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Vuclip, the leading premium mobile video on demand service for emerging markets today announced their launch of Vuclip app on Windows Phone Store. The Vuclip Windows Phone app allows users to enjoy high-quality movies, TV shows, and music videos, including long form content from premium partners such as Rajshri Entertainment, Unisys, Reliance Entertainment, Balaji Motion Pictures, ESPN, Sun TV, Maa TV, SIMCA, 9XM, India TV, Gemini.

Features:

1. Continuous scroll to view more content — While on the list view, users can scroll down to view continuous list of content eliminating page navigation to offer easier access
2. Grid to list view — Users can click on the view more button for each of the categories on the home screen to expand and view more content in the list view with an endless scroll.
3. Swipe to explore more categories on list view — While on the list view, users can scroll left and right to see more categories.
4. High quality Video — thumbnails offer perfect content representation.
5. Top search keywords: Auto-populated top search keywords reflect the key search trends based on search trends in their specific regions to offer a customized look
6. Region specific content curation: Content is programmed to ensure that users see localized content depending on the regions where they access the app from.

Download it here from Windows Phone Store for free.

There's two problems with beer pong. First: drinking beer blessed by a ball that's been rolling around on an undergrad apartment floor. Second: the lack of Kickstarter daydream machines to solve problem number one. Behold the solution to exactly one of those problems: the Clean Cup.

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Our friends at Pop Chart Lab love tracing down the tangled, tortuous branches of the family trees connecting some of our favorite things. They've done it for beer , and now they're switching to the hard stuff, with a lovely taxonomy of the world's many types of whiskey.

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Steve Ballmer, the CEO of software giant Microsoft who took over from co-founder Bill Gates, will retire from the company within 12 months.

The announcement came from Microsoft moments ago. The company said that its board of directors will form a special committee to find a successor. Members of that committee will include Gates, the company’s chairman, and directors John Thompson, Chuck Noski and Steve Luczo. The company has tapped the executive search firm Heidrick and Struggles to consult on the search.

After the news was announced, Microsoft shares rose by more than seven percent, to $35.02 in pre-market trading.

Here’s Ballmer’s memo to Microsoft employees, and here’s the original announcement from Microsoft:

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months

Board of directors initiates succession process; Ballmer remains CEO until successor is named.

REDMOND, Wash., Aug. 23, 2013 /PRNewswire/ — Microsoft Corp. today announced that Chief Executive Officer Steve Ballmer has decided to retire as CEO within the next 12 months, upon the completion of a process to choose his successor. In the meantime, Ballmer will continue as CEO and will lead Microsoft through the next steps of its transformation to a devices and services company that empowers people for the activities they value most.

“There is never a perfect time for this type of transition, but now is the right time,” Ballmer said. “We have embarked on a new strategy with a new organization and we have an amazing Senior Leadership Team. My original thoughts on timing would have had my retirement happen in the middle of our company’s transformation to a devices and services company. We need a CEO who will be here longer term for this new direction.”

The Board of Directors has appointed a special committee to direct the process. This committee is chaired by John Thompson, the board’s lead independent director, and includes Chairman of the Board Bill Gates, Chairman of the Audit Committee Chuck Noski and Chairman of the Compensation Committee Steve Luczo. The special committee is working with Heidrick & Struggles International Inc., a leading executive recruiting firm, and will consider both external and internal candidates.

“The board is committed to the effective transformation of Microsoft to a successful devices and services company,” Thompson said. “As this work continues, we are focused on selecting a new CEO to work with the company’s senior leadership team to chart the company’s course and execute on it in a highly competitive industry.”

“As a member of the succession planning committee, I’ll work closely with the other members of the board to identify a great new CEO,” said Gates. “We’re fortunate to have Steve in his role until the new CEO assumes these duties.”

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (MSFT) is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential.

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There is a full-blown shopping mall right on the grounds of Microsoft's sprawling campus in Redmond, Washington. 

The Commons, as its called, opened in 2009. It's on Microsoft's West Campus and its near the buildings that house the Xbox group. 

When we recently visited Microsoft's campus we spent some time walking through the Commons. If you're at work and you need to knock out some chores like banking, or a hair cut, the Commons is a pretty neat. 

Here's an overview of the Commons, and its outdoor space.

Outside of the building, there's a big soccer field.

And here's The Commons.

See the rest of the story at Business Insider

This article originally appeared on TechCrunch.

Creating awareness for your brand and products is one of the lifebloods of technology startups yet in a world where so many companies are being created it becomes difficult to rise above the noise.

Ever notice how some companies tend to be in the press all the time and your big new product launch struggled for inches?

Mostly it’s because your marketing campaigns suck.

Or more directly – they are likely narcissistic resuscitations of your newest features or bragging points that nobody but your marketing team and your mom care about.

I recommend that companies move beyond narcissistic marketing to what I call “point-of-view (POV) marketing.”

