10 Best Samsung Galaxy S8 Armbands of 2017

It is critical for many of us to receive a call from someone even when we are working out in the gym. But at the same time, you can’t put your Smartphone away or put anywhere else just like that. To solve that problem with newly launched Samsung smartphones, we bring the best Samsung Galaxy S8 armbands, selected for you only.

Just like we care about touch sensitiveness while selecting the best Samsung Galaxy S8 screen protectors, we care the same while choosing an armband for Galaxy S8. Don’t worry all of these armbands have top class touch sensitive access at the front and this is not it, they are loaded with many features as well.

#1. iMangoo

This is a universal armband from iMangoo, which can fit any smartphone, but since it can definitely fit Samsung Galaxy S8, we are including it on our list. This armband is made from top grade material, which actually gives comfort even when your arms are sweaty due to extreme workouts. Let us know more about this armband.

Features of iMangoo Armband

• Premium Nylon/Neoprene material is human skin friendly, and it is durable, washable, and there will not be any pungent smell.
• Three pockets where you can put your cards, IDs, cash and also a slim power bank, not to mention your keys.
• The strap is fully adjustable to any arm size and extremely responsive.
• Special cut for the headphone jack hence the wire won’t get tangled under any extreme circumstances.

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#2. JEMACHE

Presenting an armband for your Samsung Galaxy S8 from a relatively new brand called JEMACHE. The brand may be not much popular but let us assure you that this armband is fully equipped with all the facilities and comfort you require when you are into an extreme workout session. Not only that if you like to go for a run at night, but there is also a printed reflective strip for your safety.

Features of JEMACHE Armband

• Made from the top grade neoprene, which is breathable and will give you soft and odor-free feeling all the time.
• The design of this armband is unique and humanized which is carved out of a durable fabric over-edging in all selvage to prevent tearing apart during strenuous exercising sessions.
• The armband provides large and extendable size range, which can fit any size of the arm.
• Carry key, cards and even cash in the inbuilt water resistant pocket.

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#3. PORTHOLIC

This is a universal armband from PORTHOLIC which is another ‘not so known brand’ on Amazon, but still, it is providing a quality armband for your Samsung Galaxy S8 smartphone. This armband too has a pocket where you can store your keys, cards, and cash when you are exercising hard without fearing the important things getting lost.

Features of PORTHOLIC Armband

• Made from skin friendly breathable combination of Lycra and neoprene that allows long time workout without getting irritation.
• Apart from the quality of the material, this armband is extremely flexible, and thus it can fit almost any size of the arm.
• The HD transparent PVC front cover allows the LCD to function as normal and also provides easy access to your smartphone when you exercise.
• Get the lifetime warranty from PORTHOLIC and get a hassle-free replacement if you are not satisfied with the product.

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#4. Jarv

Select this special armband made for your Galaxy S8 smartphone, which has a special right side up pocket so that you can read the display really easily unlike some of the other armbands available in the market. With such display friendliness you can easily operate all the functions of your smartphone and hence you can enjoy your exercise even more.

Features of Jarv Armband

• Another unique feature of this armband is that you can fit your smartphone inside the pocket with or without the protective case; mind you not all armbands carry this feature.
• Very comfortable to wear as it is lightweight and because of the durable material it will last long and will still remain in its original shape.
• Any arm size between 9 to 17 inches can easily fit into this armband, and that means all men, women, and teenagers can use it.
• The neoprene material is also sweat proof and easy to wash so the armband will not get dirty or your phone will not be affected due to sweat.

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#5. SUPTMAX

This incredibly great looking armband for your Samsung Galaxy S8 is furnished by SUPTMAX. What makes this armband different than the many others we are discussing today is that the color choices it offers. You can select your armband between Rose Red, Green, Blue and Black and that will make your armband look different than the rest of the people at the gym.

Features of SUPTMAX Armband

• The face cover of the armband pouch is made from the clear scratch resistant material hence your smartphone’s screen remains safe from scratch.
• The material used in the armband is extremely flexible, and it can be stretched to any size of an arm, and thus it makes this armband a universal armband.
• Carry ID, credit or debit cards and even some cash with security in the extra pocket provided in the armband.

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#6. uFashion3C

A Samsung Galaxy S8 compatible armband from uFashion3C has a strong look which can give you comfort that this armband can face any extreme conditions. The lightweight, soft neoprene, which is molded to twist and bend but it, will never go out of the shape.

Features of uFashion3C Armband

• It is very easy to clean this armband with gentle soap and water. Once it is clean just put it for air dry.
• The box is touch screen friendly so you can access all the touch features quickly.
• A unique key holder to keep your keys and also an earbud jack which allows you to access music.
• Best armband for running, fitness, workout, exercise, gym, cycling, jogging and more.

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#7. MELOP

MELOP is a very well known brand for providing quality smartphone accessories. MELOP’s Armband for Samsung Galaxy S8 is excellent against sweat and it is also waterproof, and hence it is very easy to clean it with water once you finish your hard workout wearing this armband.

Features of MELOP Armband

• Manufactured by taking the extreme needs of professional sportspersons in mind and hence it can fight any amount of sweating even for fitness enthusiasts.
• Two side holes for accessing the headphones and also great getting direct and easy access to the touch screen when the armband is in use.
• Best armband for jogging, running, exercising and even yoga and cycling as well.

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#8. Trianium

A universal armband by Trianium is also compatible with Samsung Galaxy S8 smartphone. For comfortable wearing all through your jogging, running, cycling, yoga or gym sessions you should give a long hard look at this armband from a known and reputed brand for smartphone accessories.

Features of Trianium Armband

• Apart from the exercise methods mentioned above, this armband can also be used for hiking, biking, and walking and it will still give you the desired result.
• The belt is stretchable so it can fit any arm size, but the best thing about this is that despite repeated use this armband never goes out of the shape.
• Get the complete comfort even when you have an extended session of exercise, and your arm is sweaty.
• There is a secret compartment, which can store your house key or car key when you are busy exercising.

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#9. Zestrend

This is a unique armband because it is entirely different than what we discussed till now. Usually, you wear an armband on your arm, but the design of this piece is such that you can wear it only on the wrist. We believe this design allows perfect solutions to those sportspersons who like to do lots of cycling.

Features of Zestrend Armband

• Not only cycling but also this armband can be your best buddy while playing any sports because of its unique and user-friendly design.
• It protects and holds your device while exercising perfectly, so your phone will not fell off from the armband.
• The PVC filter and sensitive main touch screen operation, you can enjoy the full interaction with your phone at any time.
• There is two multi-slot adjustable Velcro will fit any forearm size easily.
• The reflective stripe allows you for safe running or cycling during the low light conditions or at night.

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#10. Avarious

Just like the name Avarious, this armband made for Samsung Galaxy s8 smartphone offers you a various range of color combination to choose from. So, apart from selecting a perfect armband for your smartphone, you can also take care of your style and your favorite color as well.

Features of Avarious Armband

• Fully compatible with Samsung Galaxy S8 as it keeps the smartphone fit within the safety or the front pouch.
• It is a lightweight and comfortable armband so you would hardly feel wearing it when you are working out hard.
• Fully protective against any amount of sweat and will maintain the comfort level even in the extreme workout conditions.
• Adjustable Velcro strap can fit any small or large sized arms easily.

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Best Fitness Apps for Android: Keep Yourself Fit Forever

Keeping yourself fit within your busy schedule is no longer a tough task. Download those best fitness apps for Android suggested here and get your personal fitness trainer at home.

Who doesn’t like to remain fit? One would believe that every person living on this earth always want to stay healthy. Fitness fuels the stamina to work for the entire day and not only that, but it also keeps the harmful elements like heart trouble, blood pressure away.

There are some best fitness apps for Android, which can certainly be the helping hand for many of us.

Just like the best Fitbit apps for Android and iPhone, these best Android fitness apps will give you novel ideas to exercise, keep the record of what you are doing and they can even give you encouragement to keep it going until you feel absolutely fit. There can be some fitness apps, which gives you advice depending upon your current fitness level.

So, all in all by using any of these best Android fitness tracker apps; ultimately you are going to get benefitted for sure and we believe that you should go through the list we provided below just to make sure that you remain fit forever!

Best Fitness Apps for Android

#1. Calorie Counter – MyFitnessPal

It is good that you exercise to keep yourself fit, but what about the food you intake? The food you eat is also as important as the exercise is. Calorie Counter – MyFitnessPal is one of those apps which keeps track of your food and how much calories you are taking. Just enter your everyday diet in the app, and the app will give you an accurate figure of calories you are taking every day. This became possible because the app has over four million food recipes as its database and hence it can give you meticulous details about the calories you are taking. You may also receive help from the web interface it offers.

Apart from the regular features you would also like its Recipe Importer, Restaurant Logging, Personalized Experience and Customize Your Diary features which will give you more tips on how to keep your food on track. The app is free but if you wish you can make the in-app purchase.

Price: Free
Download Calorie Counter – MyFitnessPal App

#2. FitNotes – Gym Workout Log

Sometimes you don’t like those fitness apps keeps on advising you on what you should do and what you should not. If you feel that those apps are bothering you too much in your routine then here are the best fitness tracker apps for Android which we are bringing you right now.

This app is called FitNotes Gym Workout Log, and it works exactly the opposite the way other fitness apps work. It lets you decide your fitness program by giving you a log entry board. Just feed your schedule and follow it accordingly to stay fit. If you are bored with routine and want to change it, no problem, you just need to swipe and check your workout history and can make changes accordingly.

There is also a rest timer and vibration option, just in case you wish to take a break while working out. Reordering or editing the current workout schedule is also easy to do on this app. The best part of this app is that despite being free to download it is also free from ads as well!

Price: Free
Download FitNotes – Gym Workout Log App

#3. Ingress

All those who know a thing or two about Ingress must be wondering that how on earth a gaming app is included into this best fitness apps for the Android list? Well, we got some solid reason to prove our case. Actually, Ingress is a game where you need to roam around and hack portals around your area.

This app brings the virtual world to the reality by doing just that. So if you are not motivated enough to go out of the home even for a walk, then Ingress will just push you out of the home just to complete the task in the game. There are missions which you need to achieve, and these tasks are provided by the game, and you may even create your mission. Theses missions are very complex, and it will keep you going once you are into it. It doesn’t matter which mission you are doing; you have to come out of your home and do it. In this way, Ingress can keep your fit, after all, walking is also a good exercise, right?

Price: Free
Download Ingress App

#4. Pocket Yoga

Yoga is an ancient Indian way to live a fit life, and after decades of deliberations, even the West has accepted Yoga as one of the best ways to keep fit. So, if you are inclined towards Yoga to keep yourself fit then Pocket Yoga app could be a great help for you for sure. Get detailed information about different poses via animations and voice instructions.

The Voice instructions will guide you on how exactly you are going to do the asana. You may also keep the log about your daily Yoga workouts and check what improvements you need to have at a later stage. There is also a description along with the pictures which show what pose has what kind of benefit for your body. Throughout your journey of Yoga, with this app, you can also unlock new environments. If you are a newcomer then also you can get a quick preview and practice to check whether it is right to start Yoga or not.

Price: Free
Download Pocket Yoga App

#5. RunKeeper – GPS Track Run Walk

RunKeeper fitness app is regarded as best Android fitness apps by many Tech based websites, and hence you can understand what level this app has set. As the name suggests, this app tracks your running and walking habits. You can also keep track of your everyday performances. You can even create your running routes and then maintain the record tracking going.

The app allows you to make your fitness plans and if you wish you can sync various hardware to ensure that your heart rate is good enough. The good thing about RunKeeper is that not just running or walking it also allows you to track other types of workouts as well. If you are planning to do a marathon, then also RunKeeper will help you out. Just like external hardware, you can even sync RunKeeper with the other fitness apps as well. If you are using any Android Smartwatch, then it is very easy to pair RunKeeper with it.

Price: Free
Download RunKeeper App

#6. Sports Tracker Running Cycling

Apart from running and walking cycling is another way to keep yourself fit and to keep a record about your cycling there is an app called Sports Tracker Running Cycling. This app is certainly helpful to keep track of your daily cycling activity, and then you can analyze your progress every day. After you analyze it, you can even make changes accordingly. All you can do with the utmost ease with this app. You can also share your activities on various social media platforms through this app and boast about it. Get the help from different maps, time and distance calculators so that you can remain informed always.

Apart from keeping you informed about your cycling activities, this app can also give you details about your heart rate, so that you can increase or decrease your speed. Sports Tracker Running Cycling is also considered to be the best fitness app for Android free download, and you can check it why on Google Play Store ratings this app has got.

Price: Free
Download Sports Tracker Running Cycling App

#7. Sworkit Personal Trainer

Don’t you have time to go to the gym? Don’t worry here is a fitness app for you which can act as your personal trainer. You can get the fitness right inside your home without going to the gym. You can select any of the fitness regimes which are pre-loaded in this app and start working out accordingly.

Apart from fitness regimes the app also has over 160 different exercises which you can choose to remain fit. It also has Yoga which can benefit you even more. If you are not happy with those 160 exercises, then you can craft your exercise and start getting benefits of it. For the beginners, there is a six-week program to get fitter and stronger. You may also like to select plans for intermediate and advanced exercises. If you don’t have much time, then there are also five minutes stretch advise which you can do even in your office.

Price: Free
Download Sworkit Personalized Workouts App

#8. C25K Couch to 5K RunDouble

The app believes that you can run 5K despite being a couch potato! Yes, it has inbuilt programs which include zero to 10K and 5K to 10K and a half marathon training programs, and by following them religiously, you can gain fitness for sure. What’s more, this app also has an integration with MyFitnessPal, the app we already talked above. The app also has something which will not let you bore while exercising because the app allows you to create your favorite music playlists which you can listen while working out.

The best part of the app is the flexibility it gives you during your workout lessons. You can keep on editing your workouts by reducing or increasing according to your wish.

The free version of the app is just a trial version, and if you are ready to spend as low as $1.60, then you can unveil some of the best fitness tricks with the app.

Price: Free
Download Couch to 5K by RunDouble App

#9. Endomondo

Endomondo is hugely popular fitness app available right now on Google Play Store. It has gained 4.5 stars on the Play Store from over 434,000 downloads, and that shows the volumes about this app.

With Endomondo you can track your fitness every day and also track your performance and what kind of change you may need or not. What makes this app different than the other fitness apps is one feature which allows you to record pep talk and share it your friends. Even they can do the same and can advise each other on how to go that extra mile to remain fit.

The app also provides you the big list of other things you can do and access to gain that fitness which you always wanted. Make a personal training plan and also analyze your heart rate always. Again, this is a free download app, but you can also make $2.50 payment every month as an in-app purchase to get rid of ads and plenty more helpful features.

Price: Free
Download Endomondo App

#10. Google Fit

Ending this excellent list of the best fitness apps for Android, we are presenting the fitness app from Google. Surprisingly not lot many people talk about this app when it comes to discussing fitness apps, but Google Fit is working quietly on updating various cool features for you and we though you should take a look at this app. You can effortlessly track your fitness activities like walk, run or be cycling throughout the day on your smartphone and also on the Wear Watch. The app keeps track of your activities and gives you instant insights. You can check real-time status for each exercise you do.

The app will also keep you motivated by providing you details about your workouts. Set goals based on steps, time and distance. Check how much calories you burned and you can also receive personalized recommendations and be coaching for activity goals. You can check your activity details from anywhere, be it a phone, tablet or even website, fit.google.com easily.

Price: Free
Download Google Fit App

Uber “Greyball” Software Now Subject of Criminal Investigation

Company received subpoena from grand jury

The discovery of Uber’s “Greyball” software drew widespread public criticism to the ride-hailing company, and now it has prompted a criminal investigation. Reuters reports that the U.S. Department of Justice has begun an investigation into Uber’s use of the software to sniff out any criminal wrongdoings.

The software was used in areas that banned or restricted Uber to hide drivers from authorities who registered and used the app. It reportedly did this by searching credit card data for credit unions affiliated with law enforcement and checking social media profiles to see if the user was a cop. If it determined the ride request was coming from the fuzz, the app would send false info and the user would never be picked up. Uber admitted Greyball helped it identify government officials. An investigation in Portland, Oregon, a city where Uber was previously banned, revealed Greyball helped the company evade 16 Portland Bureau of Transportation officials in 2014. Not long after the software’s discovery, Uber promised to stop using it.

Now, two sources briefed on the matter tell Reuters that the Justice Department is in the early stages of investigating Uber, though it’s not known if the company was in violation of any federal laws or if anyone will be charged. Uber was served a subpoena from a Northern California grand jury for documents related to how Greyball functioned and where it was operational. The company is also conducting its own internal investigation.

The criminal probe is the latest in a series of scandals that have come to light in recent months. Uber has been accused of systemic sexual harassment, and Google spinoff Waymo is suing the company for allegedly stealing intellectual property.

Source: Reuters

Best Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus Charging Docks: Charge Your Smartphone Anywhere With Comfort

Want to have a charging dock, which you can use at work and home as well? Take a look at these best Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus charging docks.

For instant charging required when you are driving, we prepared the best Samsung Galaxy S8/S8 Plus car chargers. For the comfort of charging we even selected one of the best wireless chargers for Samsung Galaxy S8/S8 Plus. Now it’s time to choose the primary charging option, which is the best Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus charging docks.

Although you will find few wireless charging docks in this exclusive list too, our primary aim is to provide you the orthodox charging docks which you can carry anywhere, either at home/office or even when you are traveling. So, here we are with the best possible selection of the charging docks for your Galaxy S8 and S8+.

Best Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus Charging Docks

Charging Dock	Features
Encased	Sych Compatible	Check It Out
Wellci	Optimal View Angle	Check It Out
Kshion	Fast Charging	Check It Out
Nesee	Qi Compliant	Check It Out
Pasonomi	Multi Angle	Check It Out
Rnd Power Solutions	Case Compatible	Check It Out
Elaco	120Cm Coiled Cord	Check It Out
Monoy®	Fast Charging Dock	Check It Out
Womail	Wireless Charging	Check It Out
Minertech	USB Type C Cradle	Check It Out

#1. Encased

Encased is known for providing some great accessories for smartphones and here it is with a sleek designed charging dock, which you can use at your office and also at your home. With an open design, you can even watch videos by fixing your Samsung Galaxy S8 or S8 Plus horizontally.

Features of Encased Charging Dock

• Aluminum Black color of this charging dock syncs very well with the design of new Samsung flagship smartphones.
• Use it as a nightstand and can check time easily just in case you wake up in the middle of the sleep.
• Integrated Type C charging which ensures safer and quicker charging of your smartphone.
• You can sync your smartphone and computer with this doc with the inbuilt cable.

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#2. Wellci

We would not recommend the Wellci charging dock to be used at your home. The reason behind this is its design, and because of its design it would be a better idea to put it on your office desk, and that will only increase the looks of your working desk. Let us know more about this charging dock.

Features of Wellci Charging Dock

• Also get the USB Type C with this charging dock for complete charging.
• You can have the optimal view angle, which is ideal for watching videos or surfing the web while you are charging the smartphone.
• There are four rubber pads on the bottom of the dock, which will not let the dock sleep from the surface.

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#3. Kshion

If your working desk has a very little space to offer for a charging dock you need to purchase for your Samsung Galaxy S8 or S8 Plus, then have a look at this charging dock from Kshion. The area of this charging dock is so small that it can fit on any tablespace.

Features of Kshion Charging Dock

• Fits on any table or space at office, kitchen or bedroom without using much space.
• Comes with a 120cm coiled cord with is very easy to store and discourages tangles.
• Always get fast charging whether from wall charge or via PC or laptop USB port.
• This is a 100% brand new product and quality is guaranteed.
• Available in four different colors like Black, Blue, Silver and Rose Gold to give you a wider choice.

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#4. Nesee

Presenting one of the most elegant and beautiful charging docks you will ever find just for your Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus, which is designed by Nesee. The main component used for this fantastic looking charging dock is wood, and that is defeating almost all the charging docks we are presenting here.

Features of Nesee Charging Dock

• The best wooden material used not only to emboss the great looks but also to provide sturdiness.
• Equipped with short circuit protection and also works against overcharging or overheating.
• Vertical wireless charging will provide a faster charging solution.
• No problem using the smartphone while it is in charge, the acceptable distance must be 5mm.
• Make sure that you put the device in the magnetic inductive center.
• Available in attractive colors like brown and khaki.

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#5. PASONOMI

PASONOMI is a known brand for most of the smartphone accessories users, and it is bringing a differently looking charging dock for your Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus. Apart from the two new Samsung smartphones, it is compatible with most of the other smartphones as well.

Features of PASONOMI Charging Dock

• The adjustable 270-degree angle gives you the ideal angle for recording or watching videos and also comfortable for reading.
• The dock is adjustable, and it is smooth and firm, so your phone can remain stable the way you want to.
• The rubber protection gives extra protection for your device from sliding or scratches.
• Anti-slip silicon protects the phone from slipping.
• Get a lifetime replacement warranty. The company offers replacement or refund if you are not satisfied with the product.

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#6. RND Power Solutions

Another universal charging dock is here, and this time it is from RND Power Solutions. This charging dock works well with your Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus, and it provides you quicker and safer charging all the time. Select your charging dock from two color choices; black and white.

Features of RND Power Solutions Charging Dock

• Inbuilt Type C (USB-C) cable, which can give you fastest charging up to 3AMPS.
  Also get the data synchronization up to 480mbps.
• Made from highest quality plastic and the nickel-plated connector ensures stable, faster and reliable charging.
• The connected cable has 5 feet long cable.
• RND Power Solutions offers a 1-year hassle free warranty.

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#7. Elaco

This charging dock for Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus from Elaco is another charging dock, which can accommodate suite on your working station. As per Elaco, you can even use this charging dock in your bedroom and also in the kitchen, but the design of the dock suggest something else.

Features of Elaco Charging Dock

• This is a 100% brand new product from Elaco that gives you high-quality guarantee.
• Available with a 120cm coiled cord, which is easy to storage and doesn’t allow any bending.
• Excellent choice for students, travelers, and businessman as it is easy to carry.
• Get the fastest possible charging from laptop or PC USB port and even from the wall charging.

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#8. Monoy

Finally, an exclusive charging dock for Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus is here. Monoy is suggesting that only these two smartphones can be fit in this charging dock which has a unique but sleek design as well. The best option for those who are looking for an exclusive desktop charging dock.

Features of Monoy Charging Dock

• It will allow you to synchronize and charge your Samsung Galaxy S8 or S8 Plus in the best possible way.
• Very easy to fix the smartphone and get instant charging.
• Get the best angles for watching videos and listening to the videos while your smartphone is charging.
• You can even read ebooks with the hands-free comfort.
• Get the fastest possible charging of your Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus.

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#9. Womail

This Womail charging dock or cradle is providing safest and fastest charging speed always. You can be assured of protection against overcharging, overheating and short circuit. So feel safe while using this charging dock from Womail for your Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus.

Features of Womail Charging Dock

• It may look like an orthodox charging station, but it provides wireless charging.
• Non-slip base allows increased absorption and friction and makes you feel comfortable to use.
• Made from aluminum and metallic luster.
• Fast charging from laptop and PC also possible with 120cm coiled cord available with this dock.

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#10. Minertech

This is a simple charging dock with no extravagant features, which many other charging docks offer. To give your Galaxy S8 and S8+ the fastest possible charging and also the safest one, then you should look at this charging dock from Minertech.

Features of Minertech Charging Dock

• Select your charging dock from four colors: Black, Silver, Rose Gold and Blue.
• There is a 120cm coiled covered cord given with this charging dock which provides safe charging.
• Easy to store and easy to take anywhere, hence best for frequent travelers.

Checkout Price

Trust you will appreciate the variety we worked out for you to give you the best Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus charging docks. There are exclusive charging docks, fixed to charge docks, portable charging docks and above all, there are also wireless charging docks, and that provides a significant range for you to select your charging dock.

You must have noticed that in the list given above, most of the charging docks are compatible with cases as well, so you got comfortable enough of not removing the case while charging. If we are talking about compatibility, then most of the charging docks above are compatible with other Type C smartphones as well so you have flexibility at home and also at work.

Killer Robots and the Many Ways in Which AI Could Go Wrong

On October 19, 2012 an international coalition with the incredibly cool name of, The Campaign to Stop Killer Robots (yes, there are bumper stickers), formed to call for a preemptive ban on Lethal Autonomous Weapons (LAWS).

The Campaign to Stop Killer Robots is comprised of 63 non-governmental organizations (NGOs) including organizations like Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom. And while killer robots might sound like little more than the plot line to what is arguably one of the greatest Flaming Lips songs of all time, it’s actually not that crazy. LAWS are likely only years, not decades away, and they have the potential to herald “the third revolution in warfare, after gunpowder, and nuclear arms.”

It’s not hard to imagine how an army of killer robots could go wrong. What if they fell into the wrong hands? What if they turned on all of us? What about the millions of military personnel that will be out of work thanks to machines with human-like intelligence?

And these three questions largely represent the full scope of AI fears. Open Philanthropy is currently researching the potential dangers of transformative AI. Its early research provides more tidy categorizations for the above questions:

1. Misuse Risks
2. Accident Risks
3. Other Risks

Open Philanthropy’s work is primarily concerned with “global catastrophic risks,” risks that “could be globally destabilizing enough to permanently worsen humanity’s future or lead to human extinction.” But really these risks will show up wherever there is AI — whether that AI is powering military weapons or marketing campaigns. And understanding these risks is valuable to anyone working with AI, whether you’re an engineer or a CEO.

So, let’s take a look.

1.Misuse risks: These risks are all about what humans can do by choosing to misuse powerful AI technology. Of course, when it comes to something like killer robots, there’s a whole other question about whose hands are the “right hands.” This is the same kind of risk we took on by developing nuclear weapons. We create a monster that can be used for either good or evil. Holden Karnofsky, one of the researchers working on the Open Philanthropy project, summarizes with this:

I do not think we should let misuse scenarios dominate our thinking about the potential consequences of AI, any more than for any other powerful technology, but I do think it is worth asking whether there is anything we can do today to lay the groundwork for avoiding misuse risks in the future.

This sounds reassuring, but again, Open Philanthropy is only concerned with global catastrophic risks. Misuse risks have serious implications for business and individuals. Just look at the stream of companies constantly getting their hands smacked over data misuse (We’re looking at you, Uber and Unroll.me).

Data is the gasoline of artificial intelligence. As AI gets better, it will get harder for both governments and corporations to pass on the temptations of that powerful fuel.

2. Accident risks: These risks are about how AI could go wrong due to human error. In other words, what if humans build a killer robot so smart that it decides it doesn’t want to work for humans anymore, and would rather, in fact, destroy humanity. Oops! Someone should have caught that goal mismatch during the last code review.

This humanity-destroying AI could come in the physical form of a killer robot, or it could just be a killer algorithm with some mean hacking abilities (see short below).

https://thinkgrowth.org/media/5eb9ce7c2841c255d4f70c5a02020b8a?postId=31e31a221bd6

Funny YouTube videos aside, accident risks are worth digging deeper into because they are, by definition, preventable. In a paper released last year, Google Brain researchers along with researchers from Berkeley, Stanford, and OpenAI identified five concrete problems in AI safety.

The researchers use an example of a cleaning robot — harmless enough to not cause too much psychological discomfort, so let’s start there.

1. Avoiding negative side effects: You want your cleaning robot to clean, but not at the expense of frightening the dog or knocking over a glass of water.
2. Avoiding reward hacking: This might be the most human-like of all responses. Imagine a robot rewarded for clean spaces that chooses to disable its vision (see no mess, clean no mess), cover messes, or just hide whenever you’re around.
3. Scalable oversight: You want your cleaning robot to throw out an empty tube of toothpaste, but not your wedding ring. Will the robot know the difference?
4. Safe exploration: This has to do with learning. You want your cleaning robot to get better and more efficient over time, without hurting itself in the process. The researchers use a mopping example — you want your robot to experiment with mopping strategies, but never put a wet mop in an electrical outlet.
5. Robustness to distributional shift: This is another learning situation. If you train your cleaning robot in your small, minimalist, one-bedroom can it apply that learning to your parent’s house which recently has started to look like an episode of Hoarders?

Okay, so none of this sounds too bad, right? We’re talking about cleaning robots with behavior patterns not unlike a precocious five year old. But what happens when our army of killer robots tasked with keeping the peace happens into some “reward hacking”? Determining, perhaps correctly, that the best way to keep the peace on earth is to simply eliminate humans?

Bad robot!

But there are also some very present-day applications of these concrete problems. Last year, a Tesla in self-driving mode, was involved in a fatal crash for what boils down to “robustness to distributional shift” — the car was unable to detect the white side of a tractor-trailer against a brightly lit sky. The car had “learned” one thing in its training environment, but was unprepared for dealing with a much less predictable reality.

Or how about the scene in Alien:Resurrection when Ridley hops into the surgical machine designed only for men? She’s trying to find a category for “extract alien out of my uterus,” a scenario in which she’s banking on “robustness of distributional shift.” She needs the AI to understand the unique factors of her situation — being a woman hosting an alien — and make the appropriate decisions. (Spoiler: it does, and it’s an awesome scene.)

Also in the world of self-driving cars is the problem of “avoiding negative side effects.” If you’re about to hit someone, obviously you want your car to swerve to miss that person. But what if avoiding the person means you hit a wall? Or what if there’s a whole group of people in front of you and swerving means hitting a lone person? What should an “ethical car” do?

Or what about the issue of “scalable oversight” in the context of conversational UIs. Late last year a YouTube video began circulating of a toddler asking his Alexa for his toy — “Digger Digger.” Alexa misunderstood, delivering unexpectedly NSFW (or toddlers) responses.

It’s not hard to imagine a multitude of accident risks in the business context. Task an AI with running an email marketing campaign and it just might decide to scrape the web and turn into a mega spammer. Put it in charge of hiring and it might decide to hire only white men because minority employees churn at a higher rate. Ask it to grow your Twitter following and it might spawn its own army of follower bots.

3. Other risks: This is a dumping ground for less easily categorizable risks, like what happens when killer robots put millions of military personnel out of work? These are not sudden risks that result from an error; rather, these are creeping changes that threaten to upend our social order as AI rises in popularity.

For example, we’re on the cusp of tech-enabled humans at a scale that will make our iPhones look like Chutes & Ladders. Tech that will help people see, hear, communicate through our skin, and find healing at the hands of nanobots living in our bloodstream is already being developed. These advances will improve the lives of millions of people, but also bring with them new risks.This same technology could, and likely will be, used to give perfectly normal people superpowers.

One of the more bizarre risks of transformative AI is the potential emergence of a race of super humans with access to technology that makes them smarter, faster, and stronger than any human before them. Perhaps, even, immortal (see Project Gilgamesh).

A less futuristic example of how AI could have negative social impact can be found in crime detection technology. Last year, ProPublica released a story exploring how crime risk assessment software developed by Northpointe, was inherently biased:

“Overall, Northpointe’s assessment tool correctly predicts recidivism 61 percent of the time. But blacks are almost twice as likely as whites to be labeled a higher risk but not actually re-offend. It makes the opposite mistake among whites: They are much more likely than blacks to be labeled lower risk but go on to commit other crimes.”

The algorithm on its own is harmless, but becomes quite dangerous when people take action on it, which is exactly what it is designed to do. This has implications outside of crime.

In 2015 Breitbart News published a story on how women drop out of STEM fields at a higher rate than their male counterparts. The takeaway was that there should be a cap put on how many women should be allowed to enter STEM programs. You might scoff at this, yet this human conclusion is very similar to the conclusion reached by Northpointe’s software.

At least until recently, if you searched “C.E.O.” on Google the image results showed 11% women. Actually, 27% of CEOs in the United States are women. Start typing “Are transgender” into Google or Bing and autocomplete would prompt you with “going to hell.”

