A Sonos speaker – for your television: That’s the idea behind the Playbar, the company’s first soundbar. It’s a big step for a company like Sonos, which is about to get a whole lot more competition. Read more »
We’ve been talking about connected homes and the internet of things for at least a decade, but why is there so much suddenly happening in the connected device space? Smartphones, access to cheap off-the-shelf technology and open software platforms have sparked the change. Read more »
I was debating the purchase of a $130 broadband-connected scale versus to help me track my fitness and nutrition goals. As I weighed (HA!) the choice, I came up with three metrics that should help consumers figure out if paying more for connectivity is worth it. Read more »
Google’s Nexus Q music streaming device officially went up for sale on Google Play this week. The device wants to compete with Sonos, btu also stream videos from YouTube and Google Play. How well does it work? Check out our video review. Read more »
Sonos, a ten-year-old company that makes networked connected music hardware has raised a $45 million in new investment from the likes of Elevation Partners, KKR and has added some heavy weights such as John Maeda , president of the Rhode Island School of Design to its board. Read more »
Google is making an Android-powered entertainment system and will design and sell it under its own brand, according to the Wall Street Journal. When I read the news, the word that came to mind: amazing! Read more »
A new Pandora competitor called Raditaz combines customized online radio stations with location. Users can see what stations others are listening to in their neighborhood and even geotag stations specific to their gym or office. Raditaz built the service with a team of just seven. Read more »
Connectivity changes everything. That’s the credo driving just about every corner of our day-to-day lives. As human beings, we are now connected to one another through not just our social networks but also our cars, the books we read, the albums we download and even our own health and wellness habits (to name just a few areas). With that in mind, GigaOM Pro has singled out certain areas in the technology industry where we see this shift to constant connectivity taking place most drastically. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
The enterprise is where the big bucks used to be, but home is where the heart and consumers are. As the web becomes more integrated in people’s lives, the home will become the battleground for the coming generation of startups and big-name companies. Read more »
Sonos, the wireless music system, has achieved what it calls the 1 million room milestone. For a web service, such a milestone may not be as notable, but for a hardware maker that has been selling gear since January 2005, it’s a big deal. Read more »
Bolstered by the success of its partnerships with services such as Pandora, Rhapsody, Rdio and Spotify,consumer electronics maker Sonos now wants to launch an API that would allow any music service to integrate with the Sonos platform. To me that seems like a great idea. Read more »
We all have our secret Lady Gaga songs tucked away in our playlist or the 80s’ Monster Ballads that are loved rather than laughed at, so now as Spotify comes to the U.S., here’s how to avoid sharing the skeletons in your musical closet. Read more »
There is re-definition of the consumer electronics landscape and we are seeing a future for hardware that combines hardware, software and connectivity with specific services. Without the services, the devices may lose our attention and end up at the back of the proverbial drawer. Read more »
This week saw a new Android handset with two 3.5-inch displays: the Kyocera Echo on Sprint can turn into one larger display or run two apps on the screens at the same time. Twitter saw a huge update while Sonos software is coming soon to Android. Read more »
Sonos, the maker of a wireless music system, will soon have a free Android app, so the people who purchased one of the 67 million Android phones sold last year can control their Sonos music playback around their homes with their handsets (and their tablets). Read more »
More exciting than examining the previous quarter is looking forward into the next 12 months and using the trends of 2010 to predict the realities that will surface in 2011. Throughout this past December, GigaOM Pro’s curators did just that, making trend predictions, pointing out companies to watch and even telling us what not to expect. Connected Consumer curator Michael Wolf’s thoughts, analyses and predictions are compiled here in a single report. Companies mentioned in this report include Netflix, Hulu, Facebook, Apple and Boxee. For a full list of companies, and to read the full report, sign up for a free trial. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
One has to look really hard to find a Silicon Valley startup that has found success in the hotly contested consumer electronics marketplace. However, one company might just change that: Sonos, a Santa Barbara, Calif.-based maker of networked digital music devices. Read more »
Blame cord cutting, at least in part, for the drop in cable subscriber numbers in 2010. Looking towards 2011, we expect this trend could gather further steam thanks to bundled subscription offerings from players like Microsoft and Apple. We also expect a new iteration of the ... Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Wi-Fi was hot last year and it’s only getting hotter in 2010 as the availability of personal hotspots such as the Mi-Fi and the rise of the Direct Wi-Fi standard mean that putting a Wi-Fi chip in anything makes the device more useful. Read more »
The consumer electronics industry, like its mobile phone counterpart, is going into a phase of flux, where Moore’s law and smart software and services would dictate how tomorrow’s consumer devices are built. Everyone — from start-ups such as Sonos to Microsoft and Sony — is trying […] Read more »