Here’s what I mean …

Let’s start with what it takes for a journalist to want to write a story. Here’s what’s going through his/her head:

• Is this story “newsworthy” or am I being asked to publish a press release?
• Do I have an “angle” from which to write the story (first company to do X, company does biggest X, consumer behavior is doing X)?
• If I’m covering a company can I get evidence of what the competition is doing so the story is balanced?
• Do I have data or facts to present so the story has legs?
• Can I get sources to talk on-the-record or off-the-record to lend credibility to the topic?
• Will I have information that other journalists don’t have (otherwise known as a “scoop”)?

But mostly they’re thinking, “Will my audience even care about this topic?”

The ultimate measure of success for a journalist is viewership so if nobody cares about your shitty little company and the story you’re trying to pitch then the journalist doesn’t want to publish. And it’s their judgment that becomes the ultimate arbiter of this.

And beyond eyeballs they also care about “journalistic integrity” (aka their reputation) so they want to be sure they’re not being gamed. That’s why having long-term relationships with journalists matters and why having people close to the journalist who can vouch for you.

So how exactly do you break out then?

If you start with a POV rather than product features / functions or your own internal news story you’re already a long way down the track of answering the above questions. The idea is that you put out information with data and a point-of-view and that becomes the story rather than you.

Why would I want to have a POV rather than talking about my cool new features?

The major battle for press is a battle for “mindshare” and it’s exactly the reason I blog. I am a VC. I hand out money. How differentiated is that? But through expressing points-of-view I can raise above the consciousness of my customers (entrepreneurs and limited partners who invest in VC funds) in ways that I couldn’t without breaking through the noise of the hundreds of others of VCs who also have money.

Think about Luma Partners. They are an investment bank that targets the technology & media sectors. They basically help companies get sold and help buyers determine which companies to buy.

Their website proclaims,

“LUMA Partners is a different kind of investment bank. We provide strategic advice to digital media companies in a manner that reflects how corporate development is actually done. This more strategic approach produces better outcomes for acquirers and target companies alike.”

Can you imagine that ever getting inches in the press? Or somebody reading that and thinking “Yeah, I get it. Let me be sure to use me some Luma Partners. They’re different. More strategic. Must call. Now. Dialing.”

Of course not.

But everybody knows Luma Partners in our space. Why?

Because they produce the “LUMAscapes” which are essentially visually guides to all of the major players in a technology market. It’s brilliant.

Every corporate buyer of technology and/or technology companies knows the LUMAscape and uses it to figure out which vendors they should consider. And thus every technology company in that space fights to be sure they’re on the LUMAscape.

And every time a new LUMAscape is published it is newsworthy. Why?

A journalist has a visual chart they can use. That chart has information on it. Some people were added to the chart. Others were removed. There’s drama. Intrigue.

It doesn’t talk about Luma’s strategic approach. But everybody knows that Luma produced it.

Now of course there’s a lot more that goes into building a brand like the fact that the founders of Luma have long reputations in our industry and people respect them. Plus they run conferences with the top people (which is another form of POV marketing by the way).

But mostly they break through the noise of many other investment banks by having a POV.

One of the masters of this in the startup technology world is Flurry. Consider this blog post titled, “Christmas 2012 Shatters More Smart Device and App Download Records.” In the post they list four charts with data showing how Christmas day is a huge driver of downloads for mobile applications (obviously because many people get new smartphones for the first time). It’s why every major mobile app developer gears up for the holiday season by trying to be as high as possible on the charts because when the newbies come searching for popular apps in the app stores you get a huge additional bump if you’re already high in the charts.

Flurry doesn’t talk about all of their analytics features and functions. They offer a point-of-view about their market. And they back it up with data. And journalists eat that shit up because it has all that they’re looking for: facts, charts, an angle, news, something that their readers care about, etc.

And Flurry always gets mentioned. So when somebody is going to the purchase aisle and thinking about buying a mobile analytics platform they have the brand recognition that matters.

Final example. PwC. They sell accounting services. You can imagine the press release, “New innovative model allows us to do audits differently than the competition!” Or I guess that was the slogan for Arthur Andersen. Ouch. Kidding!

But look at what PwC actually does in this report, “CEO Surveys for Business Growth” which has a POV, two charts and a video to watch. They have configured the charts to be easily downloadable and sharable directly from the page and the video to be embeddable. Their marketing team ought to gets some pats on the back. Making it extra easy to copy charts / data just increases the lift the story gets.

By publishing your data on a blog (as in the case of Flurry and PwC) you get the added benefit of driving traffic back to your website as the journalists often link to the “full report” and thus you get all of the SEO juice to drive future search traffic also.

So next time you’re thinking about how to get coverage for your new downloadable widget that third-party vendors can install and instantly get optimized gobblygook for some feature they didn’t know they needed and want a journalist who doesn’t give a fork about optimized gobblygooks and frankly doesn’t even understand what that is … think about leading with POV marketing instead.

When you get your potential customer talking about your brand, linking back to your website to learn more and show curiosity that’s when you want to hit them with, “have you ever thought about …?” But by then that person is a qualified lead that has shown enough interest in your website to pay you a visit.

