On Thursday, Groupon — the popular location-based coupon service — filed for an initial public offering with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The start-up, which alerts 83 million email subscribers in 43 different countries of local deals that range from restaurant discounts to sailing lessons, hopes to raise $750 million in its IPO. “Expect us to make ambitious bets on our future that distract us from our current business,” Andrew Mason, Groupon’s chief executive officer, said in...

On Wednesday Delivery.com — the popular food delivery service — launched a dedicated iPhone application. It offers a bunch of useful features, including a “nearby” feature to find restaurants that deliver nearby, automatic sync with your account, the ability to filter for cuisine, distance, or rating, and more. Users can check out using a debit card, gift card, or credit card, although we suspect that cash-on-delivery is still an option, too. The application is free in case you’re ever l...

Wirefly this month unveiled a new service option for its popular mobile backup service. Mobile Backup PRO, which is compatible with the Android, iOS, BlackBerry and Windows Mobile 6.5 devices, affords subscribers a host of functionality not available with the standard free service. For starters, PRO subscribers get either 10GB or unlimited storage for music, photos, videos, and any other data backed up using the service, depending on the subscription option they choose. Free subscribers only get 2GB of storag...

A new series of emails were made public on Monday as a result of Skyhook Wireless’ lawsuit claiming Google interfered with a contract the LBS company had in place with cell phone maker Motorola Mobility. The emails, which were sent to and from numerous top executives at Google including CEO Larry Page and SVP of Mobile Andy Rubin, detail the company’s shock at losing out to Skyhook. The internal emails also reveal Google’s admission that Skyhook’s location product is better and more ac...

The “is Android open?” question is one that constantly fades in and out of focus on blogs and in the tech media. The latest snippet that will undoubtedly reinvigorate the argument was revealed this past weekend, and this time it’s not a pretty one for Google. As part of Skyhook Wireless’ lawsuit against Google, which alleges that the company interfered with a contract that placed its services on Android phones sold by Motorola, several internal emails have been made public by a Massa...

AT&T on Monday announced ShopAlerts, a new mobile advertising service that will introduce location-based ads to the AT&T wireless network. The service, developed by AT&T Advanced Ad Solutions and Placecast, will serve advertisements and special offers to subscribers’ cell phones when they are in the vicinity of a participating retailer. Initially, the service is only being offered in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and San Francisco. “We are proud to take mobile marketing into the future ...

Yobongo, if you haven’t heard, is a new iPhone app that meshes location-aware messaging with a chatroom-like environment, and it’s kind of amazing. By using a custom algorhytm and different variables including your location, people you have chatted with previously, or even people you know, Yobongo connects you with up to around 10 people in a single “room” and well, from there it’s one big conversation. I’ve been using Yobongo for around a week, and while the beta test didn...

Apple released its first developer build of iOS 4.3 on Wednesday and needless to say, developers have been on a treasure hunt ever since. We compiled a list of new iOS features last night, but an interesting one popped up early this morning. The forthcoming addition, found buried in the iOS code, is called “Find My Friends.” The purpose of the service is unknown for the time being, but the code suggests that it is tied to MobileMe. The name of the forthcoming feature obviously leads us to believe ...

Navteq, a mapping and navigation solutions company owned by Nokia, has acquired California-based Trapster according to a Reuters report. The somewhat controversial move suggests that future navigation solutions from Nokia might integrate Trapster’s product. Trapster provides a location-based service that alerts motorists equipped with its iOS or Android app when they approach known police speed traps. The company’s speed trap location data is completely user-generated, and the service claims to cu...

Remember Google Latitude — Google’s location-based social network that allows users to easily share their locations with friends? Yeah, neither did we… at least not until Google’s new iOS app popped up over the weekend. Google Latitude is half-baked at best, though we imagine once Google launches a social network that doesn’t flop, Latitude will probably be folded in to add the LBS element. For the time being, all the service really does is share your location with friends (and Googl...

Facebook today announced the introduction of its mobile platform. The purpose of the project is to provide a social environment for mobile devices that will eventually mirror the company’s dominant Web-based platform. The initial mobile platform involves a number of projects across a variety of mobile operating systems — including iOS, Android and BlackBerry — and it will allow developers to more easily expand their Facebook products beyond the desktop environment.Platform announcements made today i...

Could there possibly be a better way to introduce the world to an app that locates sex offenders? Antoine Dodson, who inadvertently earned a place in the Web video hall of fame as a result of the Internet phenomenon Bed Intruder Song, does his best to keep America’s children safe by introducing the world to Sex Offender Tracker. The mobile app makes users aware of local sex offenders using a nifty augmented reality interface that… Seriously, just hit the jump for the video and let Antoine tell you...

Google has introduced new location-aware advertising for iPhone and Android handsets. Advertisers will now have the ability to select a “location extension for display” option that will serve up their ads based upon a user’s GPS coordinates. Ads will appear within mobile applications and mobile browsers and will allow users to get mapping and contact information for businesses that are within the immediate area. This feature is pretty cool once you get over the creepiness of Google sending a...

Google came clean on its blog yesterday and admitted to accidentally collecting personal data while canvassing positioning data during Street View sweeps. The potentially damaging revelation came after the data protection authority (DPA) in Hamburg, Germany requested Google’s Street view data due to privacy concerns. An internal review of the collected data revealed that the software Google was using to compile and map SSID’s was also recording a portion of the of data that was being transmitted...