Geegles

Teenagers pose near-naked in Sneaky Hat trend on Facebook

2011-11-22T23:41:00.001-08:00

Cyber safety campaigner Susan Mclean said contributors to the fad were not only staining their futures but risking child pornography charges.
A NEW Facebook craze where teenagers take near-naked photos of themselves has cyber-safety experts horrified.
The Sneaky Hat trend has been branded a ''paedophile's paradise'' and involves mostly young people posing in nothing but a hat covering their genitals.
Countless Facebook pages and other sites, open for anyone to see, have sprung up showing male and female teens in provocative poses after reportedly originating at a Queensland highschool.
Cyber safety campaigner Susan Mclean said contributors to the fad were not only staining their futures but risking child pornography charges.
''It's no use saying its just fun, it's harmless fun, the consequences can be quite severe,” she said.
''It is going to end in tears and those pictures - it's not like sending it on your phone to your boyfriend who may or may not send it on - this is on www (world wide web).
“They're on public sites, anyone can see them and people are posting them with their names, they're proud of the photos,'' Ms Mclean, founder of Cyber Safety Solutions said.
A Queensland Police spokesperson said they were monitoring the trend but a Victoria Police spokesperson said there had been no reports they knew of in Victoria.
Incidents of teenagers being charged with possessing child pornography are growing and include a group of Colac Secondary College students who filmed a sexual act in their school gym.
''Children under the age of 18 all over Australia are routinely being charged with child pornography offences,'' Ms Mclean, an ex-police officer, said.
The craze has spawned spin-offs such as girls and boys-only sites, and location-specific groups such as ‘Sneaky Hat Brisbane'.
Ms Mclean said that as well as creating a “haven for paedophiles'' the photos would ruin participants' career prospects.
''What people don't understand is that a large proportion of pictures that are on Facebook actually get cached into Google Images. If it gets onto Google Images it's permanent, you cant just ring up Google and get your photo back,'' she said.

Facebook: How it tracks you

2011-11-19T00:11:00.001-08:00

Facebook has for the first time revealed details about how it tracks users across the Web.
SYDNEY: Facebook has for the first time revealed details about how it tracks users across the Web.

According to USA Today, the complete picture how the social network keeps tabs on its 800 million users was revealed through series of interviews with the social networking site's engineering director, spokesman, corporate spokesman and engineering manager.

Facebook does not track everybody the same way, as it uses different methods for members who have signed in and are using their accounts, members who are logged-off and non-members.

The first time you arrive at any Facebook page, the company inserts cookies in your browser.

If you sign up for an account, it inserts two types of cookies and if you don't set up an account, it inserts only one of the two types.

These cookies record every time you visit another website that uses a Facebook "Like button" or other Facebook plugin, which work together with the cookies to note the time, date and website being visited.

Unique characteristics that identify your computer are also recorded.

Facebook keeps logs that records your past 90 days of activity and deletes entries older than 90 days, the Sydney Morning Herald reported.

If you are logged into a Facebook account, your name, email address, friends and all of the other data in your Facebook profile are also being recorded.

Data about web searches and browsing habits could be used to figure out political affiliations, religious beliefs, sexual orientations or health issues about consumers.

Facebook users in India may surpass US

2011-11-08T22:29:00.001-08:00

Social networking giant Facebook expects its largest user base to come from India, surpassing Indonesia and the US in the near future, a senior executive said.

NEW DELHI: Social networking giant Facebook expects its largest user base to come from India, surpassing Indonesia and the US in the near future, a senior executive said.

"India is our third largest market in terms of number of users and what we're excited about and why we're here is because some time in the future, we think that India will pass first Indonesia, which should happen soon, and then US," Facebook's vice president for mobile partnerships and corporate development Vaughan Smith said.

Indonesia has more than 45 million Facebook users while India follows at around 30 million users, Smith added.

More than three-fourth of Facebook's 800 million users are outside the US with users in India growing at phenomenal pace. According to Comscore data released in June, one in three Internet user in India was a Facebook user.

Facebook's user count in India jumped 85% to 34 million as of June this year over the 18 million last year, as per Comscore. Smith expects more number of users to come from India than the US.

Facebook's prospects are also looking up since India is adding more around 5-7 million internet users a month. According to an IMRB and internet and Mobile Association of India, the country's internet population was 112 million in September, which is likely to go up to 121 million by the year end. At this rate, India will overtake the US, which has 245 million internet users, within two years, the survey adds.

"We expect that majority of people in India who have phones would use Facebook as the most important thing on their phone, because that's what we see in other markets. Which means we will have more Facebook users in India than we do in America," Smith added.

"More than twice as many people login to Facebook from mobiles than desktops, globally. Usage is switching and the same is happening in India," Smith said. Facebook's statistics reveal that 350 million users access the website through mobile phones.

On Tuesday, Facebook and mobile phone chipset maker MediaTek announced a partnership to bring the social networking major to low-cost feature phones or entry-level mobile phones, which may encourage more people to access the website on the go.

"We think that partnership with MediaTek will create a good, fast and engaging experience on devices that cost less than $50 and that's a bonus for us, not just in India but in all of Asia and Africa where affordability is one of the ways for people to get on Facebook," Smith added.

The Taiwanese chipset maker will embed Facebook on its mobile platform solution, MRE, which will be offered to handset makers. More than 40% of handsets sold in India used MediaTek's chipsets as of last year.

MediaTek's corporate vice president Cheng-Te Chuang said it was working with the Indian brands such as Micromax and Spice Mobility to offer the solution on affordable low-cost handsets being sold in India.

Micromax mobile business director Vikas Jain said the company will launch three handsets with the embedded solution by the end of this month, which will be priced below Rs 5,000.

Spice Mobility managing director Dilip Modi said the company will launch one to two devices next month, priced between Rs 2,000 and Rs 8,000. Modi added that they are also talking to mobile operators for bundling of the new device with data plans.

Google Plus adds business, celebrity pages

2011-11-07T22:22:00.001-08:00

San Francisco: Google's social networking service is now open for businesses.
The expansion, announced on Monday, is the latest feature on Google's Plus service to imitate what's already available on Facebook, the leading website for sharing with family, friends and businesses.
Google Inc. unveiled Plus in late June to counter Facebook's popularity and learn more about people's interests. It hopes to gain insights that will help its dominant Internet search engine spit out more compelling results that keep people coming back to click on ads.

Until now, Plus was open only to individuals. Google says more than 40 million people have Plus profiles. Facebook has more than 800 million users.
In addition to companies, celebrities and sports teams will be able to set up Google Plus pages just as they can on Facebook.
Google showcased the new Plus feature Monday with pages from 20 business, celebrities and sports teams. The initial list includes Toyota, the Muppets, the Dallas Cowboys, Pepsi and the pop music group Train.
Other organizations can open their Plus pages at http://plus.google.com/pages/create .

YouTube launches broad entertainment venture

2011-10-28T23:28:00.001-07:00

New York: YouTube is making a bold step into original programming in an entertainment venture with some 100 content creators, from Madonna to The Wall Street Journal. The Google Inc.-owned video site said Friday that it's launching more than 100 new video channels. The partners include an array of Hollywood production companies, celebrities and new media groups that will produce mainly niche-oriented videos.
YouTube is shelling out $100 million to producers, according to people familiar with the matter, who spoke on condition of anonymity. The money is an advance on advertising money the videos will bring in, and Google will recoup its portion first before splitting the proceeds. Advances are as high as $5 million per channel, said another person familiar with the arrangement, also speaking on condition of anonymity.
Neither person was authorised to comment publicly on the matter. Google declined to offer financial details of the deals, but said the majority of revenue will go to partners.

Participants include Madonna, former NBA star Shaquille O'Neal, comedian Amy Poehler, actor Ashton Kutcher, "Office" star Rainn Wilson, spiritual doctor Deepak Chopra and "Modern Family" actress Sofia Vergara. Most are creating channels through their production companies. Madonna is a partner with the dance channel DanceOn, while O'Neal plans the Comedy Shaq Network.
Lionsgate is presenting a fitness channel, and other channels will be launched by news satire the Onion, professional wrestling's WWE, online magazine Slate and news service Thomson Reuters. The channels will roll out beginning this month, though most will premiere next year. YouTube says the channels will add 25 hours of new original content daily, with dozens of Web series debuting at scheduled times.
Ultimately, YouTube is aiming to create a new digital video platform that will rival television programming. In a blog posting Friday night, YouTube said the channels are being developed "specifically for the digital age." The video site compared the expanded video offerings to the advent of cable television. YouTube has tried to build a more advertiser-friendly product of professional-quality video, as opposed to simply user-created videos. Advertisers generally prefer to have their ads matched with known quantities. YouTube has also previously tried to urge viewers to stay longer with TV-like services like the YouTube Leanback, which continuously plays a personalized selection of videos.
Google is also looking to add professionally produced content to its huge roster of user-generated videos, to give users of its Google TV platform something to watch. Major Hollywood networks such as News Corp.'s Fox and The Walt Disney Co.'s ABC have blocked their content from being shown on Google TV because the sides have been unable to come to a licensing deal that the networks believes pays them fairly. Networks also don't want to jeopardize their lucrative relationship with pay TV distributors like Comcast Corp. and DirecTV.
Google is a platform that has been adopted by set-top box maker Logitech, which makes a device called a Logitech Revue that sells for $100.

Twitter to tie-up with Airtel to offer free access

2011-10-20T01:31:00.001-07:00

Twitter creator, co-founder and chairman, Jack Dorsey, has revealed at AsiaD that Twitter is partnering with Airtel to offer free access to Twitter to Airtel’s subscribers. The official announcement is expected in the coming weeks. Dorsey did not reveal any more details of the service or the partnership, but said that customers will be able to access the Twitter’s mobile web portal, which sounds similar to Facebook Zero, a stripped down version of Facebook, where subscribers on some carriers could access Facebook for free by going to 0.facebook.com. At the moment, Airtel subscribers can access Twitter and send Tweets over SMS using the shortcode 53000.

Samsung's big idea? Upsetting the Apple cart

2011-10-19T06:14:00.001-07:00

By Miyoung Kim and Anshuman Daga

SEOUL/SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Just a few doors down from the Apple store in Sydney, where a long line of fans eagerly awaited the sale of the new iPhone 4S, another throng was gathering at a Samsung store.

Samsung was ambushing Apple at a temporary "pop up" store offering its new Samsung Galaxy S II smartphone for just A$2 to the first 10 customers each day in the run-up to the rival iPhone launch.

The guerrilla marketing tactic is the latest flare-up in the intensifying competition between two of the biggest players in the mobile devices industry that has also seen them battle in courts across the world over patents.

What makes the battle so captivating is that the two companies are such contrasts. Apple is known for innovation and big ideas that create whole new markets. What Samsung lacks in ideas, it makes up for with a sleek production system that is lightning fast in bringing new products to market.

Graphic on new iPhone vs Galaxy S II, click http://link.reuters.com/pym44s

Still, Samsung Electronics delayed the unveiling of its latest smartphone, the Nexus Prime, by a week to Wednesday as a sign of respect following the death of Apple's co-founder Steve Jobs -- Apple is Samsung's biggest customer for microprocessors.

The Nexus Prime has been much anticipated because it is based on the latest version of Google's Android operating system, named "Ice Cream Sandwich" after previous versions also named after foods, such as Gingerbread and Honeycomb.

But the war for smartphone dominance is one Samsung appears to be winning for now, just. Third-quarter figures are expected to show it has overtaken Apple as the world's biggest smartphone vendor in terms of units sold.

Apple, the world's largest technology company with a market value of $391 billion, is counter-punching hard as the holiday sales season approaches.

It is expected to present a positive short-term picture -- sparked by roaring sales of its iPhone and iPad -- when it reports results for the July-September period on Tuesday. The company moved 4 million iPhone 4S units in three days -- more than double its predecessor -- despite lukewarm reviews.

"The quarter we are focusing on is the holiday quarter," said Channing Smith, co-manager of the Capital Advisors Growth Fund, which owns Apple shares. "We expect Apple to absolutely blow the doors off during Christmas."

The battle between Samsung and Apple is being waged not just in malls and stalls across the world, but in courtrooms as well.

On the same day Samsung was luring away potential Apple customers in Sydney with the Galaxy promotion, an Australian court slapped a temporary ban on the sale of Samsung's computer tablet, named the Galaxy Tab, in the country, saying Samsung infringed on Apple patents.

Apple has also scored preliminary injunctions against some Samsung products in Germany and the Netherlands, and seeks to block sales of Samsung models in the United States, the key smartphone battleground.

Samsung is trying to counter with lawsuits of its own, unsuccessfully so far, accusing Apple of infringing its technologies.

FAST EXECUTIONER

Analysts who follow the company say Samsung may not have the next big idea but it does have world-class marketing chops.

The world's biggest maker of flat screens and memory chips and the second-biggest mobile phone maker after Nokia can bring a product to market faster than anybody. Samsung can leverage costs by using the chips and screens from its other divisions in its products. It has unrivalled product differentiation, offering different phones for different market segments.

But while Samsung has shown it can beat Apple in the market, few are convinced it has the innovative corporate culture to be the next Apple.

The conglomerate's legendary founder Lee Byung-chull set up Samsung Electronics in 1969, producing black-and-white TVs that he supposedly learned how to make by tearing apart a Sony. Apple claims in its lawsuits that the Galaxy lineups using Google's Android platform copied the look and feel of its iPhone and iPad.

"Koreans are great at reverse engineering," says John Strand, founder of Danish telecoms consultancy Strand Consult.

Samsung's corporate culture values speed and adaptability, aspiring to be what they call in Korea the "fast executioner".

"But to capture the imagination of the public in the way the iPhone or iPad have done, Samsung will need to take risks and produce something unique that has a true 'wow' factor and be first to market," said Tim Shepherd, an analyst at Canalys, a technology focused research firm.

TECHNOLOGY AGNOSTIC

Samsung doesn't just rely on Android. It is technology neutral, jointly developing software with Intel, using Microsoft's Windows, free software Linux and its own operating system, Bada, in its phones. Its vertically integrated supply chain of chips and displays also helps it better control production costs.

"With eggs in all baskets, Samsung is poised to be the long-term winner regardless of how the dynamics play out between technologies and standards," analysts at Bernstein said in a report. "Samsung is unique among leading manufacturers of being extremely 'OS-agnostic'," they said referring to operating systems.

One Samsung executive helpfully suggested that Apple might want to copy the Korean company.

"What Apple might want to pursue is ironically what Samsung is doing right now: Keep introducing differentiated products to cater to the very low end of the market to the very top," said a senior Samsung official, who declined to be named because he was not authorised to speak to the media.

"We may have looked foolish by not focusing on just one mobile platform and instead spreading our resources for the time- and labour-consuming work of making phones with various platforms, but it showed patience eventually pays off."

Samsung's speedy ascent to the smartphone summit came after the company was sent reeling by the storm Apple created over the launch of the iPhone 4 and the iPad early last year. Profit halved in the second quarter last year because it didn't have products to compete with the iPhone 4 and the iPad.

But it caught up fast. Samsung released an upgraded version of its Galaxy S smartphone with improved processing power in April, less than a year after it was first introduced, making it also bigger but lighter. Months later, it unveiled upgraded versions of the Galaxy smartphone, running on the fast 4G network with a high-resolution display.

The company was also first to challenge the iPad with different sizes and is now the No. 2 tablet vendor.

Samsung sold nearly 20 million smartphones in the second quarter, about one million fewer than Apple. Its market share gap was less than 1 percentage point.

But Samsung is expected to sell 95 million smartphones this year, higher than Apple's 81 million, and raise sales to 136 million versus Apple's 89 million units next year, JPMorgan analysts forecast.

By comparison, Apple's latest iPhone followed 15 months after its previous model and had no facial changes, disappointing investors and fans who had hoped for a fancy and thinner product with a bigger screen and 4G connection.

"If users are concerned about being 'future-proof' from a network technology point of view, Samsung clearly has a marketing edge at the moment ... Samsung has a strong ability to release competitive new smartphones on a timely basis," Fitch analyst Alvin Lim said.

CLEAN, CLEAR, COLOURS

Just listen to Michael Santos, an iPhone user for the last two years. The 22-year-old is about to abandon his iPhone after spending the past half-hour in a Samsung store in Singapore playing with the new Galaxy S II.

"The screen on the Galaxy is high resolution, much clearer, cleaner and the colours are brighter," said Santos, a student on a holiday in Singapore.

The Galaxy S II uses Samsung's own dual-core application processors, cutting costs there. It is slimmer and has a bigger display than the iPhone 4S and is being sold through around 140 operators in more than 100 countries.

Choice, and lots of it, has been key to its success.

"The secret to Samsung's success is strength in depth," said Geoff Blaber, analyst at London-based mobile consultancy CCS Insight. "Samsung is competing aggressively -- from pre-pay right up to the high-tier, where the Galaxy S II has arguably gained most from Nokia's slide in market share."

"Words once solely used to describe Nokia are now applicable to Samsung. Scale, distribution and supply chain are interdependent elements that Samsung has mastered to drive both profit and volume," he said.

Analysts say smartphones now account for one-third of Samsung's handset portfolio, up from 26 percent in the second quarter and 12 percent a year ago, lifting the profit margin of its overall handset business to around 14 percent.

The iPhone, introduced in 2007 with the touchscreen template now adopted by its rivals, is still the gold standard in the smartphone market.

But phones based on Android, which is available for free to handset vendors such as Samsung, HTC, LG Electronics, Motorola Mobility and Sony Ericsson, have come to dominate the market.

Consumers of Android-powered smartphones tout its customisation, price and also the fact that they do not need to synchronise their devices with a computer like users of Apple's operating system.

Samsung may not have come up with the concept but it has adapted Apple's breakthrough smartphone idea perhaps better than any other handset maker. It tries to offer the Apple experience at a better price with better functionality.

That was why Cho Su-ah, a college student in Seoul, picked Samsung over Apple.

"I was attracted to the iPhone 4 more since many of my friends have it and I could get a lot of help from them if I needed. Also, as a girl, I was attracted to the cute design of Apple," she said.

"But my thoughts on Galaxy changed after a few days of using it. Since it's a Korean phone I could get technical help much more easily than I would have with an iPhone. And although people said the Android market has fewer applications, I didn't have any trouble finding applications I wanted."

(Additional reporting by Tarmo Virki in HELSINKI, Poornima Gupta in SAN FRANCISCO, Iktae Park in SEOUL, Cerelia Lim in SINGAPORE and Lee Chyen Yee in HONG KONG; Editing by Bill Tarrant)

Google to close down Google Buzz

2011-10-14T23:13:00.001-07:00

Google Friday announced to shut down the highly-controversial social networking product Google Buzz, along with several other services in the coming weeks, Xinhua reported.

Google on its official blog, Google announced the death penalty to its code search engine, Buzz, Jaiku which let users send updates to friends, the Google personalised homepage feature iGoogle, and the University Research Program for Google Search.
The shut-downs came as part of Google's housecleaning effort announced in early September, in which the company said it will shut down a number of products and merging others into existing products as features.

"Changing the world takes focus on the future, and honesty about the past. We learned a lot from products like Buzz, and are putting that learning to work every day in our vision for products like Google+. Our users expect great things from us; today's announcements let us focus even more on giving them something truly awesome," said Google in the blog post.
Google Buzz, a social networking and messaging tool integrated into Gmail service, has been widely criticised for privacy concerns and held back the search giant from expanding its businesses to the social networking space.
After Buzz, Google launched Google+ in June, which has been receiving a good response and passed the 40 million user mark, the company's chief executive officer Larry Page said Thursday.

China reins in microblogs to counter internet ‘rumours’

2011-09-28T02:31:00.001-07:00

China, well known for tightly controlling the internet in its borders, is on a campaign to counter what it sees as rumours on the internet.
The focus of the campaign is China’s rapidly growing microblog services, Twitter-like applications that have taken the country by storm.
In August, Chinese internet giant Sina proclaimed in a seven-storey advert in New York that while it took a little more than three years for Twitter to get 200m registered users, it took its own Weibo service half that time to reach the milestone.

All internet companies in China have to agree to state controls to obtain an operating licence so Weibo faces the same rules as other services. Reuters
The service grew quickly in part because Sina CEO Charles Chao and other company executives invited Chinese celebrities and well known media and business figures to join the service, according to Forbes Asia.
Despite having more than 100 editors monitoring content on the service, the service became a place where ordinary Chinese vented their anger over a range of issues in their society.
At times, Chinese authorities have allowed such protest, leading those familiar with the internet in China to believe the authorities see microblogs like Sina Weibo as a safety valve for frustrations over a range of issues.
After a fatal high-speed train crash in July, news and images quickly spread on the microblogs such as Sina Weibo that countered official reports. Messages of outrage quickly poured out on the microblogs.
One Weibo user wrote in response to state reports, “In the eyes of the authorities, regular people will always be gullible three-year-old children.”
In another incident, the 15-year-old son of an army general and well-known singer not only rear-ended the car of a family, but then got out of the car and started shouting at the family. The teen, Li Tianyi, didn’t have a licence, and this was one of 36 driving violations that he had.
According to CNN, Weibo user @ Gujingyema wrote, “For kids with family and social connections, the only way to deal with this kind of kid is to go by laws.”
After initially being seen to tolerate such comments, authorities are now reasserting their control. However, rather than simply blocking the service as Twitter has been since 2009, Chinese authorities are instead calling on police to correct facts and publish authorised information to quell rumours.
Many have been watching to see if Weibo would launch a Twitter revolution in China, but as Gady Epstein (formerly with Forbes, now with the Economist) said, Sina Chairman Chao, a former journalist, is “more cautious loyalist than agitating newshound”. He has made it clear that he will cooperate with authorities to rein in Weibo.
At the recent China Digital Media Summit, he said, “Weibo is a microcosm of a big society and a society needs to be properly managed by regulations.”
The site will institute a “credibility system”, according to CNN. Users who are found guilty of spreading rumours will have their accounts suspended from one week to one month.
Investor blogs covering China cited Sina’s efforts to rein in rumours on Weibo as one of the reasons that the stock has dropped recently, but the drop was against broader weakness in Chinese internet stocks.
Was Weibo’s meteoric growth due to the relative freedom that users’ felt? We’ll soon find out. All internet companies in China have to agree to state controls to obtain an operating licence so Weibo faces the same rules as other services.
However, Weibo users will now find their complaints about government corruption or the bratty sons of high-powered officials countered with ‘authorised’ information, and if they continue to spread ‘rumours’, they might find their accounts suspended.

