In case you may have missed out on watching it in the past, the team put together this awesome one-minute video. It purrrfectly describes the entire show, and the whole thing was done with adorable little kitty cats.

If you have been following the show all these years, good for you. Our friend Traci Toguchi played a role on there in season four. I had a fantastic time touring some of the sets in Hawaii, and almost felt as though I was a part of the show. Alas, I admit to not really watching it. I don’t watch a lot of television. Who has time for that these days?

Are you a LOST fan? Does this video come pretty close to resembling the show?

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Google to Buy Global IP Solutions, Looking to Add Video Chat to Android? —

Google has agreed to pay $68.2 million in cash to buy Global IP Solutions, which makes technology to deliver voice and video over IP. The deal will enable the search giant to boost call and video quality on various services, and may see it offer video chat through Android mobile phones and other devices.

GIPS offers technology for high-quality, real-time audio and video streaming via IP, which it licenses to companies like AOL, Nortel, Samsung and Yahoo for their voice and video chat offerings. But as paidContent points out, GIPS also recently rolled out what it claims was the first product enabling developers to add video chat to Android devices. With such technology in hand, Google could accelerate plans to offer such services on its own, or make the technology part of its own developer toolset.

Google will pay 13 Norwegian krone ($2.12) in cash per share, or NOK 421 million ($68.2 million). The offer represents a premium of 142 percent over GIPS’ closing price on January 11, the day that GIPS said it had a possible strategic buyer, and a 27.5 percent premium over its share price on May 14, the last trading day before Google made its bid.

The deal remains subject to certain closing conditions, including approval by 90 percent of GIPS shareholders. But based on a recommendation of the GIPS board, Google says it has already gotten commitments from shareholders the represent about half of all outstanding shares, including Kistefos Venture Capital AS and Kistefos Venture Capital II DA.

Related content on GigaOM Pro: TV Apps: From Novelty to Mainstream (subscription required)

See the marking on that chip with the Apple logo. No, not the "N90" codename indicating that it's from Apple's next generation GSM iPhone, the other text. If we're not mistaken then we're seeing "339S0084" on that chip from today's fourth-generation iPhone teardown. Guess what? According to Chipworks, that's the Apple A4 microprocessor fabricated by Samsung and the presumed work of Apple's acquired PA Semi and Intrinsity engineers. The "APL0398" text is also the same as that found on the iPad's A4 system-on-chip. The other markings differ however. What that means isn't entirely clear yet but we're digging.

Fourth generation iPhone teardown reveals A4 microprocessor originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 12 May 2010 06:19:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Apple has confirmed that it has acquired Intrinsity, a Texas-based semiconductor maker that was likely the brains behind the chip that powers the iPad.

Terms of the deal — which was first reported by The New York Times — have not been disclosed, but analysts believe the price was $121 million.

Intrinsity creates semiconductors focused around mobile devices. It created the 1GHz hummingbird processor in partnership with Samsung last year. Many believe that this technology is behind the iPad’s A4 chip.

This news isn’t a total surprise — reports surfaced earlier this month about the acquisition after Intrinsity employees changed their LinkedIn pages to reflect their new roles at Apple.

Apple has been bringing more chip technology in-house in recent years. The biggest example to-date was the acquisition of P.A. Semi for $278 million in 2008.

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Tags: apple, Intrinsity, ipad

Chip Maker Intrinsity Moving to North Korea —

Ashlee Vance and Brad Stone:

Apple has bought the company that many analysts say helped make the brain in the iPad tablet, people familiar with the deal said Tuesday.

Apple has finalized a deal to acquire a small chip company called Intrinsity, Apple confirmed. Intrinsity, of Austin, Tex., made a name for itself by creating a fast chip for mobile devices in cooperation with Samsung, both a partner and competitor to Apple.