Machines are incapable of considering the systematic factors creating certain patterns in the data. Though to be fair to the machines, many humans are, as well.

The primary risk here is that humans interpret the recommendations of the machines as being somehow bias-free. Machines can only hold a mirror up to human behavior. We must be wary of interpreting the reflection as being a prediction of the future.

A fourth risk category?

Perhaps a better label for the range of risks in the “other risks” bucket might be something like “human response risks.” In other words, risks that don’t arise from the engineers building AI or the AI itself, but rather risks that arise based on how humans respond to AI — either as individual end-users taking action on algorithmic recommendations, or as a democracy choosing how to live in an AI-enabled world.

Which brings us to this present moment.

Transformative AI with human-like intelligence is coming. AI is already creeping into our lives with many of us not even realizing it. And what we choose to do today, what we choose to speak up for today, the people we vote into office today, what we let companies do with our data today, the ways in which we educate ourselves about AI today will determine the state of our tomorrow.

The Importance of Product-Channel Fit in Freemium

Over the past 16 months, at HubSpot, I’ve spent a lot of time working on two problems.

• “How do we scale user growth for our freemium products?”
• “How do we convert those free users into paying customers?”

There are a lot of examples of where companies adopt a freemium model, manage to scale their free user growth, but are unable to turn those users into an acceptable level of profit — Trello and Evernote are examples of companies who had that problem. But this isn’t the most common reason businesses abandon a freemium model.

The most common reason businesses pivot away from a freemium model is the inability to scale free user growth.

A good freemium funnel will convert users to paying customers at about 4%. That’s a low conversion rate and if you want to make it profitable, you need to have scale at the top of your freemium funnel. Getting that scale right is dependent on product-channel fit.

Finding Product-Channel Fit

HubSpot has grown a lot since 2006, and a lot of that growth is the result of organic traffic from Google. Frequently, this is traffic from people who are in ‘passive’ mode — these people are a good fit for our products but are not directly searching for them. Instead, they’re reading informational content on our blog or consuming our different content offers.

A reason Google works so well for us is we’re able to educate those in passive mode about our marketing product and how it can help them to grow their own business. The result is that HubSpot can generate revenue from users who are both in ‘passive’ and ‘buying’ mode, allowing us to continue scaling through Google.

We generate revenue from both ‘buying’ and ‘passive’ mode

But that product-channel fit breaks down when we try to apply it to our freemium CRM product. First, it’s difficult to convince people who are in a passive mode to try a new CRM, even one that’s free and easy to use. Second, there is less search traffic available for topics related to the CRM.

So our product-channel fit starts to look more like this:

HubSpot CRM Product-Channel Fit

When people are in buying mode for our free CRM product, our most important channels for acquiring new customers will be:

1. word of mouth (measured by NPS)
2. ranking for keywords where there is buying intent
3. appearing on sites that aggregate software reviews for our product.

For people in passive mode we’ll attempt to convert people to another free tool where there is less friction to signup or to join our email list so we can continue to engage and provide value to them until such a time as a % of them move into buying mode. Our most important channels will be:

1. attracting people through Google, but it will be for informational keywords, where people are looking for content related to their job and are not directly looking for our software.
2. attracting people via social advertising.

The goal is to dominate channels where people are in active buying mode, and for those in passive mode, offer a lower-friction product or content offer.

Looking at Zapier’s Product-Channel Fit

Let’s take another example, Zapier, a product that allows you to connect two different apps easily. They have over 1 million users signed up to their platform. Their product-channel fit might look something like this:

Zapier Product-Channel Fit

Again, in buying mode, WOM is going to be a big driver of Zapier’s signups. That’s the advantage of having over 1 million people signed up for your product. People talk 🙂 Like HubSpot’s marketing product, Zapier has product-channel fit that works for both users in buying and passive mode.

In buying mode Zapier can rank for content that’s relevant to people searching for integrations between two products:

People searching for specific integrations

Or they can rank for tool specific integrations:

Eventbrite Integrations

Another great opportunity for Zapier is to work with partners. They could promote their product to their partners’ users who are looking for an easy way to integrate that partner’s software with other applications.

Consider how much churn there is for freemium products, I bet there are a lot of cases where that churn would look better if users connected the product to others they’re already using via Zaps.

In passive mode, much like the HubSpot marketing product, Zapier can use the same channels to convert these people into either email subscribers or new accounts. Zapier can educate people on their product and convince a percentage of these to sign-up and try it.

For example, they can create content that ranks for product specific categories in Google and within that content link across to the integrations they have available for each product mentioned.

Appearing for content in ‘passive’ mode

There are also opportunities for Zapier to do a broader form of comarketing with partners to promote their new integrations to both audiences.

Now for the maybe bucket. It’s always worth considering new channels to test for user growth. Although most of a company’s growth will usually come from a couple of channels, being solely reliant on one can have pretty dire consequences. Take the example of the video sharing app Viddy, at one point it was adding 500k new users per day until a change in Facebook’s algorithm killed their entire business. They may have had product-channel fit, but they never diversified their mix to include at least another one or two channels.

The example I gave for Zapier is Youtube. ‘How to’ content performs well on the platform, and there could be potential for Zapier to tap into this. For example, let’s take Zapiers blog post on ‘project management apps’:

Zapier Project Management Apps — Blog Post

Looking through each of these I found a lot of videos that had thousands of views:

KanbanFlow Tutorial Video

There could be potential to work with users who are creating content on software that Zapier supports to give an overview of the different integrations available for that software and how users could benefit from them.

Making This Work For You

The earlier you consider product-channel fit, the better. The earlier you consider how your product will perform for people in ‘buying’ and ‘passive’ mode the better. Ideally, you should be thinking about product-channel fit as you’re building your product.

Product-channel fit should influence your product development roadmap. You’ll want to prioritize certain features that will help you generate users from a certain channel.

For example, RapGenius launched at a time when there was a lot of competition for searches around different song lyrics on Google. They added features that helped them to dominate this space and quickly scale their user growth. One of those ways involved allowing users to signup for an account and add commentary on what different lyrics meant. It helped to make RapGenius’s content a lot richer than competitors and in turn helped their pages to rank higher in Google.

Adding commentary around Rap Lyrics

It’s certainly something that can affect your go to market decisions. Having a product that doesn’t perform well in the ‘passive’ space will mean a higher cost of acquisition as you’ll need to dominate the space for a smaller group of people (those in ‘buying’ mode).

It’s Worth It

Spending time on identifying your product-channel fit can be a really valuable exercise, particularly for new products that you’re bringing to market.

Lack of Product-Channel fit is one of the main reasons your freemium model will fail.

It’s something you should consider when deciding on your go to market, and could save you a lot of future pain in pivoting away from a freemium funnel.

Stop Hiring People You Don’t Like

My name was signed to each email in the thread… but I hadn’t written any of it.

It just wasn’t computing in my head how this could have happened.

Shocked, I stuttered to my employee, “What is this? How did you think this was okay to use my name, to pretend to be me, without telling me?”

She said, “Well, when I worked for other people before, they were always cool with me sending emails as them. It removed the hassle for them. I thought you’d be grateful to me for this.”

If “grateful” was code for “hold the phone, what on earth just happened,” I could roll with that.

The trouble was, these emails weren’t in my voice and the influencer on the other end of the exchange didn’t even know.

And how would I tell him?

“Oh, by the way, my employee was writing these emails and signing them as me, without my knowledge.”

What kind of person allows that to happen?!

Clearly I must have communicated to her somewhere along the line that this was okay.

I know she had the best intentions and was only trying to help, but I never meant to give her license to act so independently of me, as me.

As frustrated as I was, I knew that I must have done something to bring about the situation, so I set out to learn from my mistake and make better hires from there.

And that, I did. My second employee was a dream, and she’s still here to this day as my right-hand woman.

In total, I’ve made 10 hires: 7 of them long-standing and wonderful.

Here’s what I’ve learned about hiring and keeping the best and what I make of how 3 didn’t work out:

1. What did I do wrong with the first hire, and what did I do right with the second? When my first hire offered to “take the burden of marketing from me,” I all too easily let her.

In hindsight, it was clear from our first conversation that she was more comfortable being directive rather than directed by anyone, including me.

In my frenzy to get help with marketing, I irresponsibly overlooked that.

“Conveniently overlooking” is precisely what led to the, “Why the hell is my name signed to emails I didn’t write?” moment.

My second hire and all the 7/10 who have been DREAM HIRES all have this in common: They are thoughtful, engaged, enjoyable people who are inspired by my company and have already been doing inspired work before finding me.

For example, here’s how things fell into place with my successful second hire…

I won her over with my hiring ad.

In it, I was very specific about what I was looking for and what I imagined my future hire was looking for.

I had carefully considered exactly who I wanted on my team: values, disposition, even down to season in life.

In the ad, I specifically wrote,

“Who You Are: Stay-at-home-parent (or parent-to-be!) who doesn’t want to choose raising a family versus an exciting, fulfilling career life. You want BOTH alongside each other, adding to a rich and vibrant work-life balance.”

That really landed with her.

She’d just had her first baby two months prior and had been hoping for exactly what I outlined.

She loved the feel of Introverted Alpha and the idea of working for a young company, so she was a Yes before we even got on the phone.

I was also a Yes to her before we got on the phone because of her extraordinarily detailed and thoughtful application answers she emailed me ahead of time.

It was love at first call and continues on that way to this day. We are both so happy working together, and we’ve been able to accomplish amazing things.

2. All my awesome hires are people I could be friends with. We don’t go out drinking every night after work, though especially when we hit a big milestone, we all want to! (We are all working from home across North America, so that would be quite a coordination.) But whenever we talk, there is such a synergy and mutual respect.

To accomplish this, I just noticed how I felt reading their applications.

• Do I feel drawn to this person?
• Does she seem positive, resourceful, and smart?

I really paid attention.

In the two cases where I already knew them personally, I imagined how I’d feel working with them and having them become part of Introverted Alpha.

Because I really thought about how much I liked them and how I’d like working with them day-to-day, they’ve worked out beautifully.

3. What happened with the 3 who weren’t good fits? My three hires who didn’t work out only stayed a couple of months each, and their reason for being let go fell into one of two camps:

Two had personalities that were too dominant for my leadership style.

For some leaders whose style is different from mine, more competitive and dominant, dominant employees can be truly excellent fits.

Since my leadership style is more relaxed and co-creative, I work best with people who are the same.

They enjoy the flow of being collaborative and creative within the direction I’ve set for them, rather than pushing to follow their independent vision within the company or being so distracted with other things that they’re not present at Introverted Alpha. (All 7 are extremely present, and it’s a gift every day.)

I realized after a bit of experience that it’s smoothest and most fun for everyone when I hire people who do fit my style than having to change my style altogether.

The other hire that didn’t work out struggled with the technology and communication style of our North American business, as she was halfway across the world. That kind of distance can work well for other businesses; it just didn’t for mine in that case.

Stop hiring people you don’t like.

Team culture is everything.

How we feel around each other every day (even if we’re a 100% remote team) infuses how we do everything, which of course translates to our leads’ and clients’ experiences.

A huge damper on things is hiring people who are not the right fit. It really is about that right fit personality-wise, values-wise, humor-wise even.

The “right fit” doesn’t equal “exact clone.” For example, a few of my core team members are Myers Briggs INTJ types while my type is ENFP (two very different kinds of people).

I like to hire more cautious, analytical types to balance out my risk-friendly nature. We complement each other, and we’re just enough alike to share laughs and enjoy collaborating daily.

So why do we hire people we don’t like?

On the one hand, maybe we want someone to “rescue” us from what we don’t know, like how I did with my first employee.

I abdicated an entire area of business to her and wondered why it didn’t work out later.

On the other hand, maybe it’s because we don’t know we can have better fits.

It’s like dating.

At Introverted Alpha, we help smart introverted guys attract the right women for them without having to be someone they’re not.

So it’s like when my guys say to me, “How do I get that unhappy, closed-off woman at the bar to like me?”

I ask them, “Why are you trying to talk to a woman you don’t like?”

Then we bask in a lightbulb moment together.

They quickly realize the reason is they hadn’t known they could focus on attracting the right people for them.

That requires getting CRYSTAL CLEAR on what we want in a date or an addition to our team:

• What kind of values?
• What kind of disposition?
• What kind of sense of humor?

In dating and in business, success comes with being aware of how we feel around different people and paying honest attention to whether there’s a true fit.

When we do that, everyone wins.

Best Samsung Gear VR Games: Jump into the Exciting Virtual Reality Gaming World

If you are confused about which games you should spend money on or which games are available for free for the Samsung Gear VR, then here is the complete list of the best Samsung Gear VR Games.

There were days when we used to play those dotted Interfaced video games at home and in some countries they were available at video parlors only. But now the time has changed. After video game gone digital, they can be found on smart devices, and the ultimate level is VR gaming. So, here we are with the best Samsung Gear VR games which we have selected just for you.

In this exclusive list of the Virtual Reality Games for your Samsung Gear VR, there are many games which will totally turn your gaming experience. If you are using VR for the first time, then let us tell you it can become addictive for sure.

We are also providing you a great mixture of paid and free Gear VR games so that you can choose the download according to your budget.

10 Best Samsung Gear VR (Virtual Reality) Games

Before we start knowing more about each game, let us clarify that all these games are distributed by Oculus which is an integral part of Samsung Gear VR, and hence we stuck with the official download links of Oculus only and avoided any third party downloads.

So, just feel free and get the original and high-quality VR games only from Oculus from the download links given just below the game description.

#1. Dark Days

If you are a fan of horror games, then you will certainly like Dark Days. With the virtual reality images and surround sound the effect of the game will be more frightful. This is a story of a lost soul which is stuck in a hotel room, and different characters are helping you to know what is going on. While playing this game, you would feel that you are a part of the story and not playing a game.

It is a single player game and you will need no WiFi connection to play it. Most of the game reviewers have given a big thumbs up to this game. Hence we feel that we should also give it a try. So if you are ready to get thrilled by paying a small price, get Dark Eyes on your Samsung Gear VR headset. So, get, set, terrified and enjoy the horror gaming on your VR!

Price: $7.99
Download Dark Eyes from Oculus

#2. Manchester

Manchester will make you remember of those good old games you used to play during your childhood with its retro colors. It is a racing game where you have to switch lanes to pass obstacles and avoid getting hit by rockets. You need to collect the green dot in the sky to achieve good heights in the game.

The best part of this game is that it comes with five game packs and thus you can play four games extra by paying for just one game. Very comfortable in playing and both kids aging more than 3 years and adults can enjoy it at par.

Although you cannot say that Manchester is the game meant for VR but it keeps on luring you to achieve more and more and that is where you forget everything and enjoy the gaming.

Price: $2.99
Download Manchester from Oculus

#3. Great Header

When you play soccer in the field, you need to use your foot and head to score a goal. With Great Header VR game for Samsung Gear VR, you can use your head and touchpad to score more and more. Here the combination of head and the touchpad will let you hit the targets, balloons and more.

This game has no story behind it all you need to do is to achieve higher goals all the time. One of the best games for killing time and what’s more the game comes for free, so you can always play it whenever you wish to. So, if you are carrying a soccer dream, then Great Header is meant for you.

Price: Free
Download Great Header from Oculus

#4. Minecraft

One can easily say that Minecraft is one of the most popular games seen in any generation. Now Minecraft has become one of the premium Virtual Reality games for Samsung Gear VR, and it has the same old blend of building blocks, explore and battling mobs. This Gear VR version of Minecraft is a pocket edition, and you can play with your friend and play on the pocket edition servers. You can play two modes in which one of the modes will allow you to play as the main character and the second mode is like playing the game on your TV or phone screen with ease.

Minecraft is told to be a very addictive game, and one can keep on playing for hours, and that is why you probably need a lightweight playing Samsung Gear VR.

Price: $6.99
Download Minecraft from Oculus

#5. Lands End

Lands End is one of the best-reviewed games which is available on Samsung Gear VR. The game is a puzzle game which has five different chapters. You will experience the serene sunsets, blocky mountains, and other beautiful backgrounds while playing Lands End and that too in VR which will be ultimate. Enter at the one end of the landscape and keep on solving the puzzles till you get the exit and reach the next level.

It is very simple to control this games, and the instructions given are very easy to understand as well. Major tech gurus like WIRED, The Verge, Engadget, and CNET have praised this game like anything.

Price: $5.99
Download Land’s End from Oculus

#6. Anshar Wars 2

This is part 2 of the Anshar Wars game in which you have to fly a variety of spacecraft by the movements of your head. To shoot the enemies, you need to use the touchpad. You got space crafts like Ansharian Fighter, Bomber and EMP ships which are available across 13 large mission fields. You not only have to eliminate your enemies but also have to dodge space debris and asteroid fields by steering your shop also by moving your head.

The best part of this game is the 360-degree view, and it will be well advised if you use a swiveling chair to get the best out of this feature. You can even fly to alien planets and have to hit the ground targets while battling with enemies in the air.

Price: $9.99
Download Anshar Wars 2 from Oculus

#7. Oculus Arcade

Once you see Oculus Arcade, you will probably call it one of the best free games for Samsung Gear VR. Actually, Oculus Arcade is a pack of the good old time games like Pac-Man, Sonic, Galaga, Defender, Gauntlet, Sega, Midway, and Namco. So if you want to go back to the memories without paying anything at all, then Oculus Arcade is the place for you. Mind you all these games are 2D games, but for the old time’s sake, it is worth trying to play on Samsung Gear VR.

Although Oculus Arcade is a free game but to play unlimited games, you need to pay. It would sound and feel odd to play small 2D games in a VR headset but as we said anything to relive the childhood memories.

Price: Free
Download Oculus Arcade from Oculus

#8. Hitman Go: VR Edition

Hitman Go is a turn-based strategy VR game which is beautifully purified in diorama-style set pieces. What you need to do is to make your navigation strategy on a fixed space given on the grid to avoid enemies and take out your target or just infiltrate into the well-guarded locations. This is an action game, but you will certainly need to use a lot from your mind and think your next strategy carefully. You will get amazing tools like disguises, sniper rifles, distractions and much more.

Hitman Go belongs to the ‘Go Family’ which produced Laura Croft Go and Deus Ex Go games in the past. Hitman Go became hugely popular on Google Play Store, and now it is here with its VR version on Samsung Gear VR.

Price: $7.99
Download Hitman Go: VR Edition from Oculus

#9. Skylight

One of the best games on Samsung VR for the age group of 12 and above. This is another space mission game, and at the starting point, it shows you a holographic projector which indicates that your fleet is floating in the space and waiting for your orders while it is facing the enemies. So, right from the beginning, it becomes very captivated. Get the entire fleet of fighters, specialized frigates, and giant capital ships as you take charge towards the victory.

Although you need to have an internet connection for the downloadable content, you will not need the internet to play it. The game is absolutely free to download and play but to play the full game, you need to do the in-app purchases which will cost you around $4.99.

Price: Free
Download Skylight from Oculus

#10. Totems in Dreamland

This is a story based game where a small boy Xiaoshan falls asleep while reading a book about legendary lost totems. After falling asleep Xiaoshan goes into a mystic dreamland where he has to fight against orcs, dragons, mummies and has to collect the totems. In the game your head becomes Xiaoshan, and you have to use the touchpad or one of the best gamepads for Samsung VR to jump and avoid the enemies. You can just move your neck and feel relaxed to get the maximum out of your game.

The atmosphere of the game is extremely dreaming like where you can see floors and walls having different angles which we generally don’t find in our world. All in all, it is a very innocent and a good game to kill your time, and it is available for free.

Price: Free
Download Totems In Dreamland from Oculus

Bonus

#11. Suicide Squad: Special Ops VR

There were different opinions about the Suicide Squad movie when it was released. Whatever the views were about the film, this official game of the movie will certainly let you enjoy the actual VR world. You can become one of the three top characters of the movie and then you are out there to save the world from increasingly challenging piles of enemies. To increase your scores, you need to hit the combos, and that will also let you survive for long as you keep on marching ahead on the leaderboard.

The game is very easy to play and will not be much botheration for your device. So, just go and save the world from its enemies!

Price: Free
Download Suicide Squad: Special Ops VR from Oculus

We made sure that you get the choice from all kinds of VR games and this list doesn’t become stereotyped or one-sided at all. If you check the list given above carefully.

You may also know about how to set up Gear VR with Samsung Galaxy S7/S7 Edge and enhance your VR experience fully with best Samsung Gear VR accessories.

Best Android Camera Apps of 2017: Capture Every Moment Brilliantly!

In this dynamic world, we are always on the move stumbling upon those picture perfect moments and wondering if our Smartphone had the best Android camera apps. There are many instances where we hardly have time to take out our digital cam or carry those DSLRs with us.

In all those times, our Smartphone is our best companion for capturing those rare moments like a sunset or a rainbow for that matter. Especially for amateur photographers, Smartphone is a boon.

We never know when a picture perfect moment might arrive so all we can do is to keep our Smartphone handy and well-equipped. This is where camera apps come to play. Android Smartphone offers a vast scope of photography with its amazing camera apps. Keeping this in mind, we have enlisted the best Android camera apps for you to explore and let the clicking game begin.

10 Best Android Camera Apps of 2017

#1. Candy Camera

Candy Camera is one app which has beautifying filters and also a silent mode. By using these two excellent features, you can take some of the amazing selfies anywhere and at any time. There are more than 1,000,000 active users of Candy Camera which speaks volumes of this app. You will find a broad range of filters which are specific for selfies. Using these filters will make your selfie looking fantastic. Changing filters is also easy with this app as you just need to swipe left or right to change them.

Price: Free
Download Candy Camera

#2. Retrica

If you are looking for the best selfie cameras, then you must give a good look to Retrica because there are over 300 million users of this camera app. If an app has this vast amount of user base, then one can understand the amount of trust they have put in. What makes Retrica unique is that the selfie or video you take from this app will give you natural looks. There are some great filters which will help you to enhance what you click or record. This app is just perfect for every occasion and fits your requirements perfectly.

Price: Free
Download Retrica

#3. YouCam

Are you looking for a perfect selfie camera? Your answer lies here. With YouCam you can take some amazing real-time selfies and videos and also add stickers, make frames and collages and do whatever you want to do with your captures. With this app you need not a studio to make your selfie look great, just use the inbuilt filters, and that’s it! What’s more? You can quickly remove wrinkles, erase pimples, edit tired eyes and also reshape your face. What else one needs in an Android camera app?

Price: Free
Download YouCam

#4. Bestie

We all know what Bestie means, right? So just like your best friend this app also helps you to get natural and radiant complexion retouching on the selfies you have clicked. You can also reshape your face and change the entire feature of it. Make your skin smooth, white or bright with different filters available with this app. There are some filters for a portrait as well which will stun you, to say the least. Just use animated stickers and make your selfie look more attractive than ever before.

Price: Free
Download Bestie

#5. BeautyPlus

Around 100 million people around the globe are using the BeautyPlus app to make their selfies look best and different. You can express your style statement with this app as it has an upgraded version of AnimeCam. This upgraded cam will transform your selfies into an animated collage and that will ultimately express your creativity and will give you more popularity on different social media networks. You can quickly add filters to your skin and face which will make your picture look even better.

Price: Free
Download BeautyPlus

#6. Cymera

Cymera is a widely popular app amongst hobbyist photographers. It ranks in the list of the most popular and one of the highest rates camera apps for Android. You can use the app for taking pictures as well and then you can edit them directly. There is a lot of editing goodness available, and its filters are something you will have a hard time deciding on selecting just one. Cymera is different from other usual camera apps as it uses standards features like face shots. The interface is clean, and filters are nothing but the best.

Price: Free with in-app purchases
Download Cymera

#7. Open Camera

The open Camera, as the name says, is an open source camera project that is hugely popular among masses for its features. It enjoys high user rating and is a favorite among amateur photographers for its simple design. It comes packed with a plethora of features like white balance, exposure settings, ISO settings and auto stabilization. You can get creative with its focus and zoom modes. The app provides pretty much we need to edit our pictures. Nothing can get better than having a free yet incredible app.

Price: Free
Download Open Camera

#8. DSLR Camera Pro

If you do not have an actual DSLR Camera, you can still enjoy many of its features with this one. The DSLR Camera Pro app is worth every penny. You can easily fool your friends into thinking that you clicked the pictures with a DSLR camera. The features like ISO settings, exposure, and white balance effects along with grids are just fantastic to use to get those high-quality pictures. Besides these, you can also add geotags to your pictures, and there are many effects to transform your shots in just one click. Your Smartphone needs to be compatible to use all of its features, and it will turn out to be your best purchase ever.

Price: $2.99
Download DSLR Camera Pro

#9. Paper Camera

Paper Camera is one of the highest ranked camera apps that enjoy high credibility among Android users. It is not easy to believe as the app has just one filter. Still, users are fond of that filter, and you can customize that single filter as per your requirements. The app is fun to use, and you can edit your pictures as well as your videos in it. While you are applying the filter or customizing it, the app will simultaneously show your unedited work so that can line up with your work seamlessly.

Price: $1.99
Download Paper Camera

#10. Camera 360 Ultimate

This camera app is a hit among Android users to this extent that it is said to be the best camera app for Android. The app is packed with some amazing features, and since it has been here for a long time, it understands the editing needs of users well. All the basic editing features that you can imagine like white balance, focus, zoom, exposure are packed along with some filters and effects. The recent version is updated with additional features for an enhanced camera experience.

Price: Free
Download Camera 360 Ultimate

We hope you liked our selection of 10 best Android Camera Apps that will cater to every audience. Have fun to edit your pictures with them and never let any picture perfect moment skip without a capture.

Sharing is caring! Do share it with your friends and especially the photography lovers you know so that they don’t miss out on any good Android camera app.

How to Find Lost Android Phone Using Google Search

The days are gone when we used to carry a bulky phone with us. Now is the time of slim and beautiful smart devices that are light weight and hardly feels in the pocket. With the huge competition of Android phone manufacturers, the devices are getting thinner and light weight day by day.

As the devices are sleek, we often tend to place them here and there all the time and then forgetting where it was placed. It’s good if you have misplaced your device in your home or office, but in case you have lost it somewhere else then Google search can help you locate it. Yes, I am talking about Google Search engine which we use quite frequently.

Google Search can track your device and also ring it, so you can locate it if you have lost in your home or office. If your device is stolen or lost somewhere else, then Google Search can also give you a pin point location of your device. Now, you might be wondering how you can use this awesome feature of Google. That’s what this post is all about, just stay with us till the end.

Before we proceed with the guide section, you should know the basic criteria for Google Search to locate your device. You device should have the Google App installed, Now cards enabled, Web & App activity enabled, Google Now notifications turned on and lastly, Location access should be set to “High Accuracy” from the Settings app.

Step #1. On your PC or Mac, open any browser and log in to your Google account. You should log in with the same Google ID that is used on your Android device.

Step #2. In the Google Search box, type “find my phone“.

Step #3. Give Google some time to breathe and it will show you the location of your phone on a map. It might not be the pinpoint location, but it will surely give you an idea of where your phone is.

Step #4. The above map gives you the location of your Android device. But if you have lost your phone in your room, then you can also ring it to full volume so that you can locate it easily. To do that, you can either click the “Ring” icon or click the link on the map to ring it.

That’s it; by now, even if you phone is stolen or lost in your room, you should be easily able to locate it. There are many third-party apps available on Play Store that provides Android tracking facility. But if it is from Google itself, there’s no reason to switch for other apps.

Best Fitbit Alta HR Bands: A Replacement Bands for Fitbit Alta HR Activity Tracker

Looking for replacement bands for your Fitbit Alta HR fitness watch which is stylish as well as guarantees total protection? Here is the complete list of such exclusive and best Fitbit Alta HR Bands.

We already prepared the exclusive list of the best Fitbit Alta bands, which changed the entire look of your fitness smartwatch. Now it is time to give you bands replacement ideas with these best Fitbit Alta HR bands. With an extra care of taking style into the account along with the protection, we went through a big number of such bands and then selected these bands.

Not only the style and security but we also took care about the quality of the products and also the choices in material as well. Here you will find Fitbit Alta HR replacement wristband made from stainless steel, PU, silicon and genuine leather as well. So you have a wonderful choice in your hands.

There are certain brands which are offering good numbers of bands for Fitbit Alta HR smartwatch in one pack. We selected those packs as well so that you get good savings on money on each of your purchase. If you decide to buy those packs then believe us you can change your Fitbit Alta HR bands almost every single day in a week without letting them repeated.

So, all in all, you will enjoy your selection and when you enjoy something the ultimate result will always make you happy.Wishing you a very happy shopping friends!

10 Best Fitbit Alta HR Replacement Bands

Fitbit Alta HR Bands
Benestellar	Check It Out
Swees	Check It Out
Maledan	Check It Out
AK	Check It Out
POY	Check It Out
Oitom	Check It Out
Gincoband	Check It Out
Umtele	Check It Out
Bayite	Check It Out
Kingbaas	Check It Out

#1. BeneStellar

BebeStellar is currently giving you an irresistible offer of a 12 pack Fitbit Alta HR bands. If you compare this pack’s price with other such bands, you will see that this is going to be a money saving offer and there is no reason why don’t you accept it, looking at the quality of these bands as well.

Features of BeneStellar Band

• 12 highly attractive and addictive color choices for you in just one pack.
• Personalize your Fitbit Alta HR according to your mood and outfit.
• Extremely comfortable to wear and replace.
• Made from durable and best silicon material.
• Wear them anytime as it is fit for exercise, sweat, sleep travel and much more.
• It is an adjustable band with wrists sizes between 5.5″ to 8.9″.

Checkout Price

#2. Swees

We have noticed that most of the professionals who are using Fitbit Alta HR either go for a leather variant or a metal one when it comes to select a replacement band. So, for those professionals, we are presenting this Swees metal band which is exquisite looking and fits the image of a professional very well.

Features of Swees Band

• Perfect fit for Fitbit Alta HR as it can be fixed and removed quickly.
• The metal clasp will give the secure lock to the smartwatch.
• Made from premium stainless steel mesh with unique magnet clasp which gives your watch fashionable look.
• Fully durable, comfortable and smooth touch when you wear it for the entire day.
• The strong metal clasp will also provide best wearing experience.
• Available in 12 different and attractive color choices.

Checkout Price

#3. Maledan

Another excellent metal band for your Fitbit Alta HR smartwatch is here. Maledan which is the manufacturer for this replacement band is offering this piece in two different sizes, and thus you can select the one which you feel can best fit your wrist.

Features of Maledan Band

• Made from excellent material which is durable and lasts long.
• This Fitbit Alta HR band has a design of bracelet hence it can be a good choice for ladies.
• The quality stainless steel used makes this band look extremely elegant and comfortable to wear.
• There are two sizes available for both small and large sizes of wrists.
• Easy to resize the band with different strong magnetic closure.
• The company offers one-year hassle-free money back warranty.
• Select your band from six different options available.

Checkout Price

#4. AK

Another pack of colorful bands is here, and this time it is brought by AK a known brand for accessories. You will get good and low price choice on selected options, so choose your replacement band from AK for your very own Fitbit Alta HR band carefully.

Features of AK Band

• Personalize your Fitbit Alta HR band according to your mood with so many color options.
• Made from the best TPU material for smooth and rash-free wearing.
• Men and Women both can have different bands as the company offers this option.
• Excellent choice for sports events, meeting and even dating.
• The freely adjustable band and can fit almost any wrist according to circumstances of individual wrists.

Checkout Price

#5. POY

We already mentioned that metal and leather replacements for Fitbit Alta HR bands are the first choices for the professionals. We already showed a metal replacement and not it is time for a leather replacement band for your Fitbit Alta HR from POY.