Facebook Forms Its Own Political Action Committee

2011-09-26T22:35:00.001-07:00

Facebook filed paperwork with the Federal Election Committee Monday to form a Political Action Committee called FB PAC. "FB PAC will give our employees a way to make their voice heard in the political process by supporting candidates who share our goals of promoting the value of innovation to our economy while giving people the power to share and make the world more open and connected," said a spokesman to The Hill's Hillicon Valley blog. The FEC did not have FB PAC's information on its website as of Monday afternoon.
Facebook has already spent $550,000 this fiscal year on lobbying, up from $350,000 in 2010. Facebook's lobbying pales in comparison to Google and Microsoft, both of which have spent already about $3.5 million this fiscal year lobbying.
Facebook has recently hired a number of GOP consultants, joining tech rival Google in embracing elements of the conservative movement. For Facebook, that includes cozying up to conservative stalwarts the National Federation of Independent Business and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce
"Small businesses are the backbone of the American economy and we believe that Facebook can be a tremendous tool to fuel their growth and success," Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook Chief Operating Officer, said in a statement published in Monday's Politico Playbook.
As part of the gesture, Facebook announced that it would offer small businesses up to $10 million in free advertisements on its site. Every business that joins and redeems a $50 credit will be entered into a contest to get more check-ins and likes.

How to See Who Unfriended You on Facebook

2011-09-24T23:37:00.000-07:00

BuzzFeed explains how Timelines makes it a breeze

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg shows Timeline during the f/8 conference in San Francisco Thursday.

(Newser) – Tech pundits are still debating how big Facebook's new Timeline features will be—blogger Dan Lyons is in the it's-overhyped camp—but BuzzFeed has stumbled onto one indisputable fact: Timeline makes it really easy to see who has unfriended you over the years.

Click here for the four-step process. (It involves calling up your friends' list from any given year and looking for the "add a friend" button.) "Prepare to be upset," warns Matt Stopera.

iPad 3, LTE iPhone promise ‘monster’ Apple earnings next year

2011-09-24T21:47:00.001-07:00

Is Apple’s product pipeline too full of home runs to fail? The release of the iPhone 5, a second entry-level iPhone, the next iPad and even next year’s 4G LTE-powered iPhone will help Apple maintain its series of “monster” quarters according to Wedbush analyst Scott Sutherland. He expects Apple to ship 26 million iPhones during the first quarter of next year, up from 23 million during the first quarter of this year. New product launches are the special sauce to Apple’s success, Sutherland says. “While the iPhone 4 appears to be selling well due to existing market demand and new markets, we expect a bump up from the iPhone 5 this October, and a lower end iPhone geared towards emerging markets,” he wrote in a research note. “With the introductions ahead of the holidays, we expect a monster FQ1 from Apple. Furthermore, in 1H12, we expect the introduction of a 4G LTE iPhone with a materially improved user interface and the iPad 3.” Sutherland also said Apple will revamp its Mac and iPod products in the future, as it always does, and he believes rumors that Apple will enter the connected TV market. Apple’s new iCloud service may contribute to additional media and app sales, further propelling Apple’s quarterly success, Sutherland said.
Read

Yahoo! ties up with Facebook, launches new features

2011-09-23T06:17:00.001-07:00

Yahoo! has launched a new feature called ‘Yahoo! News Friends Activity‘ which will allow you to keep a tab on what your friends are reading on Yahoo! News. The feature lets people discover what news are you reading seamlessly through updates on Facebook. Users will also be able to feature the TV shows they watched on their Facebook profile via the IntoNow app from Yahoo!. This content will appear on people’s profiles under “Most Watched” and “Most Recently Watched.” You’ll also be able to discover new content based on your friends’ activity. Hit the break to read about these features in detail.

Control What You Share – By opting-in to the new feature, people can see their Facebook friends’ and the recent articles they’ve read.

You on Yahoo! News – People will have a lightweight dashboard that provides a clear view into their activity.

Your Friends’ Activity – Shows Facebook friends and what they’re reading on Yahoo! in a new “facebar” at the top of Yahoo! News.

Your Friends’ Tab – For friends who have also opted-in, displays the articles they’ve recently viewed.

Android: Oracle wants $1.16bn from Google

2011-09-23T06:11:00.001-07:00

Oracle Corp estimated it suffered roughly $1.16 billion of damages from Google Inc's alleged copyright and patent infringement of Java technology used in the Android operating system.

In a court filing, Oracle said Google's claim that the damages sought exceeded $2.2 billion "mischaracterizes" a report by Oracle damages expert Iain Cockburn, a Boston University business professor.

The lowered damages estimate is one-fifth the maximum $6.1 billion that Oracle had earlier sought in the case.

Oracle had sued Google in August 2010, claiming that the Internet search company's Android system infringed Java patents that Oracle had acquired when it bought Sun Microsystems Inc seven months earlier. It also alleged copyright infringement.

The lawsuit is one of several among phone and software companies seeking a greater share of profits in the growing market for smartphones and tablets.
A trial is set to begin on October 31 before U.S. District Judge William Alsup in San Francisco. The judge had on July 22 rejected Oracle's request for up to $6.1 billion, but gave the company a chance to revise its claim.

In a letter to Alsup, Oracle lawyer Steven Holtzman said the revised damages estimate includes as much as $202 million for patent infringement, and as much as $960 million for copyright infringement.

He urged the judge to deny Google's request to exclude parts of Cockburn's report from the case.

Google did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Google is based in Mountain View, California, and Oracle in nearby Redwood City.

The case in Oracle America Inc v. Google Inc, U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, No. 10-03561.

Face off: Social media moving into MySpace as Facebook integrates music and movie streams

2011-09-23T00:37:00.001-07:00

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg is expected to deliver a big announcement at the F8 Developer Conference. Picture: AFP
Facebook is heading into MySpace territory, announcing an integrated music and movie streaming service this morning at the F8 Developer Conference in San Francisco.

The social networking company will roll out some significant changes to its site, including a dramatic overhaul of its profile pages and integrating music, media and lifestyle apps into separate activity feeds.
Here's a run down of how the morning went:
8.38am A new "Read" button will be coming to a Facebook page near you soon, according to TechCrunch.
The new button would allow third party advertisers to add a button to their website that allows users to let their social graph know what they are reading, for example.
Read more about how this button works at TechCrunch.
7.45am Will Facebook ticker turn into a "noise machine" filled with song spam? March Hachmann over at PC World has written an interesting piece on the potential downside of Facebook's dramatic makeover.

Picture: Facebook
7.30am So have the new Facebook changes sidelined Google +? Tech blogger Robert Scoble says this is the "lamest" question he's been asked so far.

Robert Scoble says Facebook vs Google+ is the most interesting corporate fight of the last decade. Picture: Robert Scoble
"If Google fails with Google+ the entire company fails," Mr Scoble wrote on Google +

"This is why I'm on Google+. This is why this fight is - by far - the most interesting corporate fight of the last decade.
What Facebook will bring out today is GOOD for Google. It will cause Google to step up their game."

Mr Scoble's full analysis of today's announcements can be found here.
7.15am The new changes to Facebook could have users asking "what have you done for me lately?"

Though Google + announced the launch of new improvements on its site, including video chat "Hangouts" and an improved search experience, it pales in comparison to the offer of online movie and music streaming services.
Though many Facebook users are concerned about their decreasing right to privacy, it's not as though Google+ offers a more private experience. Last month Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt admitted that Google+ was an "identity service".
Tell us what you think, leave a comment below.

6.50am The keynote may be over but there's plenty going on behind the scenes. The team at Facebook are hosting panels and Q&A sessions throughout the day. Check it out:
f8live on livestream.com
6.41am Want the low-down on every single change coming to Facebook?

Mark Zuckerberg delivers the keynote address at the 2011 F8 Developers Conference. Picture: Facebook

Business Insider has an interactive guide that tells you everything you need to know about the future of your Facebook page.

6.36am Wired has a great piece on how the new Facebook makeover is changing the future of sharing.

"Facebook’s vision of the future involves bringing its users entirely into its social platform, allowing for the Facebook page to be a sort of one-stop shop, scooping up all of your activities and displaying them in one grand, blue and white frame."

6.27am Can Facebook save the music industry from bankruptcy?
It looks you will have to pay for much of the music you stream through Facebook. Spotify CEO Daniel Ek said during a panel on The Future of Digital Music that he hopes Facebooks music streaming service will get people paying for music again.

Spotify CEO Daniel Ek hopes the new music streaming service will revolutionise the music industry. Picture: Getty Images / AFP
"What kills me is that back in the day you used to have all these great stories of artists who could afford to spend a few years in a studio and they would bring in big bands and orchestras and record their album," Mr Ek said.
"These days we don't have that luxury.
"I hope to create a platform that people engage with that allows artists to make more money, and that way they'll create more music for us to listen to."
6.13am Check out this video about the future of social apps on Facebook:
Video: Facebook

6.04am Hate the new Facebook? Well it pretty much sucks to be you because there's not an awful lot you can do about it.
However a new Chrome plugin is promising to remove the scrolling ticker from the right hand side of your Facebook page.

The new Chrome plugin promises to remove the news ticker from your Facebook page. Picture: Chrome store
We're not sure how long Google have known about this but you've got to admire the chutzpah of Facebook's major competitor preparing a plugin that helps roll back the new changes its rolling out.
Read more about it over at PC World.
5.54am The keynote presentation is finished but if you missed it, TechCrunch has an archived video of the event.
5.35am Comedian Andy Samberg was the warm up act this morning, he took to the stage playing Mark Zuckerberg, exclaiming: "We're going to change the universe! I say that every year!".
Watch the video as Samberg pokes fun at the baby-faced Facebook founder:
Video: Facebook
5.23am No word yet about what the Winklevoss twins have to say about the Facebook redesign, but thankfully Twitter weighed in on their behalf.

Picture: AFP
IT marketing expert Christopher Penn has posted some pretty interesting first impressions of the announcements at the F8 conference - on G+ - how's that for irony!
Summary: The winners of the new design are media outlets and celebrities. The losers - entrepreneurs and independent promoters.
5.12am Oh the outrage. People are not happy.
So to re-cap, Facebook seem to be heading into serious MySpace territory. Along with your standard profile picture, your new profile page will contain a massive photo which runs across the top of the page.

Picture: Facebook
The new redesign also includes applications for almost every area of your life from jogging, to watching movies and cooking.

Picture: Facebook
Each timeline will also contain isolated newsfeeds or "Activity Logs" for each separate activity.

Picture: Facebook
4.54am Johnny Evans from Computerworld has written an Op-Ed piece on how Facebook's new music streaming service will pose a serious threat to Apple's dominance over the music world via iTunes.
4.51am The new Spotify app allows you to stream music through your Facebook page.

Picture: Facebook

4.38am The new "Open Graph" feature will feature apps from major news organisations, game developers and lifestyle companies.
Here's how it works: When a user reads a news article, it will appear in their ticker newsfeed, allowing their friends to click on the article and read it on Facebook using a customised application.
People will be able to read The Washington Post, The Daily, The (UK) Telegraph and The Huffington Post.
4.32am Let's jump over to Twitter and see what the reaction is so far. Here are just a few selections:

@mattmcgeeRT @AnnieCushing: There has never been a better time to be a stalker. #sigh #f8

@KuraFireI admire Facebok for trying to represent and capture your entire life inside their product. It’s not just social; it’s intimate. #f8

@ShoeDaydreamsThis update is also know as "stealing even MORE data from you" #f8

4.27am A new Hulu "social canvas app" will also be available where you can watch TV shows on your Facebook. Hulu is also not available in Australia so it seems unlikely we'll be seeing any of this social movie and TV action any time soon.
4.20am Netflix CEO Reed hastings announced that people will now be able to stream Netflix movies through Facebook.

No word yet on whether this is will be available in Australia. Considering it hasn't been available in Australia thus far, I wouldn't be holding your breathe for this one.
4.08am Spotify CEO has announced a bold new way to refamiliarise people with the concept of paying for music.

"The more music you listen to, the more engaged you are with music, the more likely you are to pay for music," Mr Ek said.
"We're bringing people back to paying for music again. That's how artists can continue to create music for all of us to enjoy."
"Our goal is to make music readily available whilst making sure artists get a fair deal."
4.05am The rumours about a music streaming service were right. People will be able to play music live through Facebook using a Spotify app which will show up on your news feed and your friends will also be able to listen in too.

3.57am All the information about the new Facebook overhaul is available on the official blog. Picture: Facebook

3.45am Users will now have a giant photo that will appear at the top of their timeline which they can change as often or as seldom as they want.
It is separate from your profile picture which still remains in the top left hand corner of your profile - but Zuckerberg says the large photo tells a lot about your life and personal story.
"we wanted to design a place that feels like your home," Zuckerberg said.
"Now you have a new way to express who you are".
3.38am Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg says apps are central to the future of Facebook as they "help tell the story of your life".
2.45am The Huffington Post has a collection of the latest rumors on what will be unveiled at today's Facebook F8 conference. They include the release of the long awaited iPad application, Facebook Music and new buttons including "Read", "Watched" and possibly "Want".
2.30am Here’s what we know so far:
Facebook yesterday rolled out a series of significant changes to the site including a subscribe function and news ticker that updates activities in real time.
Rumours of the big announcement have been flying around the interwebs for months.

The word on the street is that Facebook will be launching a new music and movie streaming service, as well as a new photo application similar to Instagram.
Oh and apparently a new Facebook app will finally be available for the iPad.
These and many more rumours will be confirmed or dispelled shortly.
Follow News.com.au as we bring you all the latest Facebook developments live.

@shawkeithThe more that FB wants me to be social, the more anti-social I want to become. #f8

5.04am

@onetakeRT @SocialMedia411: "After today, the Winklevoss twins wont want people thinking Facebook was their idea." MT @hipstermermaid #f8

Microsoft to roll out Windows Phone 7.5 update in coming weeks

2011-09-22T22:21:00.001-07:00

Microsoft has announced that Windows Phone 7.5 Mango update for older Windows Phone devices will begin rolling out globally within a week or two. This lines up very well with what we had reported earlier this week about Windows Phone 7.5 rolling out in India towards the end of this month. While we are confident of at least one new Windows Phone 7.5 smartphone launch in India this month, updates for older ones will be rolled out in batches and can take a few weeks to reach every user.
Read

Angry Birds come to F1 racing in Singapore

2011-09-22T22:19:00.001-07:00

Angry Birds will be seen at the Formula One event this weekend in Singapore, as Rovio is planning to roll-out a crowd game to be played by live audience at the F1, Reuters reports. The makers of Angry Birds have teamed up with Singapore Telecommunications and the physical crowd game is created by a Finnish start-up named Uplause Ltd. In this crowd game, viewers will control the slingshot on jumbo screens with their voices. After the Singapore F1, Rovio and Uplause are planning to take the new gaming experience to the biggest live events in the world such as sports stadiums and rock concerts.
Read

Gmail gets multiple account sign-in on mobile

2011-09-22T00:06:00.001-07:00

Google has now enabled multiple account sign-in for Gmail mobile users. This feature will enable users to be simultaneously signed-in to multiple Gmail accounts and switch between them without having to log out. The new release also enables users to have a separate signature when they are composing mails on their phones to let receivers know why there are spelling mistakes in the mail and also set an out-of-office auto-reply. Both options are available in the settings menu when viewed on a mobile phone browser.

Now, you could become James Cameron with just party videos

2011-09-21T23:50:00.000-07:00

YouTube is test firing a new feature that, according to claims, converts uploaded content into 3-D. Users, however, will need the glasses to view converted material.
Starting soon, the website will feature an 'Edit Info' button inside which the user will be able to choose the '3-D video' option to convert already uploaded 2-D videos into yes, blue people.
YouTube has been experimenting with 3-D for a while now and experts believe the delay has been due to a general lack of 3-D acceptance and very few 3-D recording devices.

Google advertises Google+ on homepage to mark its new ‘open to all’ status

2011-09-21T00:11:00.001-07:00

After yesterday’s major update to Google+, which also made it open to all, Google is now using its search homepage as an advertisement to make users log on to its online social network. And mind you, Google rarely advertises anything on its homepage and as expected, this one is no conventional banner ad. Instead, it is a simple hand-drawn arrow mark that points to the corner of the top bar from where users can sign up to Google+. This is just the beginning, we think, and the fight between Google and Facebook is only going to get more interesting from here, with Facebook expected to announce new features including a music service offering later this week at its f8 conference. Stay tuned.

The End of the Road for Yahoo?

2011-09-16T01:50:00.000-07:00

A screenshot of the website for Internet giant Yahoo.com.
Once-giant tech firm Yahoo has seen its brand slump and its fortunes founder, as a new generation of nimbler web companies have consumed its market share.

Sensing blood in the water, several bidders have contacted the company, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal that mentioned private equity firm Silver Lake Partners as just one.
Other reports suggest many suitors are pursuing the company -- seeking to buy not the Yahoo brand but parts of the tech behemoth.
Would that mean the end of Yahoo altogether? No more Yahooligans?
"It probably would," technology analyst Ben Bajarin with Creative Strategies told FoxNews.com. Given the competition the company faces and the changing business landscape, those bidders are best off seeking bits of the Yahoo puzzle, rather than the whole smorgasbord, he said.
"It was hard to look forward and say they were going to be relevant … The wisest thing to do would be to sell off the pieces."
Yahoo has built or acquired numerous disparate elements over the years -- job board Monster.com and HotJobs, bookmarking site del.icio.us, image-sharing site Flickr, and so on -- that many consumers don't necessarily connect to the Yahoo brand anyway, Bajarin noted.
"A lot of consumers might know Flickr but don't associate that with Yahoo," he told FoxNews.com.
Those individual assets are definitely valuable, agreed Rob Enderle, a leading technology analyst with the Enderle Group. And they definitely don't connect effectively.
"There's too many parts of Yahoo that came up under different leadership and don’t mesh well enough together -- this one won't be easy," Enderle said. But the Yahoo brand and what it represents is worth more as a cohesive unit than as parts, he said.
Those whole brand is worth saving after all, he told FoxNews.com.
"I'm not so sure what it's going to be worth in parts … You either try to make it work or you sell the brand and go home."
Yahoo thinks change isn't around the corner: The company has signaled to potential suitors that it isn't under pressure to make a deal quickly, a person familiar with the situation told the Wall Street Journal.
Analysts tend to disagree, telling FoxNews.com the exact opposite: Change is imminent and necessary.
"It clearly can't continue on the way it is," Enderle said.

Android to run on Intel processors

2011-09-14T04:58:00.001-07:00

Intel Corp and Google Inc launched a development partnership.
SAN FRANCISCO: Intel Corp and Google Inc launched a development partnership on the latest effort by the world's dominant maker of PC microprocessors to break into the booming smartphone market.

The two companies will work together to optimize future versions of Google's Android mobile software for Intel's "Atom" processors, hoping to speed the development and time-to-market of future Intel-powered smartphones.

The move could jump-start Intel's efforts to expand into the market for mobile phones and touchscreen tablet devices at a time when sales of PCs are slowing.

The first Android phones featuring Google chips should be available in the first half of 2012, Intel executives said at the company's annual developer conference in San Francisco.

Intel is allying itself with one of the biggest players in the mobile industry. In August, Google announced plans to acquire mobile phone maker Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion.

And Android software, which Google licenses free to manufacturers, is currently the most popular smartphone software, ahead of Apple's iOS as well as software by Microsoft and Research in Motion.
While Intel is the world's No. 1 maker of PC microprocessors, it has struggled to gain a foothold in the new class of mobile gadgets such as smartphones and tablets.

Today's crop of smartphones, from the iPhone to devices based on Android software, use chips from companies like Texas Instruments and Samsung which in turn license technology from ARM Holdings.
Those chips are considered more power efficient than Intel's -- a key factor for handheld, battery-powered devices.

Still early days

But Intel Chief Executive Paul Otellini, speaking at the conference, said the smartphone market is still in its early stages.

"The smartphone business is not established in terms of the ultimate shake-out of who's going to win and who is going to lose," Otellini said during a chat with reporters following his keynote speech.

"You saw what happened in terms of how fast Android took share from Apple," he said. "So good products on good platforms can really still make a big difference in this industry."

While Android technically already could support Intel chips, the new partnership will make it much easier for a manufacturer to bring an Intel-based Android phone to market.