If you want more marketing & PR tips I summarized a few of them over here on my blog, BothSidesofTheTable and I’ll add to the mix over time.

And I’m sure it’s not lost on you that my tips and my blogging are, in fact, POV marketing. After all, my money has the same president on it as everybody else’s in the US.

As the Korean explained previously, Korea celebrates Christmas, but not in the same way Americans do. Except for Christians in Korea -- who celebrate Christmas in a similar way as Christians around the world -- Christmas in Korea is basically an extra Valentine's Day, in which young couples get together for a romantic date concluded by gift-exchanging.

This is the kind of image that "Christmas" evokes in the minds of Koreans. (source)

You can guess how well this sits with Korean young people who are single. But this year, the singles of Korea decided to do something about it. Two young men jokingly planned an event called the Battle of the Solos [솔로 대첩], which went viral online. So it was actually going to happen: on Christmas Eve, thousands of men and women would gather on opposite ends of the Yeouido Park. Single guys will wear white; single gals will wear red, by 3 p.m.. At the signal, the two groups would run toward each other like prospectors running into the empty lands of Oklahoma. By the miracle of love, the lonely hearts will meet, and spontaneous dating will happen all over the city. It's heart-warming. More than 36,000 people signed up on Facebook, which caused Seoul city government to deploy a thousand policemen at the Yeouido Park as a precautionary measure. Inspired by Seoul, the singles in other cities around Korea also called the meeting on Christmas Eve.
Did it work? Well, it half-worked. Specifically, the dude half. This is what it looked like:

A vision of solo hell. (source)

Here is a bird's eye view:

Red circle = girls. Yellow circle = guys. Yeah. (source)

It actually was not quite as grim as the pictures above. Apparently, out of the 1,000 or so attendees, 300 were women. Also, at least a few people did manage to secure a date for Christmas, like this newly created couple:

(source)

But it was clear that this event could not overcome the same fundamental problem that plagues any mass speeding dating:  gender disparity. Even the women who attended did so with their significant others, simply there to witness the spectacle of the world's saddest flash mob. In fact, the thought that this might work probably shows why the two guys who thought of this idea do not have a girlfriend.
The winner of the event -- other than the lucky few that did manage to find a date -- is, clearly, Korea's Internet, which sparkled with many hilarious jokes. In Busan, a city renowned for its tough, macho guys, there were so few women that the male attendees changed the event into an impromptu wrestling match. In Jeju, exactly three guys showed up, stared at one another for about 15 minutes, then left. At Seoul, it was estimated that the most frequent attendees were: (1) the police; (2) pigeons; (3) men, followed by reporters, street vendors, cars, and then women. The situation was also likened to the ratio of sperms and an egg. Here is the Korean's favorite one:  "Battle of the Solos was organized so that all the singles would be concentrated into a single geographic area, opening up the rest of the city for couples on dates."
Merry Christmas everyone. Don't spend it alone.
Got a question or comment for the Korean? Email away at askakorean@gmail.com.

Setting up an iPhone or other non-Android smartphone to sync with Gmail's services just got a little more difficult. Google is dropping consumer support for the Exchange ActiveSync protocol soon as a part of a "Winter Cleaning," the company has announced. As a replacement, Google is recommending CalDAV for calendar, CardDAV for contacts, and IMAP for email — though obviously iPhone owners will also likely use the new Gmail app for that. The move isn't entirely unexpected, Google has been updating its help pages to deprecate Exchange ActiveSync recently, leading us to speculate that it would be dropping support.

Using the Exchange ActiveSync protocol to connect smartphones to Google's services was a very convenient way to get contacts,...

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Since the 1950s, Norad, the North American Aerospace Defence Command, has been giving children updates on Santa's progress from the North Pole each Christmas Eve.

Norad has teamed up with Google to track Santa's progress online for the last five years but this year Microsoft is sponsoring the service for the first time.

A NORAD spokesman told Search Engine Land : “NTS [Norad Tracks Santa] and Google mutually agreed to go in new directions.”

NORAD has also built its own apps for Windows Phone, Android, and iOS, along with a Windows 8 app this year.

The Santa-tracking tradition began in 1955 after an advertisement misprinted a telephone number for children to call Santa. The phone number in fact put children through to the Commander-in-Chief's operations 'hotline' for CONAD, the forerunner of Norad.

The Director of Operations at the time, Colonel Harry Shoup, had staff check the radar for Santa making his way south from the North Pole. Children who called the hotline were given updates on his location as he made his journey.

Geekwire commented: "This is a score for Microsoft, as nearly 25 million people are expected to follow Santa this year. Last Christmas, the NORAD Tracks Santa Operations Center in Colorado Springs received more than 102,000 calls, 7,721 e-mails and reached nearly 20 million people in more than 220 countries around the world."

Don't Miss: Do You Care About Your iPhone Privacy? This App Will Quadruple Encrypt Your Messages And Shred All Data >

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Somewhere in Afghanistan...(be sure to watch for the flag raising)