Features of POY Band

• Exquisite looking band replacement for your Fitbit Alta HR fitness watch.
• Fits comfortably with wrists sizes between 5.5 inches to 8.1 inches.
• There are precise multiple alternative holes which will adjust the suitable length for your wrist.
• Made from genuine leather material means you have the best quality material.
• Comes with metal clasps on both the ends for secure locking.
• POY offers 30 days money back warranty.

Checkout Price

#6. Oitom

Oitom is one of the respected brands around when it comes to providing secure and great looking bands for various smartwatches. Today, we have selected a metal band from Oitom which will add more value to the looks of your Fitbit Alta HR.

Features for Oitom Band

• Available in two different sizes for different wrists.
• The Large sized band is good enough for the wrists size between 6.7″ and 9.3.”
• The small sized band from Oitom can handle wrists between 5.1″ to 6.7″.
• A wide range of colors like Gold, Pink, Blue, Brown, Silver, Black, and Rainbow.
• Replace the original band with this band by just using its unique fully magnetic Milanese loop, which needs no tool to fix.
• 18-month warranty of unconditional refund.

Checkout Price

#7. GinCoband

We have seen few replacement bands here which are available in 12 band packs, but over here GinCoband is offering three replacement bands for Fitbit Alta HR fitness watch with multiple color choices as well. Overall this can also become a great option for you to save some money.

Features of GinCoband Band

• It is very easy to install or remove this replacement band.
• The buckle design gives you not only the comfort but security for your gadget as well.
• There are numerous and precise holes which will help to adjust your wrist size.
• Made from high quality and durable material which is waterproof as well.
• You have 12 different color choices to fit your daily fashion statement.

Checkout Price

#8. UMTELE

UMTELE is another known and respected brand for manufacturing some of the coolest and brightest replacement bands for various smartwatches. For Fitbit Alta HR too UMTELE has a broad range of alternative bands which will certainly steal your heart without a doubt.

Features of UMTELE Band

• This replacement band has a precise measurement for 5″ to 8″ wrists.
• Made from silicon material which is of top quality.
• Silicon material is also human skin friendly hence there is no chance of your skin getting rashes.
• Metal adjustable buckle clasp brings the old fashioned look but very comfortable to wear as well.
• There are ten pin holes for fine-tuning according to your wrist size.
• UMTELE offers one year’s unconditional refund guarantee.

Checkout Price

#9. bayite

A great looking leather replacement band for your Fitbit Alta HR is here, and it is presented by bayite. The band is available in 9 different colors, and all you need to do is to pick up the band which suits your personality and style. For all those executives, they should give these bands a good look for sure.

Features of bayite Band

• Made from top quality genuine leather to give you smooth and secure feel.
• Best fit for the wrist sizes between 5.5″ to 8.1.”
• Ten holes at precise gap will make sure that you get a perfect wearing.
• Stainless steel buckle, not only adds value to the looks but also secures your fitness watch.
• Get 1-year warranty with replacement or full refund without returning the belt.

Checkout Price

#10. KingBaas

Finally, a replacement band made for Fitbit Alta HR which can win the hearts of ladies is here. This beautifully crafted alternative band from KingBass looks so elegant that it will be very hard for any woman to deny purchasing it.

Features of KingBaas band

• You can personalize your Alta HR with this band with outstanding crystal which will make your watch look elegant and upscale.
• The company also provide a tool so that you can remove the links easily and can fit your size.
• The standard size which can fit this band is between 5.5″ and 8.1.”
• If you have any quality issue after the purchase, you can quickly ask for a full refund without even returning it.

Checkout Price

We can bet that after going through this exclusive list of the Fitbit Alta HR bands, you will need not to go anywhere else to find a perfect band for your fitness smartwatch.

Once you select any band from the list above, do let us know which one you picked and what prompted you to do so.

Best Samsung Galaxy S8/S8 Plus Car Chargers: Faster & Flexible Charging While You Drive

If you are always in the need of charging your smartphones while driving then these best car chargers for Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus will certainly help you.

There are many ways of charging your smartphone. The most popular way is to charge from wall fixed plug, and the other way is to charge by power banks. With new flagship smartphones from Samsung, you can charge them with the best Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus wireless chargers. But you need best Samsung Galaxy S8/S8 Plus car chargers when you are driving.

When you need to reach an important meeting, and you need your smartphones with full juice, you probably need one of these car chargers for sure. These car chargers are safe and have passed all the safety and quality standards. All of these car chargers are also equipped with smart technologies which will give you not only the fastest charging but also secure charging as well.

Best Car Chargers for Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus

Car Charger	Features
Noot	2 Port Usb	Check It Out
Choetech	3.0 Usb Type	Check It Out
Trianium	Dual Usb Port	Check It Out
Maxboost	Quick Charge 3.0	Check It Out
Jelly Comb	3Ft Charge	Check It Out
Cellet	Retractable Charger	Check It Out
Spigen	Dual Output Usb	Check It Out
Nekteck	5.4A Usb-C	Check It Out
Usbelieve	Rapid Car Charger	Check It Out
Ivoler	Quick Charge 3.0	Check It Out

#1. Noot

A relatively new brand on offer here, but Noot car charger for Galaxy S8/S8 Plus is no less in providing quality charging and safety. All those necessary measures are taken in this car charger with an extra addition of great look.

Features of Noot Car Charger

• Equipped with 36W Qualcomm Quick Charge 3.0 which provides safe charging.
• You can charge two devices at the same time while driving the car.
• Each USB port auto-detects the amount of charging power a device needs and charges it accordingly.
• There is also a 3 feet USB 2.0 Type C to A charging cable provided with the pack for a comfortable placing of your device.
• Noot offers 24 months hassle free warranty.

Checkout Price

#2. CHOETECH

Although you can proudly attach CHOETECH’s name with any accessory, it provides for a smart gadget, but when it comes to car chargers, there is hardly any alternative to this brand. You can always depend and trust any car charger produced by CHOETECH, and this one is no different.

Features of CHOETECH car charger

• The CHOETECH car charger can charge your device four times faster.
• Auto detect port at the bottom which makes sure fastest charging speed possible.
• Compatible with most of the Android devices along with Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus that gives you more flexibility.
• Meets any of your charging demands and charges your device at full speed.
• Secured from over current, overcharging and short circuit.
• Get 18-month warranty with this product.

Checkout Price

#3. Trianium

A very compact looking Trianium car charger is here for your Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus smartphone. Because of its compact design, it is very easy to carry, and you can even put it in your pocket or a small pocket of your traveling bag.

Features of Trianium Car Charger

• While using this car charger your device’s charging time will be reduced by 70%
  Equipped with Quick Charge 3.0 technology for safe charging.
• Allows two devices to charge simultaneously.
• Blue colored LED light at the top indicates that charger is ready to use.
• Safety is certified and hence guaranteed as this car charger protects your device from any serious dangers.
• Made with heavy duty aluminum frame which will ensure its durability.
• Compatible with most of the Android devices which will allow you flexibility.
• Get 12 months hassle free warranty and friendly customer services.

Checkout Price

#4. Maxboost

Maxboost is another trusted brand which has an exceptional capability in manufacturing some excellent car chargers for us. This car charger which is although compatible with many Android devices and also with iPhones it will certainly match your charging requirements for Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus.

Features of Maxboost Car Charger

• Certified Qualcomm Quick Charge 3.0 Port output.
• Integrated 3FT microUSB cable for easy charging.
• Get your device charged with almost 80% fast charging than many other car chargers available in the market.
• Identifies smart devices automatically and provides charging accordingly.
• Also, has backward compatible with all the version of Qualcomm Quick Charge Technology.
• External soft glow LED ring lights up while plugged and can be useful in the dark and will not distract while driving.

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#5. Jelly Comb

Jelly Comb car charger we are going to present now carries an entirely different design. Without going much into its design, this car charger for Jelly Comb can be a good option for you to charge your Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus while driving.

Features of Jelly Comb Car Charger

• Different design, Fast charging to three different smart devices at once.
• Freely charge your smartphone while on the drive with all the standard functions of it are on.
• The inbuilt 3 feet Type C cable makes it easy for you to have easy charging.
• The SI Smart Identification technique allows intelligent identification of all 5V devices, and hence it delivers exactly the right amount of power as per your device’s needs.
• Secure against over current, over voltage, overload, and short circuit.
• Charging stops automatically after your device is fully charged.
• Inbuilt LED indicator allows the ease of usage at night without getting distracted while driving.

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#6. Cellet

One can easily say that this car charger from Cellet is a typical car charger for any smartphone including Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus. It has almost all the features that you require in a car charger, and it doesn’t make any extraordinary shouting about it. What’s more, this Cellet car charger is one of the most reviewed car chargers on Amazon!

Features of Cellet Car Charger

• Best suited for Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus and also compatible with other smartphones and tablets.
• 15 Watts / 3 AMPS output.
• As per new industry standards, it has a capacity of reversible USB Type-C connector.
• Guarantees 3 years of hassle free warranty.
• Blue color light helpful in dark conditions.

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#7. Spigen

There can be no list of accessory declared complete until and unless there is a product from Spigen in it. Spigen is a market leader in smartphone accessories, and it provides top most quality of accessories and this car charger from Spigen is no different.

Features of Spigen Car Charger

• Charge two devices at the same time with this car charger.
• Get the highly efficient charging speed for both the devices.
• Total risk-free charging from over current and over charging.
• No worries about overheating as well as charging will stop once the device is fully charged.
• Compatible with the latest industry standards to match all the safety measures.
• Four-time fast charging than the standard charging.
• Up to 38% more efficient charging than many other car chargers available in the market currently.

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#8. Nekteck

Nekteck is another known brand for car chargers, and this piece is also very popular among its users as it has got great rankings on Amazon. This is a USB Type C car charger which is equipped with the latest requirements of the industry, and hence you can have safe charging of your smartphone.

Features of Nekteck Car Charger

• Superior quality USB C 3.1 for easy charging.
• A newly designed car charger for your Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus which is fully reversible.
• Allows plugin without fail no matter how you are holding and inserting the cable.
• Equipped with Smart sense IC technology which identifies the device and how much charging it needs.
• Made from high-quality fireproof anti-oxidation aluminum pull tab.
• Certified by RoHS, CE & FCC authorities for guaranteed safety and high performance.

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#9. USBelieve

An excellent car charger from USBelieve which provides 27W power with an inbuilt cable. The cable can give you a good comfortable charging extension while you are driving. For the rapid charging of your Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus, you should take a look at this car charger’s features.

Features of USBelieve Car Charger

• Apart from S8 and S8 Plus, this car charger is compatible with most of the smart gadgets.
• With 1 USB Port and 1 USB-C Cable, you can charge two devices at the same time.
• Adds minimum bulk to your device and can put it in your bag and purse without any trouble.
• Gives 12/18 volt output and it is compatible with all standard cigarette-lighter sockets.

Checkout Price

#10. iVoler

iVoler is another respected brand in car chargers, and that is visible in the number of rankings it has got on Amazon. More than 1100 users have ranked this product as their top choice product. So, we can easily trust this car charger for sure.

Features of iVoler Car Charger

• Charge your device four times faster than any other car charger from this.
• It has a backward compatibility with all the versions of Qualcomm Quick Charge technology.
• Certified by CE, FCC, and RoHS, so safety is always guaranteed.
• Made from A grade materials and premium circuitry ensures the best performance.
• Multiple inbuilt safeguards will give protection against overcurrent, overcharging and overheating.
• Get 3.3ft long USB type C cable for flexible charging.
• The company offers 18 months warranty.

Checkout Price

Now you must get the idea that all these car chargers we introduced above are highly secured from overheating, overcharging and short circuit. Not only the safety purpose, but most of the charger comes with either inbuilt or unattached USB C Type cable so that you can have a greater flexibility while charging and driving.

Checkout the List of best Galaxy S8/S8 Accessories like best Samsung Galaxy S8 Plus wallet cases, Samsung Galaxy S8 Plus cases from Spigen, Samsung Galaxy S8 cases from Spigen, best Samsung Galaxy S8 Plus screen protectors, best Samsung Galaxy S8 screen protectors, best Samsung Galaxy S8 Plus cases, and best Samsung Galaxy S8 cases.

We believe there can’t be any greater or better list of the best Galaxy S8/ S8 Plus car chargers for than what you will get above. So, start selecting a car charger for your Samsung Galaxy S8 or S8 Plus now and once you get the charger delivered and start using do give us your feedback.

Why Venture Capitalists Don’t Do Marketing Like the Rest of Us

And what all of us can learn from them

Marketing would be a whole lot easier if you were giving away money.

Right?!

Suddenly getting (and keeping) peoples’ attention would get pretty damn simple.

So you might be inclined to look at venture capital marketing and write off the whole marketing strategy. It wouldn’t work for me, you might think, I’m not giving away money.

Of course…neither are VCs. And while I’m not going to attempt to convince you that the widget you’re selling is more exciting than funding — it’s probably not — I will attempt to convince you that any B2B company has a lot to learn from how VCs do marketing.

The best VC marketing places both firm and partner in a position of strength, and they gain this position of strength, not just because of what they do (funding), but by how they do it. This strategy has implications for any B2B company.

If you boiled the VC marketing strategy down to one sentence it would be this: Know more about your space than anyone else — and prove it constantly.

The history of VC marketing

Early 2000’s

History never gives us a neat line marking the beginning or end of a thing, but if you had to choose, if you had to identify the line of demarcation between “before VC firms did marketing” and “after VC firms did marketing” you would place it in 2001, the year that Mary Meeker published her first Internet Trends report.

Mary Meeker’s Internet Trends report is arguably the longest running piece of content marketing as well as the most influential. In 2012, Wired named Mary Meeker the queen of the internet. Digital nerds, myself included, plan our day around the release of this report:

https://twitter.com/Janehux/status/738532650235760640?ref_src=twsrc

And Wall Street also pays close attention:

 https://twitter.com/cyberomin/status/763737869999599616?ref_src=twsrc

Mary Meeker’s report changed the game for how venture capital firms did marketing. 2001 was the tail end of the dot com bubble bust, a time when fear was high and trust was low. The Internet Trends Report was never created to be a lead-gen tool. It was created to show that Mary Meeker knew more about the world of internet companies than anyone else, and they proved it with data and research.

This model has become a defining characteristic of how venture capital firms do marketing. It’s not about generating leads or press or even necessarily about providing helpful content and resources. Venture capital marketing is 100% about proving that you, personally, are the smartest in your business.

Twitter and the emergence of the thought leader

2004–2010

But while the Mary Meeker report set the gold standard for how VCs do marketing, it was nearly a decade before her strategy of creating content that proves expertise reached popular adoption. In 2004, Brad Feld published his first post on Feld Thoughts. In 2007, Jason M. Lemkin joined Twitter. In 2008, David Skok started his blog, For Entrepreneurs. In 2010, Ben Horowitz started Ben’s Blog.

Across all of these tactics, you see a similar trend emerge — the focus is always on showing that you know more about your space than anyone else, and proving this by regularly writing thoughtful posts about what’s happening in that space.

Very few of these early adopters of VC marketing followed the same research-heavy, data-rich approach used by Meeker, but they held on tightly to the idea of delivering a unique perspective that shows their personal expertise.

Tapping new channels

2010–2014

As competition in the area of VC thought leadership started heating up, the level of professionalism and the pursuit of new channels followed.

In 2010, Brad Feld published the first of his seven books on startups. In 2013, Jason Lemkin answered the first of his 2,000+ Quora questions. In 2014, Marc Andreessen introduced the world to the power of the tweetstorm. Each of these individuals carved out a niche for themselves by being the first to a platform or applying a new approach to an established platform.

Marc Andreessen Tweetstorm about disruption

The content itself hit an evolutionary inflection point. There were now fewer quippy thoughts and more talk of sales models, CAC, ARR. The focus was still on demonstrating personal expertise, but doing that took going a layer deeper.

Building communities

2014-present

Today, you will be hard pressed to find a venture capital firm where at least one partner isn’t actively producing content in an effort to position themselves as the smartest VC out there. But more and more, VCs are also bringing in help. Rather than individual partners demonstrating expertise, the craft is evolving to demonstrate the expertise of the firm itself.

In 2014, Andreessen Horowitz became the first VC firm to break into podcasting. Bringing on Sonal Chokshi, senior editor from Wired, to build a podcast that, today, is listened to by an average of 20,000 people per episode.

In 2015, First Round brought on Camille Ricketts to grow their new publication, First Round Review. Rickets approach to content marketing was less partner focused and instead provided extreme value to entrepreneurs by connecting them to the thinking and ideas of operators.

In 2015, Jason Lemkin launched SaaStr Annual. By 2017, the event was bringing in over 10,000 attendees and heralded as the single best place to meet and mingle with like minded entrepreneurs.

What people are saying about SaaStr Annual.

This updated approach positions, not just a partner, but an entire firm as being experts on a space; relying heavily on the community around them to help make this point. Podcasts, in-person events, publications — all of these tactics show off the deep connections a firm has in given space.

Learning from VCs

For the past 14 years, the way that VCs do marketing has placed them in a position of strength. They know more about the space they occupy than anyone else, and you trust them because they are constantly proving it to you. But they are not the only companies (or people) for whom this works:

• SaaS: Danielle Morrill built an incredibly strong SaaS brand for her company, Mattermark, by publishing research reports on the funding landscape. Some of it is gated, but a lot of the good stuff is just given away completely free.
• Non-profit: Kimberly Bryant is the founder of Black Girls Code, and boasts a Twitter following of over 20k. Like VCs, she regularly tweets about the space she works in — diversity in tech and leadership.
• Consulting: Kevin Hillstrom has never gated a single piece of content, but year after year he’s published blog posts that demonstrate his incredibly deep expertise in ecommerce and catalogue businesses. He’s built a consulting business with over 200 global clients.

High numbers of pageviews, big email lists, and marketing funnels feel good because they scale. But Ben Horowitz and Mary Meeker don’t need a giant email list because they’re never going to put you a 5-email drip. And they’re not going to put you on a 5-email drip because they have something so much more valuable — they’ve earned our trust.

How to be Good at Marketing

“Yea, but he doesn’t really know marketing.”

She was talking about her husband. He works in marketing, apparently.

She clarified, “He’s a designer. More than anything, he’s an artist. He doesn’t really know how to (air quotes) ‘market’ things.”

I feel for this guy.

The truth is the majority of people who work in marketing, don’t actually know marketing. They know a facet of marketing.

They’re not bad at marketing either. They simply handle one piece of the pie.

Pieces of the Marketing Pie

They know their piece of the pie does X. And they do that.

To know marketing is to understand that marketing works as a system.

The system has two sides that work together.

Side One: What you tell people about your organization.
Side Two: What people’s subjective experience is with your organization.

Marketers are experts in Side One.

They help tell people about your organization through your logo, your photography, your colors, your ads emails, your Tweets…

They forget that there is another side to marketing because that part (they believe) is out of their jurisdiction.

It’s in Side Two.

Side Two lives in other departments. It’s in customer service, product development, the front desk lady, the POS system…domains marketing isn’t allowed to touch.

Can’t touch this

That side feels like the Wild West.

And we hate the Wild West. Bandits pop up everywhere, the terrain is a nightmare, and you’re likely to get dysentery.

No thanks. We like our marketing done by-the-book, so there are no surprises.

Templates and Skillshare courses, please. You have a proprietary method? Perfect, sign me up.

We like by-the-book marketing because it gives us the illusion of certainty. We’re not going in totally blind. We have a roadmap.

Unfortunately, marketing — real marketing — doesn’t have a road map.

It’s a sloppy messy series of things you do that may not work.

The good news is that you don’t have to understand marketing to be good at marketing.

You don’t need fancy software, complicated spreadsheets, or a word-smithing genius.

To be good at marketing, you only need to understand one thing: People.

You don’t need to “learn marketing.”

You need to learn people. Study people. Pay attention to people.

When you pay attention, you realize you’ve been asking the wrong question this entire time.

You’ve been asking, “How do we market this?”

The real question is: “Who is this for? And why should they care?”

And when you can answer that (honestly), you’re good at marketing.

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Margo Aaron is the winner of many Participation Trophies and a lifelong Day Walker. She writes about the dubious underbelly of marketing and other lighthearted topics at That Seems Important.

Pope Francis worries a Trump nuclear war with North Korea could wipe out ‘large part of humanity’

Pope Francis addresses a joint meeting of Congress in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 24, 2015. Photo courtesy of REUTERS/Jim Bourg

Pope Francis told reporters over the weekend that a nuclear war between the United States and North Korea could destroy a “large part of humanity.”

According to CNN, the pope was traveling from Egypt to Italy when he echoed earlier remarks about the danger of a “piecemeal third world war.”

“It’s piecemeal but the pieces are getting larger, and are concentrated in places which were already hot,” Pope Francis explained. “Today a wider war would destroy, I won’t say half of humanity, but a large part of humanity and culture. It would be terrible. I don’t think humanity today could bear it.”

“I think the United Nations has the duty to resume its leadership, because it has been watered down a bit,” the pope said, adding that a third-party nation like Norway could help mediate talks between North Korea and the United States.

An app analyzes texts to see if people like you. So I tried it on my husband

Crushh claims it can objectively scan for signs of affection in texts from a friend, family member or first date. But does it work?

The founder of Crushh says he built the app after he watched his friend try to navigate the dating scene in New York. Photograph: Alamy Stock Photo

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Olivia Solon in San Francisco

Wednesday 26 April 2017 03.00 EDT Last modified on Wednesday 26 April 2017 14.16 EDT

Husband: Morning. How’s my Livvy? Missed you last night. How are the girls?

Me: Having a lovely time. Was Beez [our dog] OK? Did he sleep?

Husband: He did. And he also did a poo in the kitchen.

Me: Oh 😦

Husband: It’s fine. On tiles and it rained so hard last night he didn’t want to poo outside.

Big money, big ego, big bills: how to get divorced Silicon Valley style

Read more

This 2014 exchange marks the peak of my husband’s affection for me, according to Crushh, an “algorithm-driven app that reads your text messages and can interpret how much the other person likes you”.

The system reads your text interactions with another person, analyzing frequency, responsiveness and sentiment and taking into account demographic trends (40-year-old men don’t tend to use emoji) to spit out a score out of 5. The higher the score, the more into you the other person is. A solid 2.5 means you like (or hate) each other equally (as is the case in my marriage, thankfully).

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The Crushh app.

“We overanalyze messages and tend to hand our smartphone to friends thinking they can be objective about it. But they can’t. Imagine the friend being a machine that has perfect recollection and can learn from hundreds of thousands of relationships,” said Es Lee, the creator of Crushh.

My teenage self thinks this app is a godsend. Finally I can know with scientific accuracy how much my crush is into me. Cast aside the plucked flower petals, origami fortune tellers or the crude love calculator tests, this is the real deal.

But let’s face it, it’s probably not.

Lee told the Guardian that he built the app after his friend moved to New York and was struggling to navigate the dating scene. The friend had gone on a date with a girl and thought he had hit if off but she wasn’t responding to his texts.

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He loves me, he loves me not: the writer analyses text messages from her husband. Photograph: Crushh app

“I looked at his texts and could tell that she liked him; I have been on the dating scene for a while and can read between the lines,” he said.

At first he thought Crushh would most appeal to young people who haven’t yet mastered their emotions or ability to read others, but he was surprised to find there was appetite from a broader audience.

“Let’s say you are a 25-year-old woman and met this 40-year-old man and he doesn’t seem that interested in you. He replies three hours later with no emojis or positive things and he seems so blase. You would read that as face value: ‘I guess he’s not interested’.”

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Message from the writer’s mother relating to a woman who was crushed to death by falling debris at a building site near the writer’s office. Photograph: Crushh app

However, Lee explained, because Crushh analyzes the texts of thousands of people it knows “that’s just how 40-year-old men text”. Relationship angst averted.

The app has informed decisions in Lee’s own love life, helping him pick between two women. “I was unsure about how each of them felt about me. So I used the app.”

He was surprised by the results: the woman he thought was more keen produced a lower score than the one he thought wasn’t that into him. So he went on another date with the latter, while giving up on the former.

“While we’re in a relationship our emotions and desires can obscure obvious signs,” he said. The app in this particular case provided me some objectivity that I could act on.”

It is kind of creepy. I totally admit that … But people are going to analyze messages anyway

Es Lee, Crushh founder

In another instance he sent an uncharacteristic emoji to woman he was dating. “The algorithm figured out that I never use emojis so when I did it was meaningful.”

The date responded enthusiastically, and there was a corresponding spike in the relationship score. “It was a good validation of the algorithm,” said Lee.

In addition to an overall score, there is also a bar chart indicating “engagement” and “interest”. Engagement quantifies how frequently the person contacts you and how quickly they respond. Interest looks for features in the text, including emojis and sentiment. “I am not very expressive [in text messages], so I make up for it with engagement,” said Lee.

Currently the app only acts as a diagnosis tool. It gives you a score and some charts but doesn’t offer tips on how to improve the relationship. Lee said he’s working with sociologists and psychologists to understand the data better before introducing such features.

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Is it creepy to analyze someone’s texts without them knowing? Photograph: Crushh app

Crushh has two major practical drawbacks: it’s only available on Android devices, not iPhones, and it only analyzes SMS messages – so it’s no good for WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger or any other means of communication.

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Then there are the ethical drawbacks. Isn’t it a little creepy to be secretly scanning your interactions with other people?

“It is kind of creepy. I totally admit to that,” said Lee. “But people are going to analyze messages anyway, so we’re just using technology to our benefit.”

Beyond the creep factor, outsourcing our emotional intelligence to a computer seems a little dehumanizing. Shouldn’t grown adults be able to ask the other person how they feel?

“Relationships would be a lot easier if people worked this way, but often people won’t ask because of fear or the expectation they won’t get an honest answer,” said Lee.

“[Crushh] puts hard data to things we may already feel, which makes the how-do-you-feel-about-me conversation more broachable.”

The app launches on 29 April on the Google Play store.

10 Reasons to Meet With a VC Associate

A lot of founders these days are being coached to avoid meeting with associates. Articles like these encourage founders to only meet with general partners (GPs), or risk being a part of a “fishing expedition” at their own expense.

While I can understand a number of reasons to avoid putting an extra step between yourself and a check writer at a venture capital firm — extra time/work, they could wrongly ding you when the GP would actually love you and your company — there are also quite a number of reasons to go ahead and meet.

Even the most junior of junior, cold-emailing, non-check writing associates (or “principals,” “partners,” “investors,” etc.) can add some value. Here are a few reasons to take the meeting:

1. Associates do the diligence.

Associates are often the ones analyzing the financial plans, adjusting assumptions, doing reference check calls, and so on. They also often write the investment memos, which are quite important in shaping the views of the GPs who weren’t on the deal team.

It is very easy when putting together these materials to focus on either the positive or the negative components of your business and team. If you’ve developed some rapport and a connection with the associate, they are more likely to see (and emphasize in their materials) the more flattering side of things.

2. They are motivated to get a deal done.

Venture capitalists are made, not born, and they are made by doing deals. While your average GP may be up to his eyeballs in portfolio company woes, your average associate is chomping at the bit to get a deal done — stat — and brag all over the internet about it. That deal could be yours!

3. They don’t know their ABCs, and that’s a good thing.

While a GP has seen a hundred ways for a company to fail, associates are still bright-eyed and hopeful. They haven’t been through the gut-wrenching experiences of firesales or filing for ABC. (Full disclosure — I looked up ABC for the first time a few weeks ago…)

4. They may be all you can have (at least at first).

Many firms are structured in a way such that associates are the gatekeepers to the GPs. This isn’t done to be obnoxious, or to enable the GPs to sit around at the country club counting their LP fee dollars. This is because GPs are *really* busy. They’re in long board meetings, on the phone with their portfolio CEOs, and dealing with whatever fire drill is happening in their most troubled company. One day your company may be that troubled company, and you will be extremely thankful that the associates are providing leverage to your board advisor so she can take your call.

5. Because today’s associate could be tomorrow’s GP.

The GP who hired me, Dan Scholnick, sourced New Relic to Trinity Ventures as an associate. He championed the deal within Trinity, took a board seat, and a few years later stood next to founder, Lew Cirne, as he rang the NASDAQ bell at their IPO.

Granted, this is not the typical scenario, but my point is, you don’t know what will happen. Today’s associate may be a GP at their firm (or another one) in a few years. You may be raising a new round of financing, or even starting a new company altogether, and find yourself appreciative of the relationship you developed early on.

6. They may have something helpful to offer.

Associates are meeting with founders and other venture capitalists all day, every day. While you’ve been buried in your latest A/B test, they’ve likely met with a bunch of your competitors, or other founders and up-and-coming operators who could have some valuable support to send your way. Ask the associate for something specific (e.g., an introduction, perspective on your space, help recruiting). If they dig you and your company, they’ll do their best, and maybe even deliver!

7. You might make a new friend.

As cheesy as this sounds, it’s true. Some of the founders, and journalists and seed investors, I’ve met through work have become very close friends. One of the first founders I ever brought into Trinity is now dating a former roommate. Another founder I met through work just got *engaged* to one of my friends. The world is big, and many venture capitalists are natural-born connectors. Might not be so bad to have a few of them in your rolodex (or Snapchat friends list 😉

8. Goodwill is the currency of Silicon Valley.

A founder told me recently that he hits the spam button whenever he receives an email from an associate. That is really harsh! Associates are just trying to do their job, and if you blow us off, I promise you, we remember. Also, karma bites. Don’t take my word for it? Sarah Tavel, GP at Greylock Partners can confirm.

9. It’s just a meeting, not a marriage proposal.

If you are *really* that heads down, or crunched for time, how about having a quick phone call? If you have nothing to discuss, or the associate is truly unhelpful, you can wrap it up after 15–20 minutes with a promise to get in touch in the future, “when you’re raising.” If said associate is actually so painful to meet with, you likely won’t have to do a second meeting anyway. You either had very bad founder/investor chemistry, or they may be struggling…

10. And, one last bonus reason — you might want to hire them.

Lots of associates are working in venture to find their next gig. They’re typically decently intelligent, thoughtful, and hard-working. Might make a great hire for your budding team!

So there you have it, a few reasons to go ahead and take that coffee or phone call. Best of luck in your fundraising (or non-fundraising). May your meetings be fruitful, short & sweet!

Best Fitbit Alternatives 2017: Top Activity Trackers You Can Buy Right Now!

One cannot question the quality standards Fitbit has created. With so many best Fitbit apps for Android and iPhone, it has become the best fitness gadget world around. There is nothing which can beat Fitbit at a technology level, but still, there are some complaints about it, and people are searching for best Fitbit alternatives due to that the claims only.

Complaints like getting rashes on the skin because of the extended use are the most familiar with the Fitbit users. Fitbit promises that they are working on this and the rashes do not remain for a longer period. But still one has to admit that there is a problem.

As I mentioned above that technically there is hardly any discrepancy one can find in Fitbit, but still, if you are looking for an alternative, you can find it, and I am here to help you out to find one as well.

#1. NIKE + FUELBAND

If not Fitbit then what? If this question is bothering you before selecting an alternative for Fitbit then what can be the better option than NIKE? NIKE is one of the best options you can think about while choosing a fitness gadget which is not Fitbit. NIKE + FUELBAND gives you almost the same facilities which your Fitbit can offer.

NIKE + FUELBAND will track your fitness activities every day including counting of steps, an amount of calories burnt and plenty of other things. Set your goals and this gadget will help you to achieve them. This band also keeps you giving information about how you can improve your daily fitness routine.

Not only when you are exercising, but also the NIKE + FUELBAND also takes care of your sleep as well. The app of this band is compatible with iPhone only and not with Android, but still an excellent Fitbit option to look for.