Until now, it has been up to phone manufacturers to make their Android phones compatible with Intel chips, whereas future versions of the Android software will work with Intel chips right out of the gate, and will be optimized to take advantage of Intel's technology.

"It's really about Google saying that Intel is going to be a first-class citizen in the Android ecosystem," said David Kanter, an analyst with Real World Technologies.

But he added that Intel still needs to win over hardware makers if it hopes to succeed in the smartphone market.

Otellini also again highlighted his confidence in the new "ultrabook" computing market during Tuesday's speech, saying the lighter, sleeker laptops should hit store shelves starting this holiday season.

Google invites children from India for its Children’s Day doodle

2011-09-13T01:07:00.001-07:00

Google India has announced its third Doodle4Google contest that invites children to create doodles that will grace Google India’s homepage on Children’s Day on November 14. This year’s theme is ‘India’s gift to the world’ and children in the age-group of 5-16 years can participate. The winning entry will receive a laptop with an year’s Internet subscription as well as a Rs 200,000 technology grant for the school the winner represents. The bigger deal, of course, would be having their creation adorn Google India’s homepage for an entire day. Hit the break to find out how to register and submit your doodles.
Google Invites children to ‘Doodle’ on its India home page
Announces the launch of the third Doodle4Google Competition 2011 in India
New Delhi, September 12, 2011: At Google we love to play!- even with our corporate logo. To celebrate scientific and artistic achievements, festivals and historic events, we keep redesigning our logo. Google’s Doodle is an inspiration for many young children and seeing their continuous enthusiasm to contribute to the world of ‘Doodles’, we are happy to announce the commencement of the third Doodle 4 Google competition in India which will also mark Children’s Day celebrations on 14th November 2011.
We are inviting children from across the country to participate in this exciting ‘doodling’ competition and get a chance to feature their ‘doodle’ on 14th November 2011 on www.google.co.in. The competition is open for all children from the age group of 5 to 16 years. This year, our chosen theme is ‘India’s gift to the world’.
In addition to the winner’s doodle appearing on Google.co.in on Nov 14, 2011, the star Doodler will receive a technology starter package which will include a laptop, an year’s Internet connection and a Rs 2,00,000 technology grant for the school that he or she will represent.
Announcing the launch of the third D4G contest, Nikhil Rungta, Country Marketing Head, Google India, said, “Doodle4Google has become a global platform giving young children an opportunity to showcase their talent globally. In India, we have noticed great enthusiasm amongst children toward the Doodle4Google competition. Last year the competition crossed the 100,000 mark from just 4500 entries in the 1st year and we expect it to grow much higher this year.”
Just like last year, the participants will be clubbed in three different categories- 1st to 3rd Standard, 4th to 6th Standard and 7th to 10th Standard. Top Indian art schools will select the top 200 entries from each category which will be reviewed by a panel of judges. The judges will then shortlist 15 doodles from each category, bringing it down to a total of 45 final Doodles.
All the final entries will be exhibited for public voting and based on the number of votes, one winner from each category will be selected. Each of the winners will receive a technology starter kit which consists of a laptop and an Internet connection. Dennis Hwang, the original Google Doodler, will then choose the final winning Doodle from the total 45 finalists.

Participating in the competition is simple:

Children studying in class 1st to 10th can participate in the competition. These will be divided into three categories- 1st to 3rd Standard; 4th to 6th Standard and; 7th to 10th Standard
All participants must register on the website (www.google.co.in/doodle4google). The submission may be either individually or through the school. The school route is valid only if the school is organizing to collect and submit the doodles on behalf of their students.
Last date for submissions is 15th September, 2011.
After a series of elimination by celebrity panel of judges, 45 best Doodles will be displayed on the gallery (www.google.co.in/doodle4google). These entries will be open for public voting allowing users to vote for their favorite Doodle in each category.
This year we will have 3 winners in total one from each group
Winning Doodle will be uploaded on the Google.co.in homepage on 14th November 2011, Children’s Day and all the winners will get a Technology Starter Package.

So gather those art supplies. All it takes to enter is a drawing on paper using your favorite medium (crayons, markers, colored pencils, whatever!) –
For information about the contest and to download/print material for use, log onto: www.google.co.in/doodle4google

Michael Arrington leaves TechCrunch, the blog he founded

2011-09-12T23:47:00.001-07:00

New York: Michael Arrington, founder of the popular technology blog TechCrunch, is leaving the blog and its owner, AOL, to work on the venture capital fund he recently started.
Arrington, 41, sold TechCrunch to AOL nearly a year ago. When he and AOL CEO Tim Armstrong announced the acquisition last September, Arrington had said he expected to stay with the company for at least three years.
In a statement, AOL spokeswoman Maureen Sullivan said the "TechCrunch acquisition has been a success for AOL and for our shareholders, and we are very excited about its future."

Araya Diaz/Getty Images for TechCrunch

"Michael is a world-class entrepreneur and we look forward to supporting his new endeavour through our investment in his venture fund," she said.
Arrington started his venture capital firm with an initial $20 million. Its investors include AOL as well as venture capital firms such as Greylock partners, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Sequoia Capital.
Erick Schonfeld, who joined TechCrunch in 2007, has been named its editor.

Google to Iran: Change your password

2011-09-10T03:48:00.001-07:00

San Francisco: Google Inc is advising its Gmail email service customers in Iran to change their passwords in the wake of a cyberattack that has affected a major swath of the country.
Google itself was not compromised, but the attackers may have been able to break into the link between Gmail and a person's computer, essentially. As such the attack was the latest illustration of the difficulty and complexity of securing the Web.
"We learned last week that the compromise of a Dutch company involved with verifying the authenticity of websites could have put the Internet communications of many Iranians at risk, including their Gmail," Google said in a post on its official blog on Thursday.

"While Google's internal systems were not compromised, we are directly contacting possibly affected users and providing similar information below because our top priority is to protect the privacy and security of our users," Google said.
A certificate guarantees that a Web surfer is securely connected with a website and not being monitored by someone else.
In mid-July, Dutch Information Technology company DigiNotar's systems were hacked and security certificates were stolen for a number of domains, DigiNotar and its owner, US-listed VASCO Data Security International, said on August 30.
The stolen certificates were immediately revoked after detection of the theft but one, for the site Google.com, was only "recently" revoked after a warning from the Dutch government, DigiNotar and VASCO said.
Google, which alerted users to the threat last week, recommended on Thursday that all users in Iran follow a series of steps to protect themselves, including changing their Gmail passwords and verifying their account recovery options.

How to get your stolen laptop back within 24 hours

2011-09-10T03:12:00.001-07:00

Before you read this article, download the free, open-source application ‘Prey’. Did you do it? Good. Now you’re convered in the event you wind up like Doug Van Spronsen, who recently had has his laptop stolen. He wrote a great article for Lifehacker that outlines exactly how he used the app to get his precious laptop returned safely to him.
Users who fall victim to laptop theft can log into Prey with their iPhones to report their missing device. Soon after, they’ll start receiving emails that look a lot like this:

Using the GPS functionality (along with the incriminating photos of the man or woman that stole your gadget), you can give the police every detail they need to collect and return your computer to you before you can even miss it.
Full story at Lifehacker.

Apple 'fear': HTC buys Google patents

2011-09-08T01:57:00.000-07:00

HTC now has more ammunition in its fight to fend off multiple patent-infringement claims lodged by Apple

WASHINGTON: HTC Corp, Asia's second-biggest smartphone maker, is using nine patents bought from Google Inc last week to pursue new infringement claims against Apple Inc.

Google had taken ownership of the patents less than a year ago, with four of the patents originating from Motorola Inc, three from Openwave Systems Inc and two from Palm Inc, according to US Patent and Trademark Office records. Jim Prosser, a spokesman for Mountain View, California-based Google, wouldn't discuss reasons for the nine transfers to HTC.

HTC now has more ammunition in its fight to fend off multiple patent-infringement claims lodged by Apple that contend phones running Google's Android operating system copy the iPhone. Google's involvement in aiding HTC represents a new front in an industrywide dispute over smartphone technology that has also ensnared Android customers, Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc, Barnes & Noble Inc and Samsung Electronics Co.

"That's a bit of a game-changer," said Will Stofega, a technology analyst at Framingham, Massachusetts-based IDC. "Google was interested in protecting its licensees with Android. It shows they need to support their customers in order to make sure the customers stick with them."

HTC sued Apple yesterday in court and filed a complaint at the US International Trade Commission, alleging infringement of the patents obtained from Google.

Tremendous pressure

Google, which hasn't been sued directly by Apple, has been criticised for sitting on the sidelines while its Android partners faced lawsuits.

Taoyuan, Taiwan-based HTC, which gained attention in the US by making the first phone to run Android, has defended itself partly by bringing two infringement cases against Apple at the trade commission in Washington, one submitted last year and another last month.

HTC also agreed to buy closely held S3 Graphics Co less than a week after that company won a preliminary patent ruling against Cupertino, California-based Apple.

"Google knows that HTC is under tremendous legal pressure from Apple and clearly on the losing track," Florian Mueller, a Munich-based consultant and intellectual property activist. "This intervention on Google's part increases the likelihood of direct litigation by Apple against Google."

Google, which had been issued fewer than 1,000 patents as of the start of this year, had said it would build a stronger patent portfolio as a defense against intellectual property lawsuits. It made good on that promise last month when it agreed to spend $12.5 billion to buy Motorola Mobility, acquiring more than 17,000 patents.

HTC complaints
HTC sued Apple in federal court in Delaware, claiming infringement of four of the patents obtained from Google and originally issued to Motorola before it split into Motorola Mobility and Motorola Solutions Inc. Google acquired one of the patents in October, two in February and one in March, according to the PTO.

The lawsuit contends the Mac computer, iPhone, iPod, iPad, iCloud and iTunes are infringing patents for a way to upgrade software wirelessly; a way to transfer data between a microprocessor and a support chip; a method to store user preferences, and a way to provide consistent contact between application software and a radio modem.

HTC also amended a complaint with the trade commission yesterday, adding five of the former Google patents to a case that targets many of the same products. Three of those patents Google bought from Openwave and two others had been owned by Palm, which was acquired by Hewlett-Packard Co last year.

Openwave, RIM
The patents in the ITC case relate to an interface that lets the user add identifiers such as .com or .org; an interface that enlarges characters being typed; a way to display information on mobile devices; and status bars that let a user check phone calls, text messages or calendar events.

"HTC will continue to protect its patented inventions against infringement from Apple until such infringement stops," HTC General Counsel Grace Lei said. "We believe that we have an obligation to protect our business, our industry partners and our customers, who love using our products."

Google transfered the nine patents to HTC on Aug. 29 and the transactions were recorded by the patent agency on Sept. 1.

Openwave, a Redwood City, California-based maker of software for mobile phones, filed its own patent-infringement complaints against Apple and Research in Motion Ltd last month.

Healthy competition
HTC and Apple are part of a struggle among smartphone makers looking to fight copycats and thwart competition in a market projected by researcher IHS Inc to be $206.6 billion this year. In addition to HTC's three complaints, Apple won a case in July in which a commission judge determined that some HTC Android devices infringed two patents.

Apple has another complaint, filed in July, that also targets HTC's Flyer tablets. "We think competition is healthy, but competitors should create their own original technology, not steal ours," Kristin Huguet, a spokeswoman for Apple, said, reiterating a statement Chairman Steve Jobs made last year when Apple sued HTC.

HTC and Apple "have to sit down and figure it out," HTC Chief Financial Officer Winston Yung said in a July 26 telephone interview. "We're open to having discussions," he said.

The ITC case is In the Matter of Certain Electronic Devices with Communication Capabilities, Complaint No. 2841, US International Trade Commission (Washington). The earlier civil case is HTC Corp v. Apple Inc, 11-cv-715, US District Court, District of Delaware (Wilmington).

Yahoo! could be up for sale following firing of CEO Carol Bartz

2011-09-08T01:49:00.001-07:00

A file photo shows CEO of Yahoo, Carol Bartz, speaking at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona earlier this year - AFP

Internet services company Yahoo could be sold before it appoints a new chief executive to replace recently fired Carol Bartz, according to sources.
Software giant Microsoft that tried to buy Yahoo in 2008 for 45 billion dollars is likely to reprise its bid.
“Some of the same rationale, in terms of expertise in display advertising and search - still stands, so if Microsoft can get it for half the price, it will want to do so,” the Telegraph quoted a source, as saying.
According to the paper, former chief executive of AOL Jon Miller, who is now heading digital at News Corporation, is tipped as a frontrunner, and could also double as a buyer.
Miller earlier held talks with private equity firms to raise the money to acquire Yahoo.
According to the infuential technology blog Techcrunch, Miller also held ‘early and unofficial’ talks with the Yahoo board in June, the paper said.
Bartz was recently fired by the company’s board over the phone, ending a rocky two-year run marked by stagnating growth and a bitter rift with Chinese partner Alibaba.
The board named Chief Financial Officer Tim Morse to be interim CEO while it searches for a replacement for Bartz.

Carol Bartz's goodbye note to employees

2011-09-07T06:23:00.001-07:00

Carol Bartz

NEW YORK : The chief executive of Yahoo, Carol Bartz, has been fired by the company's board, ending her two-and-a-half years tenure at Yahoo.

The board has named Chief Financial Officer Tim Morse as interim CEO while it searches for a replacement for Bartz.

Bartz struggled to revive struggling Yahoo, however, failed to regain the Internet pioneer's former glory.

In a memo sent to Yahoo employees from her iPad, Bartz confirmed that she has been fired by the company's board. Here's a copy of the note as published by Mashable:

To all,
I am very sad to tell you that I've just been fired over the phone by Yahoo's Chairman of the Board. It has been my pleasure to work with all of you and I wish you only the best going forward.
Carol

Sent from my iPad

Yahoo fires CEO Carol Bartz, ends tumultuous tenure

2011-09-06T23:04:00.001-07:00

San Francisco: Yahoo Inc said on Tuesday it has removed CEO Carol Bartz and replaced her on an interim basis with Chief Financial Officer Tim Morse, ending a rocky two-year run marked by stagnating growth and a bitter rift with Chinese partner Alibaba.
The outspoken Bartz, famous for her salty language, in a two-sentence email to employees obtained by Reuters said that Chairman Roy Bostock fired her over the phone.
Bostock had only just voiced his public support in June for the CEO, a lightning rod for criticism from Wall Street, and known for her tough attitude.

Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Shares in the company rose in after-hours trade to $13.72, from a close of $12.91 on the Nasdaq.
"I am very sad to tell you that I've just been fired over the phone by Yahoo's Chairman of the Board. It has been my pleasure to work with all of you and I wish you only the best going forward," Bartz said in the email.
The news was first reported by tech blog AllThingsD, which cited company sources.

Google buys Zave Network

2011-09-05T23:27:00.001-07:00

Internet giant Google has bought digital coupons and incentives platform Zave Networks for an undisclosed amount.

Internet titan Google, which is on an acquisition spree, has bought digital coupons and incentives platform Zave Networks for an undisclosed amount.
Zave Networks is Google's 19th buyout this year so far. According to an estimate, Google has acquired over 100 firms in the last decade, starting with Deja, a company in the Usenet space that was later integrated with Google Groups.
This roughly translates into the purchase of 10 companies every year, on average, by Google.
Last month, the search engine giant said it would buy Motorola Mobility, the mobile phones division of Motorola Inc, for USD 12.5 billion in cash.
Zave Networks, a company founded in 2006, has announced on its homepage that it has been acquired by Google.
"We are delighted to share that Zave Networks has been acquired by Google. When we had the opportunity to join Google, we felt it was the perfect fit for our company and the perfect opportunity to rapidly drive the deployment and use of our platform to the next level," Zave Networks said on its website.
"We're humbled by the unending support our investors, retailers, advertisers and consumers have provided over the past five years and would like to thank each and every one of them. Going forward, we are excited about being part of Google's efforts in this space," it added.
The company did not disclose the financial details of the deal.

Google+ Adds A Big New Feature

2011-09-03T23:13:00.001-07:00

Google+ Adds 'Suggested Users List'

Google+ has rolled out a new feature that lists well-known Google+ users that you can add to your profile's personal circles. O'Reilly Media's Alexander Howard pointed to the new suggestion feature in a Friday night post on Google+.

This "Suggested Users List" takes cues from Twitter's "Who To Follow" feature. Users can browse celebrities, journalists, and more personalities featured on Google's general "Picks" list. Users can also sort through categories like Entertainment, Fun and Interesting, Photography and Art, Technology and others. Within these lists, you'll find celebrities like Paris Hilton and Ashton Kutcher, as well as entrepreneurs like Richard Branson and journalists such as MG Siegler.
The Huffington Post's Craig Kanalley has posted a list (with links) of all the Google+ profiles from the Suggested Users List.
"[This feature will] alienate people and lead to an inevitable followers war that can hurt the health of the social network and inflate people's egos," Kanalley wrote worriedly of the lists. "As the famous get more followers, the non-featured fall farther behind, and a giant gap is created between the two. This is what happened on Twitter. (In a perfect world, all interact together, around common interests, and there aren't such huge disparities.)"
However, Google+ VP of Product Bradley Horowitz responded to Kanalley's concerns and said that the feature will soon expand to include many more categories and kind of Google+ profiles. Horowitz, went on to explain how the lists will be maintained in the future:

In order to retain a position on the list, a user will need to continue creating compelling content. But we should probably allow for folks to take an occasional vacation without concern about their rank dropping [...] No one gets on the list "automatically." But again, in the early days, we do want to make it easy for users to connect with people they might find compelling. If they prove not to be, justice will be served, and all will be right in the world.

And, wrote Horowitz, personalized lists will be coming soon, too:

At first personalization will be "lite" - users in different regions and languages will get different recommendations. [...] [W]e intend to allow people to deeply personalize and connect with like-minded people that create great content around almost any topic they care about. Just as Google Search helps connect you to web pages about almost anything, Google+ should help connect you to people who deliver content you'll find interesting - on any subject. Stay tuned!

Take a look at a sample of suggested Google+ users from each category on the Suggested Users List (below). If you have a Google+ profile, you can get started with your own list (here). For more ideas on how to beef up your Google+ Circles, check out our lists of 35 Google+ profiles to follow and 19 executives to follow. Then, visit our slideshow of Google+ tips for newbies.

