5 posts and columns on Northern California

News Byte

Starbucks' Pay-By-App Test Grinds Away

in News on October 25, 2010 at 11:13 am PT

Starbucks said today it was expanding its mobile-payment testing grounds to include 300 company-owned stores in the NYC-Long Island area. The system uses an app version of the Starbucks Card. The app displays a barcode that is read by the scanner at check-out. Testing of the app (available for the iPhone, the iPod touch and certain BlackBerrys) began late last year in Starbucks locations inside Target stores and a few outlets in Seattle and Northern California.

BoomTown Turns TWiT Again and Talks About the Apple iPad Launch, Paywalls and Whither Embargoes

in News on April 5, 2010 at 9:00 am PT

BoomTown just made it through the snow-choked Donner Pass in the Sierras of Northern California, so excuse my laxity in posting this episode of “This Week in Tech,” the very fine Leo Laporte-helmed online chitchat tech show done on Sundays. It has a lot going on, including predictions about the Apple iPad launch, online content paywalls and a lively debate related to the Twitter fracas over embargoes.

Thanks, iPhone: 2,000 Percent Increase in Bay Area Data Traffic Since 2008, Says AT&T

in News on November 17, 2009 at 2:36 pm PT

Bay Area iPhone users, relief is on the way. AT&T has almost completed a $65 million upgrade to its network in the region. The carrier has upgraded close to 850 cell sites in an effort to better handle the massive surge in data traffic it has seen in and around San Francisco since the debut of iPhone. And make no mistake: The surge has been massive.
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BoomTown Has Yahoo's Qi Lu in Video Sights and Flubs It!

in News on June 19, 2008 at 8:33 pm PT

On Tuesday night, BoomTown reported from the Harvard Business School Association of Northern California dinner honoring Facebook. And, as usual, I was video-harassing Greylock Partner’s David Sze and James Slavet about the acquisition of Yahoo (YHOO) Network division head Jeff Weiner into the firm as an executive in residence. I prodded: “This is the pair [...]

Harvard Dropout Zuckerberg Feted by, Well, Harvard!

in News on June 18, 2008 at 5:12 am PT

Oh the sweet irony of Facebook Founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg getting awarded a big round glass object, suitable for mantel-showing-off, from Harvard types. Especially since he is now the school’s second most famous tech mogul dropout–after Microsoft’s Bill Gates. But that was the case last night at the San Francisco Airport Hyatt Regency, where the 24-year-old Zuckerberg collected the 30th Entrepreneurial Company of the Year Award from the Harvard Business School Association of Northern California.
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