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#2. Microsoft Band 2

One can easily call this band as a complete gadget to track your daily fitness activities. I can even add that you cannot just call it a fitness tracker because it gives you more than that. It monitored your steps, calorie intake and burned, heart rate, sleep just like a regular fitness gadget. What makes Microsoft Band 2 different than others is that it also alerts you to your phone calls, social media notifications, texts, emails, and calendar reminders as well.

Microsoft Band 2 carries some unique features like sun intensity measuring sensor and GPS mapping. You can also get information about your workout training, and this gadget will update you with constant tracking of your heart-rate. Microsoft also has an affiliation with TaylorMade hence it is the best gadget for the golfers.

Microsoft Band 2 available in three different sizes and it is compatible with iPhone, Android and of course Windows phones.

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#3. Pebble Time Steel Smartwatch

Pebble is another known brand, and I can say it is growing popularity at very fast rate and soon can give real competition to Fitbit. So if a brand is good enough to give competition to Fitbit, it can indeed become a real alternative to it as well. Pebble smart devices come in many shapes and size, and it works well with Android, though it is compatible with iPhones as well. It measures your steps and sleeps and almost all your daily exercise activities.

Pebble has a strong partnership with some of the big names like Jawbone, Misfit Swim.com, and ESPN. Apart from fitness apps, Pebble is loaded with some great mobile gaming to keep you attached to it. The best part of Pebble is its long lasting battery which can last for at least a week on a single charge. If you are looking for a better alternative to Fitbit, the Pebble can come close to it.

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#4. Samsung Galaxy Gear Fit

Along with fitness tracker, you will also get a smartwatch features in Samsung Galaxy Gear Fit. This is probably the slimmest smart watch cum fitness tracker you will ever see. This most attractive gadget has the Super AMOLED screen to add to its beauty. The smart watch is protected against dust and water, and you can track your daily activities easily.

Measure your heart beats, steps and get daily feedback on your activities without fail from Samsung Galaxy Wear. Not only that you can even get notified about your messages, emails, and alarms. Customize this fitness wear as per your wishes. With that, you got the brand name Samsung which you can always trust.

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#5. Adidas MiCoach Fit Smart

If you want to concentrate more on your heart rates than anything else, then you should go for Adidas MiCoach Fit Smart. This device has a unique heart rate tracking features. Once you wear it on your wrists, it will start monitoring your heart rate, and you will be informed about it always.

What makes Adidas MiCoach Fit Smart different than the rest is that it has a special coaching features as well. This feature will keep on motivating you, and it will train you to become fit and smart. If you are a real athlete or want to become one by going through some tough training sessions, then I believe Adidas MiCoach is the best alternative for you to Fitbit.

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These were the five best alternatives to Fitbit fitness gadgets. We have taken care that you get the best options by providing you products offered by known and trusted brands only. Hope you liked this feature.

 

Trump: Chance of ‘major, major conflict’ with North Korea

http://player.theplatform.com/p/7wvmTC/MSNBCEmbeddedOffSite?guid=n_maddow_ckorea_170427

Rachel Maddow reports breaking news that in an interview with Reuters Donald Trump has said that there is a chance of a “major, major conflict” with North Korea.

2017 Aston Martin DB11: Is It the Most Important Aston Martin Ever Made?

On this episode of Ignition presented by Tire Rack (http://www.tirerack.com), Jonny Lieberman takes a close look at the first product from Aston Martin’s Second Century plan, the stunning DB11. Stunning, it should be noted, both inside and out. Riding on an all-new platform, the DB11 also sports an all-new twin-turbo 5.2L V-12 engine that makes 600 hp. Jonny is immediately enamored of Gaydon’s latest but worries he’s not sufficiently British enough to properly explain the DB11 to the audience. So he calls in the help of his friend and 24 Hours of Le Mans winner Justin Bell. Jonny and Justin then proceed to reanalyze the DB11. Next up, Jonny shows off the new Aston to 24 Hours of Daytona winner Randy Pobst, before Randy puts the big GT through its paces on terrifyingly fast Big Willow track. Is the DB11 good enough to help propel Aston Martin through the 21st century and beyond? Watch and find out.

Trump plan will slash taxes for rich people and corporations — and deliver a major boon to his own family

Donald and Ivanka Trump in the White House (NASA/Bill Ingalls)

By Brad Reed

President Donald Trump on Wednesday unveiled his tax reform proposal — and it contains massive giveaways for America’s richest individuals.

Among other things, the plan would completely eliminate both the alternative minimum tax and the inheritance tax — two taxes that were designed to stop rich people from gaming the system to avoid paying any taxes.

The plan would also slash the corporate tax rate down to just 15%, which would be lower than what millions of Americans pay on their individual taxes.

Additionally, the plan would condense the current seven income tax brackets down to just three brackets that would come in at 10%, 25% and 35%.

“Our basic premise here is to simplify the tax system, lower rates and make it easy,” said top White House economic adviser Gary Cohn.

The plan also says it will at least partially offset the drop in revenue from the elimination of “special interest” deductions — but it also didn’t list any specific deductions it would kill.

Trump Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin said during a press conference that President Trump will still not release his own taxes, despite the fact that critics have claimed that we need to see them to understand if Trump is crafting policy designed to maximize benefits to his own family.

A healthy 3-foot-long giant rabbit is found dead after United flight

(CNN)United Airlines has taken another blow to its image after a giant, apparently healthy rabbit died following a transcontinental flight.

The bunny was found dead at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport, the same place passenger David Dao was dragged off a United flight earlier this month — dragging United’s reputation through the mud.

It happened when Simon, a 3-foot-long, 10-month-old Continental Giant rabbit, flew in from London’s Heathrow Airport to O’Hare on April 19.

“I haven’t got a clue who’s to blame, but it’s certainly very weird when Simon was so healthy,” said Annette Edwards, a breeder who sold the bunny.

The bunny was on his way to a new owner and died in the cargo hold area while waiting for a connecting flight, Edwards told CNN.

“A man in America wanted him brought over. He wanted to bring him over as a pet,” she said.

Simon is the progeny of Darius, who holds the Guinness world record for longest rabbit. He potentially could have surpassed his father’s size, Edwards said.

Darius (pictured) is Simon’s dad

“I just feel that it’s such a sad thing that I didn’t really want to discuss it,” she said. “It’s never happened before, because if a rabbit has a full health check you don’t expect them to die.”

United ‘saddened’

In a statement sent to CNN, United said it was “saddened to hear this news.”

“The safety and well being of all the animals that travel with us is of the utmost importance to United Airlines and our PetSafe team,” the statement said. “We have been in contact with our customer and have offered assistance. We are reviewing this matter.”

The Department of Transportation reports on deaths on animals traveling by air every year and says the numbers are down.

According to its Air Travel Consumer Report (ATCR), 26 animals died in 2016. Compare that to how many animals were transported: 523,743.

CNN’s Chris Liakos contributed to this report.

Best Portable Battery Chargers: Work with iPhone, iPad, Android, or Nintendo Switch

Here are the best portable battery chargers which can charge any of the smart devices available with you.

In the past, we gave you the best power banks for Google Pixel and Pixel XL, best power banks for LG V20 and even the best power banks for iPhone 7 and 7 Plus. But now it is time to have best portable battery chargers, which are compatible with almost every smart devices like iPhone, iPad, Android, or Nintendo Switch. These power banks will give us extra flexibility if we are using more than one brand of devices at home or work.

The portable battery chargers we selected are compatible with most of the devices around like iPhones, iPads, Tablets and almost all the Android devices, so you will have a comfort of carrying just a single portable charging battery pack for all your devices and charging any device without worrying about selecting a wrong portable battery pack.

One more thing you will be happy to know which is that these power banks have multiple USB ports so you can charge more than one smart device simultaneously.

Before writing this list, we made sure that we will give you a benchmark of the minimum battery capacity of 10000mAh so that you not only get the greater flexibility in power but also you get the best value for the money you are spending on these portable battery packs.

10 Best Portable Battery Chargers for All of Your Smart Devices

All these products are small and compact in size and also stylish. So just go through the list carefully and decide which portable battery pack will suit your needs the most.

Portable Battery Pack	Features
Ravpower	20100Mah Capacity	Check It Out
Powerjak	13000Mah Dual Usb	Check It Out
Aukey	10400Mah Capacity	Check It Out
Fibonic	20800Mah Capacity	Check It Out
Tohlo	20000Mah – 2 Port	Check It Out
Amazonbasics	16,100Mah Capacity	Check It Out
Polanfo	20000Mah Capacity	Check It Out
Imuto	20000Mah Capacity	Check It Out
Ec Technology	22400Mah Capacity	Check It Out
Smartech	10000Mah Capacity	Check It Out

#1. RAVPower

RAVPower is giving us one of the best reviewed portable battery chargers on Amazon. This is a USB C/Type C portable battery pack with a whopping capacity of 20100mAh. This power bank is compatible with most of the smart gadgets including Macbook.

Features of RAVPower Portable Battery Pack

• Quickly charges your device and hence it saves your time.
• A universal portable battery charger which charges iPhones, iPads, Tablets, Android smartphones and even certain gaming gadgets.
• You can even play your favorite games on your Nintendo Switch while charging it with this pack.
• Equipped with Qualcomm Quick Charge 3.0 technology so it can charge up to 80% within 35 minutes.
• Charges your device 27% faster and saves power consumption by 45%.
• It can charge any device with a full charge from 5 times to 8 times.
• With 4-LED indicator, it will keep you informed on current battery status.
• Automatically shuts down in the case of short circuit or overload, hence 100% safe.

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#2. PowerJak

PowerJak is offering one of the best backup battery options for your smartphone. Be it iPhone or Android smartphone, PowerJak can charge it. The sleek designed power bank not only looks good but because of the design, it can become the best option to charge your device while traveling.

Features of PowerJak Battery Pack

• Carries 13000mAh power with dual USB.
• Uses USB cable to charge your device for easier charging.
• With one full charging, it can charge two devices simultaneously up to five times.
• Extremely lightweight and you can carry it even in handy, best utility tool for traveling, camping, tracking activities.
• With patented IC safety technology at disposal, it prevents your device from short circuit, overcharging and also from overheating.
• The company offers a lifetime warranty so feel free and keep on charging your smart devices.

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#3. AUKEY

The AUKEY battery charger we are presenting now is one of the most preferred portable battery chargers

on Amazon as more than 1000 customers gave their positive reviews about this product. It is equipped with an excellent power capacity of 10400mAh and believe us; it looks great as well.

Features of AUKEY Portable Battery Pack

• With Quick Charge 2.0 technology in hand, it can charge your device 75% faster than conventional charging.
• It charges all 5V USB powered devices which include most of the Android devices and also Apple devices.
• When full it can charge an iPhone three to four times and Android phones two times.
• Don’t worry about your device getting overcharged or overheated as it has inbuilt safeguards.
• Just note that this power bank is not compatible with Motorola smartphones.
• Along with these smart features get the AUKEY brand’s trust for safer and faster charging of your device.

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#4. Fibonic

The portable battery charger from Fibonic has a compact design for easy carry, and it also has a digital LED indicator which will keep you informed about how much juice is left in the power bank. Apart from that, it is compatible with all iPhones, iPads, tablets and Android smartphones.

Features of Fibonic Portable Battery Pack

• Get the ultra-high capacity of 20800mAh capacity for repeated charging of your devices.
• The lithium battery used in this power bank is of the highest quality, and hence it gives you faster charging.
• Charge 3 devices at a time with its triple USB ports, which saves your time.
• Apart from the compact design, it is lightweight as well, so you can even carry it in your pocket.
• For those who need fast charging while camping, they got an extra benefit of the flashlight as well.

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#5 ToHLo

We saw many compact looking portable battery chargers, but this piece from ToHLo is apart from being compact it is great looking as well. Being a great looking power bank it doesn’t mean that ToHLo is offering nothing or compromised features.

Features of ToHLo Portable Battery Pack

• The capacity of this power bank is 20000mAh, and it can charge your iPhones, iPads and Android devices from 2 to almost eight times with a full charge.
• It has almost same power like the other best portable battery chargers, but it carries half of the size.
• Stylish design allows you to take it even when you are at your professional gatherings.
• Aviation Aluminum body ensures security against any drops and falls and also smooth on feel.
• It has the polymer battery which is regarded as the safest till date.
• Dual USB outputs of 2.1A give you seamless charging.
• Charge two devices simultaneously with fast possible charging speed.

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#6. AmazonBasics

This product is from Amazon, and it has more than three thousand satisfied customers online who gave their positive reviews on Amazon. The capacity of this portable battery pack from AmazonBasics is good 16100mAh, and hence it can give you a good number of charges as well. Let us know more about this power bank.

Features of AmazonBasics Portable Battery Packs

• For reduced weight and increased safety Amazon is using lithium-ion polymer battery.
• You can charge your smart device without any tension as it has protection against overloading and overcharging.
• Amazon is also offering USB charging cable with this power bank, and hence it will give you safe and fast charging.
• There is a LED indicator, but unlike other such power banks, this LED indicator shows you remaining battery life as 100%, 75%, 50%, 25% and 10%.
• Amazon offers a 1-year limited warranty with this portable battery pack.

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#7. Polanfo

Sometimes you don’t need a portable battery charger which has a huge capacity, and you are fine with limited but good enough power charging possibilities. For such a medium ranged requirements we are presenting Polanfo power bank which is compact and exquisite looking.

Features of Polanfo Portable Battery Pack

• The power bank from Polanfo has a mid-range capacity of 12000mAh.
• Polanfo claims that its power bank is equivalent to six iPhone batteries.
• Get an additional talk time of almost 84 hours after charging your smartphone with this power bank.
• Slim, compact and lightweight so you can carry it easily even in your pockets.
• Apart from being thin, it is cased in a crisp anodized finish with an aluminum alloy which means it gives it a great look.
• Best use for iPhones but it is a universal portable battery charger.

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#8. imuto

The 20000mAh capacity power bank from imuto certainly will add a shot in your smartphone’s armory because it is a universal portable charger and you can charge your iPhone, iPad, Tablets and Android smartphones.

Features of imuto Portable Battery Pack

• It may look small, but this portable battery pack is robust and yet light in weight.
• Not only the smartphones, but you can even charge your MacBook and also the Nintendo Switch with this power bank.
• Shows are remaining power in the battery in digital format.
• The inbuilt LED flashlight helps you in low-light or dark environments.
• There are multiple protection measures which will keep your smart device safe from overheating or overcharging.
• It has the A-class lithium ion batteries for safety and lightweight.

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#9 EC TECHNOLOGY

We bet you will certainly fall for the color combination this power bank from EC TECHNOLOGY offers. Not only the good looks but also the huge 22400mAh power capacity is also one of the main features of this portable battery charger.

Features of EC TECHNOLOGY Portable Battery Pack

• The power bank is a second generation power bank which delivers higher efficiency rate with the fastest possible current.
• With DC 5V 2A input it charges your device twice fast than the regular portable battery packs.
• There are four integrated LED indicators to show you the current power status.
• A flashlight which is inbuilt will give you an extra option to carry the power bank in low-light or dark areas.
• Get three different bulb modes like SOS, Bright, and Average for the light.
• Inbuilt microchip will ensure comfortable, safe and long lifespan.
• Get more than 500 charges over the life of the battery, and after 24 months it still maintains unrivaled performance.
• 3 USB charging ports for charging three devices simultaneously.
  Compatible with all smart devices.

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#10. Smartech

The last product we are offering from Smartech has the lowest capacity of the battery which is just 10000mAh which is the minimum capacity we decided to include in this list. So, if you have a limited usage of a portable battery charger, then this one is for you.

Features of Smartech Portable Battery Pack

• Equipped with Smart Technology, this power bank identifies what type of device it is charging and how much charging it needs.
• The smart technology delivers complete charging at the desired speed.
• It can charge any device from 2.5 times to 3.5.
• It also can turn off and turn on charging when your device is connected.
• You have a benefit to charging both your smartphone and this portable battery pack at the same time.

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We gave you the best possible options for the best Portable battery chargers which are compatible with most of the smart devices. Hope, you liked this list. If you do or even don’t, please give your valuable feedback here in the comments section.

Why I Care About Problem Size More Than Market Size

For seed investors, overfocusing on TAM (total addressable market) can be a trap. It causes founders to think that displaying a generic sizable dollar stat (“$150 billion is spent on Education annually”) is sufficient versus really spending time understanding important characteristics about the problem they’re solving. Namely,

• Is the problem large?
• Is the problem urgent?
• Is the problem valuable?

One of three and you don’t have a business. Two of three and you have a business, perhaps just not venture-scale (nothing wrong with that!). Three of three and I’m interested.

Here’s my presentation on this topic from LAUNCH Festival earlier this month. It doesn’t hold up as well if I’m not ranting and gesticulating.

Problem Size, Not Market Size (Hunter Walk @LAUNCH 2017 Angel Summit) from hunterwalk

Scientist invents way to trigger artificial photosynthesis to clean air

Process produces energy at the same time

University of Central Florida

IMAGE: Professor Fernando Uribe-Romo and his team of students created a way to trigger a chemical reaction in a synthetic material called metal-organic frameworks (MOF) that breaks down carbon dioxide into harmless organic materials. Think of it as an artificial photosynthesis process similar to the way plants convert carbon dioxide (CO2) and sunlight into food. But instead of producing food, Uribe-Romo’s method produces solar fuel.

Credit: UCF: Bernard Wilchusky

A chemistry professor in Florida has just found a way to trigger the process of photosynthesis in a synthetic material, turning greenhouse gases into clean air and producing energy all at the same time.

The process has great potential for creating a technology that could significantly reduce greenhouse gases linked to climate change, while also creating a clean way to produce energy.

“This work is a breakthrough,” said UCF Assistant Professor Fernando Uribe-Romo. “Tailoring materials that will absorb a specific color of light is very difficult from the scientific point of view, but from the societal point of view we are contributing to the development of a technology that can help reduce greenhouse gases.”

The findings of his research are published in the Journal of Materials Chemistry A.

Uribe-Romo and his team of students created a way to trigger a chemical reaction in a synthetic material called metal-organic frameworks (MOF) that breaks down carbon dioxide into harmless organic materials. Think of it as an artificial photosynthesis process similar to the way plants convert carbon dioxide (CO2) and sunlight into food. But instead of producing food, Uribe-Romo’s method produces solar fuel.

To see an explanation see this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cdTuwe2SruA&feature=youtu.be

It’s something scientists around the world have been pursuing for years, but the challenge is finding a way for visible light to trigger the chemical transformation. Ultraviolet rays have enough energy to allow the reaction in common materials such as titanium dioxide, but UVs make up only about 4 percent of the light Earth receives from the sun. The visible range — the violet to red wavelengths — represent the majority of the sun’s rays, but there are few materials that pick up these light colors to create the chemical reaction that transforms CO2 into fuel.

Researchers have tried it with a variety of materials, but the ones that can absorb visible light tend to be rare and expensive materials such as platinum, rhenium and iridium that make the process cost-prohibitive.

Uribe-Romo used titanium, a common nontoxic metal, and added organic molecules that act as light-harvesting antennae to see if that configuration would work. The light harvesting antenna molecules, called N-alkyl-2-aminoterephthalates, can be designed to absorb specific colors of light when incorporated in the MOF. In this case he synchronized it for the color blue.

His team assembled a blue LED photoreactor to test out the hypothesis. Measured amounts of carbon dioxide were slowly fed into the photoreactor — a glowing blue cylinder that looks like a tanning bed — to see if the reaction would occur. The glowing blue light came from strips of LED lights inside the chamber of the cylinder and mimic the sun’s blue wavelength.

It worked and the chemical reaction transformed the CO2 into two reduced forms of carbon, formate and formamides (two kinds of solar fuel) and in the process cleaning the air.

“The goal is to continue to fine-tune the approach so we can create greater amounts of reduced carbon so it is more efficient,” Uribe-Romo said.

He wants to see if the other wavelengths of visible light may also trigger the reaction with adjustments to the synthetic material. If it works, the process could be a significant way to help reduce greenhouse gases.

“The idea would be to set up stations that capture large amounts of CO2, like next to a power plant. The gas would be sucked into the station, go through the process and recycle the greenhouse gases while producing energy that would be put back into the power plant.”

Perhaps someday homeowners could purchase rooftop shingles made of the material, which would clean the air in their neighborhood while producing energy that could be used to power their homes.

“That would take new technology and infrastructure to happen,” Uribe-Romo said. “But it may be possible.”

###

Other members of the team who worked on the paper include UCF graduate student Matt Logan, who is pursuing a Ph.D in chemistry, and undergraduate student Jeremy Adamson, who is majoring in biomedical sciences. Kenneth Hanson and his research group at Florida State University helped interpret the results of the experiments.

The University of Central Florida, one of the largest universities in the nation with more than 64,000 students, uses the power of scale and the pursuit of excellence to make a better future for our students and society. Described by The Washington Post as demolishing “the popular belief that exclusivity is a virtue in higher education” and credited by Politico with creating a “seamless pipeline of social mobility,” UCF is recognized as one of the best values in higher education. UCF aligns its teaching, research and service with the needs of the community and beyond, offering more than 200 degree programs at more than a dozen locations, including its main campus in Orlando. Faculty and students are creating innovations in areas as diverse as simulation and training, optics and lasers, hospitality management, video game design, business, education and health care to solve local and global problems. For more information, visit http://www.ucf.edu.

Police Use Data Found on Slain Woman’s Fitbit in Murder Case Against Husband

http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1750003874001/?bctid=5410479084001

Data showing the actions of a woman in the days, hours and minutes leading up to her murder at her Connecticut home — including her movements logged on her Fitbit — will show her husband was allegedly behind the brutal killing, according to police.

Connie Dabate, 39, was found shot dead in the Ellington home she shared with her two children and husband, Richard Dabate, on December 23, 2015.

She had been shot twice, including once in the back of the head, and her body was discovered in the basement.

First responders found her husband upstairs in the kitchen where he had one arm and one leg zip-tied to a folding chair. He only suffered superficial knife wounds, authorities said.

Richard Dabate, 40, told investigators that a masked man with a deep voice like “Vin Diesel’s” shot his wife and tied him up before he was able to burn the intruder with a torch, according to the warrant first obtained by the Harford Courant.

There were no signs of forced entry or a struggle in the home, nothing was stolen and three separate K-9 officers were unable to pick up any scent but Richard Dabate’s, the warrant filed by Connecticut State Police said.

Investigators also said that witness statements, text messages pulled from cell phones, information from social media, computers, the home’s alarm system, as well as data from the victim’s Fitbit contradict Richard Dabate’s initial statements to police, the warrant said.

The night before her death, Connie Dabate confronted her husband through text message about an unexpected cable television bill, accusing him of lying to her, the warrant said.

“… You lied to me and I am again cleaning g(sic) up your f****** mess!” Connie Dabate’s text apparently said, going on to say: “Great day off and merry f****** Christmas!”

“It will be a very Merry Christmas,” Richard Dabate apparently replied. “Just give me a call when you’re ready.”

Numerous witnesses said they didn’t recall Connie Dabate ever discussing problems in her marriage or planning to leave her husband, but police recovered a December 2014 entry in the “Notes” on her cellphone listing reasons she wanted a divorce.

In the nearly 500-word note, Connie Dabate reportedly wrote: “He takes money from a lot of accounts that don’t belong to him, says he is sorry, but takes no responsibility for it,” and claims “I don’t know anything about his day, who he speaks to or what goes on in his life other than work.

“I’m tired of covering for him, I’m tired of lying and acting like things are great when they aren’t,” she continued.

In a 53-word note listing “the good,” in their relationship, Connie Dabate wrote: “People like him, when he is in a great mood he is fun to be around, I still find him attractive, I’m myself around him.”

The warrant claims that Richard Dabate used a credit card that his wife did not know about to pay for flowers for his pregnant girlfriend, stays at a Motel 6 and to spend more than $1,200 at a strip club.

Richard Dabate’s unidentified on-again off-again girlfriend of seven years told detectives that he said he was going to serve his wife with divorce papers in mid-December of 2015, and while he spoke to a lawyer, he never filed those papers, the warrant said.

The other woman was about seven months pregnant at the time of Connie Dabate’s murder, according to the warrant.

The day before the killing, Richard Dabate allegedly texted her: “I’ll see you tomorrow my little love nugget.”

Richard Dabate allegedly told investigators his wife knew about his affair and the pregnancy, and that since she was unable to have another child, he did some “untraditional things,” got his girlfriend pregnant, and all three adults planned to co-parent the child, the warrant said.

He said the pregnancy was his wife’s idea, “in a way,” police said.

But those close to Connie Dabate said she would never have been okay with such an arrangement, that to their knowledge, she was still able to have children, and that she would have been angry to find out her husband was allegedly cheating.

Richard Dabate later said the pregnancy was an accident, the warrant said.

Detectives said they used data from Dabate home’s alarm system, their computers, cellphones and Connie Dabate’s Fitbit to construct a timeline of events of the day she was murdered.

“No evidence was found to indicate that [Richard] Dabate left the residence during the morning of 12-23-15,” as opposed to his claim that he had left for work and returned home after receiving a notification that their alarm system had been triggered, the warrant said.

The gun used to kill Connie Dabate belonged to her husband, and a swabbing of its handle grip found Richard Dabate’s DNA, along with the DNA of an unidentified person, the warrant said. Richard Dabate’s shirt he was wearing the morning of the killing had gunshot residue on it, but a gunshot residue test conducted on his hands were negative, according to authorities.

Five days after his wife’s murder, Richard Dabate put in a claim for her $475,000 life insurance policy, and withdrew nearly $93,000 from an investment account in her name, police said.

Richard Dabate was arrested this month and charged with murder, tampering with evidence and making a false statement.

He was released on bail last week and ordered to turn in his passport. He is due in court on April 28.

“My client is innocent of these charges and he looks forward to being vindicated after a trial,” Richard Dabate’s attorney Hubert Santos said in a statement to the Hartford Courant.

Driverless cars to be trialled on British roads in 2019

► DRIVEN consortium plans public road tests
► To run between London and Oxford in 2019
► Test vehicles will have a human on board

A fleet of fully autonomous vehicles is planned to complete test runs in urban areas and on motorways in 2019. A consortium of British technology companies, operating under the name DRIVEN, plan for six intercommunicating vehicles to complete an end-to-end journey between London and Oxford, as well as shorter test runs on motorways and public roads.

The programme is likely to involve six intercommunicating vehicles with ‘Level 4 autonomy’ – i.e. with the ability to monitor the surrounding road conditions for an entire trip, and perform ‘safety-critical functions’ (y’know, not crashing into stuff, etc) and could function without a human being on board, although thankfully there’ll be someone on board during the trials to take over in the event of an emergency.

‘No connected and autonomous vehicle trial of this level of complexity and integration as ever been attempted anywhere in the world’, says Oxbotica, an artificial intelligence company that’s a lead member of the consortium.

What does the DRIVEN consortium’s test programme aim to achieve?

The 30-month project, underway from April 2017, aims to iron out many of the logistical kinks which currently lie in the path of robot cars. For example, how connected cars will communicate with each other and share data; how insurance companies could or should treat autonomous vehicles; how to handle the inevitable cybersecurity risks and data protection issues associated with connected cars.

The programme is funded partially by an £8.6m grant from the Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles.

Professor Paul Newman, Head of the Oxford Robotics Institute and a lead member of the consortium says the project ‘brings a host of new questions surrounding the way these vehicles will communicate with each other. We’re moving from the singleton autonomous vehicle, to fleets of autonomous vehicles – and what’s interesting to us at the Oxford Robotics Institute is what data the vehicles share with one another, when, and why.’

Best iPhone Bike Mounts: Perfect for iPhone 7/7 Plus, iPhone 6/6 Plus, 6s/6s Plus

If you are a bike rider and love to touch unearthed territories, then this suggestion to buy the best iPhone bike mounts which are compatible with iPhone 7, 7 Plus, iPhone 6, 6 Plus, 6s, 6s Plus, iPhone 5, 5c and 5s.

How to Bypass iCloud Activation Lock on iPhone and iPad in iOS 10/9/8/7

Have you activated the lost mode or iCloud activation lock on your iPhone and iPad? And want to Bypass iCloud Activation lock? Do not worry, here is a guide for iCloud Activation Bypass.

Apple always discourages theft with Apple products like iPhone and iPad. With the release of iOS 7, Apple introduced iCloud activation lock, which allows users to lock his/her misplaced iOS device.

With the help of iCloud, a user can find iPhone. Under Find My iPhone user can track iOS device, activate the Lost Mode or even Erase iPhone Data.

A user must have to enter Apple ID and Password to reactivate his/her iOS device, turn off Find My Phone feature or factory reset. But what if you forgot or found lost iOS device or you bought the iOS device online, which has Lost mode activated?

iCloud activation bypass is the solution.

The trick to bypass iCloud Activation lock on Apple device running iOS 7/8/9/10 is easy. You will no longer require entering Apple ID and can bypass iCloud password.

iCloud Activation Bypassed on iPhone running iOS 10/9/8/7

Now you can bypass iCloud activation lock on iPhone with this little bit long but proven process.

Step #1. Visit OfficialiPhoneUnlock.co.uk.

Step #2. Select iCloud Unlock Option from the left-hand sidebar menu.

Step #3. Over here you need to enter IMEI number or Serial number. If you don’t know the IMEI number, then dial *#06# to get the IMEI number of your device.

You can find IMEI number on SIM tray of iPhone 7, 7+, 6S and 6S Plus. On iPhone 5, 5C, 5S, SE, 6 and 6+ you can find IMEI number printed back side of the phone.

Step #4. Make the payment and wait for 1-3 working days to unlock an iCloud account.

Visit OfficialiPhoneUnlock.co.uk to get more information about iCloud activation bypass tool.

How to bypass iCloud Activation Lock using iPhoneIMEI.net

iPhoneIMEI.net is one of the trusted sources for bypass iCloud Activation lock. Let’s take a look at the complete process.

Step #1. Visit iPhoneIMEI.net and Click on Unlock iPhone Button.

Step #2. Select Model and iCloud Removal Service for iCloud Activation Bypass.

Step #3. Enter IMEI number in the field and click Unlock.

Step #4. Make the payment. Wait for 1-3 days to unlock iCloud Account.

Bypass iCloud Activation Lock on iOS 9 and iOS 8

Do you want to remove iCloud lock without password? Do you want to bypass iCloud activation lock for free? Then this process of removing iCloud Password will help you. This service is not that much reliable, but you can try it at your own risk and can bypass iCloud activation lock.

Step #1. Reboot your iOS device to set up it as a new device.

On iPhone 7 and 7 Plus press and hold Power Button + Volume Down Button at once.

On other iOS device press and hold Power Button + Home Button at once.

Step #2. On the next screen, select country and preferred language.

Step #3. You will find nearby WiFi Connections. Press home button once and select More WiFi Settings.

Step #4. Tap on “i” icon next to your WiFi network.

Step #5. You will see multiple options. Over there find DNS option and enter following DNS address based on the country selection you made on the first screen.

• USA/North America: 104.154.51.7
• Europe: 104.155.28.90
• Asia: 104.155.220.58
• In the rest of the world: 78.109.17.60

Step #6. Tap on < Back to enter your home WiFi network Password.

Prevent iPhone screen to process anything and quickly tap on < Back button.

Step #7: Over the iPhone screen you will see iCloudDNSBypass.net, which has iPhone Menu to access several settings of iPhone. Choose the app to find the right information about the owner of that iPhone.

Below are Videos, explaining how to bypass iCloud Activation lock on iOS 9 or iOS 8.