Steve Jobs steps down from Apple

2011-08-24T20:52:00.001-07:00

By Josh Lowensohn
Apple CEO Steve Jobs resigns as CEO of the iconic electronics company he co-founded. He also asked Apple's board to put chief operating officer Tim Cook in his place.
Apple co-founder Steve Jobs resigned from his CEO position today, with former chief operating officer Tim Cook replacing him at the helm.
Jobs has been dogged by a string of health problems in recent years that forced him to take periodic leaves of absence from the company. Jobs announced in January that he was taking an indefinite medical leave from Apple--his third in recent years--and handed over day-to-day responsibility to Cook. He told his employees in January: "I love Apple so much and hope to be back as soon as I can".
In January 2009, Jobs said that he was suffering from a hormone imbalance that was impeding his body's ability to absorb certain proteins. In April of that year, Jobs underwent liver transplant surgery and returned to work by early July. In August 2004, Jobs underwent successful surgery to treat a rare form of pancreatic cancer, which sidelined him until September of that year.
In a separate note to Apple's board members and the Apple community today, Jobs said that he was no longer up to the job of CEO.
"I have always said if there ever came a day when I could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple's CEO, I would be the first to let you know. Unfortunately, that day has come," Jobs said.
Jobs concluded by saying that "Apple's brightest and most innovative days are ahead of it", and that he looks forward to contributing as Apple's chairman of the board, director, and as an Apple employee if the board allows it.
Cook, 50, joined Apple in 1998 and was promoted to COO in 2004. He has long been Jobs' right-hand executive, heading up shareholders meetings and earnings calls with Wall Street investors, and acting as a figurehead at product introductions.
The Jobs era
One of the most legendary businessmen in American history, Jobs turned three separate industries on their head in the 35 or so years he has been involved in the technology industry.
Personal computing was largely invented with the launch of the Apple II in 1977. Legal digital-music recordings were brought into the mainstream with the iPod and iTunes in the early 2000s, and mobile phones were never the same after the 2007 debut of the iPhone. Jobs played an instrumental role in the development of all three, and managed to find time to transform the art of computer-generated movie-making on the side.
The release of the iPad in 2010, a touch-screen tablet computer his competitors flocked to reproduce, could be considered the capstone of his career as a technologist. A conceptual hybrid of a touch-screen iPod and a slate computer, the 10-inch mobile device was Jobs' vision for a more personal computing device.
Jobs is considered brilliant yet brash. He values elegance in design yet is almost never seen in public wearing anything but a black mock turtleneck, blue jeans, and a few days' worth of stubble. A master salesman who considers himself an artist at heart, Jobs inspires both reverence and fear in those who work for him and against him, and is adored by an army of loyal Apple customers.
Jobs was born in San Francisco in 1955 and moved out of the city five years later to the Santa Clara Valley, later to be known as Silicon Valley. He grew up in Mountain View and Cupertino, where Apple's headquarters are located.
He attended Reed College in Portland, Ore., for a year but dropped out, although he sat in on some classes that interested him, such as calligraphy. After a brief stint at Atari working on video games, he spent time backpacking around India, furthering teenage experiments with psychedelic drugs and developing an interest in Buddhism, all of which would shape his work at Apple.
Back in California, Jobs' friend Steve Wozniak was learning the skills that would change both their lives. When Jobs discovered that Wozniak had been assembling relatively (for the time) small computers, he struck a partnership, and Apple Computer was founded in 1976 in the usual Silicon Valley fashion: setting up shop in the home of one of the founder's parents.
Wozniak handled the technical end, creating the Apple I, while Jobs ran sales and distribution. The company sold a few hundred of the Apple I, but found much greater success with the Apple II, which put the company on the map and is largely credited as having proven that regular people wanted computers.
It also made Jobs and Wozniak rich. Apple went public in 1980, and Jobs was well on his way to becoming one of the first tech industry celebrities, earning a reputation for brilliance, arrogance, and the sheer force of his will and persuasion, often jokingly referred to as his "reality-distortion field".
The debut of the Macintosh in 1984 left no doubt that Apple was a serious player in the computer industry, but Jobs only had a little more than a year left at the company he founded when the Mac was released in January 1984.
By 1985 Apple CEO John Sculley--who Jobs had persuaded to leave Pepsi in 1983 and run Apple with the legendary line, "Do you want to spend the rest of your life selling sugared water or do you want a chance to change the world?"--had developed his own ideas for the future of the company, and they differed from Jobs'. He removed Jobs from his position leading the Macintosh team, and Apple's board backed Sculley.
Jobs resigned from the company, later telling an audience of Stanford University graduates "what had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating". He would get the last laugh.
He went on to found NeXT, which set about making the next computer in Jobs' eyes. NeXT was never the commercial success that Apple was, but during those years, Jobs found two things that would help him architect his return.
The first was Pixar. Jobs snapped up the graphic-arts division of Lucasfilm in 1986, which would go on to produce "Toy Story" in 1995 and set the standard for computer-graphics films. After making a fortune from Pixar's IPO in 1995, Jobs eventually sold the company to Disney in 2006.
The second was object-oriented software development. NeXT chose this development model for its software operating systems, and it proved to be more advanced and more nimble than the operating system developments Apple was working on without Jobs.
Jobs returned to Apple in 1996, having convinced then-CEO Gil Amelio to adopt NeXTStep as the future of Apple's operating system development. Apple was in a shambles at the time, losing money, market share, and key employees.
By 1997, Jobs was once again in charge of Apple. He immediately brought buzz back to the company, which pared down and reacquired a penchant for showstoppers, such as the 1998 introduction of the iMac; perhaps the first "Stevenote". His presentation skills at events such as Macworld would become legendary examples of showmanship and star power in the tech industry.
Jobs also set the company on the path to becoming a consumer-electronics powerhouse, creating and improving products such as the iPod, iTunes, and, later, the iPhone and iPad. Apple recently became the most valuable company in the world, with a market capitalization topping US$330 billion.
He did so in his own fashion, imposing his ideas and beliefs on his employees and their products in ways that left many a career in tatters. Jobs enforced a culture of secrecy at Apple and was an extremely demanding leader, terrorizing Apple employees when he returned to the company in the late 1990s with summary firings if he didn't like the answers they gave when questioned.
Jobs is an intensely private person. That quality put him and Apple at odds with government regulators and stockholders who demanded to know details about his ongoing health problems and his prognosis as the leader and alter ego of his company. It spurred a 2009 SEC probe into whether Apple's board had made misleading statements about his health.
Jobs' last public appearance as Apple's CEO was in June at the company's Worldwide Developers Conference, where Apple debuted its upcoming iOS 5 and iCloud efforts.
Shares of Apple's stock were down US$18.68, or about 5 percent, in after-hours trading.

Facebook takes privacy more seriously, offers more control to users

2011-08-24T02:20:00.001-07:00

Facebook has just announced new privacy measures that will give its users more control on everything related to them, right from pictures in which they are tagged to what others can see on your profile page to who can see posts shared by you. The move, which would be welcomed by users, can be seen as a response to Google+, which is being viewed as the biggest threat Facebook has witnessed so far. Hit the break to check out new privacy features on Facebook.
The first major change would enables users to control who can see what on their profile page. Users will be able to set controls for individual components like updates, albums, etc. with a simple drop-down menu. Earlier, one had to dig into the complicated Settings menu to figure these out. The same drop-down menu (public, friends, custom) is highly inspired by Google+, which offers the same settings. Users will also be able to edit their privacy setting on an update after posting it, just like they can do on Google+.
My favorite update, however, would be the ability to approve tagged photographs before they reflect on the user’s profile page. Plus users can choose to approve tags by friends in their photo album before they become visible. This would enable users who are not friends to tag anyone’s photos. While this could be handy, I can foresee a lot of spam. I won’t be surprised if Facebook revokes the latter part soon enough. And finally, users will no longer have to ‘Check In’ from Places and will be able to tag locations to virtually anything.
These are by far the biggest changes Facebook has implemented in one go and demonstrates how big a threat the world’s largest online social network considers Google+ to be. Considering Google+ is still in beta, expect a game of catch-up taking place on both networks. Eventually, it will be the users who will benefit.
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Is Facebook "required reading?"

2011-08-24T02:16:00.001-07:00

London: British youngsters are ditching Dickens, Shakespeare and Keats for Facebook and Twitter, with one in six failing to read a single book in a month, according to a survey.
The poll, which questioned 18,141 children aged eight to 17, also showed less than half of youngsters choose to read a book outside of class at least once a month. Instead, children's exposure to the written word arises mostly from sending messages via texting, emails, and social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter.
The poll was carried out for British charity the National Literacy Trust. "Getting these children reading and helping them to love reading is the way to turn their lives around and give them new opportunities and aspirations," said Trust Director Jonathan Douglas in a statement.

Older pupils were "considerably more likely" to say they have not read any book in the past month than their younger counterparts, the survey showed. The trends it highlighted could have significant consequences for the children as they enter adulthood.
"We are worried that they will grow up to be the 1 in 6 adults who struggle with literacy to the extent that they read to the level expected of an 11-year-old or below," Douglas said.
With indications that reading frequency has a direct link to attainment, fresh approaches are "urgently needed" to encourage young people to read more, the charity said. It described Secretary for Education Michael Gove's proposals that all pupils aged 11 should read 50 books a year as a "huge challenge" in the light of the findings.

Twitter adds photo gallery feature

2011-08-22T21:38:00.000-07:00

Twitter is rolling out a new feature that would enable users to see the 100 most recent images posted by any user. Images will appear on the right column and can be expanded to see all (the latest 100) of them. Twitter will support its own photo-sharing service apart from TwitPic, yFrog, Instagram and other image sharing services supported in Twitter’s details pane. Prior to this release, users had no way to access pictures posted on Twitter at one place and had to dig through individual Tweets to find them. This is a great move by Twitter and would take it a step closer to make it more user-friendly, especially when it not only has Facebook but even Google+ vying for consumer attention. We would love to see how Twitter takes this forward, especially by lifting the 100 photos limit and organizing photos into albums based on hashtags that accompany them in the original Tweet.
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Google Maps adds a weather layer

2011-08-19T23:34:00.001-07:00

A Google Maps screengrab shows weather data from across India.

Internet search giant Google is providing current weather information and cloud data from across the world on its Google Maps application, a move that will hopefully make travel and activity planning easier.

“We’re adding a weather layer on Google Maps that displays current temperatures and conditions around the globe,” Google User Experience Designer Jonah Jones said in a blog post on Thursday.

The company is providing this facility through an arrangement with weather.com and the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory.

The information about weather is visible through a widget in the upper right corner of Google Maps. Clicking on the weather icon for a particular city opens a window with data like current humidity and wind conditions, as well as a forecast for the next four days.

In addition, users can also click on the left-hand panel to change the units for measurement of wind speed and temperature and enable or disable the viewing of clouds when zoomed out from the map.

When Google+ gives Facebook a run for its money

2011-08-19T23:32:00.001-07:00

San Francisco: Facebook finally has a serious competitor. At least, that's what social-media investor Sergio Monsalve thinks.
Venture capitalists such as Monsalve see early signs that Google+, which has picked up more than 25 million users since launching in June, is headed down the right path.
Google Inc's infant social network, which counts Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg a member, has met scepticism so far. Some are waiting to see if it can maintain the rapid momentum of its first months.

Others see reason to be optimistic. Monsalve, who has invested in various consumer-Internet start-ups, is among a group of VCs who see promise.
If Larry Page's brainchild - which some say mimics better than Facebook the instinctive categorizing of friends that occurs in real life - fulfils its early promise, it will come at a pivotal moment for its bigger rival.
Facebook is widely expected to go public as early as 2011, barring further market ructions. The emergence of a serious challenger - when it now has none - will almost certainly give some investors pause, maybe even hurt its valuation.
"It's much richer, much more interesting pieces of content" compared to what he typically sees on Facebook, says Monsalve, who invested in recently-acquired MyYearbook.com and worked closely with MySpace in its heyday when he headed marketing at Photobucket.
The stakes are high. Facebook should pull in advertising revenue of $4.05 billion this year, according to eMarketer. Rival research house ComScore says its US users spend 434 minutes a month each on the site. It has 750 million users globally.
That makes each minute spent on Facebook today worth roughly about 10 cents, excluding revenue earned from peripheral sources such as third-party games or people buying Facebook credits.
And marketers are pouring more money into online advertising overall; eMarketer says Facebook's take should grow to $5.74 billion next year.
The question in the near future will be how much - if at all - Google+ cannibalizes time on Facebook.
"It's not like for every minute on Google+, you spend a minute less on Facebook," says Lou Kerner, an analyst at Wedbush who owns Facebook shares and likes various features in Google+, including that it is an open network with much of its information available to anybody. "You might even spend more" in a recommitment to social networking in general, he argues.
WHAT'S TO LIKE?
Just two months after its launch, the impact of Google+ on Facebook is hard to gauge. If a sense develops that Google+ keeps gaining serious momentum, that's when it could hit Facebook's valuation, venture capitalists say,
Signs are emerging that Facebook's valuation on the secondary market has peaked, although that may have less to do with Google+ than with the external environment. Interpublic Group of Cos Inc reportedly sold half its Facebook stake at a valuation around $10 billion to $12 billion lower than recent private-market transactions at around $80 billion.
Watch out, some say. Among the things venture capitalists like about the new service: the longer-term ability to integrate search - Google's core strength - into social streams, so for example, a favourite search result could be shared with the click of a button.
Also, the 5 per cent fee Google charges game developers for transactions on Google+ compared with Facebook's 30 per cent.
And circles, perhaps the most-discussed feature.
"For some time now I have been pitched on businesses that attempt to solve the groups problem: how do you share information efficiently with small groups of people," David Hornik, a partner at August Capital, told Reuters.
Users can assign their contacts to one or many circles - from family and work to hobby groups such as book clubs - and select which comments to share with specific circles.
"Google+ does a nice job of allowing more purposeful sharing," Hornik said. While Facebook also allows users to segment friends, it's a less straightforward process.
Hornik says it will take until the end of the year to see how strongly Google+ is catching on.
Others point to social-networking essentials such as group chat - on Google+, that includes video - and just last week, a roll-out of games.
Monsalve likes Google+'s "Sparks" feature, which lets him set up lists of topics that interest him, then see related articles or videos. His Sparks topics are heavy on his portfolio companies.
Facebook boasts 750 million members, but sheer numbers are no guarantee of eventual success. In late 2006, MySpace had three times Facebook's users - but Zuckerberg's invention had reached critical mass and was growing much faster than MySpace. The rest is Internet lore.
One key metric some VCs are looking for is how long it takes Google+ to reach 75 million users who spend significant amounts of time on the network - say 10-15 minutes a day. If that happens in the next couple of months, the service "starts to become pretty interesting," Monsalve told Reuters.
However, some say Google has already made a few missteps. Last week, Google+ banned the use of pseudonyms and nicknames on the service, which some investors say could limit its acceptance among the free-wheeling cyberspace crowd.
David Cowan, a partner at Bessemer Venture Partners whose investments include social-networking sites such as LinkedIn Corp, believes Google+ is missing an opportunity.
"Think about someone who is challenging her government, or his employer," he told Reuters. "People want to be social in contexts that do not and should not demand transparency of identity."
Others, such as Dave Whorton of Tugboat Ventures, believes competition from an unexpected source - perhaps even what he calls "sharing fatigue" - may prove more disruptive to Facebook than any rival social network.
With a proliferation of social media sites, including Twitter, Facebook, Linked In and Tumblr, many people might shy away from adding another social network to the mix. Those that do may have limited time to devote to it.
ComScore says social networking overall continues to grow strongly for now, with US users spending 385 minutes in July on such sites.
There is one wild card: with its acquisition of Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc, coupled with Android, Google may have landed an important weapon to help Google+ go mobile more deeply than Facebook.
"Ultimately, we move more and more toward mobile," Greg Gottesman, a partner at Madrona Venture Group, told Reuters.
He believes advances in social networking on phones could be key to winning over teenagers, which eventually is "where the battle will be won or lost."

Facebook blocks Google+ invite links

2011-08-17T21:32:00.000-07:00

This certainly does not bode well for Facebook. The world’s largest online social network is blocking Google+ invitation links its users are posting in their feed. The sneaky thing is it does not give an error message to the user posting the link – the post is visible on the user’s timeline but is not visible to the user’s friends. How about manning up Zuckerberg and playing fair? Hit the break for a video made by a Googler demonstrating Facebook’s new trick.

Samsung eyes acquisitions to boost software prowess

2011-08-17T21:11:00.001-07:00

Reuters is quoting local Korean media reports that claim Samsung’s Chairman Lee Kunhee has asked his top managers to seek measures including acquisitions to boost the company’s software prowess. The move comes as Samsung is embroiled in patent-related lawsuits with Apple and Google’s proposed acquisition of Motorola, which could affect Samsung’s position as the world’s largest Android smartphone vendor. Samsung is currently the second largest smartphone vendor. In our analysis of what Google’s acquisition of Motorola would mean for other OEMs, we had predicted that major OEMs like Samsung and HTC would take measures to boost their software capabilities.
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Yahoo! India launches 'Movieplex'

2011-08-16T21:38:00.001-07:00

Internet giant Yahoo! India today announced the launch of 'Movieplex' service, which will allow users to enjoy licensed full-length movies for free.
Yahoo! India will collaborate with movie production houses to bring thousands of local Bollywood movies online to users for a piracy-free, quality entertainment experience, the company said in a statement.
It will also offer advertisers an opportunity to connect with their target audiences through immersive video content, it added.
Movies currently available on Movieplex include Rock On, Rann, Dil to Baccha Hai Ji among others.
According to a ComScore report released in March this year, the Indian audience currently spends over 9.1 billion minutes watching online videos each month.
Entertainment is the leading category in online video content consumption, ahead of news and sports content.
"Over 30 million Internet users consume 1.7 billion videos every month across India. With the increasing demand for online video, both consumers and content providers are looking for a trusted destination where quality content can be consumed in a piracy-free environment at their leisure," Yahoo! India Managing Director Arun Tadanki said.

Google To Acquire Motorola Mobility For $12.5 Billion

2011-08-15T08:13:00.001-07:00

Google announced early Monday morning that it will acquire smartphone maker Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion in cash.
According to a Google press release, published in full at TechCrunch, "The acquisition of Motorola Mobility, a dedicated Android partner, will enable Google to supercharge the Android ecosystem and will enhance competition in mobile computing."
In a post on the Official Google Blog, Google CEO Larry Page offered a few more details about how this buy would affect the company's Android platform.
"This acquisition will not change our commitment to run Android as an open platform," wrote Page. "Motorola will remain a licensee of Android and Android will remain open. We will run Motorola as a separate business. Many hardware partners have contributed to Android’s success and we look forward to continuing to work with all of them to deliver outstanding user experiences."
Page also noted Motorola Mobility's role in Google's ongoing patent battles with smartphone rivals like Microsoft and Apple.
"Our acquisition of Motorola will increase competition by strengthening Google’s patent portfolio, which will enable us to better protect Android from anti-competitive threats from Microsoft, Apple and other companies," wrote Page.

Business Insider sees Google's mega-deal putting pressure on Microsoft's smartphone business: "Other handset makers, like RIMM and Nokia are both up pre-market on the news as the focus obviously turns to Microsoft: Is it now forced to buy one of them? Or does Microsoft benefit because the remaining handset makers (Samsung, etc.) now turn more towards Windows?"
In January 2011, Motorola announced that it would split into two companies: Motorola Solutions, which would manufacture tech products aimed at businesses; and Motorola Mobility, which would focus solely on consumer technology.

Tech Companies Family Tree. Links between company founders and acquisitions

2011-08-15T07:38:00.001-07:00

via mashable.com

Google+ social network adds games

2011-08-12T23:29:00.001-07:00

Google+ social network adds games
Google+ added games, including the hugely popular Angry Birds, to the fast-growing social network vying with Facebook to be the hub for people's online lives.
"We want to make playing games online just as fun, and just as meaningful, as playing in real life," Google senior vice president of engineering Vic Gundotra said in a blog post.
"When you're ready to play, the Games page is waiting."
Along with global game sensation Angry Birds, the initial array of offerings available at Google+ included Bejeweled Blitz, Zynga Poker, and Dragon Age Legends.
A standalone version of Crime City lets Google+ members play as a ruthless crime boss.
"We're excited to partner with Google to bring Crime City to Google+ users," said Ken Chiu, chief executive of Funzio. "We can't wait to release more great games on Google+ in the future."
A Facebook version of Crime City leapt to popularity after being released in September of last year.
Just hours after Google+ added games, Facebook touted a set of new features for playing online with friends.
"When you're playing games, you'll now see a separate stream of your friends' game activity, scores and achievements in a ticker," Facebook's Jared Morgenstern said in a post late Thursday at the social network's blog.
"The best way to find new games is through friends, and now you'll have more opportunities to see what they're playing," he continued.
Facebook increased the screen size of games, and made it easier to bookmark favorite titles or adjust settings regarding which friends can see what is being played, according to Morgenstern.
Google is a latecomer to social networking but its new site, Google+, has grown rapidly to more than 10 million members since its launch on June 28.
While Google+ may be the fastest-growing social network ever, it remains to be seen whether it can pose a serious threat to the social networking titan Facebook, which has more than 750 million members.
Google has a billion users worldwide that could be drawn into the California-based Internet giant's social network.
Games are among the most popular activities at Facebook, where social game startup Zynga rose to stardom.
Most Google+ users -- 6.4 million -- are in the United States, followed by India, with 3.6 million, Canada, with 1.1 million, Britain, with 1.1 million, and Germany with over 920,000, according to online tracker comScore.
In unveiling Google+, Google stressed the ability it gives users to separate online friends and family into different "Circles," or networks, and to share information only with members of a particular circle.
One of the criticisms of Facebook is that updates are shared with all of one's friends unless a user has gone through a relatively complicated process to create separate Facebook Groups.

Google buys more than 1,000 IBM patents

2011-08-09T21:54:00.001-07:00

New York: Google, which last month failed to grab a huge portfolio of Nortel patents, has bought more than 1,000 patents from IBM. The new purchase boosts Google's intellectual property portfolio which currently has just 700 patents.

The loss of Nortel patents was a big blow to Google as the search engine was willing to pay any price to beef up its bank of patents - which is the smallest among major wireless players. Since Nortel-patented technology is also used in Google Android smart phones, the Apple-led consortium have not only got the rights to license this technology to secure royalties but also gain market influence vis-a-vis Google in the multi-trillion-dollar technology field.
As Google is involved in more than 45 patent lawsuits - the biggest against any major player - it is consolidating its patent bank to avoid future litigations. Google has refused to confirm the price it has paid for IBM patents. "Like many tech companies, at times we'll acquire patents that are relevant to our business needs. Bad software patent litigation is a wasteful war that no one will win," a Google spokesperson was quoted as saying by the LA Times Friday. Google' popular Android smart phone operating system is the target of legal challenges. Oracle is seeking billions in damages from Google claiming that Android infringes its Java patents. Facing so many patent-related lawsuits, Google has urged the US Federal Trade Commission to curb this practice.

"Like many tech companies, at times we'll acquire patents that are relevant to our business needs. Bad software patent litigation is a wasteful war that no one will win," the Google spokesperson was quoted a saying.

BlackBerry helped spread riots in London

2011-08-09T21:42:00.001-07:00

There were calls on Tuesday to shut down the BlackBerry Messenger service, which is thought to have helped mobilise looters in the riots, a media report said.
Mike Butcher, a technology journalist and adviser to London Mayor Boris Johnson, said it was ‘unbelievable’ that the BBM service had not been disabled.
Messages on the service, along with posts on Twitter, helped spread the locations of riots like wildfire and brought hordes of teenagers together to attack neighbourhoods throughout the weekend, Daily Mail reported.
Butcher described the BBM service as ‘text messaging with steroids’. Blackberry, however, denied reports it had planned to disable the service.
"Mobile phones have become weaponised in their capability of spreading information about where to target next.
"There is evidence that BBM is an encrypted, very secure, safe, fast, cheap, easy way for disaffected urban youths to spread messages for their next target," the Mail quoted him as saying in the BBC Today programme on Tuesday.
"It's like text messaging with steroids, you can send messages to hundreds of people and once it's gone from your phone it cannot be traced back to you," he said.
BlackBerry UK said it will help the authorities with their investigation.
Young looters were accused of an opportunistic 'Supermarket Sweep' motivated by nothing other than greed. Dozens were filmed as they disappeared into the night with their arms laden with plasma TVs, laptops and sports clothes.
Many of those involved were rallied by calls spread through mobile phone messages and social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook.
Claims that rampant lawlessness was motivated by the death of Mark Duggan at the hands of police was quickly exposed as a lie, Mail said. Some of those involved in attacks on stores were barely old enough to be arrested.
Deputy Assistant Commissioner Steve Kavanagh said those caught using Twitter, BlackBerry messaging and other sites to stir up violence could be prosecuted.
The BlackBerry smartphones offers a text message-style service, which is instant, free and private where users can exchange updates with individuals or large groups.
Several countries, including the UAE and India, have complained that BlackBerry messages are too secure and may be used by terrorists.

