Cloud storage platform Box has made a move to show developers that it’s more than just a place to keep files, images, and videos in a safe and secure place on the Internet. At its inaugural BoxDev conference, CEO and co-founder Aaron Levie revealed three new features for the community available today:

It’s now easier for customers to deploy the Box platform.
Customers and developers are now able to build “rich data applications” connecting data and content together through a new experience.
Developers can seamlessly integrate Box’s document embedding and viewing capability into …

Facebook has gone ahead and made another bold purchase. On Tuesday, the social networking company announced that it had paid $2 billion in cash and stock for Oculus VR, the creators of a virtual reality headset useful in 3D gaming. Some were befuddled and chagrined by the move, wondering what benefit Facebook would have with the yet-to-be-tested product. Company CEO Mark Zuckerberg offered up a hint as to its potential by saying:
Mobile is the platform of today, and now we’re also getting ready for the platforms of tomorrow. Oculus has …

It’s no surprise that technology has played an integral part in times of disaster, emergency, or crisis. Companies like Twitter, Facebook, and Google have all offered their support to assist people in affected parts of the world to ensure that they can communicate with their loved ones and to help share eyewitness accounts. Twilio happens to be one of those companies and it has launched a new open source offering it’s calling a “Rapid Response Kit”, designed to help rescue teams and organizations quickly deploy telecommunication-focused apps.
Available through the company’s …

On Wednesday, digital magazine publisher platform Zite was acquired for the second time … this time by its main competitor Flipboard in an all-stock transaction with CNN. You might remember that CNN picked up Zite in 2011 for $20 million. The deal will see Zite shuttered and the team moved over to Flipboard’s offices, with the exception of CEO Mark Johnson, who will be departing to pursue other ventures.
You can read more about the deal here, but what makes this fascinating is it opens up an incredible opportunity for Flipboard …

As we wind down the week filled with news of Facebook’s monstrous acquisition of WhatsApp for $19 billion, Paul Graham stepping down as president of Y Combinator, Apple acquiring Burstly (creators of TestFlight), and more, I thought it might be a good time to reflect on what’s been going on in my life and where I’ll be heading soon.
I must admit that I’m rather nervous about writing this post — it’s certainly not easy. So I’ll just flat out say it: next week will be my last time writing as …

It’s somewhat surreal that this month I celebrate five years living in San Francisco and it’s has most certainly been a while ride. September also marks the first anniversary of me working as a professional journalist/blogger at The Next Web.
In looking at the past 12 months, I must say that it’s certainly been a learning experience shifting gears away from working in a pharmaceutical advertising agency to writing practically non-stop for TNW covering news from the likes of Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Twitter, Salesforce, Twilio, and many other companies.
On one hand, …