How To Bypass iCloud Activation Lock on iPhone [Video]

I am sure that you can Bypass iCloud Activation with the help of above mentioned three different processes.

If you feel that none of the processes worked, do let us know. We will check it and will let you know the latest and updated process for iCloud Activation Bypass.

12 Best Google Pixel Cases: Flaunt Your Smartphone with Great Looks

This is an exclusive list of the best Google Pixel cases, so you can have the ease to choose the best case for your high-end smartphone.

Whenever you are buying an ultra-modern and extremely expensive gadget like Google Pixel, you always need to think about its protection first. To protect any smartphone in a much better way is to protect it with a case. But there are plenty of choices available in the market hence to choose a perfect case for your Google Pixel phone is an extremely difficult exercise.

But you don’t need to worry at all. These are the best Google Pixel cases which will take every care of your phone.

What we have done here is that we have selected the best cases and covers for Google Pixel by taking the quality, compatibility and of course the price. All you need to do is to just go through the cases offered here and then decide with which case you will protect your expensive Google Pixel smartphone.

12 Best Google Pixel Cases and Covers

#1. YOUMAKER

The first case we are offering is offered by YOUMAKER and it is very much compatible with the upcoming Google Pixel 5.0-inch smartphone. It is made from a dual layer of TPU and polycarbonate. TPU will keep the inside of the case smooth while on the outside the hard polycarbonate will protect it from any accidental bumps and drops along with scratches. The raised lips on this case will only mean that it will protect your phone’s screen even when it is put upside down. With clip holster attached, it will be easy to carry your phone along. The precise cuts will make sure that you can use the cameras, speakers, buttons and also ports easily. Available in three colors, Black/Black, Gold/Gray, and White/Gray.

Price: $14.99
Buy it from Amazon.com

#2. SPARIN

SPARIN is one of the most respected names in mobile accessories. It is specially designed for Google Pixel and that is why the cuts are very precise to give easy access to camera, ports, keypad and speakers. It is made from eco-friendly TPU and a transparent body; hence the original color of your smartphone is easily retained. The soft coating and rounded edges will make sure that you get a perfect grip o the phone. Extremely slim and light in weight adds almost nothing to your most loved smartphone the Google Pixel. It is easy to install and remove as well. SPARIN also offers a lifetime warranty. What else you need?

Price: $6.99
Buy it from Amazon.com

#3. Cimo

Cimo is offering you a lightweight and ultra-slim durable case for your most valuable Google Pixel smartphone. The best part of this case is its anti-slip properties and hence it will give you an extra benefit while you are holding it in your hands. Raised bezels will make sure to protect the camera as well as the screen when your phone has but put upside down. This case is made from extremely durable TPU and polycarbonate material so your phone will always remain protected both from the inside and also from the outside as well. This is another protective case which has precise cuttings. Cimo offers five color varieties to choose from.

Price: $7.98
Buy it from Amazon.com

#4. Vinve

You got two color options to choose from for this protective case made specially for your next smartphone the Google Pixel, one is Black and the other is clear. Made from non-toxic TPU material this case is very flexible and it can protect your smartphone from any scratch, bump or shock perfectly. It has a unique design which means you can easily operate all the buttons, ports, and controls. When you hold this phone you will feel the comfortable grip in your hands as well. The company claims that it has specially designed this case for Google Pixel only.

Price: $4.98
Buy it from Amazon.com

#5. DGtle

This case is very easy to fit on your Google Pixel smartphone and it is also made from a top quality and flexible TPU material. It is designed to give you the comfort of easy access to all the ports and buttons when you are using the smartphone. The touch is smooth but the protection is perfect as the company guarantees ultimate protection against any scratches or shatters. The clear color will protect the original look of the phone and the design will make sure that it remains comfortable for your daily usage. DGtle has made sure that its case doesn’t add any bulk to the phone.

Price: $7.99
Buy it from Amazon.com

#6. Ringke

This is the trendy case for the Google Pixel smartphone. It fits perfectly on the upcoming phone from Google and it has a multi-color choice as well. The highest quality clear case will make sure that the original look of the Google Pixel is survived. The cover will have two times coating protection which will make sure that your phone doesn’t get any scratch. With TPU cushions inside it will secure the phone from any shocks and bumps which may happen accidently. This case with slim and sleek profile also guarantees zero addition in weight. This Ringke FUSION has passed the MIL-STD 810G – 516.6 Military Grade Drop Protection which only means that you do not need to worry about your phone’s protection at all.

Price: $11.99
Buy it from Amazon.com

#7. LK

This case is also made from high-quality TPU but it also gives you protection from dirt and stains as well. Apart from accidental drops and falls the protection is guaranteed from shatters, shocks, and scratches as well. The best part of this case offered from LK is that it can be easily cleaned and it doesn’t carry any odor. The sleek design allows the easy access to all the buttons and ports and it also adds nothing to your Google Pixel’s weight. Excellent anti-slip grip will make sure that it gives you the best grips in the business. Raised edges will protect the screen when the phone has put upside down.

Price: $7.99
Buy it from Amazon.com

#8. Orzly

What stands apart from this case specially made for Google Pixel smartphone by Orzly is the transparency. It is so transparent that the back of your smartphone will be easily identifiable. It is made from durable and elastic bumper so it will increase your phone’s protection while you grip it and the toughened polycarbonate panel will make sure that it will remain protected from any bumps and drops. The design is simple and hence it will allow the easy installation and also the removal of the case whenever it is necessary for you. Like many other cases we have offered here, this case will also give you an easy access to all the buttons and ports due to its precise cutting.

Price: $3.99
Buy it from Amazon.com

#9. Casology

The case from Casology for your Google Pixel smartphone has everything in it. It has a modern design and also has a pattern which allows anti-slip and anti-fingerprint grip. The dual layers of thermoplastic polyurethane and polycarbonate materials are shock absorbent and also impact resistant. The cuts of this case keep the buttons and ports accessible all the time. Casology offers four different colors to choose from.

Price: $14.99
Buy it from Amazon.com

#10. NZND

This case offered by NZND is probably offering nothing different than the other 9 cases we have presented to you in this article. But what makes this case stand out is its extremely low price offer. With all the features like lightweight, ultra-slim, total protection from scratches and bumps, easy to install and to remove, tailored cutouts the other companies are offering this case by NZND comes at less than a half a price right now on Amazon. So what you are waiting for?

Price: $3.99
Buy it from Amazon.com

#11. LUCKY CLOVER

For those genuine thin leather case lovers, here is a great product from LUCKY CLOVER. It is a perfect fit case for your Google Pixel smartphone and it is available in two color choices as well. Get the slim body shield to give total protection to your phone. There is one pocket where you can carry your credit or debit card easily. The flexible leather will allow instant installation and removal all the time.

Price: $14.99
Buy it from Amazon.com

#12. Spigen

Who would not like to protect his high-end smartphone like Google Pixel with a protective case by a trustworthy brand? Here is a clear case from Spigen, which is a market leader in smartphone accessories. This clear case is slim fit in nature and adds no bulk to your smartphone. Not only the fit profile but being a clear case it will keep the original looks of Google Pixel phone like it is. The TPU material will keep the scratches away and give you smooth feeling while holding your phone in your hand.

Price: $11.99
Buy it from Amazon.com

Conclusion

So are you ready with your new pixel phone? Then you must be ready to choose one of these best Google Pixel cases as well. Pick any of these cases without having any doubt in mind because these are meant for your valued smartphone only.

Best Sleep Tracking Apps for Apple Watch to Make Sure You Get a Good Night Sleep

If you are having ‘sleeping problems’ or you want to track whether you have sound sleep or restless one, then these five best sleep tracking apps for Apple Watch will certainly help you.

On one side we say that electronic or smart gadgets are the reason behind getting less sleep, but on the other side, we take help of sleep tracking apps for Apple Watch to track and control our sleep.

While taking note of the irony, we talked about earlier; we are suggesting you some of the best sleep tracking apps for Apple Watch to help your good night sleep. Remember, just like the best Bluetooth headphones for Apple Watch give us the pleasure of music to stay happy, these apps keep track of your sleep and keep you healthy.

All these apps do one thing, which is to track your sleep and give you analysis about your sleep so that you can get proper sleep and rise fresh in the morning. Some of these apps work differently, but still, they are there to provide you best results.

5 Best Sleep Tracking Apps for Apple Watch

#1. Sleep Track

Do you want to know how much time you are spending in your bed? Then Sleep Track will certainly help you in doing that with lot many other features.

• You will have the overview of ‘go to bed’ time and also a time when you awake, so you can easily get the information on how much time you are spending in bed.
• With you are wearing Apple Watch while sleeping you can also track your sleeping habits with this app.
• There is an inbuilt guide which will let you know how good or bad you sleep you are having at nights.
• You can set your next goals once you analyze your sleep habits.

Price: Free
Download Sleep Track for Apple Watch

#2. Sleep++

Sleep++ is one of the best sleep tracking apps currently available on App Store. It measures your sleep closely and then let you help on how to get a quality sleep every night.

• The motto of this sleep tracking app is to make you understand how well you are sleeping and how you can take advantages of a good sleep for your work next day.
• You can ask your Apple Watch by simply saying, “Sleep+++ I am to start sleeping” and “Sleep+++ I am woken up” and leave the rest to Sleep+++ app.
• In the morning the app will give you a complete analysis of your previous night’s sleep with the detailed break up mentioning how well you slept or how restless you were during that sleep.
• If you wish you can integrate this app with other health apps you have and then you will be able to get a complete health analysis.

Price: Free
Download Sleep+++ for Apple Watch

#3. Heart Analyzer

When you are sleeping your heart keeps on functioning. While sleeping, you should also consider how your heart reacts to your sound or restless sleep. This app will help you analyze that.

• The app will analyze your heart rate in understandable form when you are sleeping.
• You can retrieve data of your heart rate while sleeping for one full year.
• Just let know the app that you are going to sleep, or you are already awake, and Heart Analyzer will do the rest of the analysis.
• If you wish you can integrate Heart Analyzer app with Apple Health app which will help you to set your sleeping and awakening time automatically.

Price: Free
Download Heart Analyzer for Apple Watch

#4. Sleep Pulse 2 Motion

One of the great looking sleep tracking apps for Apple Watch is here. Sleep Plus 2 Motion app works like other apps in the bracket, but it provides you a great compilation of your sleep tracking results.

• Sleep Plus 2 Moon tracks your motion while you are sleeping along with your heart rate and also nightly steps to give you the best picture of your sleep.
• You can sync this app with your iPhone to get the detailed analysis.
• You will also be able to check the complications if any while you have a sleep and the progress of your sleep at a glance and then can decide how you can improve your sleep.
• You need to activate the Health and Motion feature, and then the app will do the rest.

Price: $3.99
Download Sleep Pulse 2 Motion for Apple Watch

#5. Zleeper

Zleeper is perhaps the easiest sleep tracking apps to work with among all such apps we are prescribing here. Let us know more about it.

• To start tracking your sleep you don’t need to speak or do anything special, just toggle the sleep mode when you are hitting the bed, and the app will start monitoring your sleep.
• Set the ‘Zmart Alarm’ which will wake you up when you are having light sleep, which means that the Zmart alarm will start monitoring your light sleep 15 to 30 minutes before your waking up time.
• It is a companion app for your iPhone so that you can check your sleep patterns and other related information.
• You can set a back alarm with your iPhone, and your iPhone will display a clock view if you wish.

Price: $4.99
Download Zleeper for Apple Watch

All these sleep tracking apps will be a great help for you if you wish to control your sleep in a better way so that you can work even better next day.

Do let us know about this tutorial and how it became helpful to you to get the best sleep. You can give your feedback here in the comments section or on Facebook, Twitter, and Google Plus.

Building on Slack Saved Our Startup

The perils and perks of building on a platform

“This isn’t working… we’re screwed.”

Those are not the words you want to be saying out loud three months after you quit your jobs to start a company.

You especially don’t want to hear the reply back from your cofounder, “Yeah, I think you’re right…”

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From the start, we did everything right with Tettra. We validated our assumptions through customer interviews and fake mockups. We got 10 teams to agree to use our product before we ever touched a line of code.

Our idea was to build a simple wiki for sharing knowledge on a team, and everyone we talked to seemed really excited to use the product.

Then we launched our MVP…and no one used it.

When we reached back out to those team to figure out what had happened, we found that they all still had a problem sharing internal knowledge. They still believed they could use Tettra solve it. The problem was that no one remembered to use the product.

Even after all our research, we missed an important truth about how the world has changed: The way people access a tool is just as important as what the tool does. People are overloaded with information, logins, and interfaces. And here we were, asking them to create a whole new habit.

Around the same time we were trying to figure out how to save Tettra, Slack launched their app directory. This felt like the right move.

A year later, it’s been one of the best strategic decisions we’ve made as a new startup. If you’re considering this path for your business, here’s what you should be taking into consideration.

The Perils of Building on a Platform

There’s been an explosion of new platforms in the last few years. Facebook Messenger, Slack, Medium, and many others have opened their ecosystems, letting third-parties hook into their massive user bases. Jump-starting your growth by building on another company’s platform is enticing, but not without its risks.

Platform can shut down or cut you off

A few years ago Twitter opened its doors and let third-party developers build on their platform. New companies sprung up building all sorts of tools on top of Twitter’s API, including dozens of alternative clients to Twitter’s native web app.

Then when Twitter had grown large enough and needed to start monetizing their audience, they locked down their APIs. Many of those companies, including most of the alternative Twitter clients, shut down because they couldn’t access the data they needed to make their products work.

Another more recent Twitter-related example is Meerkat. Meerkat launched a live-streaming video app in early 2015 and used Twitter for distribution. It took off like wildfire, growing to millions of users and raising millions of dollars soon after launch. But unknown to them, Twitter was quietly working to acquire a competitor in the live-streaming space called Periscope.

Twitter eventually disabled Meerkat’s access to their social graph and promoted Periscope instead, cutting off Meerkat’s primary distribution. The blow proved fatal and, six months later, Meerkat shut down.

And Twitter’s platform strategy is not an isolated event. More recently, LinkedIn, Netflix and ESPN all locked up their public APIs to approved partners only, shutting off access to open third-party developer ecosystems. Unless you can pay, you can no longer play on these platforms.

Betting your business on an open API can be risky business.

Our risk assessment

We talked about this risk a lot at Tettra. For us, this decision came down to two things:

1. Platform investment: Slack is investing heavily in their platform and even has a dedicated investment fund to support 3rd party developers.
2. Revenue model: Slack’s platform is focused on businesses. Its likely monetization strategy is subscription revenue vs. ad revenue. 3rd party revenue from external developers lines up with their business model and is good for their bottom line.

The platform can clone your entire product

Earlier this year Reddit finally added native image hosting to its service, ending a long-standing alliance with Imgur. Now Reddit users have a choice — they can keep using the third-party app Imgur or they can use the built-in option when posting an image to Reddit.

It’s yet to be seen what the effects of Reddit offering their own image hosting service will be on Imgur, but it’s probably safe to say that the majority of users will choose the path of least resistance and go with Reddit’s option.

When you hook into a platform, the owner of the platform gets to see all your usage data. Information like how many times your product’s been installed or how much money you’re making through the platform’s billing system is realistically accessible to the platform owner.

In other words, if you have a popular app, the platform knows it’s popular. In the age of ever-growing juggernauts vying for attention and wallets, this is bad news.

Our risk assessment

This is a big risk for us. Slack’s actually an acronym that stands for Searchable Log of All Conversation and Knowledge. As a knowledge sharing product, you can see why that’s worrisome.

At SaaStr Annual 2016, Slack’s VP of Product, April Underwood, gave some good advice to developers:

‘’If the end goal for what you’re building is to make Slack using better, … then I would recommend trying to think more broadly and to try to solve a broader problem than trying to make the experience on [the] platform a little bit better.”

We feel like Tettra fits the bill of “thinking broader.” Synchronous and asynchronous communication are complementary and should be integrated together, but separate tools. Time will tell what happens as Slack expands their product offering, but for right now Tettra and Slack are symbiotic and work better together.

You don’t own your destiny

Let’s get away from software platforms for a minute and talk about media platforms. What happens if you build an audience on a platform and that platform shuts down? You lose your audience.

This happened earlier this year when Twitter shut down Vine. People who had spent years building up a following on Vine lost their entire subscriber base.

The same thing can happen if a platform decides to shut down a mission-critical endpoint that your company relies on. After raising $49M and growing to 33M users, BranchOut, a service to see where Facebook friends worked and help you find a job, ended up having to shut down. Facebook changed the way its API worked, cutting off developers from accessing data about friends-of-friends and the way apps could post to people’s Facebook walls.

Our risk assessment

Our second version of Tettra was built 100% on top of the Slack API — we didn’t even have a database when we launched. Doing so allowed us to quickly validate whether people wanted a wiki connected to Slack.

And the move was great for us. We went from concept to live product in 2 weeks and received over 200 sign-ups within the first 2 days of launching.

We also had a plan to move away from this heavy reliance on Slack ASAP. We knew from the start that, if we saw product-market fit, we would rebuild the product to house our customer’s data in-house. For us, the plan to rebuild and store our customers’ data made Slack a safe choice.

The Perks of Building on a Platform

Now let’s talk about the positives. As a geek, Slacks APIs are some of the best I’ve ever worked with for a few reasons.

1. You can tell from the consistency of the APIs that the Slack API team put a lot of thought into the design of it all.
2. The entire company is super responsive with support inquiries for developers. They even opened up an endpoint for us last year so we could launch our MVP on time.
3. Most importantly, the user base is super enthusiastic about third-party apps and we’ve seen great adoption from teams who want Slack to be the backbone of their company.

Being connected to Slack is one of Tettra’s main selling points and helps new users find us. From there, we’re able to sell them on the vision for a simple, internal wiki to share knowledge with the rest of their team and easily explain why Tettra’s the best solution for them.

But beyond just Slack, there’s plenty of good reasons to build on platforms.

Access to a massive amount of users

Most of our early sign ups for Tettra came from our Slack App Directory listing. Even a year later, it’s still a steady source of traffic to our site and new accounts for us.

Distribution channels take a long time to build up and scale. Piggy-backing off the customer base that another company has already built is a good way to jumpstart your early growth while you build your own acquisition sources over time.

Clear value proposition for prospects

Tettra is an internal wiki for teams that use Slack. In fact, the product only works for teams that use Slack and there’s no way to use the service without it.

This value proposition limits the upper bounds of our growth to the number of teams using Slack, but it’s also crystal clear: we are the wiki for Slack teams. If you’re using Slack, you want to use tools that deeply integrate with it and are tailor-made for the Slack experience. We’re able to deliver a great user experience for a small group of customers. We can always expand our offering beyond Slack if we hit the upper bounds of the market.

Another great example of this strategy that I saw recently is Upscribe, a new subscription widget. There are literally hundreds of subscription widgets on the market right now, so you’d think there wouldn’t be room for another one. That’s not the case though, as Upscribe got almost 1,000 votes on Product Hunt and received such an overwhelming response that the load actually crashed their site.

So how did they do it? They went niche. Upscribe is the subscription box for Medium. If you write on Medium, there’s a clear reason to choose Upscribe over the other options out there. By starting specific, Upscribe has a foundation to build out their user base.

Buffer started life as a post scheduling app for Twitter. Once they got traction on Twitter, they expanded their offering to include other services along with additional social media management tools teams. Now they’re doing over $12M in revenue each year.

TroopsHQ, a Slackbot for Salesforce users, recently raised a $7M Series A round, just a little over a year after founding the company. If you use Salesforce and Slack, you probably will use Troops too.

Starting on a single platform gives you a clear value proposition to use in acquiring your first customers.

Increase product engagement & retention

The conventional wisdom is that it takes 21 days to build a habit, with some studies finding it might take even three times as long. Habits take a long time to form.

Getting people using your product regularly is just as challenging as building a new habit. In Hooked, Nir Eyal outlines a strategy to actually get people using your product regularly through a habit formation loop:

By integrating with Slack, Tettra’s able to hack that habit formation loop because we show up where our users hang out every day: in Slack.

Through Slack’s APIs, we can push trigger notifications about recently published Tettra pages right into Slack. There are 2 benefits to this:

1. It’s easier for the person publishing a page to spread the word without having to send an email or manually post a link in Slack.
2. Our Slack integration also helps with product engagement because the rest of the team sees the Slack notifications, which subtly reminds everyone else to share their knowledge with their team by creating their own pages.

This kicks off the loop again and helps build up a documentation habit inside the entire company. Hooking into another platform and integrating with your user’s existing workflows removes steps, making it more likely that people will continually use your product.

How to safely build on a platform

If you’re still worried about building on a platform, you should check out Josh Elman’s talk from the 2015 Weapons of Mass Distribution Conference about How to Build On Other Platform.

His four main points for building on platforms successfully are:

1. Get users to come back directly to you: Bring people in through the platform, then figure out a sustainable way to get people coming back to you directly.
2. Remember the value exchange: If you’re building on a platform that monetizes through ads, don’t build a service that pulls away eyeballs from them. Figure out a way to drive back value to the platform in the form of either users or money.
3. Build features 20–1000 on the roadmap: All companies have limited development resources, but don’t build a feature a platform is likely to build into their core product themselves. Focus on features further down the roadmap that the platform is unlikely to get to anytime soon.
4. Platforms are an accelerant, not sustainable fuel: Take advantage of the moment but don’t rely on a platform. The rules can change at any time.

Platforms are the future of growth

Competition in today’s world is fierce. In 2006, the average number of choices a consumer had when choosing a product was four or five. In 2016, that number has spiked to approximately 15 vendors. Creating an amazing product just isn’t enough anymore. They key to winning is being the best at distribution and showing up where your users already hang out.

People don’t want another login to remember or interface to learn. Connecting to existing platforms like Slack makes it easier for your users to access your product and helps you grow. If you’re early enough to a platform and build on top of it right, hopefully eventually you’ll grow big enough to become a platform yourself.

Enjoy this post? Hit the ❤ button below.

What do you think? Is building on a platform a good idea or too risky? Share your thoughts and stories below.

The Problem Is Probably Trust

In a post-mortem for a failed project, it’s unlikely that you’ll ever hear someone say, “We missed the deadline because we didn’t trust each other.” But 9 times out of 10, trust is the unspoken root cause lurking at the bottom of your 5 why’s (or maybe 10 why’s?).

Why do we waste time in pointless meetings or mire our work in layers of process? We don’t trust our leaders and co-workers to come through for us, or read our emails, or understand why what we are working on matters.

Why do we miss deadlines? It usually comes down to lack of trust. We feel like if we speak up about blockers in our way or the unrealistic timeline that our concerns would be brushed off, or we would be told to just work harder. Or maybe we think a team member isn’t pulling their weight, but we don’t trust that this is a conversation that can be had.

Why do some of us just prefer small companies? It’s much easier to have deep levels of trust in small teams (not that a small team will guarantee trust by any means).

Office politics? Lack of trust.

Overwhelming stress at work? It can often be traced back to simply not feeling safe at work…that’s a lack of trust.

It’s why we love working with our closest colleagues. We trust them. We know they have our best interests at heart. They get us.

It’s why cross-team collaboration, while great in theory, is often so difficult in reality. Each little team has its own mini-culture and workflows. They have their team’s best interests at heart, there’s just not the same level of trust.

Without trust, work is slow and stressful. With trust, even challenging work is enjoyable, meaningful, and gets done exponentially faster.

Trust is a part of my career I underinvested in for years. I put on my game face, carefully maintaining the line between “work me” and “real me,” and wasvalways cautious about asking for help or admitting failure. You can read the end result of that story here:

The Secret Club of Admitting You Suck
A story about the time I almost moved to the middle of nowhere rather than admit that I felt like a failure. thinkgrowth.org

Today, that’s just not how I prefer to work.

I don’t have any advice on how to build trust at scale, that’s a whole other topic, but I have picked up a few things about how to build trust on a more personal level.

1.Talk about how you’re feeling. If you’re frustrated and overwhelmed, ask for help. If something in your personal life is stressing you out, talk about it. If you need to cry at work, go for it. If you want people to trust you, you need to reveal yourself. I’m an introvert and a naturally private person, I keep waiting for this to get easier…so far it hasn’t, but it’s still worth it 🙂

2.Admit when you don’t know something. I think the tech community as a whole is so over-confident. It was such a relief for me when I started to admit out loud that I was confused, or something was hard for me, or I felt very unconfident in my abilities. And then I realized that nobody cared. I started to say, “I don’t think I’ll be good at that, here’s why…” and instead of doors closing, they opened wider.

In a post addressed specifically to women, but relevant for anyone looking to lean into big career aspirations, Nataly Kelly writes:

Move forward with conviction in your own ability to stretch and grow. Work hard, look for areas that need some help, and pitch in without waiting to be asked, but most importantly, believe that you can do it. You’re more likely to succeed than not.

In other words, it’s totally normal to feel uncertain about your abilities, but that’s no excuse for not moving forward. If you’re worried, admit it. Then go get it.

Hey Ladies, Let’s Reclaim This Whole “Aggressive” Insult
Nataly Kelly shares how a kidnapping in South America gave her the confidence to ignore the naysayers and aggressively pursue her dreams. thinkgrowth.org

3. Break down the separation between work life and personal life. Anita G Andrews has been a huge inspiration to me on this, and I was lucky to work with her for a few years and see her in action. Anita is an executive and a mother and never apologizes for the moments when her “personal life” interrupts work…it’s all just life after all. And this isn’t relevant advice only for parents. Life inevitably interrupts work and needs more from us. Let’s talk about these things. We all have them. There’s no shame.

Flexible Work Policies Hurt Women: Here’s Why and What Executives Can Do About It.
Anita Andrews shares her advice on breaking down the barrier between work and personal life by modeling flexibility. thinkgrowth.org

4.Assume good intent. In every interaction you have with your co-workers, assume they care as much about your customers and the company as you do. Assume they are competent, caring, wonderful people. Then, working on that assumption, put in in the time to understand their perspective and end goals.

One of my favorite books on organizational change is Switch: How to Change Things When Change is Hard. There’s a mantra repeated throughout the book that I often come back to when I have moments of feeling frustrated with co-workers:

“What looks like a people problem is often a situation problem.”

HubSpot’s CMO, Kipp Bodnar shared a story a few months ago about a time in HubSpot history when a person responsible for mid-funnel conversion rates rented a mini-van, hired a freelance videographer, and drove to Maryland (HubSpot is based in Boston) to get a customer case study on camera. The reason? The video team had its own priorities and couldn’t prioritize the customer video. Kipp writes:

“Let me be clear, this story doesn’t implicate any parties involved. Leaders, and the org structures we create, cause these scenarios.”

In other words, it wasn’t a people problem, it was a situation problem.

Structure Your Marketing Team for Growth
HubSpot CMO, Kipp Bodnar, shares how organizational design can encourage or inhibit growth.thinkgrowth.org

5. Practice radical candor. Kim Scott has been preaching the importance of radical candor between manager and direct reports for several years, but this concept isn’t just for bosses giving feedback. We could all do with more candor in our conversations. Kim Scott quotes an Apple colleague who once asked her:

“How long do you spend making sure you have all the facts right before you criticize somebody? How long do you spend making sure you have all the facts right before you praise somebody?”

This is huge. I personally have a tendency to obsess over the “awkward conversations.” But you know what makes an awkward conversation awkward? Someone coming in with a prepared speech and preconceived notions about what’s really going on. Today, I try to surface an issue right away. I ask why, try to understand motivations, and seek to understand the situation. Funny thing? I’m having fewer conversations today that feel painfully awkward.

Feedback is the Atomic Building Block of Management
Kim Scott explains how to craft better praise and deliver tough feedback. thinkgrowth.org

So, why bother with all this?

The truth is you can get away with not having trust at work for a long time. You can be a successful leader without a team that trusts you, you can achieve individual success without opening up to and trusting your co-workers. But eventually something will happen — a big launch will be missed, a campaign will flop, a key player will quit unexpectedly, you will say something unforgivably thoughtless, your personal life will implode and you’ll need some extra help.

In moments of tension and high stress, recovery is dependent on trust.

Business is personal. Work is personal. And it’s so much for fun when we trust the people we work with.

How AI is Taking the Guesswork Out of Sales Call Effectiveness

9 insights from 25,537 sales calls

In the Understanding AI series we’re exploring how AI is transforming the way we work and live — from productivity and marketing to human access and art.

Think about the mid-to-late 90’s.

What was the status quo for the Internet marketer?

Guesswork.

Marketing analytics technologies had not yet emerged as a tool-of-the-trade, so marketers would create their online campaigns and hope they worked.

Today that would be unheard of. Any marketer operating without analytics, measurement, and technology would be out of a job soon.

Analytics and marketing technologies have turned Internet marketing from mostly art to mostly science.

Marketers can easily measure what’s working (and what’s not) — continually optimizing every element of their campaigns for higher conversion, more customers, and greater ROI.

Internet marketing has become one of the most optimized disciplines in the business world.

Enter the Sales Profession

The sales profession has been a different story.

Sales professionals, managers, and leaders have been operating with the same blindfold that plagued the Internet marketing profession before analytics arrived.

We rely on what we think works in sales.

We have our theories, instincts, intuition, and anecdotal experiences.

But (until recently) there has been no technology, data, or analytics that has measure what is actually getting results in sales.

25,537 Sales Conversations Analyzed Using AI

During the first half of 2016, we analyzed anonymous conversation data from 17 of our customers using Gong’s sales conversation intelligence SaaS platform.

These customers were typically mid-market SaaS companies.

Here are the details of how we surfaced the data and insights I’ll talk about in the rest of this post:

• We analyzed 25,537 B2B sales conversations from 17 customer organizations. These were sales calls conducted on conference call platforms like GoToMeeting, join.me, and Zoom. In other words these were account executive calls rather than SDR calls (fun fact: the average call ran 43 minutes long)
• Each call was recorded using Gong, speaker-separated, cleaned, and transcribed from speech-to-text
• Next, the calls were mapped to their matching CRM records. This gave us the power to analyze against sales outcomes such as win-rates, revenue production, and sales cycle length
• Finally, we ran Gong’s artificial intelligence engine through the massive data set. Call topics, key moments, and sales behaviors were auto-categorized using sophisticated AI algorithms
• We found 9 distinct trends of high-performing B2B sales calls. Here they are:

The Talk-to-Listen Ratio Impacts Win-Rates

As sales professionals, we all know that it’s best to listen and let the prospect do most of the talking.

Still, most sales reps are speaking much more than they think they are.

The average B2B sales rep consumes 65–75% of talk time, leaving little room for the prospect to “get a word in.”

This is what the average sales dialogue looks like

I’m embarrassed to admit: When I first started at Gong, my average talk-to-listen ratio was 72:28 (!)

Fortunately, working at Gong serves as rehab for that affliction. I’m trending closer to 52:48 these days. #TalkersAnonymous

Now for the good stuff: the ideal talk-to-listen ratio for the highest yielding sales calls is 43:57

The good news is you don’t need to hit that exact ratio to see results. If you’re speaking too much, there’s low-hanging fruit in letting the prospect talk just a little more:

Increasing the prospect’s talk-time from 22% to 33% of the total call time significantly increases opportunity win-rates.

Pricing Discussions Impact Win-Rates

Discussing pricing 3–4x in a call seems to be a good sign, but let’s all remember: correlation does not always equal causation 🙂

When pricing is discussed less than 3x and more than 4x, win-rates decline.

If price comes up 3–4x times in a call, it’s best to treat that as a buying signal. But that’s not the only discovery we found in regards to pricing…

There is a Best Time to “Talk Price”?

Top producing sales reps “talk price” around the 40–49 minute mark in their sales calls.

Average and low performers tend to distribute their pricing discussions more evenly throughout the call:

Top reps discuss price late in their sales calls

Moral of the story? Establish value, then talk price.