'Spam King' broke into 5,00000 Facebook accounts

2011-08-08T22:58:00.000-07:00

Accounts of about 5,00000 Facebook users were compromised between November 2008 and March 2009, leading to more than 27 million spam messages being sent
WASHINGTON: Sanford Wallace, known as the "Spam King," has turned himself in to US authorities after he was indicted for masterminding a scheme that sent more than 27 million unsolicited junk messages through Facebook's servers.

The Las Vegas man surrendered to FBI agents to face 11 counts of fraud, intentional damage to a protected computer and criminal contempt for violating previous orders to stay off the social networking sites Facebook and MySpace, prosecutors in San Jose, California said.

Wallace, 43, developed a program that evaded Facebook's spam filters and posted messages encouraging account holders to visit a website, purportedly from a friend, according to the indictment unsealed last week.

Instead, unsuspecting users were prompted to enter their email addresses and passwords and then were redirected to an affiliate website that earned Wallace "substantial revenue" for directing the traffic, the indictment said.

Wallace's program scooped up their information, including their lists of friends, and sent spam messages to them.

Accounts of about 500,000 Facebook users were compromised between November 2008 and March 2009, leading to more than 27 million spam messages being sent, federal prosecutors said.

Facebook previously sued Wallace in 2009 and a federal judge had ordered him not to access Facebook's computer network. But he repeatedly violated that order earlier this year, the prosecutors said.
In that civil lawsuit, the judge awarded Facebook some $711 million, although the company said it did not expect to receive much of that amount. Facebook welcomed the new indictment.

"We will continue to pursue and support both civil and criminal consequences for spammers and others who attempt to harm Facebook or the people who use our service," Chris Sonderby, a lawyer for the company, said in a statement.

Wallace made an initial appearance in federal court and was released on a $100,000 unsecured bond. He pleaded not guilty. He was again ordered not to access MySpace or Facebook.
"Mr. Wallace looks forward to defending himself," said his lawyer K C Maxwell.

If Wallace is convicted, the six fraud counts are subject to a maximum three-year prison term. The three counts of damage to a protected computer carry a maximum sentence of up to 10 years. The two criminal contempt counts are subject to penalties determined by the court.

The case is USA v Sanford Wallace, No. 11-cr-456, in US District Court for the Northern District of California (San Jose).

Oracle, other companies 'punkd' in hacking contest

2011-08-08T22:45:00.001-07:00

Oracle, other companies 'punkd' in hacking contest
A weekend contest at the world's largest hacking convention in Las Vegas showed one reason why big corporations seem to be such easy prey for cyber criminals: their workers are poorly trained in security.
Amid a spate of high-profile cyber assaults on targets ranging from Sony Corp to the International Monetary Fund, one would think that many companies would be paying special attention to security these days.
But hackers taking part in the competition on Friday and Saturday found it ridiculously easy in some cases to trick employees at some of the largest U.S. companies to reveal information that can be used in planning cyber attacks against them.
The contestants also managed to get employees to use their corporate computers to browse websites the hackers suggested. Had these been criminal hackers, the websites could have loaded malicious software onto the PCs.
In one case, a contestant pretended to work for a company's IT department and persuaded an employee to give him information on the configuration of her PC, data that could help a hacker decide what type of malware would work best in an attack.
"For me it was a scary call because she was so willing to comply," said Chris Hadnagy, one of the organizers of the contest at the Defcon conference in Las Vegas.
"A lot of this could facilitate serious attacks if used by the right people," Hadnagy said.
Defcon is organized by benevolent hackers, partly to promote research on security vulnerabilities in order to pressure companies to fix them. The contest was sponsored by so-called white-hat hackers to show companies how weak their security is and encourage them to better educate their employees about the risks of hacking.
The company whose employees handed over the most data was Oracle Corp, according to Hadnagy. One of the world's largest software makers, Oracle got its start more than 30 years ago by selling secure databases to the Central Intelligence Agency.
Oracle spokeswoman Deborah Hellinger declined comment.
Other targets included Apple Inc, AT&T Inc, ConAgra Foods Inc, Delta Air Lines Inc, Symantec Corp, Sysco Corp, United Continental Holdings Inc's United Airlines and Verizon Communications Inc.
It was the second year that Defcon held a contest in "social engineering," or the practice where hackers con people into handing over information or taking actions such as downloading malicious software.
Social engineering is frequently used in attacks where the hackers send a "spear phishing" e-mail in which they impersonate a friend of the recipient and ask him or her to open a tainted file or visit a malicious website.
Security experts say spear phishing have led to many hacks over the past year, including ones on U.S. defense contractors, the IMF, EMC Corp's RSA Security division and government agencies around the world.
"It's better whenever you can get data non-confrontationally," said Johnny Long, a consultant who companies hire to hack into their data networks, using tools such as social engineering, to identify weaknesses.
The contestants were charged with obtaining specific information from their targets, including information about how the company backs up and secures its data, wireless network use, and the names of companies that provide on-site security, toner and copier paper.

Data storage 101 [infographic]

2011-08-05T21:05:00.001-07:00

Via Rackspace.

First smut site erected on .xxx address

2011-08-04T08:29:00.000-07:00

Finally, somewhere safe to w*nk

By Kevin Murphy

The first porn site to use a .xxx web address has gone live, and domain manager ICM Registry has announced another way to make internet perving a "safer" experience.
Casting.xxx (NSFW, incredibly) started doing its bit to feed the world's appetite for "adult entertainment" last night.
While ICM has had a corporate site online at about.xxx for a few months, casting.xxx is the first actual porn site to use a .xxx domain name.
The domain is registered to a company called Really Useful, based in the Turks and Caicos Islands. According to ICM, it has been given several .xxx addresses under its so-called Founders Program.
This program is a pre-launch marketing initiative aimed at drumming up interest in the new extension, which has attracted a great deal of criticism from the porn industry in the last few years.
Roughly 1,500 .xxx domains have been allocated to 35 porn companies, and many could go live ahead of the extension's official general launch, which is scheduled for early December.
"It's actually a perfect example of a Founders site," ICM president Stuart Lawley said of casting.xxx. "It's a generic name... but with a special niche in the .xxx world."
The company also recently announced the second of three initiatives aimed at building up the .xxx brand as a "safe" place to get your jollies – or not – on the web.
ICM has inked a multimillion dollar deal with San Francisco upstart MetaCert, a web-content classification service, to give surfers blocking options if they don't want to stumble onto porn.
MetaCert makes a free browser plug-in that can block sites and insert mouseover warnings into search engine results, based on its hosted database of known porn sites.
Under its deal with ICM, every .xxx site will be automatically labelled as adults-only in this database.
MetaCert chief executive Paul Walsh said the system uses the W3C labelling standard POWDER, which replaced PICS, an earlier standard which Walsh said is "completely broken".
The company, which is chaired by Salesforce.com chief scientist JP Rangaswami, plans to make money in part by selling privacy policy certificates to site owners inside and outside the porn business for half the price of TRUSTe, Walsh said.
The announcement follows a deal ICM inked with Intel-owned McAfee in June, under which all .xxx websites are automatically scanned daily for malware and other threats.
ICM has come in for a lot of criticism for the high price of .xxx domains – at least $75 a year at the checkout – and hopes its range of free extra services may make the cost seem less extortionate.
This is unlikely to persuade ICM's main opponent, the California porn trade group Free Speech Coalition, of the extension's value, however. The FSC has called for a boycott of .xxx domains, using the slogan ".XXX is bullshit!".
Larry Flynt's Hustler publishing empire has also reportedly written to ICM demanding that it take action to specifically protect Hustler's trademarks in the .xxx space, accusing the company of a "shakedown".

Death haunts government petitions site

2011-08-04T07:59:00.001-07:00

Bring me the head of the sysadmin
By John Oates
The Coalition government's epetitions site has limped online this lunchtime but is struggling to stay up.
The site was down this morning, despite a message promising its imminent availability. A spinner at Ten Downing Street promised to get back to us.
In the mean time, a bit of repeated clicking reveals over 40 petitions in favour of the death penalty – but only two have more than one vote each and even they can only claim four supporters.
This is likely to change once the site is fixed, and Daily Mail readers get involved.
The paper's front page this morning predicted restoring the death penalty would be the first issue debated by Parliament – the Coalition has promised to debate any issue which secures more than 100,000 votes.
Guido Fawkes, and other bloggers, have been pre-collecting support on the issue. Why a libertarian, small government blogger supports the right of the government to kill people is beyond the scope of this piece.
There is no doubt that Parliament exists to represent the British public.
But government by Wiki will be difficult if the bar is set so low.
It would be a weak argument that could not find 100,000 people online willing to click a link and tick box on a website in its support.
Parliament will need to set aside a lot of time to debate every petition in favour of bringing back Roobard and Custard along with slightly weightier matters such as leaving the European Union or investigating Prince Phillip's role in the 9/11 attacks.
But before getting too excited at the thought of restoring public executions to Oxford Street, we should probably remember Clegg's previous loon-magnet sites yourfreedom.gov.uk and the Treasury's Spending Review site.
Both collected thousands of responses, many about Raoul Moat, and both were widely ignored by Whitehall before being shut.
The site is here, but don't all go there at once.
A Direct Gov spokesman said:“We apologise for any inconvenience experienced as people try to access ePetitions – this is a result of greater then expected demand.
“We are getting 1000 unique visits a minute – this is equivalent to nearly 1.5 million visits a day and is far more then the old ePetitions site on Number 10 ever received.
”The main Directgov site is unaffected and running normally.”
We've asked why this happens every, single time the government launches a website and why they can't use load balancing. We'll update the story should they reply. ®

Qualcomm renames its Snapdragon chip family

2011-08-04T07:55:00.000-07:00

Qualcomm has renamed its Snapdragon family of processors and the various chips will be called S1, S2, S3 and S4. Nope, it has not done away with confusing names like MSM8660 or the APQ8060 but has instead classified them under groups according to features they offer. This, Qualcomm hopes and we agree, will make it easy for both consumers and OEMs to understand/market features of their devices rather than having to comb through troves of documents to understand whether it has a single-core or multi-core processor or whether it can shoot videos in HD resolution or not. From this day forth, S1 will be used to indicate a sub-1GHz processor, S2 for single-core processors up to 1.4GHz and S3 for dual-core processors up to 1.5GHz each. Qualcomm will keep adding new families as its processors evolve. Hit the break for an infographic about these Qualcomm processors and what they precisely offer.
The Qualcomm S1 processor – found in the HTC Wildfire, meant for mass market phones/smartphones, boasts CPU speeds of up to 1Ghz, also offers 3G modem, an Adreno 200 GPU for casual gaming and also allows you to download and watch movies.
The Qualcomm S2 processor – typically built for high performance smartphones and tablets, offers processor speeds of up to 1.4GHz, a 205 Adreno GPU for rich gaming experience, a 3G HSPA+ modem and also streams movies in 720p HD.
The Qualcomm S3 processor – incorporated in the HTC EVO 3D smartphone and the HP TouchPad, designed for multi-tasking and advanced gaming, offers dual-core processors with speeds up to 1.5GHz per core, Adreno 220 GPU for console quality gaming, gives you HDMI out to watch HD movies on TV with 5.1 Dolby surround sound, capable of capturing and sharing pictures/videos in 3D and also streams movies in 1080p HD.
The Qualcomm S4 processor – will be incorporated in the upcoming Windows 8 devices, will feature a new CPU architecture with integrated 3G/LTE multimode, will also decrease power consumption by 65 per cent and boost performance by 150 per cent and should give you graphics experience comparable to current gaming consoles present in the market.

India has the highest percentage of Gmail users in the world: comScore

2011-08-02T23:35:00.001-07:00

Google+ has registered the highest number of visitors in the U.S (5.3 million) surpassing India (2.8 million visitors), however, the same cannot be said in case of Gmail’s market penetration in the States.

According to comScore report, India has the highest number of Gmail users in the world. Gmail’s market share in India is 62 per cent almost twice the figure of U.S with a market share of 29 per cent.

Brazil has the second highest number of Gmail loyalists and its market penetration stands at 41 per cent.

The report has also stated that the Gmail usage across the world has increased substantially by 32 per cent in the last year.

Read

Google adds call phones from Gmail to 150 countries, call any phone in India at $0.02/min

2011-08-02T23:34:00.001-07:00

Google has rolled out its call from Gmail feature to 150 more countries in 38 languages. The feature is rolling out as you read and soon users will be able to make calls to any phone in India for $0.02/minute (roughly Re 1/minute) and to US and Canada at $0.01/minute from anywhere in the world. The rates are cheaper than what one would pay on Skype Out and there is no connection fee, either. Users will only have to pay VAT applicable in their region while buying calling credit from Google Checkout. You can check out calling rates to different countries here. Hit the jump below for a video of Gmail Call.

Microsoft launches Windows Phone 7 Marketplace in India, 18 other countries

2011-08-02T23:33:00.000-07:00

Microsoft has added India and 18 other countries where consumers will be able to purchase apps from their Windows Phone 7 smartphones. Ironic as it may sound, Microsoft is yet to officially launch Windows Phone 7 in India! Until now, users had to register for Marketplace by indicating they lived in the US and were unable to buy apps unless they had a credit card issued by an American bank. Microsoft is gearing up to launch new devices running Windows Phone Mango update and is hinting at a much wider launch strategy, unlike what it has done so far. Things can only get better with Nokia launching its Windows Phone powered smartphone later this year. Hit the jump for the list of countries where Marketplace has been launched.

Brazil
Chile
Colombia
Czech Republic
Denmark
Finland
Greece
Hungary
India
Japan
Netherlands
Norway
Poland
Portugal
Russia
South Africa
South Korea
Sweden
Taiwan

Read

Beware, Android spy trojan on prowl

2011-08-02T07:31:00.001-07:00

A recent study found a 400% increase in Android malware since 2010

NEW DELHI: Android users beware, there's a new trojan on prowl that is reportedly capable of recording your conversation.

According to CA, the trojan records conversation after a user clicks the install button on a message that looks almost identical to the application's installation screen.

In a blog, CA researcher Dinesh Venkatesan has displayed screenshot of a message that seeks permission to record conversation.
Venkatesan writes that malware drops a 'configuration' file that contains information about the remote server and the parameters. He further states, "As the conversation goes on, the Trojan stores the recorded call in the devices' SD card."

Recently, some Android phone users were infected with a malware that sent text messages, made calls to premium numbers and leaked personal information about the user.

In a study, Juniper Networks found a 400 percent increase in Android malware since 2010. The report also warns users of targeted Wi-Fi attacks.

Apple iCloud beta screenshot walkthrough

2011-08-02T04:05:00.001-07:00

Apple flipped the switch on iCloud a few minutes ago and luckily, I was able to login without a developer account. Of course, iCloud does not make much sense without having iOS 5 beta running on your iPhone but thankfully I am on iOS 5 beta thanks to a developer friend. Anyway, coming back to iCloud, Apple has included a mail client (though at the moment it asks users to create a free @me.com account) and it syncs contacts and calendars too. The Find My iPhone app currently asks users to go to their mobileme web page but I think that will be fixed before iCloud is commercially released. It also syncs any iWorks files (documents, spreadsheets or presentations). Backup on iCloud from iPhone has also been turned on for iOS 5 beta users. While I back up my iPhone and report on any new findings, check out our gallery of screenshots from iCloud beta.

How hackers hijack your Facebook photos

2011-08-01T04:17:00.001-07:00

The scientist created a botnet called Stegobot to show how easy it would be for a crook to hijack Facebook photos

LONDON: Beware of uploading your pictures on Facebook -- as an Indian origin computer scientist has warned that by doing this you could be helping someone to steal information from your computer.

The scientist created a botnet called Stegobot to show how easy it would be for a crook to hijack Facebook photos to create a secret communication channel that is very difficult to detect.

Like most botnets, Stegobot gains control of computers by tricking users into opening infected email attachments or visiting suspect websites. But rather than contacting the botmasters directly, it piggybacks on the infected user's normal social network activity.

"If one of your friends is a friend of a friend of the botmaster, the information transfers hop by hop within the social network, finally reaching the botmasters," New Scientist quoted Amir Houmansadr, a computer scientist at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign who worked on the botnet, as saying.

Stegobot takes advantage of a technique called steganography to hide information in picture files without changing their appearance.

The botnet inserts this information into any photo you upload to Facebook, and then waits for one of your friends to look at your profile. They don't even have to click on the photo, as Facebook helpfully downloads files in the background. If your friend is also infected with the botnet than any photo they upload will also pass on the stolen data.

From there, the data will eventually make its way to the account of someone who is also friends with the botmaster, allowing them to extract details on your identity. The botmasters can also send commands to the botnet through the reverse process - uploading a photo with hidden instructions that make their way to infected computers.

"It's scary because it's virtually undetectable," said Shishir Nagaraja of the Indraprastha Institute of Information Technology, New Delhi, India, who led the project.

No sexy girls please, China tells online game fair

2011-07-29T05:34:00.001-07:00

Shanghai: Hemlines are a little longer at this year's annual online gaming fair in Shanghai, as companies take to heart a government directive against "vulgarity," a Chinese newspaper reported on Friday.
The ChinaJoy Expo, an annual online game showcase, is well-known for its "spicy girls" who dress up in hot pants and bras to dance and pose at company booths.
But a recent government crackdown on "vulgarity" in the online games sector is forcing the girls to cover up, the Shanghai Daily said.

Reuters
"The length of my dress is longer than before," said Zhou, a model who has been a ChinaJoy showgirl twice.
The new policy prohibits costumes that show more than two-thirds of a showgirl's back and bans the girls from sticking printed logos on "sensitive positions" like over their breasts, the paper reported.
Some online games companies feared the change would lessen the attractiveness of the expo given that the girls are as much a draw for men as are the games on display, reported the paper.
"To be honest, I came here largely for spicy girls," said Xaiver Du, a college student and online gaming fan.
"I'm satisfied with the female models for this year's ChinaJoy ... I care more about them rather than only sexy clothing," Du said.
The government frequently launches campaigns against what it sees as obscene and base behavior -- including once banning "sexually provocative sounds" on television -- but to little apparent effect.
Scantily-clad women promoting drinks are a feature of many bars in cosmopolitan Shanghai and capital city Beijing, and pornography is widely available online and on pirated DVDs.

Apple is richer than US govt

2011-07-29T05:27:00.001-07:00

Apple is the second largest company on the planet after American oil giant Exxon Mobil

NEW YORK: As of today, Apple boss Steve Jobs is richer than Uncle Sam.

While the world's most powerful government has just $73.76 billion in its reserves, the world's top technology company has a neat cash pile of $75.87 billion.

The US Treasury Department warned that it has now only this much operating budget as Republicans and Democrats fight over raising the nation's debt ceiling. With only that much reserve at its disposal, the Obama White House has warned the Republicans that the US government won't be able to meet its obligations as of Aug 2.

Facing a government default, Obama can definitely turn to Steve Jobs to give him a very brief breathing space. The failure by the Republicans and Democrats to come to a compromise to raise the current $14.3 trillion debt ceiling by Aug 2 could lead to a hike in interest rates. The already battered dollar may also plunge further.

With its market capitalisation of $363.25 billion, Apple is the second largest company on the planet after American oil giant Exxon Mobil. The Cupertino-based Apple started rising suddenly in 2007 when it entered the smartphone market with the launch of its first version of the iPhone.

Within three years, Apple went on to overhaul BlackBerry company Research In Motion (RIM) which invented the smartphone and dominated the market. But its fortunes skyrocketed last year with the launch of the iPad tablet which has sold in millions. In fact, the iPhone and the iPad have made Apple the czar of mobile computing technology as rivals play up catch-up.

The stock of the company, which doesn't pay dividends, has now touched $400. After Apple, another non-financial company sitting on a huge cash reserve is Microsoft whose own pile is about $40 billion.

Skyfire unveils VideoQ app for Flash videos on iPhone

2011-07-28T22:41:00.001-07:00

Helsinki: Private-equity backed video technology firm Skyfire, best known for its mobile browser, has unveiled an application for watching Flash videos on Apple's iPhones.
Apple has been a strong opponent of Adobe's Flash technology, criticizing its power management, among other things, and it has embraced a newer set of tools for building web applications known as HTML 5.
Many Internet pages running applications using Flash technology have had to create special versions for Apple devices.

Skyfire

Users of Skyfire's new VideoQ application can send links to videos from their browsers to watch them in the app, which Skyfire hopes to build into a video entertainment hub.
VideoQ will at first be available in North America only, but Skyfire plans to expand its reach later.
California-based Skyfire, whose investors include Lightspeed Venture Partners, Matrix Partners and Trinity Ventures, said its mobile browser has been downloaded 8 million times so far.

