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Shoppers buy 2m movie tickets and 19.8m karaoke songs in Alibaba’s 24-hour mobile shopping event

Mar10
by on March 10, 2014 at 10:49 am
Posted In: Around the Web, Asia, e-commerce

146576814 520x245 Shoppers buy 2m movie tickets and 19.8m karaoke songs in Alibabas 24 hour mobile shopping event

Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba‘s plans for a mobile version of its annual shopping festival generated little buzz, the company admitted, which makes it seem like the company’s grand mobile shopping event fell flat.

However, Alibaba says the event was meant instead to shine the spotlight on online-to-offline purchases. This means consumers reserve and pay for purchases that have to be redeemed in real life by using mobile devices instead of cash.

In total, more than 2 million discounted movie tickets, 35,000 restaurant reservations and 19.8 million karaoke songs were redeemed on March 8 during the Mobile Taobao 3.8 Life Festival. Alibaba didn’t reveal how much consumers spent.

Comparatively, Alibaba’s annual 11.11 Shopping Festival – China’s answer to America’s Cyber Monday shopping bonanza — saw Chinese shoppers splurge a jaw-dropping record CNY35.01 billion ($5.7 billion) in just 24 hours last year. About 21 percent of the orders were placed via mobile devices, which could have made Alibaba tempted to tap on this potential.

Yet if Alibaba wants to focus on using mobile devices to drive purchases that can be redeemed offline, it seems like there’s still some way to go — as witnessed in its Mobile Taobao 3.8 Life Festival. Alibaba’s mobile efforts come as Chinese Internet giant Tencent announced a strategic partnership with online retailer JD.com today, waging war on the e-commerce stalwart in China.

Headline image via Peter Parks/AFP/Getty Images

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Offline over the weekend? Read all the tech news you missed right here

Mar10
by on March 10, 2014 at 10:07 am
Posted In: Around the Web, Insider, Roundups

Coffee4 520x245 Offline over the weekend? Read all the tech news you missed right here

Sometimes it’s just not possible for you to spend the whole weekend gallivanting around tech land, watching the skies for the most interesting new developments. It’s OK, we understand. And for exactly that reason, here’s a handy cheat sheet for everything you missed this weekend.

So, go grab a coffee and spend 15 minutes catching up on all the tech news you weren’t paying attention to in the last two days. 

From The Next Web over the weekend:

Good reads:

From beyond The Next Web:

Featured Image Credit – Thinkstock

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This iPhone Air concept may have nailed Apple’s approach for its next iPhone

Mar10
by on March 10, 2014 at 8:54 am
Posted In: Around the Web, Links, Shareables, Videos

Apple is tipped to launch the iPhone 6 later this year — and a concept of the “iPhone Air” that designer Sam Beckett has come up with may just be the approach Apple is taking for its next smartphone.

The concept showcases an iPhone that is only 8 percent larger than the iPhone 5s, but with a 17 percent larger display and 68 percent more pixels. Beckett decided that the iPhone Air will sport a 4.7-inch screen supporting a resolution of 1920x1080p — that’s 468ppi. According to Beckett, “some extra space could be potentially utilized by reducing the width of the side bezels and by also slimming down the top and bottom of the phone frame.” The depth of the iPhone Air’s conceptualized version is 7mm, coming in 0.6mm thinner than its predecessor.

Other features include the use of sapphire crystal as opposed to Corning Gorilla Glass, as well as a 10-megapixel camera and a faster A8 chip.

Yet apart from these tweaks, the iPhone Air that Beckett has thought of is actually very reminiscent of the iPhone 5s — which makes it seem likely that Apple may very well be already taking this design route. All we can do is wait and see what the next iPhone brings.

Thumbnail image via Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

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