“Probably” Is Probably a Good Thing

Any B2B sales rep worth his or her salt will ask the prospect the “timing question” at some point…

“When do you plan on moving forward with this project?”

“When do you estimate getting this agreement finalized?”

“What does your timeline look like for purchase?”

Surprisingly, a somewhat “cautious” response by the prospect is a good sign:

Listen for “probably” after your timeline question

When your prospect responds to your timeline question with “probably,” they are likely responding cautiously because of how seriously they are considering the purchase.

Again, it’s best to treat this as a buying signal while keeping in mind correlation doesn’t always equal causation.

“We Need to Figure Out ____________________”

Now that we’ve talked about the positive signal regarding the timeline question, let’s talk about the negative signal.

When potential customers respond to a sales rep’s timeline question with some variation of “We need to figure out [fill in the blank],” there is a negative correlation in terms of win-rates and forecast accuracy.

“We need to figure out who gives the final go-ahead for this”

“We have to figure out how we will use the product internally”

“We’ve got to figure out how we are going to justify ROI”

No need to give up on your deal if you hear this phrase, but as a sales professional, you deserve to know the data: your chances start to dwindle when you hear this.

Soothe Fear & Anxiety with “Risk-Reversal” Language

Remember when I said your lowest hanging fruit for increasing your win-rates is getting the prospect to talk more?

Well, here’s your second lowest hanging fruit: soothe your prospect’s pre-purchase anxiety by mitigating their risk.

In other words, you should proactively, frequently, and aggressively talk about terms of the deal that are designed to protect the customer from risk:

• Easy cancellations
• No long-term contract
• Easy, low-effort setup
• 90-day opt-outs
• Money-back guarantees
• SLAs (service-level agreements)

Watch the customer’s anxiety melt away

I’ve noticed most sales professionals actively hide deal terms like this.

They don’t want to deal with an opt-out, a cancellation, or headaches of that sort.

Here’s my advice: The increase in your cancellations and opt-outs will pale compared to the much larger spike in your win-rates.

The Final Insight: Coaching Sales Reps at the Conversation Level

The customers we pulled this anonymized data from were using the Gong conversation intelligence platform for sales call coaching.

Those customers that had the highest usage of coaching activity within the Gong platform experienced the highest increases in win-rates and revenue, while also shaving the most time off of their sales cycles.

Call coaching pays off — the data says so 🙂

It makes sense.

The highest leverage point of the sales cycle is the conversation between a rep and a prospect.

If you can increase the effectiveness of that “lever,” you’ve made measurable progress (click here to see a Gong demo).

Summary

To sum this up, here is what artificial intelligence has revealed to us so far about sales call effectiveness:

• The “ideal” talk-to-listen ratio is 43:57
• Most sales reps speak 65–75% of their calls
• Bumping a prospect’s talk-time from 22% to 33% delivers a sharp increase in win-rates
• If pricing comes up 3–4x in a call, consider it a buying signal
• Top sales professionals typically discuss pricing late in the call (40–49 minutes in on average)
• When your prospect responds to your timeline question with the word “probably,” consider it a good thing
• When prospects respond to your timeline question with the phrase “We need to figure out X,” you’ve got your work cut out for you
• When you sooth your prospect’s fears with risk-reversal language (such as “you can cancel at any time”), win-rates on average increase 32%
• Conversation-level sales coaching leads to higher win-rates, more revenue, and shorter sales cycles

Now that we’ve brought the sales world the first wave of data-driven sales conversation insights, I’d love to hear what you think.

What questions do you have for me?

Comment below, or email me at chris.orlob [at] Gong.io

What surprised you?

What validated what you already knew?

And if you could, would you please hit that ❤ button below so other sales professionals may find this data as well?

I hope you liked it 🙂

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10 Best Smartwatch for Kids: Browse the Coolest Kids GPS Smart Watch

Are you worried about your kids’ safety when you are away? To address your this concern we are presenting some of the best Smartwatch for kids.

One can easily understand the extreme worry the parents of little kids, in particular between the age groups of four and nine, who remain out for work for entire days. These parents have a huge concern about their kids when they are away. To address this big concern only, we are furnishing the best Smartwatch for kids just for you.

All these smart watches for kids have GPS tracking feature so you can keep track of your child’s activity in real time by using the partner app downloaded on your smartphone. For those emergency situations, many Smartwatches for kids offered here have SOS button as well, so by just pressing one button you, your family and authorities will be alerted.

It is good that such Smartwatches give parents comfort about their children’s security, but what about the kids? Well, they too get benefits of preloaded features, cameras, etc. so that they can unleash their photography and movie shooting talent right from the tender age.

Apart from safety and other features, many Smart watches have some fantastic games as well, which will keep your kid engaged all the time.

Best Smartwatch for Kids

Smartwatch For Kids	Features
Vtech	2Nd Generation Kidizoom	Check It Out
Orbo	Bluetooth Phone Pairing	Check It Out
Mindkoo	T58 Gsm Gprs Gps	Check It Out
Padgene	Gsm Bluetooth Watch With Camera	Check It Out
Turnmeon	Gbd 1.44” Touch Screen Smartwatch	Check It Out
Amenon	Anti-Lost Gps Finder Tracker	Check It Out
Kurio	High-Res Touch Screen	Check It Out
Garmin	Swim-Friendly With Water Resistance	Check It Out
Ticktalk	Touch Screen Kids Wearable Tracker	Check It Out
Lemfo	Finder Fitness Tracker Wristwatch	Check It Out

#1. VTech

The looks of this smartwatch are such that your kid will certainly fall for it. Taking the kids’ age between 4 and 9 into the consideration makes this smart watch. Because this is a kid’s smartwatch, it will keep the kids engaged with games and activities.

Features of VTech Smartwatch

• There are 3 fun activities, 5 games and 3 action challenges and also a motion sensor.
• This edition of VTech comes with 2 changeable wristbands, and your kid will love both the colors.
• You kid can take plenty of pictures and videos, which will unearth the photography talent in them.
• Apart from the camera, there is a voice recorder and voice-changing effects inbuilt in this kids smart watch.
• Additional features like alarm, timer, stopwatch, and calendar will help the kids more.
• There is also an inbuilt calculator that will be helpful to solve the mathematics problems.
• This splash-proof smartwatch can resist routine and accidental splashes not advised for shower etc.
• Also, has Rechargeable lithium battery and USB cable to upload pictures and videos taken by your kid into the computer.
• Perfect choice for you to keep your child engaged for an entire day and to address your safety concerns about your kid.

Checkout Price

#2. Orbo

This Orbo kids Smartwatch is so adorable that we are not finding any suitable words for it. Not only the looks but two color choices like pink and blue make it more desirable as well.

Features of Orbo Smartwatch

• Your kids will get hours of entertainment from this smartwatch apart from reading the time.
• Vivid Display and Highly intuitive menus and the capacitive touchscreen will keep your kid occupied.
• The smartwatch is equipped with Bluetooth so it can connect with any smartphone and you can remain in touch with your kids.
• Inbuilt camera and 1GB memory allow your kid to take the bulk of photographs.
• Orbo is one of the most respected brands for kids smart watches, so you can trust this product without any doubt.

Checkout Price

#3. Mindkoo

With some modern features loaded one can easily call this Mindkoo Smartwatch for kids as the best kids smartwatch. The looks and some of the features of this smartwatch can match with any smartwatch made for an adult.

Features of Mindkoo Smartwatch

• Inbuilt GPS will allow you to track your child’s movements on Google map via a partner app on your smartphone.
• Just a press of a button and your kid can start two-way communication instantly, which is ideal for any emergency.
• Press ‘Hold to talk’ on the smartphone app and you will be able to send the voice message to your kid.
• Insert 2G SIM card, and you can enjoy all the features mentioned above.
• Available in two attractive colors of Silver and Golden.
• If you are looking for a Smartwatch for your kid who has more to do with safety aspect than the features then this could be your natural choice.

Checkout Price

#4. Padgene

Your kid will have awesome seven color choices from this Padgene smart watch for kids. But, this Smartwatch is not limited to attractive colors only it has some impressive features as well.

Features of Padgene Smartwatch

• Fantastic features like passo meters, sleep tracker, message reminder, call reminder, call answer, dial call, remote control and push message, you will get them all with this smartwatch.
• This smartwatch is compatible with all Android smartphone and iOS enabled mobile phones.
• The bidirectional anti-loss feature will allow a smart search just in case you are not able to search your smartwatch.
• Allows not only video recording but also MP3 local playback to keep your kids entertained.
• A Bluetooth music-playing feature will allow you to make sure your child hears what you want him to.

Checkout Price

#5. TURNME ON

As the name ‘TURNME ON’ suggests, you just need to purchase this smartwatch for your kid and turn it on as it has 7 days free plan attached. So, once you are well versed with its entire feature, you can choose a plan of your choice.

Features of TURNME ON smartwatch

• This is a kids GPS smartwatch as you can get an accurate location of your kid and that too with real-time tracking.
• You can record the GPS tracking route of three months.
• Crisp mixed color design with 1.44-inch display certainly makes this smartwatch more desirable to kids than other such watches.
• Unique inbuilt flashlight plays an important role just in case your child is in any emergency. It will also bring a sense of security in your child.
• Feed important family numbers in the partner app, and when your kid presses the SOS key, the watch will make a call to all those numbers instantly.

Checkout Price

#6. AMENON

This is a Smartwatch, which is loaded with safety features for your kid. Apart from these functions, you will also get a free GPS SIM card so that you can start using this smartwatch instantly.

Features of AMENON smartwatch

• Two-way positioning is the main feature of this smartwatch, which means double safety for your kids.
• The location tracking and checking the position of the kid will remain for an entire day.
• Parents can continuously hear the voice coming from the watch in their smartphone app, so they stay aware of child’s activity via this kids smart watch phone.
• Both kids and parents can dial from and to the watch just to make each other fee secured.
• Stunning looks and vibrant colors can add more value to this smartwatch.
• Comfortable to wear as the material is smooth and will not give any rashes to your child’s soft skin.

Checkout Price

#7. Kurio

You can easily call this one of the best touch screen watches for kids as it has the best high-resolution touch screen which can compete with any smartwatch made for adults. Loaded with 256MB internal memory and extra 32GB memory card, your child will be free to click photos and load videos through this smartwatch.

Features of Kurio Smartwatch

• The rechargeable lithium battery will keep the watch going for hours.
• USB cable can charge the watch and also ideal for transferring data.
• Productivity tools like alarm, calendar, contacts, calculator and activity tracker and much more.
• Packed with 20 games and apps, which your child will love for sure.
• Kids can play games in single and two player’s mode.
• Easy to send messages via Bluetooth to other Kurio watches and any smartphones.
• Parents can enter their kid’s critical data like medical information to help medics in case of medical emergency.
• You will probably not see any other smartwatch made for kids with so many features and also taking care of your security concerns as well.

Checkout Price

#8. Garmin

Because of its sleek and compact design, one can easily call this Garmin smartwatch as the coolest kids smart watch. Although the red color looks stunning on this watch, you can also select from yellow and floral design options as well.

Features of Garmin smartwatch

• Unlike other Smartwatches, we presented this smartwatch comes with a fixed battery of 1-year life.
• The smartwatch is swim-friendly and has 5 ATM water resistances.
• Band fits your child’s wrists easily and gives constant comfort feeling.
• Best for the kids between 4 years and 9 years.
• Compatible with all Android and iOS enabled smartphones.

Checkout Price

#9. Tick Talk

You might witness many touch watches for kids, but you will probably not see such smartwatch loaded with some great features which this high-end Tick Talk smartwatch has.

Features of Tick Talk smartwatch

• The smartwatch is the newest version with a high-resolution touch panel.
• Bigger icon design easy to swipe and control for kids.
• Kids can call and receive calls from the watch itself.
• Easy to locate your kids wearing this smartwatch via GPS locator in partner app.
• Pre-loaded $5 SIM card enables you to start using this watch instantly.
• This is a rare smartwatch for kids who have almost zero confusing features and has simple functions for each need of your kid.

Checkout Price

#10. LEMFO

This kids smartwatch acts like a bracelet when the child wears it so that it will be very comfortable for your kids it he or she wears it for an entire length of the day. The quality-designed smartwatch from LEMFO is also a product of environmentally friendly material.

Features for LEMFO smartwatch

• The LED screen is perfect for children’s eyesight, and it adjusts with the bright light easily.
• Get all day tracking and that too real time so that you will know about your kid’s whereabouts all the time.
• Inbuilt SOS button so your kid can call the SOS number with just one press just in case of emergency.
• You can also choose activity areas for your kids on the APP maps so when your kid crosses any of these areas your app will send you an alarm.
• A great look will automatically keep your child engaged with it as it is highly attractive, to say the least.

Checkout Price

So, here we are at the end of this exclusive list of the best smartwatch for kids. We are sure that after going through this list you must have decided best kids smart watch. So when you buy any of the products from above just let us know about it here in the comments section or on Facebook, Twitter, and Google Plus for the benefit of our other readers.

Best Android Wear 2.0 Apps of 2017: Make Your Daily Routine Enjoyable

Now that you can directly download and use various apps on your Android Wear 2.0, we have got some of the best Android Wear 2.0 apps which will set you free.

A rumor about the release date of Android Wear 2.0 has come true, and it is already on sale now. What is different about Android Wear 2.0 then its predecessor is that now the user no longer needs to rely on Android phone to operate apps made for Wear 2.0. Now you can directly download the best Android Wear 2.0 apps to your smartwatch.

You will agree that by downloading only the serious apps which add value to your smartwatch should be the idea. To help you to get some of those serious apps for Android Wear 2.0, we have selected these apps. These apps will certainly change the way you will use your smartwatch and shall help to get rid of your daily routine.

10 Best Android Wear 2.0 Apps 2017

#1. Foursquare

The Foursquare is now with completely different looks, and it is rocking like anything. It is great to see Foursquare available for Android Wear 2.0 smartwatch as it will only make your search for lots of outing activities. Now you can choose best restaurants offering food and drink in your local area or where you are currently within no time with Foursquare. All in all a great help on your hands, err… wrist.

Price: Free
Download Foursquare

#2. Google Fit – Fitness Tracking

Google Fit, as we all know is a fitness app, but it probably works at its best when it is on Android Wear 2.0. The reason behind it is that when you are wearing the smartwatch and working it can track your health activity. You can count how many calories you burn every day by walking, exercising or running. With this app, one can set a goal of a certain fitness activity and then try to achieve it.

Price: Free
Download Google Fit

#3. Nest

Now you need not to pair your phone app to get the Nest working it is very easy to track your home temperature with your Android Wear 2.0 apps. Off course you must have installed the Nest thermostat at home, and then you can control your home heating using the smartwatch itself. If you have a smartwatch having digital crowns like LG Watch Sport or LG Watch Style then you can just adjust the temperature by using the crown.

Price: Free
Download Nest

#4. Recordr – Sound Recorder Pro

It is not always possible to note something when you are having plenty on your plate or while you are traveling. So the good idea is to record the important notes you wish to make or convey. With powerful microphone of Android Wear 2.0, it is certainly possible to record anything you wish to. Once you record the note or the message on your smartwatch you can easily transfer or share it to Drive.

Price: Free
Download Recordr

#5. Glide – Video Chat Messenger

If it is easy to send voice messages via Recordr then it is very easy to send video messages from Glide. This app works on the same logic like above. If you wish to convey a short text message to your colleague or friend then why not sending a video message instead? The camera and the mic are so strong that you will get the best results on Android watches like LG Watch Sports.

Price: Free
Download Glide

#6. Google Keep – notes and lists

Can’t remember important things? Or want to make sure to reach at an event on time? Use your Android Wear 2.0 for the solution. Download Google Keep app, and we bet you will not forget anything afterward. You can add reminders and then you probably will not need any calendar for sure. You can list your priorities like going for a haircut or shopping something very important etc. and this app will remind you at a preset time.

Price: Free
Download Google Keep

#7. Lifesum – The Health Movement

This app can be very handy for those who can’t control their food habits. This fitness and health app will help you to make good food options and to improve on how you can exercise better. You can set your health goals and build good health habits gradually. The steps given here are also very easy to do, and it will not give you any pressure to achieve. So get a great food and stay healthy.

Price: Free
Download Lifesum

#8. Facebook Messenger

This is a totally different Facebook Messenger app then you get on your Android smartphone. If you wish to keep in touch with your friends via Facebook, always this is the best solution. Sometimes if you are in need to send t a quick reminder or something like that you can do it from your Android Wear 2.0 smartwatch. There is a different interface you will see made especially for smartwatches and for certain features you need to pay a small amount as well.

Price: Free
Download Messenger

#9. Shazam – Discover Music

This is world’s most popular music app and each activity you perform here is free. You can access music, music videos, songs, lyrics and tracks at one tap. You can sync all your devices including your Android Wear 2.0 with Shazam app. The best part of this app is that you can listen to your favorite tracks even when you are offline.

Price: Free
Download Shazam

#10. Find My Parked Car

Finding your car in a big parking lot is never an easy task, you will all agree. But Find My Parked Car app is making this task rather easy. If you are using this app from your smartwatch, the task is more convenient. Once you park your car just press the park button and your location is saved. When you are back after finishing your work you can open the app and will find the exact location from it.

Price: Free
Download Find My Parked Car

The apps given here will certainly reduce your daily work and will help you to streamline it. You can check these Android Wear 2.0 apps one by one and then decide which one will make your routine easy than what it is now.

Best VR Headsets Under $50 for Android and iPhone: Get Immersing Experience

Here is the list of the best VR headsets for Android and iPhone, which you can get just under $50. So, don’t wait just pick up the VR headset which you feel is the best for you.

We have already seen best VR headsets for iPhone 6 and 6S plus, best VR headsets for iPhone 7 and 7 Plus and also best VR headsets for Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge. Now it is time to have best VR headsets under $50 for Android and iPhone, so you get a wider range of choice.

These VR headsets may come cheap in price, but there is no compromise in quality, both in material and also in having great 3D viewing experience. So just fasten your seatbelts and immerse yourself into a great virtual experience by paying a very low price.

List of 10 Best VR Headsets Under $50 for Android and iPhone

#1. PASONOMI 3D Glasses VR Headset

When a big brand like PASONOMI offers you an excellent VR headset priced under $50, then you should not skip this opportunity. This VR headset can fit with any iPhone or Android smartphone so you can get the entire family with you to enjoy some of the best 3D movies and games.

• It is very easy to adjust focal and object distance by just pushing one button, and that is how you will get the best possible viewing experience.
• The design of this VR headset will make sure that you always remain comfortable even when you are watching the videos or playing games for the longer time.
• There is also a sponge area around the head, and that will reduce the skin irritation to zero.

Price: $29.99
Buy it from Amazon.com

#2. Oct17 3D Glasses VR Headset

If you get an offer to buy an incredible VR headset at an unbelievable price then what you will do? Obviously, you won’t let this irresistible offer right? Oct17 is bringing you a great VR headset gadget at a high price, and we think you shouldn’t miss on you.

• The high precision lens provides you a clearer picture and a better view for a great 3D cinema experience.
• The adjustment to your eyes and pupil is automatic for a happy gaming and video watching experience.
• This VR headset is compatible with most of the Android smartphones and iPhones so you can pick this set without worrying.
• The material used in this VR headset is high quality and also environment-friendly ABS material, so it is sturdy and will feel good on your skin.
• It also supports 3D split screen, and thus you can run 3D images side by side and make the fun double.

Price: $8.01
Buy it from Amazon.com

#3. EpochAir 3D Virtual Reality Headset

This VR headset, filled with some excellent features which will enhance the way you can watch 3D movies or play some of the mind-blowing video games. The 360-degree virtual experience you will get from this VR headset will remain unmatched for a long time.

• The VR headset allows you to adjust the focal distance at a very comfortable level of your eyes and that will enable different vision at a different level.
• There is also inbuilt Bluetooth control which will allow you to control the gadget from outside when you are watching a movie or playing games.
• The company made full efforts to make this headset look incredibly great and stylish.
• The material used in this VR headset is durable, and the piece is an example of exquisite artistry.

Price: $35.99
Buy it from Amazon.com

#4. Beautiful-tech VR Headset with Remote Controller

Immerse yourself into a real 3D experience with this VR headset from Beautiful-tech. You can also enjoy some of the best 3D games with this headset as it is well equipped with some of the finest technologies available. With Bluetooth remote controller you have one more level of comfort.

• This VR headset is compatible with any Android or iPhone which means your family and friends can enjoy it.
• The front cover of this headset is easy to remove and that will make the smartphone cool while using it and will give the best ventilation for an extended period.
• The pupil distance and focal distance both are adjustable to get the best 3D experience for both kids and adults.

Price: $49.99 [$18.99 on Amazon when we are writing this.] Buy it from Amazon.com

#5. LUPHIE 3D VR Headset with Stereo Headphones

Apart from usual 3D movie and gaming experience, this VR headset from LUPIE will give you an excellent stereophonic sound through its inbuilt speakers. The adjustable strap will make sure that you will always get the best experience of viewing from this headset.

• The VR headset is compatible with both iPhone and Android, so you need not check again and again whether it will work with your smartphone or not.
• The company claims that these VR headsets will give you the most powerful virtual reality experience both visually and also with its surround sound effects.
• The good tune pressure will make sure that you will feel comfortable wearing this headset for the extended time.
• The adjustable focal distance and pupil distance will make sure that it satisfies different people of different age while viewing 3D images.

Price: $49.99
Buy it from Amazon.com

#6. Urgod 3D VR Glasses Headset

You can call this VR headset as ultimate one because you can get the best experience of 3D games and movies with its split screen feature. Because this headset fits with every Android and iPhone, so it doesn’t matter which smartphone each of your family members is using, he or she can still enjoy the virtual world.

• The pupil distance and focal distance both are less than 500 degrees so you can adjust the headset according to your comfort and get the best 3D experience.
• There are three adjustable straps which will adjust the pressure from the bridge of the nose, and that will give a lighter feel.
• The surface of this headset is matte, and it also uses high-definition optical resin lenses so get the best out of 3D experience through this headset.
• You just need to remove the front cover and then your phone will remain fresh throughout your viewing sessions, and that will be excellent ventilation for extended use.

Price: $46.99 [$19.99 on Amazon when we are writing this.] Buy it from Amazon.com

#7. iDudu VR Headset with Stereo Headphone

The iDudu VR headset has inbuilt stereo headphone, so you will get the best interconnected and immersing experience of 3D visuals and also a great sound effect. Bring your IMAX at your home with this iDudu VR headset.

• This VR headset is easily stretchable, and it fits all Android and iPhone smartphones.
• There are two tranches button of inter-pupillary distance and focus adjustment, high precision, and it is more convenient and stable knobs.
• The adjustable straps for flexible wear, high-grade perforated leather material suitable nose bridge, and face foam protector will bring your ultra-comfortable feeling.

Price: $39.99 [$35.88 on Amazon when we are writing this.] Buy it from Amazon.com

#8. VRidium 3D VR Headset

Not only this VR headset works excellently with any Android or iPhone, but it also looks great. The compact design and overall look can add value to your daily lifestyle. This VR headset is easily adjustable with any group or age of users so just let your VR experience go beyond boundaries.

• The VRidium headset is using advanced VR technology, so it will work with the multitude of games, apps and other VR experience which is unmatched with any other VR headset.
• Get the excellent visual controls with automatic focus capability which will allow you to adjust depth and distance between your eyes and the headset.
• With this headset, you can create a full field of view (FOV), and that will give you the high degree of optimization for your HD viewing pleasure.
• It is made from a premium and lightweight material so you can see your favorite 3D movies and play games for an extended period.
• The headset mounts on your head quickly so it will give you comfortable viewing as well.

Price: $69.99 [$39.99 on Amazon when we are writing this.] Buy it from Amazon.com

#9. KIWI design VR Headset with Remote Controller 

Till now, we saw six VR headsets for Android and iPhone and few of them also offering many accessories attached to them also. But none of the above six VR headsets are providing a carrying bag where you can store these accessories quickly. KIWI design does offer a travel storage bag so you can keep everything safe inside.

• The KIWI design VR headset not only fits both Android and iPhone but it is also perfect for every age so entire family of yours can use it.
• There is a trigger (remote) along with this headset which will provide you more freedom to enjoy those great VR apps.
• There are inbuilt earphones as well, so you need not purchase an extra set of them and also it will help you to have complete VR experience both viewing and hearing.
• The 120-degree viewing angle from this headset will allow you to immerse in the virtual world.
• Just open the upper cover, launch virtual reality app, adjust card slot to locate the phone and plug in the jack. Now adjust the strap according to your comfort with earphone and pupil distance and then immerse yourself.

Price: $56.99 [$35.99 on Amazon when we are writing this.] Buy it from Amazon.com

#10. Bnext 3D VR Headset

What do you need in a virtual reality headset? Clear-cut picture and excellent sound quality and also fit for both your Android and iPhone? Bnext VR headset will give you the same. You can get the best experience on movies and games with this VR headset.

• The advanced VR gaming technology equipped with this headset will always give you the immersing gaming experience.
• This headset works best when your eyes properly align with the screen box, and that is why your eyes will not feel fatigue.
• The adjustable strap will not only adjust your eyesight properly with the VR headset but also can fit any size of the head, so your entire family can use it.
• You will get one year warranty from the company so that you will have a worry-free enjoyment for a whole year.

Price: $69.95 [$28.99 on Amazon when we are writing this.] Buy it from Amazon.com

So, this is the list of the best VR headsets under $50 for Android and iPhone. We are sure that you now have a good number of choices in your hand and it will be easy for you to buy one of these great products.

Best Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus Accessories To Enhance Your Experience

Equip your all new Samsung phones with these best Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus accessories and get the maximum out of them.

Just last week Samsung announced its all-new flagship smartphones called Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus with some extraordinary features and specifications.

You might have started thinking about purchasing the best Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus accessories so that you can get the best out of your smartphones. If you wish to have the best among the best, then you are at the right place, because we have made your search easier.

We have chosen eleven accessories for Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus which are probably must if you get the most out of your smartphones. From charging dock to VR headset, we have got everything covered. Each and every product which you will go through now are the best in their right and made from top quality materials.

All you need to do now is to check every accessory and decide which accessory you would like to pair with your Samsung Galaxy S8 or S8 Plus so that you can enjoy it thoroughly.

Best Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus Accessories

Accessories List	Features
Samsung Gear 360	4K Video Capabilities	Check It Out
Yootech	Qc 2.0/3.0 Adaptive Charger	Check It Out
Choetech	Qualcomm Charge 3.0 Port	Check It Out
Sojitek	Car Mount	Check It Out
Caseology	Leather Bumper Case	Check It Out
Supcase	Rugged Case	Check It Out
Samsung	Gear S3 Frontier	Check It Out
Samsung Dex Station	True Desktop PC	Check It Out
Jaybird	Sport Headphones	Check It Out
Samsung	128Gb 95Mb/S Micro Card	Check It Out
Samsung	Portable VR Machine	Check It Out

#1. Gear 360 from Samsung

When Samsung announced its two new flagship smartphones Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus, it also announced its new camera called Gear 360. You can take stunning 360-degree photographs at ease with this Gear 360.

Features of Gear 360

• With all new Gear 360 camera, you can shoot videos in 4K (30fps).
• You can also live to stream the videos by using Samsung Galaxy S8 or S8 Plus.
• If you have a microSD card up to 256 GB then the videos can be saved there.
• Get 5 different viewing modes from all the shots taken.

Coming Soon From Samsung

#2. Wireless Charger from yootech

This wireless charger from yootech is probably the fastest of its kind. Get the maximum output of 10W from it and get the charging of your Galaxy S8 and S8 from zero to full within two and half hours. Perhaps no other charger can match this speed.

Features of Yootech Charger

• Two charging modes; faster mode provides 10W output whereas normal mode provides 5W output.
• Normal charging mode takes three and half hours from zero to full charge.
• Samsung provided original QC 2.0 adapter and cable and also use yootech provided cable.
• Smart LED light will indicate the charging status.
• Get hassle-free lifetime warranty with it.

Buy it from Amazon.com

#3. Car Charger from CHOETECH

CHOETECH is bringing a sleek and compact looking car charger made just for Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus only. It is a 3.0 USB Type C car charger which means it is proof against any unwanted and harmful activities.

Features of Choetch Car Charger

• Get four times faster charging than conventional car chargers available in the market.
• This car charger auto detects charging speed according to the need and device.
• Always charges your device at fastest possible speed.
• Safe from overcharging, over-current, short circuit and overheating.
• Compact design allows you to carry anywhere even in your pocket.

Buy it from Amazon.com

#4. Car Mount from Sojitek

This is a two-in-one car mount from Sojitek which also works as a smartphone charger. So now when you are traveling and navigating your Samsung S8 and S8 Plus will also get the juice it requires.

Features of Sojitek Car Mount

• This car mount-cum-wireless Charger has Qi Standard Charging.
• It is very simple to load and unload the smartphone from it via hands lock and release system.
• You can fix this dock in A/C vent without damaging the blades.
• Inbuilt swivel ball allows 360-degree rotation.
• Get a Micro USB charging cable to provide power to the mount.

Buy it from Amazon.com

#5. Protective Case for Galaxy S8 from Caseology

For any smartphone, you need a good protective case, and we are bringing you a great one from Caseology as it is a product of a premium PU leather. You can call this case as a modern classic product.

Check out: Best Galaxy S8 Cases

Features of Caseology Case

• The slim fit design makes this case pocket-friendly.
• The PU leather material is of a high-quality, and it is anti-slip and anti-stain qualities.
• Get the shockproof protection from accidental drops.
• There are four reinforced bumpers in the frame.
• Precise cuts for the full access to all the buttons.
• Raised bezels to protect camera and screen from scratches.

Buy it from Amazon.com

#6. Protective Case for Galaxy S8 Plus from Supcase

Supcase is known for throwing out some of the best accessories for smartphones, and this full body rugged holster case is one of the gems you will ever find. The rugged design of this case gives you feeling of safety for your smartphone.

Also, Check out the list of best Galaxy S8 Plus Cases

Features of Supcase Case

• Attach the front cover, back cover and holster and your smartphone get protection.
• The outer of the case is of high-grade TPU and PC
• Holster belt clip enables full 360-degrees viewing.

Buy it from Amazon.com

#7. Samsung Gear S3 Frontier

What could better partner for your Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus be than this Samsung Gear S3 Frontier Smartwatch? Get the smartest gadgets with you paired with each other can just make your routine easier.

(Checkout these coolest Samsung Gear S3 Bands)

Features of Gear S3 Frontier

• The distinctive steel bezel and always on watch face gives extra to its already stunning looks.
• Call, text and also get the notifications from your watch through Bluetooth.
• Now it is also connected with Samsung Pay and for one swipe payment.
• Share your location with inbuilt GPS tracking while on the move.
• This smartwatch can resist itself from water, dust and extreme temperature.
• The sturdy body makes sure that your smartwatch is safe from occasional drops.

Buy it from Amazon.com

#8. Samsung DeX Station

This DeX station from Samsung is the primary tool to convert your Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus into a competent desktop computer. So now just fix your smartphone in this DeX station and enjoy the comfort of PC.

It works especially with light work apps and other jobs.

Features of Dex Station

• Equipped with Windows Continuum features but the only difference is that it runs on Android.
• Get the best Samsung User Interface once connected.
• Inbuilt fan to keep your Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus cool.
• It also has ports for Ethernet, 2x USB 2.0, HDMI and USB-C port.
• Charge your smartphone while using it with ease.
• Compact design allows plenty of free space on your desk.