Cityville goes mobile

2011-07-28T22:39:00.001-07:00

Zynga recently launched Cityville Hometown, an attempt to bring the much-loved Cityville from Facebook to mobile platforms.
It is true the game is a scaled down version of the original, but it can still hold its own and looks just as great.
As the name may suggest, Cityville Hometown is about building a small community rather than a huge bustling city. There is an increased emphasis on all the individual residents of your little town. Players can pick and choose their residents and give them names and jobs.
Meanwhile, the core gameplay still revolves around collecting rent, building houses and shops and so on.
Much like all of Zyngas other games, the social aspect of Cityville Hometown cannot be overlooked. Players can add friends via Facebook connect and tour their neighbour’s towns once a day. Unlike its predecessor Hometown does not allow players to help out neighbours with crops etc.
Cityville Hometown is fun to play; a casual game you can drop in and out of at any time.
Of course there is also the option of using premium (paid) game currency to speed things up for those who don’t like to wait. The best thing about Cityville Hometown is that it’s free and there isn’t really anything you can complain about.

'Facebook for business' debuts

2011-07-28T02:37:00.000-07:00

Facebook has debuted a step-by-step online guide aimed at helping small businesses use the social networking site.

CALIFORNIA: Facebook has debuted a step-by-step online guide aimed at helping small businesses use the social networking site.

The company is billing the new webpage, found at Facebook.com/business, as an "online education centre" that gives directions on such things as how to set up a profile page, create targeted ads and deals, and interact with customer feedback online.

The timing is interesting, as it comes just a week afterGoogle began shutting off all company profiles on its Google + social network. The search engine giant says it's just company policy to restrict Google+ access to individual users, a stance that has inspired a good deal of controversy in recent days.
Facebook's new business webpage does not come along with any new features, it simply puts a lot of information that may be handy for small businesses in one place. Perhaps most importantly, it serves as a nicely timed reminder that unlike Google+, Facebook encourages companies to use its service for company branding.

"Facebook allows small businesses to create rich social experiences, build lasting relationships and amplify the most powerful type of marketing, word of mouth," a Facebook spokesperson wrote in an email. "We created Facebook.com/business to make it even easier for people to reach these objectives and grow."

This represents the second time in a month that Facebook has followed Google+ news with its own feature launch. Earlier in July, Facebook announced a partnership withSkype to bring video chat features within the social networking site, just one week after Google+ made waves with its own in-app video chat feature called Hangouts.

The timing of these events could certainly be coincidental, but it does look like Facebook is taking Google's recent entry into the social networking landscape seriously, and is increasing its feature updates and user satisfaction initiatives in turn. The new competition may be stressful for Zuckerberg and company, but ultimately it's great for consumers if both Google and Facebook continue to bring their A-games.

FB's new trick
The new webpage, found at Facebook.com/business, gives directions on how to set up a profile page, create targeted ads and deals, and interact with customer feedback online. The timing is interesting, as it comes just a week after Google began shutting off all company profiles on Google+. This represents the second time in a month that Facebook has followed Google+ news with its own feature launch.

We've arrested LulzSec spokesman: Scotland Yard

2011-07-28T00:05:00.001-07:00

London: Scotland Yard's cybercrime unit has arrested a teenager it suspects of working as the spokesman for the Lulz Security hacking collective, officials said Wednesday.
The Metropolitan Police's Central e-Crime Unit arrested a 18-year-old at an address in Scotland's remote Shetland Islands, the force said in a statement. His name wasn't released, but police said he was believed to be "Topiary," one of LulzSec's most prominent members.
Police originally gave his age as 19 but later issued a correction.

Lulz Security

LulzSec shot to prominence in May with attacks on the US Public Broadcasting Service - whose website it defaced by posting a bogus story claiming that the late rapper Tupac Shakur had been discovered alive in New Zealand.
The group is a spin-off of Anonymous, an amorphous collection of Internet enthusiasts, pranksters and activists whose targets have included the Church of Scientology, the music industry, and financial companies including Visa and MasterCard.
Topiary was linked to both groups, serving as the on-again, off-again media liaison for the publicity-hungry hackers.
In his only known television interview, on the "David Pakman Show" earlier this year, Topiary phoned in via Skype to feud with Shirley Phelps-Roper of the Westboro Baptist Church, a Kansas-based group notorious for picketing the funerals of slain American soldiers.
Anonymous vandalised the church's website live over the course of the interview.
In conversations with The Associated Press, Topiary said he controlled LulzSec's Twitter feed, which garnered some 300,000 followers over the course of its six-week-long Internet rampage.
LulzSec has claimed responsibility for breaches at pornography websites, gaming companies, and law enforcement organisations. It's also claimed credit for harassing seemingly random targets including an obscure New Jersey-based magnet manufacturer.
One its most spectacular hacks was against Sony Pictures Entertainment. The group posted the usernames, passwords, email addresses and phone numbers of tens of thousands of people, many of whom had given Sony their information for sweepstakes draws. Another stinging series of breaches last month targeted Arizona's police force in protest against its contentious immigration law. Officers had to scramble to change their numbers because their phones were being jammed with calls.
Shortly thereafter the group abruptly announced it was disbanding, although Topiary said at the time that the group wasn't bowing to police pressure.
"We're not quitting because we're afraid of law enforcement," he said in a Skype call. "The press are getting bored of us, and we're getting bored of us."
Attempts to reach Topiary since then have been unsuccessful, although his group recently re-emerged from retirement, defacing The Sun newspaper's website with a fake story claiming that media tycoon Rupert Murdoch had died. In one of its last messages, LulzSec said it was working with unnamed media outlets on a WikiLeaks-style release of emails it claimed to have stolen from the tabloid.
Topiary's once-plentiful Twitter feed was practically wiped clean Wednesday. The only remaining post, from nearly a week ago, read: "You cannot arrest an idea."
The latest arrest is one of an increasing number claimed by law enforcement in Britain and the United States in connection to their investigations into Anonymous and its offshoots. Last week, the FBI, British and Dutch officials carried out 21 arrests, many of them related to the group's attacks on Internet payment provider PayPal Inc., which has been targeted over its refusal to process donations to WikiLeaks.
Last month another 19-year-old, Ryan Cleary, was charged with attacks on Britain's Serious Organized Crime Agency and various UK-based music sites. Although at least one of the attacks he was charged with seemed linked to LulzSec, Topiary claimed at the time that Cleary was at most only tangentially involved with the group.
Scotland Yard said Wednesday it was also searching a residential address in Lincolnshire, in central England, and interviewing an unnamed 17-year-old in connection with the investigation. The second teen has not been arrested.

Google: Patent war is assured destruction

2011-07-26T05:42:00.000-07:00

Google is seeking to buy patents that would put it on a level plane with its rivals

WASHINGTON: Google Inc General Counsel Kent Walker said the smartphone industry is using patents in an arms race that hurts consumers, leaving the company trying to "sort through the mess" of litigation.

"It's hard to find what's the best path -- there's so much litigation," Walker said in an interview. "We're exploring a variety of different things."

Google is seeking to buy patents that would put it on a level plane with its rivals, and the company will continue to push to have the US Patent and Trademark Office take a closer look at issued patents that are being used in litigation, Walker said. Congress and the Federal Trade Commission also need to do more to rein in software patents and lawsuits, he said.

"The tech industry has a significant problem," Walker said. "Software patents are kind of gumming up the works of innovation."

Google, which had $39.1 billion in cash and short-term investments as of June, put in an initial $900 million offer to buy the patents of bankrupt phone-equipment maker Nortel Networks Corp. It was outbid by a group that includes Apple Inc, Microsoft Corp and Research In Motion Ltd, which all make devices that compete with phones running Google's Android operating system.

More discipline?

Walker declined to say whether Mountain View, California-based Google will bid on InterDigital Inc, the digital-imaging patents of Eastman Kodak Co or any other specific portfolio. He said it's unclear if the $4.5 billion winning bid for the Nortel patents is a sign that other sales will be equally large.

"We want to be disciplined about how we approach all this stuff," Walker said. "We're looking for a reasonable alternative, but we want to make sure Google and the companies Google partners with aren't shut out of the opportunity to bring great new products and features to consumers."

Google's Android software is now the most widely used mobile operating system, with 38.9 per cent of the worldwide smartphone market, compared with 18.2 per cent for Apple's iPhone, according to research firm IDC.

Apple has patent cases against Samsung Electronics Co, HTC Corp and Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc over their Android-based phones, and each of them has filed patent suits against Apple. Microsoft and Motorola Mobility also have filed patent suits against each other, and the Redmond, Washington-based software maker has a pending complaint against Barnes & Noble Inc over the Nook reader.

'Mutually assured destruction'

The cases have been filed with the US International Trade Commission, which has the power to block imports of products found to infringe US patents.

"Each side can blow the other up on some level --everybody can block the other's products from coming to market," Walker said. "You create this mutually assured destruction scenario, but it's very expensive to get all those munitions."

Google has been hesitant to use patents to file suits against other companies, he said. "Buying patents so you can hit the other guy, it's not good form," Walker said. "You hate to unilaterally disarm here, but we haven't in our history."

The company is providing support and technical help to companies that make products for the Android operating system and are being sued, either by rival companies such as Apple and Microsoft, or by small patent owners that don't make products.

"We'll be fine," Walker said. "We have the resources to balance the scales here."

LinkedIn tightens ties between jobseekers, employers

2011-07-26T03:14:00.001-07:00

San Francisco: Professional social network LinkedIn took the wraps off a tool that allows jobseekers to apply for open positions by sending their LinkedIn profiles directly to prospective employers.
The feature is launching as LinkedIn tries to keep its service ahead of the curve amid competition from new networks such as Google's Google+, which allows users to segregate contacts into a professional category.
The feature, known as Apply With LinkedIn, allows employers to add a button to online job listings so applicants can click on it and send their information directly to the company. Applicants have an opportunity to personalize the information with a cover letter.

For the employer, "it enables them to prioritize better," said Deep Nishar, senior vice president of products and user experience at LinkedIn.
To some extent, the new service streamlines a process that already takes place, Nishar said. For example, prospective employers often already check applicants' LinkedIn profiles for insights such as if they know employees at the hiring company.
Prospective employer companies already using the service include movie service Netflix, daily deals service LivingSocial, photo site Photobucket - and, of course, LinkedIn itself.
LinkedIn has 100 million users, but a majority of them don't visit the site regularly. The new Apply With LinkedIn feature will prompt jobseekers to update their profiles by alerting them of the date of their last update.
The tool comes on the heels of LinkedIn's March introduction of the LinkedIn Today service, which allows members to see news stories that are popular within their networks or industries.
It also comes as Google's new network steamrolled past the 20 million user mark in just a few weeks, according to ComScore. Nishar said competition helped LinkedIn stay sharp.

Head of US cyber agency resigns suddenly

2011-07-26T03:12:00.001-07:00

Washington: The head of a US agency that helps respond to cyber attacks resigned suddenly after several high-profile attacks on government computer systems but the Department of Homeland Security declined Monday to comment on the reason.
Randy Vickers resigned as director of the US Computer Emergency Readiness Team
Friday, according to an email from Roberta Stempfley, acting assistant secretary for cyber security and communications at Homeland Security, which was sent to some employees.
The email, obtained by Reuters, did not disclose any reason for the resignation, and a Homeland Security official would only say: "we aren't commenting on personnel matters."

Screenshot

Vickers' resignation follows several high-profile hacker attacks against the Pentagon and public websites of the Central Intelligence Agency and US Senate.
Lee Rock, who was deputy director, will serve as acting director until a new head of the agency is named.
The email from Stempfley said, "we are confident that our organisation will continue its strong performance under his leadership."

Chrome Store points to web evolution

2011-07-25T04:29:00.000-07:00

A screenshot of the Chrome Web Store.

Google taps a mechanism that worked well for mobile phones

Where would we be without a web browser?

Much of the World Wide Web would have been inaccessible, social networking would have been nothing more than a buzzword, and search engines would probably have been individual software applications.

Despite being so integral to the Internet experience, the basic architecture of the web browser has not changed much since the advent of Mosaic, which was the first widely used web browser. But things are set to change.

The Chrome Web Store, launched a few months ago, offers some pointers. It features more than 3,760 apps and has already recorded more than 16 million app installs. The phenomenally successful app environment is now slowly making its way to the personal computer.

The implications are significant, and could define the way the Internet evolves. Google has realised that web users are looking for a richer experience, and its strategy is to monetise web development by adopting the marketplace mechanism which has worked so well for mobile phones.

While there are around 100 million mobile Internet users, there are over two billion people who use a web browser. If the web is treated as a platform, the user size of Android or iOS would look tiny in comparison. Google is betting on the vast advertising potential, deeply integrated in-browser experience that will allow syncing of applications with mobile devices and a faster adoption of cloud-based platforms such as the Chrome OS.

A Google spokesperson said that as the web becomes ever more powerful, users will increasingly adopt web-based applications — and the better the web experience, the more people will use the web.

Mozilla has responded by launching its own open web ecosystem [https://apps.mozillalabs.com/appdir/]. A major difference is that unlike the Chrome Web Store, Mozilla's apps can be used in any web browser with the help of a plug-in.

The subtext to this whole new vision of software and application development is the remarkable democratisation of the space. Until recently, digital distribution was platform-centric, and the developer got only 30-50 per cent of the money from each transaction.

Apple unleashed the app revolution by reversing the revenue share, keeping 30 per cent and giving the developer 70 per cent. The $1.99 games and productivity apps started showing up, thanks to developers getting a bigger cut. Facebook Credits follows a similar approach.

The Chrome Web Store has taken this to the next level, giving developers 95 per cent of the revenue. By offering a higher revenue share, Google hopes to get iPhone, iPad and game developers to move over to Chrome Web Store (and Android phones as well). The plan is to make money through advertising and Ad Sense. Thus, the intense competition in the mobile phone space is changing the web. And it is ‘win-win' for both developers and users.

Google warns TWO MILLION users their computers have been infected with a virus

2011-07-22T01:59:00.000-07:00

Google has started warning more than two million internet users that their PC has been infected with a virus.
The malicious software hijacks Google browser searches and redirects people to websites containing fake security programs that pay the scammers for traffic.
Those affected by the virus will be greeted with a yellow warning at the top of their search results, Google said today.

Warning: Those affected by the virus will be greeted with a yellow warning at the top of their Google search results
According to the company, the malware found its way onto computers via fake anti-virus software.
Then, when a Google search is entered it is sent to servers, controlled by the cyber criminals, which modify and redirect the traffic.
Writing on Google's blog, security engineer Damian Menscher said: 'The malware appears to have gotten onto users' computers from one of roughly a hundred variants of fake anti-virus, or 'fake AV' software that has been in circulation for a while.'
Google uncovered the mass scam while carrying out routine maintenance at a data centre.

When a Google search is entered it is sent to servers, controlled by cyber criminals, which modify and redirect the traffic
Customers affected by the malware are issued with instructions on how to remove the virus from their computer.
Google's swift response is further evidence that large internet firms are vulnerable to cyber crime.
Apple has long boasted of the Mac's immunity to viruses and malware - but online security experts recently warned that the computers are facing an increased threat from criminals because of their popularity.
They said that Macs are now a more attractive target for hackers due to the rising number of people who choose them over a PC.

Google removes business profiles from Google+

2011-07-22T01:52:00.001-07:00

New Delhi: Google is keeping its word on not allowing non-individual accounts in the current format of its Google Plus social network. The company has removed some of the biggest company, brand and news profiles on Google Plus including that of IBNLive.com, Mashable and Ford.
Google had earlier asked businesses not to create Google+ profiles as the company was in the process of working on a business-specific feature.
In a Google+ post Christian Oestlien, Google+ product manager, said that Google will have an initial version of business profiles in the next few months. Some select businesses will get their profiles in the meanwhile so that Google can test how businesses interact with consumers.

Screenshot

"We will continue to disable business profiles using regular profiles," Oestlien said in his post and suggested that businesses should find a "a real person who is willing to represent your organisation on Google+ using a real profile as him-or-herself."
Businesses have always been early riders on new social media vehicles and Google's not having an option for business profiles right from the onset seems to be an oversight and now the company is attempting to make amends.
The suspended profiles now lead to an Error 404 (page not found) page.
Google's notification on to suspended Google Plus accounts says:
"Your profile is suspended
After reviewing your profile, we determined that some of the content (e.g. text, images, name) violates our Community Standards or our Names Policy. Please remember that we are currently limiting profiles to real people and will be launching a profile for businesses and other entities later this year.
If you believe that your profile has been suspended in error, or you have recently edited your profile to comply with our Community Standards or Names Policy please submit your profile for reconsideration. Your profile will be reviewed again and unblocked if it complies with our Community Standards."
It is not that Google has deleted the accounts, the administrators of the business accounts are still able to access their Google+ accounts but it is not available publicly and most of the features have been disabled.

Qualcomm set to make an announcement today

2011-07-21T01:24:00.001-07:00

Qualcomm is about to make some sort of an announcement in about an hour from now. Qualcomm’s India and South Asia president and senior vice president of Qualcomm Inc, Kanwalinder Singh will address selected members of the press. We will be present at hand to report what it is all about. Stay tuned…

Google Labs to be shut down

2011-07-21T01:14:00.001-07:00

Google to shut down a website that offered public access to experimental products.

Google Inc will shut down a website that offered public access to experimental products, the latest step by the company to refocus resources under Chief Executive Larry Page.

Google said it will "wind down" Google Labs, ending many of the projects offered on the site, in a move to "prioritize its product efforts," the company said on its corporate blog.
Google said that many of the products and technology from Google Labs would be incorporated into some of the company's other products, which range from the world's No. 1 search engine to its popular Android smartphone operating system.
Google Labs functions as a central hub for the various projects created by Google employees, who are allowed to spend up to 20 percent of their time working on side-projects. Google Labs products were available as prototypes that users could try out and provide feedback on, while Google made ongoing changes and adjustments.
Among the products listed as "alumni" of Google Labs on the Labs website are Google Maps, Google Alerts and Google Transit.
A Google spokesman said the closure of Google Labs was unrelated to the company's 20 percent time policy .
"We don't have any changes to announce regarding 20 percent time. We'll continue to devote a subset of our time to newer and experimental projects. In fact, we'll be focusing this same creative energy on bigger bets, with bigger potential long-term payoffs," the Google spokesman said in an emailed statement.
The closure of Google Labs comes a few months after Google co-founder Page took the CEO reins in April.
Last month Google said it was pulling the plug on a pair of products that let consumers monitor their home energy consumption and keep track of their personal health records.
On Google's second-quarter earnings conference call last week, Page said the company was moving to put "more wood behind fewer arrows."
The Google spokesperson said the company did not have any specific timing for the end of Google Labs, but said it would provide updates on the Google Labs website.

Making mosquitoes pay for every bite

2011-07-20T06:38:00.001-07:00

Making mosquitoes pay for every bite - via Commons

Scientists have hit upon a novel way to kill mosquitoes with every bite they make by disrupting their blood meal digestive syetem.

The approach could be the latest tool in the worldwide armoury to curb mosquito-borne diseases like dengue fever, yellow fever and malaria.

Blocking a cellular process known as vesicle transport, on which these insects rely to release digestive enzymes, caused them to die within two days of blood feeding.
"The idea behind our research is this: If we can kill the mosquito after she bites the first person, she won't be able to bite and infect a second," said Roger Miesfeld, chemistry and biochemistry professor at the University of Arizona.
"We do this by blocking the mosquito's ability to digest its blood meal," said Miesfeld, who led the project, reports the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
"During a blood meal, a mosquito ingests its body weight in blood. It's the equivalent of a 125-pound human consuming a 12-gallon smoothie made from 25 pounds of hamburger meat plus a half pound of butter and two tablespoons of sugar," Miesfeld said.
To maintain their bodily needs, the insects rely on sugary nectar from flowers, but when the time to make eggs comes, they need large amounts of protein. Only female mosquitoes bite and feed on the blood of humans or warm-blooded animals, according to an Arizona statement.
If a mosquito finds enough victims to bite and avoids being squashed, it can live as long as three weeks. During that time, it may lay up to five clutches of more than 100 eggs each. The team used mosquitoes of the species Aedes aegypti, which are abundant in towns and cities where the climate is warm and water is plentiful.

The interconnected world of tech companies

2011-07-20T06:33:00.003-07:00

Via Mashable.

Where's Google making its money? [infographic]

2011-07-20T06:33:00.001-07:00

Via WordStream.

Nokia rolls out online maps with heat maps

2011-07-20T02:23:00.001-07:00

Nokia today rolled out a new version of its online maps (available at maps.nokia.com) with new features like heat maps, reviews and more. Heat Maps shows places to check out popular places in a city based on the number of restaurants, pubs, tourist spots or shops. (Check out Delhi’s heat map in the pic above.) Currently, Heat Map is enabled in Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Bangalore and Chennai in India and many other cities globally. The update also brings 3D maps to Cape Town, Melbourne and Sydney. Another new feature is the ability to write reviews of places or book a room in hotels nearby. In my opinion, Nokia has done a great job by making these maps with such features available online on mobile devices across brands and platforms. This will eventually help them with their Windows Phone offering later this year, which will use Nokia’s Navteq maps and not Bing Maps.

Apple confirms OS X Lion launch tomorrow

2011-07-20T01:51:00.001-07:00

Apple has confirmed during its third quarter earnings call that Mac OS X Lion will be available tomorrow. Remember, there will be no physical media and users will be able to download OS X Lion directly from the Mac App Store for just $29.99. Jump the break to read what new features OS X Lion brings to the table.

