groupon

Google Offers--the Web giant's Groupon challenger--will launch tomorrow in Portland, Ore., Google Chairman Eric Schmidt announced this evening.

Schmidt and Stephanie Tilenius, Google's VP of commerce, demonstrated the new daily deals service at the D9 conference in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif., showing a $3 coupon that yields $10 in Floyd's coffee. The service is expected to rollout later this year in other cities, including New York and San Francisco.

Like Groupon's service, Google Offers users can receive discounts of 50 percent or more at local businesses, but the deals won't need to hit a user … Read more

Groupon has partnered with Live Nation to bring concertgoers deals on local events.

Dubbed GrouponLive, the service will combine Groupon's local-distribution abilities with Live Nation's roster of events. Consumers will be able to use GrouponLive to find limited-time deals on sporting events, concerts, theater shows, and other live events, the companies said. However, it will be limited to North America.

The pairing of Groupon, a deal-a-day provider, and Live Nation is an interesting one. Live Nation currently operates the world's most popular ticketing service, Ticketmaster. It also runs Live Nation Concerts, which puts on over 20,000 shows from 2,000 artists around the world.

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Scoutmob is a location-aware coupon service that pushes local restaurant and retail deals directly to your mobile device. No need to print or purchase anything, just scroll through the local 50 percent off (and more) coupons available, click "USE THE DEAL," and flash your screen at the location. It's like Groupon, only simpler and better.

What gives Scoutmob its edge over its other deal-serving competitors is that there's no need to purchase anything ahead of time. If your GPS-enabled mobile device detects that you are at the deal location, you get the deal. And most deals … Read more

AT&T is becoming the latest company to take aim at Groupon.

The company's Yellow Pages service has created YP Deals. Like with Groupon, subscribers will receive a local deal delivered to their e-mail in-box each day. The YP Deals page states that it will launch "soon" in Atlanta, Dallas-Fort Worth, and Los Angeles.

YP Deals is the latest in a growing number of e-mail-based deals services, led by Groupon and Amazon.com-backed LivingSocial.

Google reportedly attempted to acquire Groupon last year for $6 billion, but the deals company rejected the offer. In response, the search … Read more

Daily deals site Groupon owes a chunk of its fast growth to new customers brought in by its unavoidable ads all over the Web and on Facebook--but it doesn't want them appearing on the Web site of "The Apprentice," the reality show hosted by real estate mogul Donald Trump, a political firebrand of late.

In a blog post Thursday, the freewheeling Groupon took a rare serious tone as it explained its decision to ask advertising partner NBC, which airs "The Apprentice," to ensure that its ads not be displayed on the show's site. "… Read more

Dear every company on earth who's apparently selling our data to anyone who will buy it and/or collecting it in fat, juicy databases that are like candy to hackers: can you just, like, try to be a tiny bit more careful? And maybe we will, too? Ok, thanks, great. Verizon's LTE service is creeping back after an unexplained outage, Barnes and Noble hits back at Microsoft, calling its patent infringement lawsuits little more than extortion, and an enterprising teen-ager honors our fallen soldiers with a digital record of all the graves at Arlington. Now that is a hero.

Links from Tuesday's episode of Loaded:

Facebook launches Facebook Deals in a few, select cities

Facebook also rolls out the Send button, which is similar to the Like button, only not so public

Sony plans this fall to launch two tablets that will run Android 3.0 "Honeycomb" and have access to PlayStation content.

Yahoo buys IntoNow, a social network for couch potatoes

The Barnes & Noble Nook Color gets an update that allows it to run apps

T-Mobile pulls the Bobsled app because it was confusing Facebook users

The first market that will get Google's new Groupon competitor will be--drum roll, please--Portland, Ore.

The search giant announced Thursday that it will be launching the beta version of its Google Offers coupon and discount deals service in Portland. Google first revealed its plans for the Groupon-like service in January.

Google has already put up a page where people can sign up to receive deals that will be e-mailed each day. Like the Groupon service, users can receive discounts of 50 percent or more at local businesses. But unlike Groupon, the deals won't need to hit a user … Read more

Skyfire is the latest app to board the Groupon gravy train, as the alternative mobile browser announced this morning that Skyfire for Android 4.0 integrates Groupon's daily deal service. 

Now when you open the Groupon module on Skyfire's "SkyBar," to toolbar running across the bottom of the screen, you'll be able to view local deals.

Groupon integration is just one of eight new features that the Silicon Valley-based browser maker added to its app. Our other favorites include Twitter and Google Reader making an appearance on the SkyBar, and the toolbar's … Read more