Business

App.net, Dalton Caldwell’s audacious Twitter clone, just reached its $500,000 funding goal with almost two days to spare. Just a few days ago, it looked unlikely that Caldwell’s user and developer supported ad-free Twitter clone would reach its funding goal. A last-minute push of new sponsors, though, just pushed App.net past its funding goal. The project currently has over 7,500 backers, including almost 6,000 people who used the campaign to pre-pay $50 for an annual App.net membership and just over 50 backers who put down $1,000 for access to the service’s developer tools, phone support and a personal meeting with Caldwell. While our own MG Siegler is rather skeptical about App.net’s long-term potential, there seems to be a sizable contingent of users and developers who are looking for a viable alternative to Twitter (and who are willing to pay for it). App.net promises to give its users total control over their data and “to support 3rd-party devs making a living and maintaining a ...

Sarah currently works as a writer for TechCrunch, after having previously spent over three years at ReadWriteWeb. Prior to becoming a professional blogger, Sarah worked in I.T. across a number of industries, including banking, retail and software. ? Learn More Because we’re in need of some brighter NFC-related news today, Flomio, a TechStars-backed startup, and makers a platform for building NFC and RFID enabled applications, has closed a seed round of $525,000. The round was led by RMR Capital, and included participation from TechStars, the Cloud Power Fund, Matthew Lally (Augme, Pickflair), and Clint Watson (FASO). Based in Miami, Florida (“Silicon Beach!”), Flomio has a different approach to NFC, which will be reflected in a website redesign going out next week. In short, it wants to humanize the technology. Originally a side project from founder Richard Grundy, Flomio was recently accepted into TechStars Cloud, the cloud computing-focused incubator which held its first demo day i...