Apple® today announced that Mac OS® X Lion, the eighth major release of the world’s most advanced operating system with more than 250 new features and 3,000 new developer APIs, will be available to customers in July as a download from the Mac® App Store™ for $29.99. Some of the amazing features in Lion include: new Multi-Touch® gestures; system-wide support for full screen apps; Mission Control, an innovative view of everything running on your Mac; the Mac App Store, the best place to find and explore great software, built right into the OS; Launchpad, a new home for all your apps; and a completely redesigned Mail app.

The Mac OS X Lion Up-To-Date upgrade is available at no additional charge via the Mac App Store to all customers who purchased a qualifying new Mac system from Apple or an Apple Authorized Reseller on or after June 6, 2011. Users must request their Up-To-Date upgrade within 30 days of purchase of their Mac computer. Customers who purchase a qualifying Mac between June 6, 2011 and the date when Lion is available in the Mac App Store will have 30 days from Lion’s official release date to make a request.
“The Mac has outpaced the PC industry every quarter for five years running and with OS X Lion we plan to keep extending our lead,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. “The best version of OS X yet, Lion is packed with innovative features such as new Multi-Touch gestures, system-wide support for full screen apps, and Mission Control for instantly accessing everything running on your Mac.”
New Multi-Touch gestures and fluid animations built into Lion let you interact directly with content on the screen for a more intuitive way to use your Mac. New gestures include momentum scrolling, tapping or pinching your fingers to zoom in on a web page or image, and swiping left or right to turn a page or switch between full screen apps. All Mac notebooks ship with Multi-Touch trackpads and desktop Macs can use Apple’s Magic Trackpad.
Full screen apps take advantage of the entire display and are perfect for reading email, surfing the web or browsing photos, especially on a MacBook Air® or MacBook® Pro. With a single click your app fills the display and you can swipe from one window to another, between full screen apps, or back to your Desktop, Dashboard or Spaces® without ever leaving full screen. iWork® and iLife® apps, as well as Safari®, iTunes®, Mail, FaceTime® and others, all take advantage of Lion’s system-wide support for full screen apps.
Mission Control combines Exposé®, full screen apps, Dashboard and Spaces into one unified experience for a bird’s eye view of every app and window running on your Mac. With a simple swipe, your desktop zooms out to display your open windows grouped by app, thumbnails of your full screen apps and your Dashboard, and allows you to instantly navigate anywhere with a tap.
The Mac App Store is built into Lion and is the best place to discover great new Mac apps, buy them with your iTunes account, download and install them. Apps automatically install directly to Launchpad, and with Lion’s release, the Mac App Store will be able to deliver smaller “delta” app updates and new apps that can take advantage of features like In-App Purchase and Push Notifications.
Launchpad makes it easier than ever to find and launch any app. With a single Multi-Touch gesture, all your Mac apps are displayed in a stunning full screen layout. You can organize apps in any order or into folders and swipe through unlimited pages of apps to find the one you want.
Lion includes a completely redesigned Mail app with an elegant widescreen layout. The new Conversations feature groups related messages into an easily scrollable timeline, intelligently hiding repeated text so the conversation is easy to follow, and retaining graphics and attachments as they were originally sent. An incredibly powerful new search feature allows you to refine your search and suggests matches by person, subject and label as you type. Mail includes built-in support for Microsoft Exchange 2010.
Additional new features in Lion include:
Resume, which conveniently brings your apps back exactly how you left them when you restart your Mac or quit and relaunch an app;
Auto Save, which automatically and continuously saves your documents as you work;
Versions, which automatically records the history of your document as you create it, and gives you an easy way to browse, revert and even copy and paste from previous versions; and
AirDrop, which finds nearby Macs and automatically sets up a peer-to-peer wireless connection to make transferring files quick and easy.
Pricing & Availability Mac OS X Lion will be available in July as an upgrade to Mac OS X version 10.6 Snow Leopard® from the Mac App Store for $29.99 (US). Lion will be the easiest OS X upgrade and at about 4GB, it is the size of an HD movie from the iTunes Store®. Mac OS X Lion Server requires Lion and will be available in July from the Mac App Store for $49.99 (US).
Lion requires an Intel-based Mac with a Core 2 Duo, i3, i5, i7 or Xeon processor and 2GB of RAM. The Lion upgrade can be installed on all your authorized personal Macs.

American Express offers coupons via Facebook

2011-07-19T03:25:00.000-07:00

New York: American Express is jumping into the daily deals arena.

The card issuer launched a Facebook application that offers personalised coupons based on a cardholder's likes, interests and other profile information. The announcement marks a significant entrant into the daily deals market, which has exploded in the past year.

For those familiar with Groupon and LivingSocial - by far the two largest daily deal sites - a key advantage of the Amex application is that there's no need to spend money up front to get a deal.

Instead, cardholders simply click to add the deals they like to their Amex accounts. For example, if cardholders click on a deal to get $5 back for spending $20 at Whole Foods, they automatically get $5 credited to their Amex statement the next time they charge $20 at the market. Amex says credits should appear within three to five days after purchases are made, but may take up to two billing cycles.

In the Whole Foods example, cardholders would also earn Amex rewards points on the $15 that is ultimately charged to the card. There's no penalty if deals are never used.

With Groupon and LivingSocial, by contrast, consumers have to pay for deals up front. And there's no refund if the vouchers aren't redeemed before they expire. That's not an unusual problem; an estimated 20 per cent of daily deals go unused, according to Yipit.com, which tracks the industry.
It's not clear how personalised the Amex deals will be in the beginning, since the Facebook application is launching with offers from only about 100 national retailers. Amex says it plans to quickly start adding deals from local merchants in coming weeks.

The Amex application offers key perks for merchants, too.

Since all deals are redeemed on Amex cards, retailers can easily track how effectively specific offers drive up sales. For example, a store owner could see the total sales that resulted from a particular coupon, including the number of coupons that were redeemed and the average amount shoppers spent with the deal.

"They can see what deals work for them and which don't," said Luke Gebb, vice president of global marketing at Amex.
And unlike Groupon and LivingSocial, merchants don't have to hand over a cut of their sales to American Express. The card issuer says it may start charging merchants in the future as the application gains a bigger following. For now the company will make money only from the interchange fees Amex collects from merchants whenever customers swipe their cards.

American Express also points out that the application removes the hassle of an actual coupon, meaning less confusion at the register for the retailer and shopper.

Users can opt to share their Amex deals with their friends on Facebook, but Amex notes that the application does not share any account information with Facebook. To start seeing offers, American Express cardholders go to the company's page on Facebook and click on the "Link, Like, Love" link to enter their card information.

Notably, Amex isn't the only major company looking to tap into the growing demand for online deals.

Facebook this year began testing its own daily deals program in five US cities. Google in April rolled out a pilot daily deals program in Portland, Ore., and online retail giant Amazon in May launched MyHabit.com, which dangles a luxury item at 60 per cent off each day.

Meanwhile, Groupon, which was launched less than three years ago, now boasts 35 million subscribers in the US The Chicago-based site last year rejected a $6 billion takeover offer from Google. Last month the site filed for an initial public offering with the Securities and Exchange Commission saying it hopes to raise at least $750 million.

Hacking pranksters take down The Sun

2011-07-18T23:17:00.000-07:00

Phone hacking: LulzSec take down The Sun

By Owen Vaughan

LulzSec claimed responsibility for the attack on their Twitter acount. The have had it in for The Sun since the paper published stories about a British teen charged with hacking Sony and Nintendo sites. Picture: Twitter
THE internet pranksters who attacked the CIA and gaming giants Sony and Nintendo have taken down The Sun website.
The homepage of of the British tabloid carried a hoax story announcing the death of Sun owner Rupert Murdoch.
The story said the head of News Corp, publisher of The Sun and news.com.au, had been found dead in his garden after an overdose.
Hacking group LulzSec claimed responsibility on their Twitter account.
The fake story read: "Officers on the scene report a broken glass, a box of vintage wine, and what seems to be a family album strewn across the floor, containing images from days gone by; some containing handpainted portraits of Murdoch in his early days, donning a top hat and monocle."
The story was quickly taken down but Lulzsec attacked the website again, redirecting all its traffic to its Twitter page.
"The Sun's homepage now redirects to the Murdoch death story on the recently-owned New Times website. Can you spell success, gentlemen?" the group tweeted.
News International responded by taking down the entire website, as well as those belonging to The Times and BSkyB.
Users are now greeted with an error message instead of being redirected to LulzSec's Twitter account.
UPDATE: News International sites were back online as of 12.30pm AEST
The group also claimed to have accessed emails sent between News executives and promised to post a press release regarding their contents tomorrow.
The attack comes after police found the body of a former News of the World reporter who blew the whistle on phone hacking at The Sun's sister paper.

LulzSec posted a hoax story announcing the death News Corp head Rupert Murdoch. Picture: Supplied
Showbiz journalist Sean Hoare, who blew the whistle on the phone hacking scandal last year, was discovered at his home in Watford, England, after concerns were raised about his whereabouts.
Police are investigating the possibility that he killed himself and said that the death was "not thought to be suspicious".
LulzSec formed in May, joining a breed of pranksters making headlines known as "hacktivist collectives".
Vendetta
They are rumoured to be an offshoot of Anonymous. Two months ago, they began launching attacks against high-profile targets such as Fox, Sony, Nintendo and the CIA.
At the end of June, after "50 days of Lulz", they disbanded, claiming "boredom" with their project.
Most tech sites point to the fact that the CIA was closing in on their members as the real reason behind the break-up.
Regardless, by the time the party was over for LulzSec, they had accessed and released an estimated 750,000 usernames and passwords, mostly from gaming sites, into the public domain.
They say they don't hack for profit, just fun, and generally target corporations which deal in what they deem as unfair actions.
On June 21, 19-year-old Ryan Cleary, from Essex, UK, was arrested and charged with hacking crimes. Cleary was pegged by the UK tabloids as a "LulzSec ringleader", a claim which the group denied.
Lulz took particular exception to The Sun's reporting of the arrest of Cleary, who was later identified in court as an Asperger's sufferer.
The Sun referred to Cleary as "nerdy", "oddball" and "geeky".
Several days later they denied responsibility for an attempted attack on The Sun and The Times.
The Sun is owned by News Corp.

Hacker group launches online social network

2011-07-18T22:52:00.001-07:00

A screenshot of anonplus.com - DC

Infamous hacker group Anonymous has launched its own social network after being rejected by Google's freshly-launched online community.
"Today we welcome you to begin anew," the hacker alliance said at the website anonplus.com, which it described as a platform to distribute information.
"Welcome to the Revolution - a new social network where there is no fear...of censorship...of blackout...nor of holding back."
The drive to build a social network came after the Anonymous account was suspended at the Google+ online community, which was launched last month by the Internet giant as a challenge to Facebook.
A message on the anonplus.com website promised that the Anonymous social network would be for everyone and listed online monikers of developers taking part in the project.
Anonymous, which rose to infamy last year with cyber attacks in support of controversial whistle-blower website WikiLeaks, posted the suspension notice from Google on its blog at Tumblr.
The group has been linked to attacks on Visa, Mastercard and Paypal, which blocked donations to WikiLeaks after it published thousands of US diplomatic cables.
Early this year, Anonymous took credit for breaking into the website of HBGary Federal because the firm was working with federal agents to expose the hackers' identities.
Anonymous last week released a trove of military email addresses and passwords it claimed to have plundered from the network of US defense consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton.

Is Anon ready for the social network?

2011-07-18T04:24:00.001-07:00

Rules without tyranny is harder than it seems

By Richard Chirgwin

The story so far is that Anonymous – or someone associated with Anonymous, or someone cynically riding on the back of Anonymous, who knows? – has set up a site that will offer some kind of social network.
According to TechSpot, the idea (and the “Alpha” Website, anonplus.com) arose when Google+ allegedly banned an unknown number of Anonymous members.

The Anonplus site is couched in Anonymous’s usual grandiose phraseology – “they will know that we have arrived. There will be no oppression. There will be no more tyranny. We are the people and we are Anonymous.”

Fair enough. Anyone’s got the right to set up a social network if they want, and they have the right to claim to act on behalf of others, regardless of how accurate that claim may be.
But the idea of a completely anarchic, “no tyranny, no oppression” (defined in whose terms?) social network offers some interesting self-contradictions to resolve.
I’ll grant that the world of corporate social networks is a nightmare of “tyranny and oppression” – so much so that the success of Facebook and the excitement over Google+ mystifies me.
Facebook bans a Google+ ad at the drop of a hat, but turns into a nearly-immovable object if asked to help deal with abusive commenters (who, for example, infest tribute pages to the dead). Google+ demands an understanding of 37 different privacy statements. Social networks are not just tyrannical, they’re also a “confusopoly” whose success depends on nobody being able to decode the rules they’ve promised to follow.
Anonymous’s intervention – to me, a much more welcome intervention than the group’s inability to distinguish between targets, slapping the small and mighty with equal abandon and claiming equal credit whether they’ve defeated a flea-bite nobody or a US military operation – may or may not succeed, but it raises an interesting question.
What’s the line separating rules that are necessary for a social network to function from rules that are oppressive; and when does one become the other?
All social interactions are government by rules of some kind. They may be tight or loose, consensual or tyrannical, explicit or implicit, designed or evolved, but the rules exist, whether or not you follow them (or even acknowledge them).
If all you do is hold a conversation with someone, you will follow at least one rule – the two of you will hold the conversation in languages comprehensible to you both. The interaction won’t happen without that minimum rule.
“If we hack something, we publish it” is a rule for Anonymous – written or not. “There will be no tyranny” is a rule of interaction.
And even Anonplus.com must have, at minimum, one rule: “anybody may join”. The group itself has implied a second rule, that nobody be censored or blacked out.
Censorship provides a convenient handle on which I can hang a question about rules: censorship by whom? Sure, it’s clear that “Anonplus” won’t censor the statements or posts of its users – but what of those users who would wish to constrain, censor or silence other users?
Such people exist in every large group – whether they merely seek to shout down dissent or, since this is the Internet, if they seek to silence those they don’t like by hacking their profiles.
“We will not censor” is one rule, one which governs only part of the interaction: “You will not censor” is another – one which, in both its expression and enforcement, contains the potential for tyranny. The more difficult “do not hack other users’ profiles” holds even better tyrannical potential, since it involves questions of accusation, evidence, proof, appeal and enforcement.
These are merely a couple of simplistic examples. The greater the subtlety and complexity of the interaction, the more subtle and complex the rules that govern it.
Anonplus already has rules. To grow into something that has users – users outside its own inner circle – it faces a much tougher task. It must learn to walk a tightrope between the tyranny of rules and the tyranny of anarchy. If it succeeds, it will be a welcome coming-of-age.

source: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/07/18/anonymous_social_network/

Circles? Sparks? How to Master the World of Google+

2011-07-18T03:58:00.001-07:00

Google's new social media platform is no Facebook clone

The more people added to your circles, to closer to real-time your streams will become. (Google Plus)
You're a pro with lingo like "friends" and "walls." Too bad that vocabulary won't help you get up to speed on Google+, whose bread and butter is Circles, Hangouts, and Sparks. Writing for the Huffington Post, Craig Kanalley pulls together 15 confusion-busting tips for Google+ newbies.

Start by finding your pals: This is as easy as putting search skills to use. Google the name of a person, place, company, etc., in the "Find People" search box. Open each profile page, hover over "Add to Circles" and then drop them into one (ie, Friends, Family, or a Circle of your own design).

Then "circle" people you don’t know: This seems counterintuitive, but the beauty of Google+ is that you don't have to have a close bond with everyone you add.
Create a whole bunch of circles: Kanalley recommends that you have "lots" of circles with hundreds of people in them. Think outside the box: Beyond friends and family, you can create circles around sports, social issues, industries, etc.
"Circle" Googlers: There's no one else more in the know about fresh Google+ features or smart uses, writes Kanalley.
Customize your "Sparks": This is sort of like a personalized RSS reader. Add interests ranging from your favorite sports team to vegan cooking, and you'll be delivered news on that topic.

New Trend: Facebook Foreclosures?

2011-07-18T03:56:00.000-07:00

It's already happening across the pond

In this April 4, 2010 file photo, a foreclosure sign sits atop a for sale sign in front of a single-family home tops the for sale sign in Denver on Sunday, April 4, 2010. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski, File)
In Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and England, mortgage lenders have been allowed to serve foreclosure notices via Facebook, in most cases when the defaulting borrowers couldn't be located elsewhere. In at least two such cases, the borrowers reacted right away, thus allowing the foreclosures to proceed. And Facebook seems happy about the trend, with a spokesperson stating after the first case, in 2008, that the court had validated the site "as a reliable, secure, and private medium for communication."
Could this trend be headed to America, wonders Tara-Nicholle Nelson in Time? "Privacy concerns are moot," since foreclosure notices are already public record in the US. Debt collectors and divorce attorneys are already using Facebook to track people down and gather evidence. But, though electronic service is usually permitted in the US, parties must have agreed to it in advance. So don't be surprised if "lenders begin to routinely request—and obtain—the borrowers’ permission to make service of foreclosure notices via email, Facebook and other electronic means at the time the original loan documents are signed."

Can Google+ shake up Facebook?

2011-07-17T04:56:00.001-07:00

It is three weeks old and still not out of the labs but Google+ already boasts over 10 million users. What's drawing in the new fans?
Unabashed imitation of Facebook's key inventions and a clutch of great innovations of its own.
Here's a feature by feature comparison of the newest social networking rivals.
Posts vs Wall

A blatant copy: G+ posts are styled like FB's except one addition: you can disable reposts (they're like retweets) and comments right there.
Stream vs News Feed

Remove the signature Facebook Blue and you can't tell Stream from Feed. Imitation is the best form of flattery. Or maybe an admission Google couldn't think better?
Circles vs Lists

A winner for G+. 'Circles' are groups to categorise people you know and share posts, feeds or photos exclusively. Basic Circles like 'Friends' and 'Family' are preloaded but you can create your own. (Think 'work monsters'). Compared with this, FB's Lists is plain boring.
Hangout vs Video call

The cracker. Hangout allows up to 10 people to video chat together. Tiny feeds of buddies line up the bottom of your screen with a big image of the person talking. There's a window for text chats and a button for watching YouTube . FB's latest one-on-one video chat just doesn't make the cut.
+1 vs Like

There is something about saying I 'Like' that just isn't in I '+1'. But Google is using it to make its search social too.

Google Will Give You A Gold Medal For Reading The News

2011-07-16T10:22:00.001-07:00

Bored with the standard news reading experience?
Google News is now giving out news topic badges to their readers based on reading activity. Announcing the service, Google Engineer Natasha Mohanty writes, "The more you read, the higher level badge you’ll receive, starting with Bronze, then moving up the ladder to Silver, Gold, Platinum and finally, Ultimate."
Why should you care about earning a badge from Google?
Google offers three main reasons in their introductory video. You can track your reading interests, personalize your Google News reading experience, and share your reading interests with friends.
Google previously offered automatic personalization in Google News based on reading habits. Badges now serve as a virtual artifact to help readers understand and make better use of this personalization.
The social component of badges doesn't appear to be integrated with Google's new social network Google Plus. But, in the introductory blog post, Mohanty writes, "This is just the first step - the bronze release, if you will - of Google News badges."
Google started using badges on their Orkut social network in November 2010. They've not revealed any plans for badges on Google Plus.
Google's badges are part of a broader trend among tech companies to apply game mechanics to improve the user experience of websites and applications. Kongregate, Foursquare, StackOverflow, and many other tech companies have used badges as a part of their service.
Read more about the badges on the Google Blog announcement or view the video below.

Apple releases iOS 4.3.4, fixes PDF vulnerability

2011-07-16T10:10:00.001-07:00

Apple has just released iOS 4.3.4 for its iOS devices including the iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, iPad 2, iPad and third and fourth-generation iPod touch devices.

Apple also released a comparable update for Verizon Wireless’ CDMA iPhone 4, iOS 4.2.9.

The new build includes a security update that addresses a vulnerability with PDF files. It also patches the extremely popular jailbreak.me jailbreak solution, so it will no longer function on devices that update. IOS 4.3.4 is available immediately via iTunes.

Twitter now delivers 350 billion tweets each day

2011-07-16T10:09:00.000-07:00

Twitter now delivers an astonishing 350 billion tweets each day, the company said on Friday. ”Delivering 350 billion Tweets a day is a terribly fun engineering challenge.

But, it doesn’t capture how passionate our users are,” the company said from its official Twitter Engineering account. Coincidentally we’re sure, the news comes just one day after Google bragged that it had amassed 10 million Google+ users in just two weeks, and that these users collectively share 1 billion items each day. Google+ has quite a way to go before it is anywhere near as popular as Twitter, of course, but it’s certainly doing well for a 2-week-old product.
Read

Google+ Could Be 'Education Game Changer'

2011-07-15T01:23:00.000-07:00

Teachers can connect with students without privacy issues: Liz Dwyer

This screen shot shows a page from Google Plus. (AP Photo)

Count another one for the Google+ camp: Liz Dwyer at Good writes that the new social networking tool "could end up being a serious education game changer." "

Google's format allows teachers to set up specific "circles" just for students or classrooms, eliminating those "weird privacy issues" that limits Facebook's utility as a teacher's helper.

