Jalopnik first posted photos and videos of Wednesday’s accident in the Seattle-area when Tesla Model S caught on fire. Shortly after the accident, Tesla released a short statement, just claiming that the driver survived without injury. Musk yesterday explained that the cause of the accident appeared to be a piece of metal that fell off a semi-trailer and struck the Model S. According to him, the metal piece from a semi-trailer caused a powerful lever action as it went under the car and that only a force of 25 tons would’ve been strong enough to punch the 3-inch hole in the armor plate at the base of the Model S. Luckily, the flames didn’t enter the passenger compartment, because the fire started in the front battery section and was contained to that ares. Tesla’s shares are up 434% so far in 2013 despite this incident, when between Wednesday and Thursday stock slumped more than 10%. Continue reading »

App OpenDoor is a free app that provides users a randomized IP address to keep their browsing habits anonymous and enables users to circumvent firewalls and access restricted sites. Anonymous developer of this app has said that “as the developers of an app that protects users’ privacy and anonymity online, it only makes sense to do the same ourselves“ and that Apple provided no notification that OpenDoor had been pulled, the got that information from consumers. This is not the first time that Apple has removed apps from its App Store in China. Apple has previously removed apps for falling foul of censorship laws include one providing access to forbidden books, a news app for a US-based broadcaster founded by banned spiritual group Falun Gong. Chinese social media users are very critical of latest Apple’s move. In their opinion, the decision diminished Apple’s moral standing and comparing it unfavorably to Google as a champion of Internet freedom. This app remains available in App Stores outside China, but prior to its removal from China App Store on July 11^th, this app was being downloaded ca. 2,000 times a day and that was almost a third of the app’s total downloads. Continue reading »

Steve Ballmer got only $550,000 of his predicted $700,000 bonus check, because Microsoft woefully overestimated how many Surface tablets it would sell. Microsoft was forced to take $900 million hit to its earnings due to awful Surface sales. Ballmer got also last year a smaller bonus than planned. Last year Microsoft failed to provide a browser choice screen on European PCs running Windows, as required by an 2009 antitrust settlement. Ballmer will retire by the end of next summer and he won’t get a retirement payout from Microsoft, but he owns ca. 333 million shares of Microsoft. And this stake is worth almost $11,3 billion. Continue reading »

Apple has hires a new expert, an ex senior VP of technology development at the CableLabs, with backgrounds such as developing TV apps, Internet voice, video technologies… In 2011 Mule led development of a Wi-Fi app designed to connect users to the best possible hotspot. Apple has been building ties to the pay TV business and it’s also reportedly working with Time Warner Cable to bring the cable operator’s TWC TV app to the device. Continue reading »

Three weeks ago Twitter had filed for a public stock market offering and wants to raise $1bn in its stock market debut. Documents that were filed with US regulators revealed that Twitter has 218 million monthly users and 500 million tweets are sent daily. This will be the largest Silicon Valley stock offering since Facebook’s in 2012. The social networking company plans to list under the stock symbol TWTR, but it didn’t reveal which stock exchange (NASDAQ or New York Stock Exchange) it had chosen. Goldman Sachs is the lead bank taking the company public but also Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan, BofA Merrill Lynch, Deutsche Bank Securities and CODE Advisors will be helping with the offering. Continue reading »

Atari co-founder Nolan Bushnell claims that Apple’s new CEO Tim Cook isn’t the next Steve Jobs. Bushnell met Steve Jobs in 1974, when Jobs showed up at Atari in sandals and demanded a job interview. Atari employed him as a $5-an-hour developer. In his opinion, Cook probably thinks he’s innovating, when in fact it’s just micro-evolution. “If I were to choose somebody to run international manufacturing and processing and keep the wheels on the bus, Tim Cook is about as good as anybody can get,” said Bushnell. He is more impressed with Google’s approach, which focuses on testing new products and ideas even when some might fail. Continue reading »