Book it on Samsung.com

#9. Wireless Bluetooth Headphones from JayBird

JayBird maybe a new name for you but this wireless Bluetooth headphones from this company got a maximum number of positive reviews from its customers on Amazon. This is a high-end wireless headphone and perfect for Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus.

Features of JayBird Bluetooth Headphone

• Best headphones for outdoors as it reduces outside noise comprehensively.
• Get continuous music and calls for eight hours.
• Compatible with remote controls.
• Over and under-ear fit options for secure movement.
• Package includes carrying case and charging cable & cord.
• Get lifetime sweatproof warranty from JoyBird.

Buy it from Amazon.com

#10. MicroSD Card from Samsung

You got to have a microSD card fixed with your Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus to get extended memory and what better choice one can have than this 128GB microSD card from Samsung.

Features of Samsung MicroSD Card

• Get up to 95MB per second read and 90MB per second write speed.
• Write and add 3D video recordings, music, images and files.
• Transfer your favorite music files from PC with ease.
• Proof from water, temperature, x-ray and magnetic.
• Samsung offers five years limited warranty.

Buy it from Amazon.com

#11. Samsung Gear VR

Your Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus is equipped to view the most amazing 3D pictures and to get the best experience of it. You need to have Samsung Gear VR without a single doubt in mind.

Features of Samsung Gear VR

• Easy to use VR set which has a touchpad and dedicated back and home buttons.
• Get the wide field of view with precise head-tracking and low latency.
• Play games, watch movies and also stunning 360-degree panoramic pictures.
• Automatically detects mount and unmounts positions.

Buy it from Amazon.com

As you can see we have covered almost everything which can enhance the usage of your Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus and give you more comfort. All these accessories will make sure that you enjoy your extraordinary smartphone to its best.

Confessions of a Google Spammer

Before I became an inbound marketer, I once made $50,000 a month spamming Google. I worked a maximum of 10 hours a week. And I am telling you from the bottom of my heart: never, never ever follow in my footsteps.

This blog post will tell you exactly why…

My Mindset in 2009

I never wanted to spam the Internet. Google made me do it.

This is what I told myself back then.

If spamming is so wrong, I wondered, how come it always works so well? Most black hat SEOs think this way. They rationalize spamming Google’s index in so many ways:

• We’re helping Google improve their algorithm!
• Content is king?!? LOL! Links are the only content you need. Google’s lying to people. They deserve to get spammed.
• If we don’t do spam, our competitors will — and then they’ll beat us. We have to spam.
• We’re helping our customers — the little guy — win the battle against a big, bad, evil empire that wants to enslave them to paying PPC costs!

Black hat SEOs: masters of ethical rationalization

But there I was, responsible for Google adding 45,000,000 new words of spam to its index every day. I had built a spam machine; the thing was brilliant enough to give my clients huge SEO ranking boosts (this was before KontentMachine and all the other spam-producing software out there now).

Some examples of my “work”:

Some samples of my automated article creation “work” c. 2009

Spamming was very profitable back in 2012

Sales of our SEO SaaS subscriptions peaked at around $150,000 a month in subscriptions. Profit margins were about 70–80%. All profits were shared 50/50 between my partner and I. We had two sales threads — one on WarriorForum and another on WickedFire.

Here’s what a few hours of sales looked like back then:

An average couple hours of income at my company during the high times. These would all magically appear after I returned from a swim, playing with my son at the park, or from playing pickup basketball with the local islanders.

PayPal had no idea how I was suddenly making so much money. They were so confused about my business model that they froze $25,000 in my account. They expected massive refund and chargeback requests.

But our refund/chargeback rate was less than 1%.
Because our SEO service worked.

Most of our users were ranking high for big affiliate keywords. I even got my electrician buddy’s website in New Jersey to rank in first place for the keyword “electrician” just for fun. I could literally rank first page for any keyword I wanted to with about 5 minutes of effort.

And my life became very easy as a result. I had two apartments on an island in China with 180-degree panorama views of Sanya Bay — one for myself, and one for my son’s mom.

I barely worked.

Our entire business was outsourced to 7 VAs in the Philippines and one transgender customer support rep in Nevada who was saving up her salary to complete her hormone therapy.

My schedule looked like this:

• 7:00am: Wake up, do some stretching and play with my two-year-old son while my chef prepared breakfast.
• 8:00am: Eat breakfast and watch an NBA game (the Clippers, if they had a game) while eating breakfast. The nanny watched my son.
• 9:30am: Check in with my partner and employees, Facebook, and chat with my two journalist friends in Beijing.
• 11:00am: BS on Skype with some SEO spammer buddies for a bit.
• 12:30pm: Ride my scooter to the gym.
• 1:00pm: Run 10km, lift weights.
• 3:00pm: Go for a swim in the ocean or the neighborhood pool.
• 3:30pm: Play with my son and his friends.
• 5:00pm: Play basketball at the court with maintenance workers and tourists staying in my neighborhood.
• 7:00pm: Shower, then dinner, prepared by my chef.
• 8:00pm: Put my son to bed.
• 9:00pm: Check in on Skype, BS online, read books.
• 11:00pm: Sleep.

Lonely SEO Spammer Millionaires

The above schedule is what a spammer’s four-hour workweek looks like. And it’s the life of a lot of black hats that are still balling today. It’s a comfortable but often dull and somewhat empty life.

The most exciting (and nerve-wracking) times are when the loophole you’re exploiting gets closed, and your life flips upside down while you scramble to adjust.

During the boring times, my other spammer buddies and I would BS on Skype about our lives. One guy made $100k a week for a time selling garcinia cambogia pills after Dr. Oz fraudulently proclaimed them to be a magic weight loss supplement.

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One woman focused on morally shady but technically legal niches like bath salts, salvia, and access to guides on how to cheat on your spouse. Yet another guy (also in China, like me) was working with prison wardens who forced their inmates to mine World of Warcraft gold for sale online.

All three bought links from me.
They spent their earnings like spoiled little kids.

They bought luxury cars and $5,000 bottles of champagne to spray their spammer buddies at conventions. They ate ADHD medication like candy, trying to stay awake and focused to work as long as possible. They traded NLP secrets to work on their powers of female seduction. When that didn’t pan out there was always the old staples of prostitutes and cocaine. Many practiced intensive bodybuilding, and took steroids, HGH, and weird supplements like deer antler sprays to hack their muscle growth.

With all that money and privilege at stake, the brotherhood of spammers is merciless and ultra secretive. If you fail to attribute a useful tip to the person you found it out from, expect to be shunned. Expose an SEO loophole that made your buddy money, and you’re excommunicated. Betray the ‘family’, and you’ll get kicked out of the Skype group forever. It’s like the Sopranos except instead of wise guys, your family is made up of awkward tech nerds who have cashed in and want to live out all their fantasies.

Google Made Us Do It

I hadn’t originally wanted to go down this path. Ironically, I had applied to work for Google’s webspam team in 2010. I knew all the tricks and hacks in the book, and I thought they could benefit from my help.

When they didn’t reply to my application, I promised myself I would make them pay.
And I had them paying for a few years…

Until one day, Matt Cutts sent out this historic tweet:

The tweet that shook the SEO world

ALN (Authority Link Network) was the platform we used to boost ranking for all of our users’ websites. Our service was actually called “ALN service” — a fact that helped increase awareness of the network and ironically hastened its demise.

There was a time when our service was one of the hottest things going on WarriorForum. We had found SEO spammer nirvana, and everyone wanted a piece.

Dozens of guys using our service quit their day jobs to open up SEO businesses that relied almost exclusively on our service. Our biggest client, an SEO company that offered reputation management services for celebrities in Mexico, was paying us $25,000 a month and probably charging its clients up to 50 to 100 times more than that. I only realized how hard they were balling when they showed up on the Inc. 500 list in 2012.

But now there was this tweet from Matt Cutts, warning to take the network we relied on out of commission. When our clients asked about the tweet, I pretended I wasn’t the least bit concerned about it. Publicly, I scoffed. How could they find a network of 25,000 blogs? If they took it out, we’d just build a new one.

No big deal..

Privately, I was very concerned. I knew it was easy for Google to find every site in the network. Because all they had to do was buy a few links to one website, wait for those links to show up, then have every website receiving links from that blog manually reviewed. That review would uncover other spam blogs linking to those sites, which would then uncover more cheaters, and so forth.

In fact, from one spam site you can, and Google did, locate and destroy the entire ALN network. To us, it felt like we were the freedom fighters of Zion in the Matrix. The Google guys were like the agents, sending out Sentinels to take us out. Google, of course, saw it the other way around. We were hacking their algorithm and mucking up their search results for fun and profit.

How Google + SEO is like the Matrix

Publicly, I proclaimed that we were the good guys and Google was the evil empire. But in my heart I knew we were the bad guys.

Google provides clean search results for free, which truly benefits society. What does spamming the Internet provide for society? It helps two people: the spammer and his customer. Everyone else suffers.

And I knew it was shady. Part of me always dreamed of running a more legitimate business model. But it was just like Michael Corleone telling his wife Kaye that his business would be 100% straight in 5 years — there was just too much incentive to keep on spamming.

The psychology of spamming for money —
Spammers always think they’ll “go legit someday soon”

I was a hardened, unapologetic spammer. To the real marketing world, I was an outcast. And that became all too clear when I went to Distilled’s LinkLove event in London in April 2012.

Seeing the writing on the wall: the death of link building

My Dutch partner and I had found out about LinkLove from one of our favorite customers. Our customer was scheduled to speak there, so we bought all-inclusive tickets to the event and made plans to meet up there.

Right after we got our tickets, our customer dropped out of the speaker role without explanation. (This was right around the time ALN was getting deindexed, so maybe he was doing damage control with his clients whose rankings were dropping like flies.)

My partner and I went anyway, feeling like confident marketing experts with our massive PayPal bankroll. Those few days in London, however, opened my eyes to how the fledgling world of inbound marketing saw black hats.

We had dinner with all the VIPs the night before the event. Rand Fishkin and Mike King were there. Many other heavy hitters in online marketing were also there.

They were all talking about inbound marketing, quality content, engagement, and a bunch of stuff I didn’t understand or considered “BS.”

None of them seemed very interested in what we were doing.

“F#$%! Link Building”

Their beef with us was even clearer when Rand took the stage to kick off LinkLove 2012. My ego had already taken a hit after the lukewarm response at the dinner, but I never expected the onslaught that Rand would unleash.

He took the stage with a big smile, introduced himself and then proceeded with this presentation called “F#$%! Link Building”.

My heart sank.

I went from slightly butt-hurt to outright angry and defiant. He was insulting our entire industry. I imagine that this is the feeling Michael Corleone, from Godfather II, felt when Senator Geary called him out in the meeting about the casino rights he wanted.

How Rand Fishkin sees link builders

I swore I wouldn’t let Google make us stop hustlin’. But Rand was right. Within 2 months, our entire network of 5,000+ blogs — for which we paid more than $80,000 — was deindexed, dead, simply kaput. Our $100k/mo business was ruined.

However, I remained arrogant and defiant. I still believed that making money online would be easy. I thought I could just make some minor adjustments to our strategy and keep on banging out new successful products.

I funneled more than $100,000 into various new link schemes, each one more “white hat”-seeming than the next.

Nothing worked for long. Google’s deindexing, plus Panda and Penguin, were just too much of a challenge for us. I would put in 3 months of work, get 4 months of sales, and either almost break even or have a huge deficit.

I felt discouraged and depressed. I tried to buy myself some fancy clothes and toys to feel better about myself. I immersed myself in a shallow relationship with a model who would end up being Miss Universe China 2014. I took weekly hiking trips with my friends in the hills of Beijing on psychadelic mushrooms.

I was an empty shell of a human being, lost with no sense of purpose or what to do with my future. With anxiety levels at an all-time high, I could only sleep 2–3 hours a night. Most people I met at that time felt uneasy around me.

And I wasn’t the only one having trouble adapting to the post-deindexing world. The Google-hating spammers reached their official low-point when SEOnitro (another public blog network) tried to start a class action lawsuit against Google for intentionally doing harm to many “competing businesses.”

Seriously guys? That’s like spray painting your business’s phone number on someone else’s building, then trying to sue them when they paint over it.

Giving Up, Embracing Inbound and Getting a Job

After 18 months of banging my head against a wall, I started thinking about that LinkLove conference again. What if I started over? What could I have built with that $100,000 I had wasted chasing loopholes in Google’s algorithm? How much awesome content could I have gotten? How many email subscribers could I have gained?

Maybe there was something to that inbound marketing thing Rand and Mike had talked about so passionately after all.

Maybe it was the way for me to really go legit.

So, I moved back to Beijing and put out the word to my friends. I was ready for a marketing job. I got a few offers, but none struck me like the one from Ptengine. They were a small startup making what I would later call “the Swiss army knife of conversion optimization tools.”

They had been successful in Japan, but now they wanted to enter the English-speaking market. They wanted to double their number of users over the next 2 months to show the VC firm looking to invest in them that they were able to achieve rapid growth.

They wanted me to help them with the powers of SEO. I told Ptengine that SEO wouldn’t work. Google’s new rankings sandbox wouldn’t allow it to work. I wanted to go with the safe route.

They were confused.

“What about PBNs?”, they asked. “We’re working with a very well known SEO blogger in the UK who has tens of thousands of email subscribers. He’s building PBNs for us”. I looked at the properties this SEO “god” had built. (Actually, it turned out he just outsourced the SEO work to a company in London.)

It was like opening a time capsule from 2012. Expired domains, duplicate content scraped from Archive.org, he didn’t even block backlink checking spiders. His reasoning: “blocking spiders would look like a footprint to Google.”

I felt a pang of sympathy for Ptengine. They had already dumped $4,000 into this operation. The whole thing was shocking to me. Even the SEO gurus who talked about inbound marketing were still trying to get by with loopholes.

My Stubborn Support for Inbound Marketing

I was undeterred by the SEO guru.
I went on with my newfound ideals instead.

By using a variety of outreach methods, including permission emails, sponsored posts, social media, and a very successful deal on StackSocial, we hit the VC’s goals. They bought in with very aggressive growth goals for 2015.

And I intend to keep going this route. We just started working with Joanna Wiebe at SnapCopy.co(whom Shanelle Mullin of Onboardly said might be “the best SaaS copywriter in North America”) and Talia Wolf at Conversioner.com to optimize our entire funnel.

We’re also getting plenty of adopters and influencers to get us case studies that we will promote to targeted segments that need Ptengine. In fact, all content will take all targeted audiences to various inbound funnels that are only meant to give them value.

Hear all that talk about content?

In short, after 5 years of considering white hats and inbound marketers to be snobs, I’m finally drinking the Kool-Aid.

You win, Google.

Content is king.

The Problem Is Probably Trust

In a post-mortem for a failed project, it’s unlikely that you’ll ever hear someone say, “We missed the deadline because we didn’t trust each other.” But 9 times out of 10, trust is the unspoken root cause lurking at the bottom of your 5 why’s (or maybe 10 why’s?).

Why do we waste time in pointless meetings or mire our work in layers of process? We don’t trust our leaders and co-workers to come through for us, or read our emails, or understand why what we are working on matters.

Why do we miss deadlines? It usually comes down to lack of trust. We feel like if we speak up about blockers in our way or the unrealistic timeline that our concerns would be brushed off, or we would be told to just work harder. Or maybe we think a team member isn’t pulling their weight, but we don’t trust that this is a conversation that can be had.

Why do some of us just prefer small companies? It’s much easier to have deep levels of trust in small teams (not that a small team will guarantee trust by any means).

Office politics? Lack of trust.

Overwhelming stress at work? It can often be traced back to simply not feeling safe at work…that’s a lack of trust.

It’s why we love working with our closest colleagues. We trust them. We know they have our best interests at heart. They get us.

It’s why cross-team collaboration, while great in theory, is often so difficult in reality. Each little team has its own mini-culture and workflows. They have their team’s best interests at heart, there’s just not the same level of trust.

Without trust, work is slow and stressful. With trust, even challenging work is enjoyable, meaningful, and gets done exponentially faster.

Trust is a part of my career I underinvested in for years. I put on my game face, carefully maintaining the line between “work me” and “real me,” and wasvalways cautious about asking for help or admitting failure. You can read the end result of that story here:

The Secret Club of Admitting You Suck
A story about the time I almost moved to the middle of nowhere rather than admit that I felt like a failure. thinkgrowth.org

Today, that’s just not how I prefer to work.

I don’t have any advice on how to build trust at scale, that’s a whole other topic, but I have picked up a few things about how to build trust on a more personal level.

1.Talk about how you’re feeling. If you’re frustrated and overwhelmed, ask for help. If something in your personal life is stressing you out, talk about it. If you need to cry at work, go for it. If you want people to trust you, you need to reveal yourself. I’m an introvert and a naturally private person, I keep waiting for this to get easier…so far it hasn’t, but it’s still worth it 🙂

2.Admit when you don’t know something. I think the tech community as a whole is so over-confident. It was such a relief for me when I started to admit out loud that I was confused, or something was hard for me, or I felt very unconfident in my abilities. And then I realized that nobody cared. I started to say, “I don’t think I’ll be good at that, here’s why…” and instead of doors closing, they opened wider.

In a post addressed specifically to women, but relevant for anyone looking to lean into big career aspirations, Nataly Kelly writes:

Move forward with conviction in your own ability to stretch and grow. Work hard, look for areas that need some help, and pitch in without waiting to be asked, but most importantly, believe that you can do it. You’re more likely to succeed than not.

In other words, it’s totally normal to feel uncertain about your abilities, but that’s no excuse for not moving forward. If you’re worried, admit it. Then go get it.

Hey Ladies, Let’s Reclaim This Whole “Aggressive” Insult
Nataly Kelly shares how a kidnapping in South America gave her the confidence to ignore the naysayers and aggressively pursue her dreams. thinkgrowth.org

3. Break down the separation between work life and personal life. Anita G Andrews has been a huge inspiration to me on this, and I was lucky to work with her for a few years and see her in action. Anita is an executive and a mother and never apologizes for the moments when her “personal life” interrupts work…it’s all just life after all. And this isn’t relevant advice only for parents. Life inevitably interrupts work and needs more from us. Let’s talk about these things. We all have them. There’s no shame.

Flexible Work Policies Hurt Women: Here’s Why and What Executives Can Do About It.
Anita Andrews shares her advice on breaking down the barrier between work and personal life by modeling flexibility. thinkgrowth.org

4.Assume good intent. In every interaction you have with your co-workers, assume they care as much about your customers and the company as you do. Assume they are competent, caring, wonderful people. Then, working on that assumption, put in in the time to understand their perspective and end goals.

One of my favorite books on organizational change is Switch: How to Change Things When Change is Hard. There’s a mantra repeated throughout the book that I often come back to when I have moments of feeling frustrated with co-workers:

“What looks like a people problem is often a situation problem.”

HubSpot’s CMO, Kipp Bodnar shared a story a few months ago about a time in HubSpot history when a person responsible for mid-funnel conversion rates rented a mini-van, hired a freelance videographer, and drove to Maryland (HubSpot is based in Boston) to get a customer case study on camera. The reason? The video team had its own priorities and couldn’t prioritize the customer video. Kipp writes:

“Let me be clear, this story doesn’t implicate any parties involved. Leaders, and the org structures we create, cause these scenarios.”

In other words, it wasn’t a people problem, it was a situation problem.

Structure Your Marketing Team for Growth
HubSpot CMO, Kipp Bodnar, shares how organizational design can encourage or inhibit growth.thinkgrowth.org

5. Practice radical candor. Kim Scott has been preaching the importance of radical candor between manager and direct reports for several years, but this concept isn’t just for bosses giving feedback. We could all do with more candor in our conversations. Kim Scott quotes an Apple colleague who once asked her:

“How long do you spend making sure you have all the facts right before you criticize somebody? How long do you spend making sure you have all the facts right before you praise somebody?”

This is huge. I personally have a tendency to obsess over the “awkward conversations.” But you know what makes an awkward conversation awkward? Someone coming in with a prepared speech and preconceived notions about what’s really going on. Today, I try to surface an issue right away. I ask why, try to understand motivations, and seek to understand the situation. Funny thing? I’m having fewer conversations today that feel painfully awkward.

Feedback is the Atomic Building Block of Management
Kim Scott explains how to craft better praise and deliver tough feedback. thinkgrowth.org

So, why bother with all this?

The truth is you can get away with not having trust at work for a long time. You can be a successful leader without a team that trusts you, you can achieve individual success without opening up to and trusting your co-workers. But eventually something will happen — a big launch will be missed, a campaign will flop, a key player will quit unexpectedly, you will say something unforgivably thoughtless, your personal life will implode and you’ll need some extra help.

In moments of tension and high stress, recovery is dependent on trust.

Business is personal. Work is personal. And it’s so much for fun when we trust the people we work with.

The Startup Founder’s Guide to Analytics

You need analytics.

I’m very confident of that, because today, everyone needs analytics. Not just product, not just marketing, not just finance… sales, fulfillment, everyone at a startup needs analytics today. Analytics powers every decision, from the strategic to the tactical, from the board room to your line level employees.

This post is about how to create the analytics competency at your organization. It’s not about what metrics to track (there are plenty of good posts about that), it’s about how to actually get your business to produce them. As it turns out, the implementation question — How do I build a business that produces actionable data?—is much harder to answer.

And the answer is changing fast. The analytics ecosystem is moving very quickly, and the options you have at your disposal have changed significantly in the past 24 months. This post reflects recommendations and experience with the data technology of 2017.

First: Why should you listen to me?

I’ve spent the better part of two decades working in analytics. In that time, I’ve seen plenty of things go well, but a lot more go poorly. I spent the early part of my career implementing legacy enterprise BI (ugh). I built Squarespace’s first analytics competency from 2009–2010 and raised massive A round with the data. I was then COO of Argyle Social, a social media analytics startup, and subsequently VP Marketing at RJMetrics, a leading BI platform for startups.

Now I spend my days helping startup execs implement analytics as the CEO and Founder of Fishtown Analytics. At Fishtown, we start working with companies who have raised an A round and help them build their internal analytics competency as they grow. We’ve been through the exact process I’m going to describe in this article with over a dozen companies at this point, including Casper, SeatGeek, and Code Climate.

I’m going to walk you through, stage by stage, how your startup should be doing analytics. At each stage, my recommendations are going to answer to the question “What’s the absolute least I can get away with?” We’re not here to build castles in the sky; we need answers as cheaply as possible.

Let’s do it.

Founding Stage

(0 to 10 employees)

At this stage, you have no resources and no time. There are a million things you could be measuring, but you’re so close to the details of your business that you’re actually able to make fairly good instinctual decisions. The one thing you need to make sure you are measuring is your product, because it’s your product metrics that will help you iterate quickly in this critical phase. Everything else can take a back seat.

What to do

• Install Google Analytics on your website via Google Tag Manager. The data won’t be perfect without more work but it’s not the right time to worry about that.
• If you are an ecommerce business, you really need to make sure that your Google Analytics ecommerce data is good. GA can do a decent job of tracking your ecommerce business all the way from visitor to purchase, so spend the time to make sure it’s right.
• If you build software of any type, you need real event tracking. I don’t care what tool you use — Mixpanel and Heap are very similar and they’re both good. At this point I wouldn’t think too hard about what you’re tracking: just use Mixpanel’s autotrack or Heap’s default installation. If you realize you need a datapoint, you’ll find it’s already there. This approach does not scale well, but for now, it’ll do.
• Your financial reporting should be done in Quickbooks. Your forecasting should be done in Excel. If you’re a subscription business, use Baremetrics for your subscription metrics. If you’re an ecommerce business, use your shopping cart platform to measure GMV. Don’t get fancy.

If you’re not technical, you may need an engineer to help out with GA and event tracking. This entire exercise shouldn’t take more than an hour or two, including reading the docs. It’s worth it to take the time out of building for this.

What not to do

Everything that is not one of the things above. Do not let someone sell you a data warehouse, a BI platform, a big consulting project, or…yeah, you get it. Stay focused. When you make a commitment to analytics, there is an ongoing cost. Data changes. Business logic changes. Once you start down this road, you can’t really put the project on pause. Wait to make this investment until later.

There will be many questions that you just can’t answer yet. That’s fine (for now).

Very Early Stage

(10 to 20 employees)

You’re growing your team a bit. These people need data to do their jobs. They may or may not be data experts, and you need to make sure that they’re doing the basic things right.

What to do

• You’ve probably hired a marketing person. Make sure they own GA. Hold them accountable for making sure the data is clean. They need to UTM track every damn link they create. They need to make sure your subdomains aren’t double-tracking. Your marketing person may say that they’re “not a GA person”. Don’t listen. There is enough information on the web about GA that if they’re smart and motivated they can learn it and figure it out. If they can’t figure it out, fire them and find someone else (seriously).
• If you have a sales person or two and use a CRM, use the built-in reporting. Make sure that your people know how to use it. You need to be able to know basic things like rep productivity and conversion rates by stage. Salesforce can do this stuff out of the box. Don’t export data to Excel, build the reports in the (terrible) report builder. Even if it’s painful, this will save you tons of time in the coming months.
• You probably have a couple of people in customer success. Most help desk systems don’t have great reporting, so choose KPIs that you can measure easily within the interface.
• Make sure you track NPS. Use Wootric or Delighted.

What not to do

It’s still too early for a data warehouse and for SQL-based analytics—it just takes too much time. You need to spend all of your time doing, not analyzing, and the most straightforward way to do that is to use the built-in reporting capabilities of the various SaaS products you’re using to run your business. You also shouldn’t hire a full-time analyst yet. There are more important things to spend your limited funds on at this point.

Early Stage

(20 to 50 employees)

This is where things get interesting, and where the changes in the past two years really start to become apparent. Once you’ve raised your A round and have 20+ employees you start to have new options.

These options are all driven by one thing: analytics tech is getting better, fast. Previously this type of infrastructure was reserved for much larger companies. Its benefits? More reliable metrics, more flexibility, and a better platform for future growth.

This is the hardest and most critical phase: promising if you do it right, but pain-inducing if you do it wrong.

What to do

• Set up your data infrastructure. This means choosing a data warehouse, an ETL tool, and a BI tool. For data warehouses, look into Snowflake and Redshift (I prefer to work with Snowflake given the choice). For ETL tools look into Stitch and Fivetran. For BI look into Mode and Looker. There are many, many products in this space; these six are the ones that we come back to time and again with our clients.
• Hire a strong analytics lead. Down the road, you’re going to need an entire team of analytics professionals: engineers, analysts, data scientists… But for now, you can only afford (at most) a single headcount. You need to find that special person who will be able to provide value on day 1, but who will also be able to hire the team around them as you grow. This person is hard to find—invest the time to find them. Often these folks have backgrounds in consulting or finance, and they frequently have MBAs. While this person should be able to roll up their sleeves and get their hands dirty, focus on hiring someone that can think about data, and about your business, strategically: they’re going to be the most important piece of your analytics puzzle for years to come.
• Consider hiring a consultant. While it’s great that you’ve found your analytics lead, that person isn’t going to have the expertise required to put together all of the components of your tech stack or the experience to solve all of the different analytics problems you’ll face across your business. Mistakes made at this critical stage have serious costs in both time and money as you grow, so it’s important to lay a solid foundation. To do this, more startups today are choosing to work with consultants to help them get set up, and then building a team around that infrastructure.

What not to do

• Unless machine learning is a core part of your product, don’t hire a data scientist yet. You need a generalist, not a specialist, to build your analytics team.
• For the love of all that is holy, do not build your own ETL pipelines. This will waste so many hours of engineering time. Buy off-the-shelf from Stitch or Fivetran.
• Don’t use any other BI tool than the two I mentioned above. You will pay for this down the road, hard.
• Don’t try to “get away with” using a more traditional database like Postgres as your data warehouse. It’s not that much cheaper and it’ll be a real time suck to switch later when you max it out. Postgres does not scale well as a data warehouse.

Mid-Stage

(50 to 150 employees)

This stage is potentially the most challenging. You still have a relatively small team and few resources, but you’re being asked to deliver increasingly sophisticated and diverse analytics to the business, and your work can directly impact the success or failure of the company as a whole. No pressure.

It’s important to make forward progress here while making sure that you continue to lay the groundwork for future phases of your growth. The decisions you make in this phase can cause you to charge straight into a brick wall if you don’t think hard about the future.

What to do

• Implement a solid process for SQL-based data modeling. Your data models serve as the underlying business logic for your analytics and should be shared across all of your analytics use cases, from BI to data science. Make sure that your process allows all users to make changes to data modeling scripts, is version-controlled, and is run in a transparent environment. We maintain an open-source product called dbt that many growth-stage companies use to do exactly this.
• Migrate from your existing web analytics and event tracking to Snowplow Analytics. Snowplow does everything that the paid tools do, but it’s open source. You can either host it yourself (and just pay the costs of your EC2 instances), or you can pay Snowplow or Fivetran to host the collector for you. If you don’t make this transition during this phase, you’re going to be missing out on collecting much more granular data, and you’re going to be setting yourself up for truly massive bills from Segment, Heap, or Mixpanel down the road. Once you grow past this stage these paid tools can easily charge $10k+ per month at minimum.
• Grow your team thoughtfully. The core of your team should always be business analysts: folks who are experts in SQL and your BI tool and spend their time working with business users to help them service their data requests. Figuring out the profile of this person and how to train and equip them is incredibly important. You should also hire your first data scientist in this phase. It’s important to have your data infrastructure and core analytics team in place prior to hiring experienced (and expensive) data science talent, but at some point you should add this skill set.
• Begin selectively tackling some forecasting challenges. Forecasting is harder than just running counts and sums, but there are a couple of key areas where it makes sense to begin diving in. If you’re a SaaS business, you should be working on a churn forecasting model. If you’re an ecommerce business, you absolutely need to be working on a demand forecasting model. These models will probably not be extremely sophisticated, but they’ll be a big improvement over the random Excel workbook that someone in Finance hacked together.
• Spend time and energy on figuring out your marketing attribution. This is a whole blog post on its own, but suffice it to say that you simply can’t trust this critical business question to a third party.

What not to do

It’s easy to get carried away with yourself and begin investing in heavy-duty data infrastructure. Don’t do this. At this stage, major infrastructure investments are still an expensive distraction. Here are some suggestions on how to stay agile:

• Push SQL, and your data warehouse, hard. You can get away with doing almost anything you want at this stage using the processing power of your data warehouse. Buy as much data warehouse horsepower as you need — paying for servers is far cheaper than paying for humans.
• Add in Jupyter Notebooks for data science work. If the data has been pre-aggregated in your warehouse, you typically won’t need to do this processing on a Spark or Hadoop cluster yet.
• Find low-cost ways to ETL datasets that don’t have off-the-shelf integrations. This is one of the things we love about Singer.

Avoiding expensive boondoggles will keep you focused on solving real business problems.

Growth Stage

(150 to 500 employees)

This stage is all about creating analytics processes that scale. You need to balance getting answers that you need today with implementing analytics practices that will scale as you continue growing your team.

At 150 employees you’ll probably only have a small team (3–6) full-time focused on analytics. By the time you have 500 employees you could easily have 30 or more. 3–6 analysts can operate in a fairly ad-hoc manner, exchanging knowledge (and code) informally. By the time you have 8+ analysts, this begins to break down very quickly.

If you don’t manage this transition well, you’ll actually perform less well as your team grows: it will take you longer to produce meaningful insights, and your answers will be of lower quality. This is simply a function of non-linear complexity: you’ll have more data being produced and more analysts working with it. In order to combat this, you need processes to keep them working together reliably.