The film studios apparently should have spent as much time making sure their DVD new release DRM actually works with popular Blu-Ray players as they did on their new 28 day new release delay scheme. Avatar, which of course Netflix and Redbox users now won't be able to rent for a month, was released on DVD last Friday. While the title's hype and box office success easily translated to disc sales records, AdamR writes in to note that some customers were rewarded for their purchase by finding out the disc wouldn't play on many Blu-Ray players. While some users are able to fix the problem if they can manage to download new firmware that plays nice with the new Avatar DRM, new firmware for players like the Samsung BD-UP5000 doesn't (and may not ever) exist. It's almost as if the studios are trying to perfect the art of annoyance when it comes to Blu-Ray -- something that has helped contribute to the platform's less-than-anticipated adoption rates. While DVDs have always been loaded with unskippable crap (that ironically pirates don't have to deal with) newer Blu-Ray DVDs seem to enjoy taking this to an entirely new level -- with even more unskippable previews, promotions and warnings downloaded to your player via broadband.  Somehow the studios continue to believe that layers of seemingly-endless annoyances (DRM, delaying new releases, unskippable "features" -- none of which pirates experience) are actually going to help keep piracy at bay and physical media relevant forever.

 

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Samsung exec: We might build a Google TV —

The Korea Herald, an English-language newspaper based in South Korea, quotes an unnamed Samsung executive: “We are considering Google TVs. We are examining the business feasibility.”

The television sets would run on Google’s Android operating system, already used on the company’s Nexus One and Motorola Droid phones, among other devices.

Google announced last month that it is working with Intel and Sony to develop its Google TV platform, allowing users to surf the web on their sets and tap into various applications via Android. So far, Sony is working on building a Google TV set-top box, but not necessarily a whole TV. Last week, Google acquired stealthy chip company Agnilux, which may have something to do with the effort.

Samsung has been moving in a very similar direction. In January, it launched the first application store for televisions, calling it Samsung Apps. To populate this new marketplace and recruit developers to the platform, it is also holding a contest for the best apps.

An analyst contacted by the paper said “there is no problem” for Samsung to produce Android-powered TV sets. But he worries that the move means Samsung will risk handing its control of the TV set market over to Google. “I think it would be better for Samsung to expand its own platform,” he said.

Samsung is the world’s second-largest mobile phone maker after Nokia, and claims to have the world’s slimmest TV set ready to launch in the United States this week.

Tags: Android

People: Google, Samsung

App stores are no substitute for what the mobile industry calls “on deck” placement, in which an application is pre-loaded onto a phone’s home screen, or a top-level menu.

On-deck placement costs lots of money, plus it can take months of begging — er, negotiations with multiple wireless carriers and phone makers in order to win an expensive deal.

Yahoo just announced the inking of such a deal with Samsung, the world’s second-largest handset maker. Only supergiant Nokia sells more phones. Yahoo and Samsung have had a partnership since 2007, but the new deal expands Yahoo’s presence onto millions and millions more Samsung phones.

An exclamation-point-riddled email from a Yahoo spokesperson says that “Samsung will distribute Yahoo! services, including Yahoo! Mail, Yahoo! Messenger, Yahoo! Front Page, Yahoo! Search, Yahoo! Flickr, Yahoo! News, Yahoo! Finance, Yahoo! Contacts, Yahoo! Calendar, and Yahoo! Weather on Samsung’s mobile devices globally, currently planned to begin in May 2010.”

A Yahoo-Samsung deal makes a lot of sense. Yahoo lacks strong wireless carrier relationships. Samsung doesn’t have a star smartphone. Putting the two together gives Yahoo outstanding placement in the world’s pockets, and makes Samsung’s phones Internet-friendly right out of the box, no app downloads required.

Yahoo’s voice-driven mobile search, which is optimized for the sort of searches that mobile users make the most — restaurants, movies, air travel, businesses — will probably be competitive to Google among Samsung phone owners. There’s no placement like default placement.

Companies: Samsung, yahoo