Hightail for Dropbox’s Business Model

Just in time for the inaugural Dropbox DBX developer’s conference, the popular cloud service provider has some new competition from an old rival.

The file-sharing tool previously known as YouSendIt has rebranded itself. Now known as Hightail, it’s embracing more collaboration services, rather than just file-sharing. To go along with the name change, Hightail has also changed their pricing to be much more competitive in the public storage market. For only $16/month, customers can have access to unlimited storage, which is $10 less than the 200GB plan from Dropbox.

Speaking of the changes, company CEO Brad Garlinghouse talked about how they plan to stand-out, saying, “The name gives us a chance to differentiate in the marketplace. There are a lot of companies with ‘box’ or ‘sync’ or ‘drive’ in their name. There’s a lot of blue logos and names in this space. It’s starting to get pretty homogenous.”

Using Your Camera as A Phone

Nokia will be holding a press event today where they are expected to launch their newest Windows phone, the Lumia 1020.

The new handset has a staggering 41 megapixel PureView camera with image stabilization, a very bright Xenon flash, and a lens with a 2.2 focal ratio.

A slightly less powerful front camera will be fitted with a wide-angle lens, which is especially useful for tight shots. As for video, the device supports zooming up to 6x in full 720p.

New high-performance microphones will allow users to record high-quality audio with a range lower than ever before. Expect to hear more about this amazing new phone when Nokia officially presents it later tonight.

Stalk Your Kids!

Life360, the app which helps users locate family members, has raised $10 Million in investments, led by California-based venture capital firm, Doll Capital Management. To date, they’ve raised nearly $20 million.

The Live360 app offers a premium service for $5/month, which includes their Life Advisor, roadside assistance, and stolen phone protection service, and the ability to keep up with an unlimited number of location-based alerts.

With the new line of funding, Life360 hopes to expand their product even more. After a recent $3 million investment from BMW, they created a feature that gives driving directions directly to the location of family members without the need to enter an address. The company is working on deals with home security companies to automatically arm the systems when no family members are in the house.

Expect to see more features coming to Life360 as they continue to grow.

Literally – Killing Machines

In a historic first for the United States, the Navy has successfully landed an unmanned drone on an aircraft carrier. This paves the way for unmanned aircrafts operating side-by-side with traditional airplanes.

The experimental X-47B aircraft took off from a Maryland Naval Air Station before approaching the USS George H.W. Bush, off the coast of Virginia.  From there, the drone landed using a specially-fitted tail-hook which was deployed to catch a wire onboard ship.

Though the X-47B will likely never be used in a combat situation, the demonstration will still prove useful to Navy officials to help develop future carrier-based drones, which could begin operation as early as 2020.

Four companies are expected to compete for the military contract for the unmanned aircraft, which will be awarded next fiscal year.

Not That Kind of Moto-X!

Google is reportedly prepared to spend half a billion dollars marketing the upcoming Moto X phone, which is expected to be available on all four of the big carriers.

With an emphasis toward convenience, Google and Motorola have taken great steps to limit bloatware on the device. Customization is another area of focus, and customers will be able to choose the colors of the trim and backplate, and engrave their names, or a short message on the back, as well.

To account for the increased customization demand, Motorola has said it expects to add more than two thousand new employees in Ft. Worth, Texas to build the phones, and the central location will enable them to deliver the phones within days of the order.

ITTT Sure Seems Hard To Pronounce

IFTTT, an application which stands for “If This Then That”, is releasing its first-ever mobile app headed for iOS, aptly called IFTTT for iPhone.

With it, users can create “Recipes” that combine a “Trigger” – the “This” – that will result in an Action – the “That”.

For example, you can have it so that all the photos you take with the front-facing camera will be sent to Flickr with the “selfie” tag, or you can automatically send new contacts an introductory “Nice to meet you” email.

While initially starting out as a web-based platform, the company plans to continue its mobile ventures and develop apps for Android and Windows phones soon, but is focusing on the iPhone for now. Interested customers can begin playing around with their own “recipes” by downloading the app for free on Apple App store.

Going Once, Going Twice, SOLD To The Girl in the Bib

Sorella Stoute, just became eBay’s youngest car buyer by accident.

Even though she’s just a toddler, Sorella managed the feat by getting her hands on her dad’s smartphone, where the curious kid began clicking away at random buttons, eventually opening the eBay app, and hitting the “buy it now” button, which resulted in the sale of a car.

She purchased a rare 1962 Austin-healey, for two-hundred-and-twenty-five dollars. While most fathers might’ve been especially upset about the ordeal, Sorella’s father thought it was quite funny, even saying, “She decided to open the eBay app and started clicking around and one thing led to another and we own a car.”

EBay rules allow Sorella’s dad to turn down the sale, but in a twist of fate, he decided to keep the car, and is now trying to raise money online to fix it up. Perhaps Storella will be able to drive it once she’s old enough!

And that’s all the news we have for today. For this and more, be sure to join us every morning on NewsDesk with Kristin Feledy.

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