What to do

• Implement data testing. You have data flowing into your warehouse from at least a dozen sources at this point and you need a process to ensure that the data being loaded continues to conform to the rules you’re expecting it to: uniqueness, foreign key relationship, not null fields, and custom business logic. If you don’t have a rock-solid automated process that checks this stuff the quality of your analysis will continue to degrade and you won’t know why. We use dbt’s testing functionality for this with our clients.
• Use pull requests and code reviews. Your analytic code is an asset, just like the code that powers your website and application. Producing high-quality code requires being serious about version control. Get every one of your team members in git, train them how to use branches, and disable force-pushes to master. All code that gets deployed to production should be merged via a pull request process that includes a review from a team member.
• Get serious about documentation. The data environment at your company is complicated. The only way to effectively manage that knowledge and share it with your team is to invest the time and energy needed to document it. This will add some overhead, but if you don’t make this investment you’ll find your analysts spend more time figuring out where to get certain data or how to use it than they do actually conducting analytics. Airbnb has done excellent work in this area.
• Be intentional about your analytics team structure. There are two primary models for how to structure an analytics team: centralized and embedded. There is no clear right answer, but this decision is going to be central to how you deliver analytics to your growing organization. Carl Anderson describes the tradeoffs well in his book Creating a Data-Driven Organization.

What not to do

Don’t accept excuses. Doing analytics right at this level is hard work, and it requires a talented and motivated team that is constantly innovating and improving. Code reviews take time and energy. Analysts aren’t used to having to test their code. And documentation is painstaking. There will be resistance to doing things this way, especially among your long-term team members who remember the “good old days”. But as complexity increases, you need to evolve your processes to adapt.

These processes will actually make analytics easier, faster, and more reliable, but implementing them will feel like pulling teeth. If you’re serious about scaling analytics, you’ll push through.

You’re a Pioneer

I’ve come to each one of these recommendations after years of doing it myself within companies and now scaling the approach as a consultant. The opportunity to work with a range of similar clients has made it incredibly clear just how rare it is for companies to do this stuff well.

If you take all of the recommendations in this post, you will literally be one of the highest-functioning analytics organizations in the world. Not a bad competitive advantage.

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Want to chat about your analytics? I’m always happy to jump on a call and listen! Tweet me at @jthandy. Also, I’d be honored if you’d check out the newsletter I publish every week, The Data Science Roundup. Every week I curate the most useful data science articles from around the internet; arrives every Sunday morning with your coffee ☕

Growing Startups When the Product Sucks

We have exactly $325,710 left in our bank account.

The cash is burning fast, and we’ve already wasted a big portion of our seed investment trying to market a product for which we thought we had already found a product/market fit.

“Four out of ten,” shouts Lauren, breaking the silence we’ve had for almost twenty minutes in our meeting room.

Things were finally looking promising, with the new version of our product we’ve been testing over the last weeks.

“Four out of ten people repurchased our new product! And some even brought their friends. Now, imagine we achieved such a high repeat rate and word of mouth in all the locations where we’ll be launching.”

Sitting today in this meeting room in Singapore and seeing Lauren’s excitement over those four out of ten people, I remember, once again, how reading those powerful lines from Sam Altman had hit me back in 2013:

“… if you want to be a great company someday, you have to eventually build something so good that people will recommend it to their friends-in fact, so good that they want to be the first one to recommend it to their friends for the implied good taste. No growth hack, brilliant marketing idea, or sales team can save you long term if you don’t have a sufficiently good product.”

I’ve helped quite a few startups with growth, but this was probably one of the rare ones where the founder’s entire focus was on organic growth, driven by customer satisfaction and word of mouth.

It was really rare, though. Usually, the first months at a startup begin with a ‘exploration phase’ where you often hear ‘oh yes, we just got the first $500K investment, let’s hire as many good people as we can and spend the money on exploring growth channels like Facebook ads.’

Then, this attitude quickly disappears as the runway gets shorter.

Soon, things get serious and it’s time your HR brings on board an analyst to understand where those dollars went and which of those random traction channels brought growth.

And if what starts as a simple analysis turns into a decision to restructure your entire startup, the marketing team is likely to be the first to get kicked out the door, so those not-yet-fired can make the product work with the rest of the cash left in the bank account.

But why hire and fire fast or focus on growth too soon, before understanding whether your product was working in the first place?

It turns out this often-overlooked dilemma is more complicated than it seems.

Product vs. Growth

It’s obvious: The first step to building a great company starts with making something worth talking about.

But what is not so obvious is at what stage of building your startup do you understand whether what you’ve made is something worth talking about?

When you’re still small, it’s easy to fool yourself (and investors) and bring month-over-month growth by spending money on inorganic growth channels such as ads, marketing, or getting featured on TechCrunch.

But as you grow bigger, it gets increasingly difficult to sustain such growth rate by buying your way through if the word about your product isn’t spreading organically.

At this stage, you might take different routes, among which also lie these two options:

• Step back to understand what exactly isn’t working with your product and iterate/pivot or have the guts to start over if necessary.
• To sustain the same growth rate, set more aggressive targets for marketing and sales teams.

“… if your product isn’t quite working, but you have to hit these really aggressive targets, you end up forcing it… even if you hit the numbers, they won’t be real. You spent a lot of money to get there. And what is the point in acquiring all those users, if they leave once they see the product?”

That’s Andrew Chen, part of the growth team at Uber, once again, repeating that, without a great product, there is no growth.

And he isn’t alone, either. According to Bill Macaitis, the legendary CMO of hyper-growth startup Slack, when measured solely on aggressive short-term metrics, the sales and marketing teams then have an incentive “to do bad things to people — to put them in those prison landing pages and start calling them before they’re ready.”

This is especially important for seed-stage startups thinking about how best to position themselves for their series A, as they get confused about whether to focus on traction or on product.

According to renowned investor, Rob Go, when startups focus exclusively on a growth solves (nearly) all problems strategy, things get sacrificed in favor of growth. “You might do unscalable, hacky things to get customers. You might do tons of stuff manually to fulfil the promise of your service instead of taking more time and using more resources to build software. You will probably make decisions to sacrifice margin for growth,” he adds.

But wait, this isn’t a zero-sum game

This isn’t either growth or product.

You still need growth or some traction, at the very least, to find the few early customers who will use your product and help you understand what they want.

And many founders will also confess focusing only on product and ignoring marketing failed their startup, never mind those experts recommending why you should start marketing the day you build your product.

In his best-selling book Traction, DuckDuckGo founder Gabriel Weinberg points to ‘The 50 Percent Rule’ and suggests spending 50 percent of your time on product and 50 percent on traction.

Hence, the problem isn’t focusing on growth.

The problem is focusing on growth too much, too soon.

Having the guts to start over

Airbnb took almost 1000 days to find a product people loved. Since then, their organic growth via word of mouth has been phenomenal and still continues today.

Slack, referred to today as the startup with ’insane’ growth, started with games, kept making games for four years, failed at making games, pivoted its entire team toward communications, started building the Slack we know today toward the end of 2012, and only by August of 2013 was it running in private beta.

We easily forget building something great takes time, and instead, try to staff up very quickly the minute money is in the bank, just because the people we found available for hire are great, regardless of whether we actually need them or have a position to fill.

Before stepping on the gas aggressively, why not measure if what you’ve built is worth talking about?

Most startups set Net Promoter Score (NPS) as their number-one metric to measure user love. Some startups have also been sharing lessons from sending their survey to measure NPS.

And next to NPS, a few others, such as Slack, also use CSAT (customer satisfaction) as long-term metrics.

As Sam Altman concluded last month in a follow-up post he published after three years:

“Startups are defined by growth, but growth isn’t step one in building a great company. If you focus on trying to grow before you make a product people love, you are unlikely to succeed… so if you’re already growing a company around a mediocre product, fix it now. Don’t try to avoid the problem by raising capital for growth– the problems will still be there, with higher expectations. And if you’re just starting out, take the time to build a product your users love, no matter how long it takes. When they actively recommend your product to friends, you’re in the right place.”

Don’t hurt your company by focusing on growth too much, too soon.

Building on Slack Saved Our Startup

The perils and perks of building on a platform

“This isn’t working… we’re screwed.”

Those are not the words you want to be saying out loud three months after you quit your jobs to start a company.

You especially don’t want to hear the reply back from your cofounder, “Yeah, I think you’re right…”

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From the start, we did everything right with Tettra. We validated our assumptions through customer interviews and fake mockups. We got 10 teams to agree to use our product before we ever touched a line of code.

Our idea was to build a simple wiki for sharing knowledge on a team, and everyone we talked to seemed really excited to use the product.

Then we launched our MVP…and no one used it.

When we reached back out to those team to figure out what had happened, we found that they all still had a problem sharing internal knowledge. They still believed they could use Tettra solve it. The problem was that no one remembered to use the product.

Even after all our research, we missed an important truth about how the world has changed: The way people access a tool is just as important as what the tool does. People are overloaded with information, logins, and interfaces. And here we were, asking them to create a whole new habit.

Around the same time we were trying to figure out how to save Tettra, Slack launched their app directory. This felt like the right move.

A year later, it’s been one of the best strategic decisions we’ve made as a new startup. If you’re considering this path for your business, here’s what you should be taking into consideration.

The Perils of Building on a Platform

There’s been an explosion of new platforms in the last few years. Facebook Messenger, Slack, Medium, and many others have opened their ecosystems, letting third-parties hook into their massive user bases. Jump-starting your growth by building on another company’s platform is enticing, but not without its risks.

Platform can shut down or cut you off

A few years ago Twitter opened its doors and let third-party developers build on their platform. New companies sprung up building all sorts of tools on top of Twitter’s API, including dozens of alternative clients to Twitter’s native web app.

Then when Twitter had grown large enough and needed to start monetizing their audience, they locked down their APIs. Many of those companies, including most of the alternative Twitter clients, shut down because they couldn’t access the data they needed to make their products work.

Another more recent Twitter-related example is Meerkat. Meerkat launched a live-streaming video app in early 2015 and used Twitter for distribution. It took off like wildfire, growing to millions of users and raising millions of dollars soon after launch. But unknown to them, Twitter was quietly working to acquire a competitor in the live-streaming space called Periscope.

Twitter eventually disabled Meerkat’s access to their social graph and promoted Periscope instead, cutting off Meerkat’s primary distribution. The blow proved fatal and, six months later, Meerkat shut down.

And Twitter’s platform strategy is not an isolated event. More recently, LinkedIn, Netflix and ESPN all locked up their public APIs to approved partners only, shutting off access to open third-party developer ecosystems. Unless you can pay, you can no longer play on these platforms.

Betting your business on an open API can be risky business.

Our risk assessment

We talked about this risk a lot at Tettra. For us, this decision came down to two things:

1. Platform investment: Slack is investing heavily in their platform and even has a dedicated investment fund to support 3rd party developers.
2. Revenue model: Slack’s platform is focused on businesses. Its likely monetization strategy is subscription revenue vs. ad revenue. 3rd party revenue from external developers lines up with their business model and is good for their bottom line.

The platform can clone your entire product

Earlier this year Reddit finally added native image hosting to its service, ending a long-standing alliance with Imgur. Now Reddit users have a choice — they can keep using the third-party app Imgur or they can use the built-in option when posting an image to Reddit.

It’s yet to be seen what the effects of Reddit offering their own image hosting service will be on Imgur, but it’s probably safe to say that the majority of users will choose the path of least resistance and go with Reddit’s option.

When you hook into a platform, the owner of the platform gets to see all your usage data. Information like how many times your product’s been installed or how much money you’re making through the platform’s billing system is realistically accessible to the platform owner.

In other words, if you have a popular app, the platform knows it’s popular. In the age of ever-growing juggernauts vying for attention and wallets, this is bad news.

Our risk assessment

This is a big risk for us. Slack’s actually an acronym that stands for Searchable Log of All Conversation and Knowledge. As a knowledge sharing product, you can see why that’s worrisome.

At SaaStr Annual 2016, Slack’s VP of Product, April Underwood, gave some good advice to developers:

‘’If the end goal for what you’re building is to make Slack using better, … then I would recommend trying to think more broadly and to try to solve a broader problem than trying to make the experience on [the] platform a little bit better.”

We feel like Tettra fits the bill of “thinking broader.” Synchronous and asynchronous communication are complementary and should be integrated together, but separate tools. Time will tell what happens as Slack expands their product offering, but for right now Tettra and Slack are symbiotic and work better together.

You don’t own your destiny

Let’s get away from software platforms for a minute and talk about media platforms. What happens if you build an audience on a platform and that platform shuts down? You lose your audience.

This happened earlier this year when Twitter shut down Vine. People who had spent years building up a following on Vine lost their entire subscriber base.

The same thing can happen if a platform decides to shut down a mission-critical endpoint that your company relies on. After raising $49M and growing to 33M users, BranchOut, a service to see where Facebook friends worked and help you find a job, ended up having to shut down. Facebook changed the way its API worked, cutting off developers from accessing data about friends-of-friends and the way apps could post to people’s Facebook walls.

Our risk assessment

Our second version of Tettra was built 100% on top of the Slack API — we didn’t even have a database when we launched. Doing so allowed us to quickly validate whether people wanted a wiki connected to Slack.

And the move was great for us. We went from concept to live product in 2 weeks and received over 200 sign-ups within the first 2 days of launching.

We also had a plan to move away from this heavy reliance on Slack ASAP. We knew from the start that, if we saw product-market fit, we would rebuild the product to house our customer’s data in-house. For us, the plan to rebuild and store our customers’ data made Slack a safe choice.

The Perks of Building on a Platform

Now let’s talk about the positives. As a geek, Slacks APIs are some of the best I’ve ever worked with for a few reasons.

1. You can tell from the consistency of the APIs that the Slack API team put a lot of thought into the design of it all.
2. The entire company is super responsive with support inquiries for developers. They even opened up an endpoint for us last year so we could launch our MVP on time.
3. Most importantly, the user base is super enthusiastic about third-party apps and we’ve seen great adoption from teams who want Slack to be the backbone of their company.

Being connected to Slack is one of Tettra’s main selling points and helps new users find us. From there, we’re able to sell them on the vision for a simple, internal wiki to share knowledge with the rest of their team and easily explain why Tettra’s the best solution for them.

But beyond just Slack, there’s plenty of good reasons to build on platforms.

Access to a massive amount of users

Most of our early sign ups for Tettra came from our Slack App Directory listing. Even a year later, it’s still a steady source of traffic to our site and new accounts for us.

Distribution channels take a long time to build up and scale. Piggy-backing off the customer base that another company has already built is a good way to jumpstart your early growth while you build your own acquisition sources over time.

Clear value proposition for prospects

Tettra is an internal wiki for teams that use Slack. In fact, the product only works for teams that use Slack and there’s no way to use the service without it.

This value proposition limits the upper bounds of our growth to the number of teams using Slack, but it’s also crystal clear: we are the wiki for Slack teams. If you’re using Slack, you want to use tools that deeply integrate with it and are tailor-made for the Slack experience. We’re able to deliver a great user experience for a small group of customers. We can always expand our offering beyond Slack if we hit the upper bounds of the market.

Another great example of this strategy that I saw recently is Upscribe, a new subscription widget. There are literally hundreds of subscription widgets on the market right now, so you’d think there wouldn’t be room for another one. That’s not the case though, as Upscribe got almost 1,000 votes on Product Hunt and received such an overwhelming response that the load actually crashed their site.

So how did they do it? They went niche. Upscribe is the subscription box for Medium. If you write on Medium, there’s a clear reason to choose Upscribe over the other options out there. By starting specific, Upscribe has a foundation to build out their user base.

Buffer started life as a post scheduling app for Twitter. Once they got traction on Twitter, they expanded their offering to include other services along with additional social media management tools teams. Now they’re doing over $12M in revenue each year.

TroopsHQ, a Slackbot for Salesforce users, recently raised a $7M Series A round, just a little over a year after founding the company. If you use Salesforce and Slack, you probably will use Troops too.

Starting on a single platform gives you a clear value proposition to use in acquiring your first customers.

Increase product engagement & retention

The conventional wisdom is that it takes 21 days to build a habit, with some studies finding it might take even three times as long. Habits take a long time to form.

Getting people using your product regularly is just as challenging as building a new habit. In Hooked, Nir Eyal outlines a strategy to actually get people using your product regularly through a habit formation loop:

By integrating with Slack, Tettra’s able to hack that habit formation loop because we show up where our users hang out every day: in Slack.

Through Slack’s APIs, we can push trigger notifications about recently published Tettra pages right into Slack. There are 2 benefits to this:

1. It’s easier for the person publishing a page to spread the word without having to send an email or manually post a link in Slack.
2. Our Slack integration also helps with product engagement because the rest of the team sees the Slack notifications, which subtly reminds everyone else to share their knowledge with their team by creating their own pages.

This kicks off the loop again and helps build up a documentation habit inside the entire company. Hooking into another platform and integrating with your user’s existing workflows removes steps, making it more likely that people will continually use your product.

How to safely build on a platform

If you’re still worried about building on a platform, you should check out Josh Elman’s talk from the 2015 Weapons of Mass Distribution Conference about How to Build On Other Platform.

His four main points for building on platforms successfully are:

1. Get users to come back directly to you: Bring people in through the platform, then figure out a sustainable way to get people coming back to you directly.
2. Remember the value exchange: If you’re building on a platform that monetizes through ads, don’t build a service that pulls away eyeballs from them. Figure out a way to drive back value to the platform in the form of either users or money.
3. Build features 20–1000 on the roadmap: All companies have limited development resources, but don’t build a feature a platform is likely to build into their core product themselves. Focus on features further down the roadmap that the platform is unlikely to get to anytime soon.
4. Platforms are an accelerant, not sustainable fuel: Take advantage of the moment but don’t rely on a platform. The rules can change at any time.

Platforms are the future of growth

Competition in today’s world is fierce. In 2006, the average number of choices a consumer had when choosing a product was four or five. In 2016, that number has spiked to approximately 15 vendors. Creating an amazing product just isn’t enough anymore. They key to winning is being the best at distribution and showing up where your users already hang out.

People don’t want another login to remember or interface to learn. Connecting to existing platforms like Slack makes it easier for your users to access your product and helps you grow. If you’re early enough to a platform and build on top of it right, hopefully eventually you’ll grow big enough to become a platform yourself.

Enjoy this post? Hit the ❤ button below.

What do you think? Is building on a platform a good idea or too risky? Share your thoughts and stories below.

Best Apple Watch Alternatives for iPhone Users

If you don’t like the Apple Watch then these are the best Apple Watch alternatives for iPhone users. Just go through the list and pick the one.

If you want to own a different Smartwatch than the Apple Watch then you got plenty of choices as we have brought best apple watch alternatives for iPhone users. These are some of those Smartwatches which having the features which normally you only dream to have. So now you need not rely on Apple Watch only if you don’t like them.

Apart from likes and dislikes if you are finding Apple Watches is bit high on price then you must go through this list of great watches. They are not only compatible with your iPhone but also with your pocket too. So just read this article thoroughly and pick up your Smartwatch.

Best Apple Watch Alternatives

#1. Vector Watch

This is a Smartwatch with one mighty battery life which can run for 30 days and even more. It is equipped with glanceable notifications, no touch screen of complicated menus so that your watch lens remains clean always. You can track you work out activities, checking calorie distance and sleep tracking records. It is compatible and ready to integrate with the Apple Health Kit. Collects the GPS data in real time and gives you the report on speed, pace, and altitude. Crafted with a solid 316L stainless steel and mineral glass and is also waterproof so all in all this is one of the safest Smartwatch to wear.

Price: $349 [$220 on Amazon when we are writing this.] Buy it from Amazon.com

#2. Casio

The Casio Smartwatch is having round 56.4mm case in resin bezel. The inbuilt quad sensors will provide real-time notification of your activities like tracking along with barometer, altimeter and compass reading without the need of your iPhone. This Smartwatch has passed the tough Military standard MIL-STD-810G compliance in environmental performance. It is water resistant to 50m so it is suitable for the short periods of swimming.

Price: $500
Buy it from Amazon.com

#3. Garmin

If you are looking for an alternative to your Apple Watch which has a long lasting battery life then you must give a good look to this Smartwatch by Garmin. This Smartwatch’s battery can last for 8 days even when it regularly remains active during your tracking activities. It also works according to the recommendations health organizations like American Heart Association and monitors your progress against aerobic activity goals. You can set any notification with this watch applied with your iPhone and it will be working fine for sure. This is a GPS Smartwatch which also has sunlight readable feature along with the color touchscreen.

Price: $249.99
Buy it from Amazon.com

#4. Polar

This is a waterproof Smartwatch which can track and customize your M600 activity. To fit with your style you can add your choice of interchangeable waterproof wristbands. It also has a heart rate monitor which can measure your heart rate ever so accurately from your wrist only. Not only that, the Smartwatch also comes with a personalized training guidance which will help you to set your fitness goals easily. The GPS-equipped technology will help you to track your pace, distance, and altitude wherever you go.

Price: $329.25
Buy it from Amazon.com

#5. Huawei

This watch is having a full 1.4” AMOLED display equipped with a scratch-resistant sapphire crystal and stainless steel body which ensures a full protection of your watch. It is compatible with most devices working with iOS 8.2 and above. You will get immediate notifications from all the calls, texts and apps you are using on your iPhone. You will get a variety of pre-installed watch faces and not only that you can swap between all those bands which suit your style. Also helpful to track your heart beats with its rate monitor and sensors while you are running or walking.

Price: $349.99 [$305.45 on Amazon when we are writing this.] Buy it from Amazon.com

#6. Fitbit

For all those fitness freaks this is the best suit watch alternative for your Apple Watch. This watch can track records of your pulse rate and heart rate quickly and intensively whenever you are working really hard. The special thing about this watch is that you do not need uncomfortable chest strap to know about your heart rate. Apart from that, there is a multi-tracking feature also included which can track runs, cross-training, cardio, biking and much more effortlessly.

Price: $198.98
Buy it from Amazon.com

#7. Pebble Technology Corp

Track all your notifications like calendar events, text, and emails along with incoming calls and much more with ease with this Smartwatch. This is one Smartwatch which is compatible with your iPhone and an alternative to Apple Watch which has an exclusive Pebble Health which in an inbuilt activity and sleep tracker which will give you daily reports and weekly insights of your working out activities. This is a water resistant watch to 30 meters and its battery life is extended up to 10 days. For quick replies and voice notes the watch also carries a microphone as well.

Price: $199.99 [$178.99 on Amazon when we are writing this.] Buy it from Amazon.com

#8. LG

This LG watch is equipped with a biological sensor which detects and tracks biometric pressure, gyroscopic movements. It also has an accelerometer, geomagnetic sensor and also a PPG heart rate meter. So all in all if you are a fitness freak and want to track everything about your body’s health position every time then this is the watch for you. It can be used to accept or reject your calls but once you accept the call you need to use your iPhone. With 1.3” full circle P-OLED display and Gorilla Glass 3, full metal body with a screw-less back cover, this Smartwatch is a great pick up for sure.

Price: $145
Buy it from Amazon.com

Best Sleep Tracking Apps for Apple Watch to Make Sure You Get a Good Night Sleep

If you are having ‘sleeping problems’ or you want to track whether you have sound sleep or restless one, then these five best sleep tracking apps for Apple Watch will certainly help you.

On one side we say that electronic or smart gadgets are the reason behind getting less sleep, but on the other side, we take help of sleep tracking apps for Apple Watch to track and control our sleep.

While taking note of the irony, we talked about earlier; we are suggesting you some of the best sleep tracking apps for Apple Watch to help your good night sleep. Remember, just like the best Bluetooth headphones for Apple Watch give us the pleasure of music to stay happy, these apps keep track of your sleep and keep you healthy.

All these apps do one thing, which is to track your sleep and give you analysis about your sleep so that you can get proper sleep and rise fresh in the morning. Some of these apps work differently, but still, they are there to provide you best results.

5 Best Sleep Tracking Apps for Apple Watch

#1. Sleep Track

Do you want to know how much time you are spending in your bed? Then Sleep Track will certainly help you in doing that with lot many other features.

• You will have the overview of ‘go to bed’ time and also a time when you awake, so you can easily get the information on how much time you are spending in bed.
• With you are wearing Apple Watch while sleeping you can also track your sleeping habits with this app.
• There is an inbuilt guide which will let you know how good or bad you sleep you are having at nights.
• You can set your next goals once you analyze your sleep habits.

Price: Free
Download Sleep Track for Apple Watch

#2. Sleep++

Sleep++ is one of the best sleep tracking apps currently available on App Store. It measures your sleep closely and then let you help on how to get a quality sleep every night.

• The motto of this sleep tracking app is to make you understand how well you are sleeping and how you can take advantages of a good sleep for your work next day.
• You can ask your Apple Watch by simply saying, “Sleep+++ I am to start sleeping” and “Sleep+++ I am woken up” and leave the rest to Sleep+++ app.
• In the morning the app will give you a complete analysis of your previous night’s sleep with the detailed break up mentioning how well you slept or how restless you were during that sleep.
• If you wish you can integrate this app with other health apps you have and then you will be able to get a complete health analysis.

Price: Free
Download Sleep+++ for Apple Watch

#3. Heart Analyzer

When you are sleeping your heart keeps on functioning. While sleeping, you should also consider how your heart reacts to your sound or restless sleep. This app will help you analyze that.

• The app will analyze your heart rate in understandable form when you are sleeping.
• You can retrieve data of your heart rate while sleeping for one full year.
• Just let know the app that you are going to sleep, or you are already awake, and Heart Analyzer will do the rest of the analysis.
• If you wish you can integrate Heart Analyzer app with Apple Health app which will help you to set your sleeping and awakening time automatically.

Price: Free
Download Heart Analyzer for Apple Watch

#4. Sleep Pulse 2 Motion

One of the great looking sleep tracking apps for Apple Watch is here. Sleep Plus 2 Motion app works like other apps in the bracket, but it provides you a great compilation of your sleep tracking results.

• Sleep Plus 2 Moon tracks your motion while you are sleeping along with your heart rate and also nightly steps to give you the best picture of your sleep.
• You can sync this app with your iPhone to get the detailed analysis.
• You will also be able to check the complications if any while you have a sleep and the progress of your sleep at a glance and then can decide how you can improve your sleep.
• You need to activate the Health and Motion feature, and then the app will do the rest.

Price: $3.99
Download Sleep Pulse 2 Motion for Apple Watch

#5. Zleeper

Zleeper is perhaps the easiest sleep tracking apps to work with among all such apps we are prescribing here. Let us know more about it.

• To start tracking your sleep you don’t need to speak or do anything special, just toggle the sleep mode when you are hitting the bed, and the app will start monitoring your sleep.
• Set the ‘Zmart Alarm’ which will wake you up when you are having light sleep, which means that the Zmart alarm will start monitoring your light sleep 15 to 30 minutes before your waking up time.
• It is a companion app for your iPhone so that you can check your sleep patterns and other related information.
• You can set a back alarm with your iPhone, and your iPhone will display a clock view if you wish.

Price: $4.99
Download Zleeper for Apple Watch

All these sleep tracking apps will be a great help for you if you wish to control your sleep in a better way so that you can work even better next day.

Do let us know about this tutorial and how it became helpful to you to get the best sleep. You can give your feedback here in the comments section or on Facebook, Twitter, and Google Plus.

How to Use an Android Watch with Multiple Google Accounts

Just like on your Android Smartphone, now you can even use multiple Google accounts on your Android watch as well. Here is how you can do that.

With the arrival of all new Android Wear 2.0, there is plenty of changes we are witnessing. The first change we noticed is that your Android watch no longer remains a mere extension of your Android smartphone and it is now a proud standalone Android device.

Another change we are witnessing, which probably is because of the change I mentioned above, is that now you can add multiple Google accounts in your Android Watch just like you have on your Android phone. This new addition is like two sides of a coin, and over here I will discuss both pros and cons of that coin.

Few Drawbacks Once You Add Multiple Accounts in an Android Watch

Before we learn how we can use multiple Google accounts on Android Watch, let us check which factors, which may trouble you once you start using multiple Google accounts on your smartwatch.

• Notifications: It doesn’t matter for Android Watch, which accounts you set as your primary or default account, it will send notification for each and every account you add. For some, it can be very irritating as they may be flooded with notifications time and again and for some it may come as blessings as they can remain informed about each account and don’t miss anything.

• Notifications Doubled: Another drawback of this clubbing is that you will get notifications on your connected device as well. So, think carefully about it, and if you think, you can manage both the Android Wear and your Android smartphone flooded with notifications at the same time, then proceed to add more Google accounts in your Android Wear smartwatch.

• Google Assistant: Google Assistant will fetch and save the information you asked to search from the current Google account you are using, and hence it might not be available when you switch to another Google account. So if you are on your secondary Google account and do not want Google to ‘know much about it’ then you always need to check twice (thrice or even more) that whether you are using your primary or default Google account on your Wear Watch or not.

• Installing and Uninstalling Apps: This is a big challenge once you attach more than one Google accounts in your Android Wear. When you want to install, uninstall or remove an app from Google Play on your Android Wear 2.0, then just like the above-mentioned point, you need to think hard before making a decision. Accidentally you may install or uninstall an app, which you don’t want to be part of (or no longer part of) a particular account which can either be your primary Google account or secondary. The similar problem will occur when you want to or do not want to update an app.

Pointing out drawbacks before providing you the complete tutorial on how you can use Android Wear with multiple Google accounts is not to scare you. The above points are just to caution you so you remain better prepared and can use this excellent feature swiftly.

Big companies like ASUS, Verizon, Casio, Moto, Fossil, Guess, Huawei, LG, Movado, Polar, Nixon, New Balance, Michael Cors and of course TAG Heuer have joined Android Wear 2.0. So a day will come when we will be seeing many Wear Watch users and who knows among these users who will require this tip on using Android Wear with multiple Google accounts?

So are you also ready to know how you can use multiple Google accounts with your Android Wear?

Step #1. Go to Play Store on your Android Watch and swipe down to access the ‘Play Store settings.’

Step #2. Tap on ‘Accounts’ icon and the account, which has the text in Green, is your default Google account.

Step #3. To switch between the accounts, you have to tap on the Google account, which you want to become the default, once that is done, you will be back to the Play Store

The steps to switch between multiple Google accounts on Android Watch are simple, but you need to keep your head cool before doing that process each time because one wrong or hasty action may ruin the joy and comfort of this in the feature.

New WhatsApp Update: Separate Video, Audio Calling Buttons and Relocated Attachment Icon

In another change expected from WhatsApp, now we will soon have two separate calling buttons and relocation of attachment icon.

It seems that WhatsApp in a hurry to make changes in its interface and adding few more features as well. Just recently WhatsApp added lookalikes of Snapchat and Instagram Stories in new ‘Status’ update and now the news is that WhatsApp users will soon have different buttons for making video and voice calls. Not only will this but now the attachment icon also finds a new place in your WhatsApp app.

Currently, work is going on, on WhatsApp’s beta 2.17.93 version to make a separation between voice and video calling button. This update seems to be a small move from WhatsApp but it can have significant results and can be very helpful to users who do not want to spend more on video calling. It will be a lot easier to attach a file and send with the upcoming changes in WhatsApp.

 

The new attachment icon will be in the text box itself, which currently you can find on the top of your chat window. This change will make the process of attachment faster than now, as the user doesn’t need to move up and down again and again to attach a file. Once he taps on the attachment icon, the remainder of the process remains the same.

The space emptied by attachment icon at the top will now be taken by the new and separate video calling icon. As of now, the user can see only one calling icon, and after tapping it, he has to choose from a voice call and video call options. Now the user has a right choice with all new video and voice calling buttons right at the top of the screen.

As always it will take some time for WhatsApp to roll out these two new features to all its users once this beta testing ends successfully. If you are excited and want to join the beta tester right now, then you need to join WhatsApp’s beta testing program by clicking on the link below.