Slowly but surely, more indie bands are emerging into the Middle Eastern music scene. It’s taken a while, between finding venues to perform and a way to connect with their audience, but finally up and coming bands and singers are using both online tools as well as local venues to promote their music. The first site to step in and give them an exclusively Arabic interface to connect with their audience is Bandoora....
Social networks are incredible sources of information about local events and happenings. If you want to know what’s happening in town tonight, you can fire up Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare or Gowalla on your iPhone to see where your friends are at or just to see what people are up to. Unfortunately, you’re going to have to be logged in to those services to see what exactly is being posted to them....
Bank of America has begun inviting a select number of customers to trial a new way of transferring money by providing a new service that will allow free money transfers to be initiated using just a phone number or an email address. The pilot is part of a new venture by Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo that wasannounced in May, helping remove the need to remember account information and providing customers with a new way to transfer or receive money whilst helping to shape the service before it is rolled out to the majority of the bank’s customers....
The fintech sector was already booming, but with increased demand for user-friendly, digital financial services, the pandemic really pushed many new and innovative solutions into mainstream use. It’s understandable that banks could see this as a threat—drawing away customers and even potentiallyrendering their services obsolete. But, instead of feeling threatened, some are taking a very different approach: if you can’t beat them, join them. Unlike the world of big tech, rather than simply acquiring them, banks like ABN Amro are looking to form mutually beneficial strategic partnerships with fintechs offering key services for their customers....
In recent years, big tech companies have been pivoting into different industries. By applying their knowledge of emerging tech, they’ve been able to disrupt and overtake established players in the market. And with the emergence of open banking, they’ve now turned their sights on the finance industry. Google Pay will soon let Citibank customers (and nine other banks)manage accounts directly from the app. Apple launched theApple Card, its own credit card issued by Goldman Sachs....