"There's a good chance that Google+ is going to become a powerful communication and collaboration tool in the classroom," writes Dwyer. Google has a clear advantage on the K-12 level because of Facebook's 13-and-older restriction, but this applies all they way up to the college level, too.

"I’m already planning on holding Hangout office hours this fall for students, where they can get on and ask questions about class material," a Lehigh professor says. Click for the full column.

Google Docs Viewer now supports zipped files

2011-07-15T01:09:00.000-07:00

Google Docs Viewer can now open zipped files in ZIP and RAR formats. The next time you get a zipped file in your Gmail inbox, you can click view and the Google Docs app will show files stored in the zipped archive right there in the web browser window.

What’s more, you can download files from the archive or save them in your Google Docs account and edit them later. The best feature in my book, however, is it is supported on mobile versions too. So the next time a zipped file hits your mobile mail inbox, you know what to do.

Larry Page: Google+ has over 10 million users, 550,000 Android phones activated daily

2011-07-15T01:05:00.000-07:00

Google’s CEO, Larry Page, today confirmed what was being widely speculated – Google+ today has over 10 million users.

This is a big number considering it has been barely a fortnight since its ‘field trial’ launch and is a ‘by invitation only’ service.

Users are sharing and receiving over a billion items everyday and this number will only grow as more people join Google’s answer to Facebook.

On Android, Page revealed that over 550,000 Android phones are being activated daily, which according to him, is a big number even by Google’s standards.

Talking about Chrome, he says there are over 160 million users while the +1 button is being used more than 2.3 billion times a day! The earnings call is still going on and we will update this post as and when anything interesting is revealed.

In all, 135 million Android smartphones have been activated so far. Android now has over 250,000 apps, which have been downloaded over six billion times. There are over 400 Android phone models out there in the market.

Over 40 million songs were created by users with the Musical doodle. Hit the break to read Larry Page’s opening remarks in its entirety.

Good afternoon everyone–thanks for joining us today
It’s exciting to be on the call today and to share directly with you the progress we have made in my first quarter as CEO
As you will have seen from our press release we had a great quarter–with revenue up by 32 per cent year on year and a new record for quarterly revenue at over $9 billion!
We have substantially increased our velocity and execution this quarter–a key goal of mine since taking over as CEO
It’s why I created a new, product focused management structure–with a clear leader responsible for each product area
This new management team is working together fabulously … and has already achieved a lot in just three months
First we launched Google+ to field trial invitation only
Our goal with Google+ is to make sharing on the web like sharing in real life, as well as to improve the overall Google experience
Circles let you choose with precision who you are sharing with. Not surprisingly this has been very well received, because in real life, we share different things with different people.
Hangouts allow for serendipitous interactions. Like in real life when you run into a few friends. It gives you seamless and fun multi user video and it’s really amazing!
Last quarter, we launched the +1 button in search results and ads–enabling users to recommend stuff they liked, and have those recommendations show up in the search results of people they know
This quarter, we released +1 buttons to the entire web, and many sites like Huffington Post, the Washington Post and Best Buy have added +1 buttons
Google+ is still only in field trial with limited access as we scale the system
Users have to be invited, sign up with a profile in order to use it
However, the growth on Google+ has been great–and I’m excited to release some new metrics for you today
Over 10M people have joined Google+
Great achievement for the team
There’s also a ton of activity
We are seeing over 1 billion items shared and received in a single day
Our +1 button is already all over the web
It’s being served 2.3 billion times a day
So while we have a lot of work still to do, we are really excited about our progress with Google+
Google+ is also a great example of another focus of mine–beautiful products that are simple and intuitive to use and was actually was one of the first products to contain our new visual redesign.
We also launched that beautiful, consistent and simpler design on our home page, Gmail and calendar with many more products soon to come.
Greater focus has also been another big feature for me this quarter–more wood behind fewer arrows
Last month, for example, we announced that we will be closing Google Health and Google PowerMeter
We’ve also done substantial internal work simplifying and streamlining our product lines
While much of that work has not yet become visible externally, I am very happy with our progress here
Focus and prioritization are crucial given our amazing opportunities
Indeed I see more opportunities for Google today than ever before
Because believe it or not we are still in the very early stages of what we want to do
Even in search … which we’ve been working on for 12 years there have never been more important changes to make
For example this quarter we launched a pilot that shows an author’s name and picture in the search results, making it easier for users to find things from authors they trust.
Of course when we started doing search, people thought we were crazy–they said there was no money to be made in search over and above a bit of banner advertising
Most new internet businesses have had the same criticism
Fast forward to today–it feels like we are watching the same movie again in slow motion
We have tremendous new businesses being viewed as “crazy”
Android
We actually have a new metric to report of 550,000 Android Devices activated a day!
That’s a HUGE number even by Google’s standards
Chrome
It’s the fastest growing browser
With over 160 million users
People rightly ask how we will monetize these businesses?
And of course I understand the need to balance the short term with the longer term needs because our revenues and growth serve as the engine that funds our innovation
But our emerging high usage products can generate huge new businesses for Google in the long run, just like search
And we have tons of experience monetizing successful products over time
Well run technology businesses with tremendous consumer usage make a lot of money over the long term
I think about our products in three separate categories
First, there is search and our ads products, the core driver of revenue for the company. Nikesh and Susan are going to talk more about ads later in the call
Next, we have products that are enjoying high consumer success–YouTube, Android and Chrome. We are investing in these in order to optimize their long-term success
Then we have our new products–Google+ and Commerce and Local. We are are investing in them to drive innovation and adoption
Overall, we are focused on long term absolute profit and growth, as we have always been–and I will continue the tight financial management we have had in the last two years, even as we are making significant investments in our future
I would like to finish on our people
Great companies are no greater than the efforts and ingenuity of their people
So continuing to hire the best, keeping them happy and well rewarded is crucial to our future
Many of you will be interested in hiring–whether we hired a few hundred more or less than you expected this quarter. But we will optimize headcount for the long term and the opportunities we see
So I’m happy with the investments we’ve made in people, though we’re probably even a little ahead of where we need to be with headcount growth at the edge of what is manageable now
It is easy to focus on things we do that are speculative (e.g., driverless cars) but we spend the vast majority of our resources on the core products. We may have a few small speculative projects happening at any given time, but we’re very careful stewards of shareholder money — we’re not betting the farm on this stuff.
All of us at Google want to create services that people across the world use twice a day … just like a toothbrush!
And we strive to make those services beautiful, simple and easy to use
That way we can provide huge benefit to the world
We have made a good start but we are at only 1 per cent of what’s possible … Google is just getting started … and that is why I am here–working hard to lead this company to the next level
Thank You. And again, we had a great quarter.

Apple dumps Samsung, goes for TSMC chips

2011-07-15T01:03:00.001-07:00

Samsung is the sole supplier of the A5 chips used in the iPad 2, but Apple has hinted it is keen to diversify its supply chain from the Korean company
TAIPEI: Taiwan's TSMC has started trial manufacturing of next generation A6 chips for Apple Inc, a source familiar with the matter said, in a sign that the iPad maker is shifting from its traditional chip supplier, Samsung Electronics.

Whether TSMC would get actual orders for the chips would depend on its yield rate, or the amount of chips per batch that come out with no defects, the source said.

Samsung is the sole supplier of the A5 chips used in the iPad 2, but Apple has hinted it is keen to diversify its supply chain from the Korean company.

Samsung has emerged as Apple's toughest competitor in the smartphone and tablet market and is involved in an acrimonious legal battle with Apple over patents.

"TSMC has got all the authorisation and details ready. Whether Apple puts in a formal order will depend on the yield rate," said the source, who was not authorised to speak to the media. The source did not provide further details of the orders.

TSMC spokeswoman Elizabeth Sun said she could not comment on this issue or on market rumours. Apple was not immediately available for comment and a Samsung spokesman declined to comment.

Analysts and other sources had previously said TSMC, the world's largest contract chip maker, was set to become a supplier of some processor chips to Apple, likely starting next year. However the chip may not be called A6, the sources said.

Shares of TSMC have slipped 1.5 per cent so far this year, outperforming the broader market's 4.5 per cent decline. Some analysts expect Samsung to dominate A5 orders and said any switch by Apple could be tricky.

"It won't be easy for Apple to dramatically change its chip provider from Samsung," said Seo Won-seok, an analyst at NH Investment and Securities in Seoul.

"It has to redesign the chipset, which Samsung has been deeply involved from the beginning and has some intellectual property. Apple could try various suppliers but they (Samsung and Apple) need each other and the relationship will continue."

TSMC is an obvious candidate to win processor business from Apple in the near term as it budgets $7.8 billion for capital expenditures this year to update technology and add capacity. It also has experience with ARM architecture, widely used by Apple to make power-efficient mobile chips.

The A5 chip is designed by the California company and analysts say it is based on British chip designer ARM Holdings Plc's technology. Bevan Yeh, a senior fund manager of Prudential Financial Securities Investment Trust, estimated that TSMC's earnings per share would be lifted by T$2 a year if it manages to win all orders for the A6 chip. The T$2 would mean a one-third boost to TSMC's EPS based on the company's 2010 earnings.

"Samsung will try everything it can and offer a very low price to save the orders," said Yeh, adding that Samsung, which had just built a new lab for Intel, might offer a price low enough just to cover the variable costs, or offer a bundled package that includes different components.

Google’s photo social network, Photovine, goes live

2011-07-14T12:01:00.000-07:00

It has not even been a fortnight since Google launched Google+, another social networking service from GooglePlex is sprouting leaves. Photovine is the latest product from Google, which has been developed by the Slide team – a company Google had recently acquired. Currently in a by-invitation-only stage, Photovine seems like a phone app the connects people through photos. The teaser video on the site shows how people can see photos from other users based on keywords. The screenshot on the home page gives further clues like how you can subscribe to ‘vines’ (or photo streams by keywords) or check out the most popular vines out there. Hit the jump to watch a teaser video of Photovine.

Targeted advertising and tweaked web search - why Google needs its social network Plus to take off

2011-07-14T04:44:00.000-07:00

By Barbara Ortutay

Google Plus - now finding more ways than ever to work out your online habits.
GOOGLE didn't build its new Plus service simply to have an online hangout like Facebook.
Rather, Google's new social-networking endeavour is about trying to gain valuable insights into people's lives and relationships.
This could help the company do a better job of targeting ads so that advertisers would pay more and have less reason to spend their money on Facebook.
If it succeeds, Plus represents Google's best shot yet at muscling into a market that has threatened to topple the search and advertising leader, as Facebook leads the way in making the online world social.
Plus is Google's carefully scripted venture into a territory where its previous efforts have been duds.
The Facebook touch
On the surface, Plus is reminiscent of Facebook — with a Google touch. It lets people share photos and status messages, chat with friends and acquaintances and follow news updates.
A prominent feature called Circles allows users to organise the people they interact with into groups, such as family, close friends or fishing buddies. Users can choose to share things only among certain circles.
Google Plus is still in a restricted, test phase, and invites to join are highly coveted. Only time will tell if it takes off among the broader public or if it's too little, too late to face off with Facebook and Twitter on the social front — just as Microsoft has failed to surpass Google in search with latecomer Bing.
Google has done quite well without its own social network. Its search engine accounts for two-thirds of queries in the US, and even more in parts of Europe. Its revenue is expected to surpass $US36 billion this year, the bulk of it from text ads that appear alongside search results and other web content.
But online behaviours are changing. People are spending more time on Facebook and other social networks. And they are increasingly relying on their friends' recommendations when deciding where to eat and what movies to watch.
Third time lucky?
Google, meanwhile, has bungled past social media efforts. A sharing program called Wave was quickly killed off because users didn't know what to make of it. Buzz, a later venture, was the centre of a privacy fiasco. Google had been too aggressive about automatically creating lists of friends, which inadvertently revealed who users had corresponded with on Gmail.
Early response to Google Plus has been positive. But that's no guarantee for broader success. As Google botched one social media effort after another, Facebook grew exponentially.
Today, half of Facebook's 750 million worldwide users log on to the site every day. That's roughly the entire population of the US and UK combined. More than 250 million people engage with Facebook in some form on outside websites each month around the world. They do this by clicking the ubiquitous "like" and "recommend" buttons on news and other sites or by logging on to websites using their Facebook passwords.
Google's chairman and former chief executive Eric Schmidt has acknowledged that the company failed to respond to Facebook's threat fast enough. His successor, Google co-founder Larry Page, has made social networking one of his top priorities since he took over in April.
Facebook knows what people are reading, eating and watching. It knows who's friends with whom, and who people trust.
"We don't think it's a coincidence that (Google Plus) was introduced less than three months after Page returned to the CEO post," said Standard & Poor's equity analyst Scott Kessler in a note to clients.
Where Google's losing
Facebook's greatest advantage is the immense trove of information its users have shared about themselves through about four billion posts and connections they make collectively every day.
Facebook knows what people are reading, eating and watching. It knows who's friends with whom, and which friends people trust for recommendations on what shoes to buy and which plumbers to hire.
Google can't index most of this information on its search engine because Facebook doesn't share it. Instead, Facebook has formed a search partnership with Google rival Microsoft.
In May, Microsoft's Bing search engine started to use information from people's Facebook preferences to tweak its search results. This means Facebook users who search for shoes or concert tickets on Bing might get results that are tailored to the interests they listed on the site.
For people who aren't logged on to Facebook when they search, Bing might still emphasise links that other Facebook users have recommended.
That puts Google at a disadvantage. Unless it can get similar data through a social service of its own, the search giant is left with a formula that sorts through the pattern of web links and other computer data to determine where a site should rank in its recommendation.
That system has become increasingly vulnerable to manipulation by websites looking to rank higher than their rivals. As a result, Google results might not be as useful as recommendations drawn from an analysis of what they have already signalled that they like by pressing a Facebook button.
Companies can show a particular Cheetos ad only to single men aged 17 to 41 who live in New York, are Yankee fans and enjoy playing World of Warcraft.
There's another key way that social data can help Google as well.
Google Plus = targeted ads
On Facebook, companies can target their advertising with razor-sharp precision, given all sorts of information that people willingly share, such as a preference for Coke over Pepsi or whether they've ever been married.
For example, companies can show a particular Cheetos ad only to single men aged 17 to 41 who live in New York, are Yankee fans and enjoy playing World of Warcraft.
"That's Facebook's biggest calling card to marketers," said Debra Aho Williamson, principal analyst with eMarketer.
Advertisers are typically willing to pay more for such targeting because they'd be pitching to consumers most likely to buy.
Google does a good job already of targeting ads based on what people search for, write about in emails and watch on YouTube. Social data could help Google do even better.
Danny Sullivan, who follows Google closely as editor-in-chief of the blog Search Engine Land, said that if Google Plus succeeds, Google would get "a good insurance policy" amid the rise of social networks.
The need for it became apparent when Google's deal to include Twitter updates in its search results expired recently, Sullivan said. Google has temporarily shut down its "RealTime" search feature, though it told users to stay tuned while it explores how Google Plus will figure into it.
'Everything will be a social network'
That said, Google Plus doesn't necessarily need to be a Facebook clone.
"Google needs to have a social strategy that is relevant to Google and the way people use Google applications," said Susan Etlinger, an analyst at Altimeter Group.
"That's very different from how people use Facebook."
Facebook is, for now, an online hangout above all. People go there to scan status updates, chat with a friend or look at the latest photos, without necessarily having something specific in mind.
With Google, people usually have an objective, whether that's searching for a hair stylist or sending an email about an upcoming party.
Google's task is to make its existing products social as "social" becomes the norm for online activity, she said.
"Eventually everything is going to be a social network," Ms Etlinger said.
"Social capabilities will be in everything on the web."

The race to Google+: Is it because we hate Facebook?

2011-07-14T04:35:00.000-07:00

Jennifer Dudley-Nicholson

FACEBOOK has 750 million users.
That’s a virtual continent. It’s more than 35 Australias or two United States of Americas.

So you might think declaring a war on Facebook is a silly, long-term project that this warming Earth may never see executed.

Then you see what Google has done.

Google+, that new service you may or may not have been invited to join, is proving pretty popular.
It has allegedly passed the 10 million user mark and could reach the 20-million-member mark by the weekend. It’s not even a month old.

Do we really hate Facebook that much? Because that’s what it looks like.

Google+ is a good service, don’t get me wrong. I’m not trying to play down its offerings.

If you’ve taken a look inside the front screen you’ll see that there’s a very clean layout inside.

There’s a lot of white space, no app spam, no birthday reminders, and no advertisements (shock!).
The left-hand column offers a listing of your friendship circles, easily categorised, alphabetised and simple to access.

And when you post something, options appear instantly letting you choose exactly who will see it—just one Circle, several, all Circles or your adoring public.

Adding photos is easy (Picasa), sharing links is easy (there’s a button), and pretty soon you will be able to control who can see your gender (yes, privacy is getting that strict).

But while these additions are great, it’s take-up is even greater.

One pundit—Ancestry.com founder Paul Allen—forecasts Google+ to pass the 20-million-member mark by the weekend. This weekend.

Considering the service is not even open yet and users have been struggling with the service’s now-you-can-now-you-can’t invitation plan, this is pretty remarkable. It makes it one of the fastest growing social networks evah.

Now this may very well indicate that Google has a lot of fans or the internet has a lot of curious geeks. Both are surely true. But also I suspect it has a lot to do with a growing resentment of all things Facebook.

Farmville updates, Frontierville invites, inappropriately placed dating service ads, privacy breaches, friends who will not stop until you’re a member of their Mafia War/fantasy stock market/poker game and high-school acquaintances that just will not take the regularly-ignoring-your-friend-request hint do make Facebook life pretty dire at times.

The tipping point may already have been reached. Last night my Dad expressed interest in jumping ship. If that isn’t a sign that Facebook better take notice it’s not looking very hard for the signs.

Personally, I’m still using both Facebook and Google+ but I’m using the Zuckerberg model less and less as my Google+ days continue. There’s only so much one can share on a given day.

Is this the sign of a coming Facebook apocalypse? Maybe.

And maybe the Winkelvii got a good deal.

Google+ to hit 20million users by next week

2011-07-14T03:26:00.000-07:00

The new social network is off to a great start

Google+ is growing. The new social network by the search giant is expected to pass the 10 million user mark today, even while the service remains in invite-only beta. Google launched its social experiment just 2 weeks ago, but it has been expanding at an exponential rate ever since. The ability for Google+ users to invite others has been a bit spotty, with the company throttling the option in order to maintain network stability, but the past 48 hours or so have been an invite free-for-all.

Google+ features like Hangouts — which allow you to video chat with multiple people at once — help to give the new service its own unique feel, separating it from Facebook. Millions of users have been flocking to the network and voicing their varied opinions on how well it compares to its main competitor. Amongst my 150 or so Google+ contacts, the consensus is mostly positive, and a greater influx of users is sure to breathe even more life into the fledgling social hotspot.

If the trend of new users continues at its current rate, Google+ should top 20 million accounts by next week. Of course, even that staggering figure is nothing compared to the 750 million users that Facebook currently boasts, but there's still no question that Google is off to a good start. Once the service goes public — a milestone that is expected to come within a month's time — Google properties like Gmail and YouTube will offer many opportunities for both social network devotees and internet rookies to start a Google+ account, which should boost the numbers even further.

(Source)

Publish Your Google+ Post Automatically On Twitter and Facebook or Simply Get it on Your RSS Reader

2011-07-13T11:18:00.000-07:00

Publish your Google plus post’s into your RSS Feed Reader or Twitter or FB.

*HOW TO:*

* Open http://plusfeed.appspot.com
* Copy Your Profile Number

* Add your profile number at the end of the above mentioned URL

Mine is : http://plusfeed.appspot.com/117036774826553245801
If You don’t know how to get Your Profile Try this

https://plus.google.com/u/0/me?tab=Xh

and copy the numbers and add it to http://plusfeed.appspot.com/numbers
* Add the google plus feed url in Rss reader or twitterfeed or whateva

Google+ teetering on 10 million users

2011-07-13T06:54:00.001-07:00

Could Google finally have a winner on its hands? After the embarrassing failures of Wave and Buzz, Google may have finally gotten social correct with Google+.

Paul Allen—Ancestry.com Paul, not Microsoft Paul—estimates that Google+ will soon hit an impressive milestone of 10 million users. Using a methodology that takes into account surname popularity, Allen guesstimates that Google+ currently has about 9.5 million users worldwide.

Google has yet to comment on Allen’s estimate, but it’s probably safe to say that the newest face on the social networking block is enjoying some pretty solid early growth.

Full story at Mashable.

Facebook launches an app for every phone

2011-07-13T05:06:00.001-07:00

New Delhi: In an effort to further expand its reach, Facebook has released an application that will run on over 2,500 Java enabled mobile phones.
The Every Phone app includes Facebook's most popular features, such as, News Feed, Inbox, and Photos. It also allows users to upload photos to Facebook and find friends from the phonebook.
According to Facebook, the app has been optimised to consume less data than other Java apps or mobile sites. It has also tied up with mobile service providers to provide users with free data access for the Every Phone app for a 90-day period. The 20 service providers that Facebook is collaborating with for free data access include four from India - Aircel, Airtel, Idea and Reliance.

The Facebook Every Phone app can be downloaded and installed from http://d.facebook.com/install through mobile phone web browsers. The app is also available on GetJar, Appia, and Mobile Weaver.
Facebook, had earlier in May 2010, teamed up with 50 mobile phone operators to offer cellphone users 0.facebook.com, a stripped-down version of the social networking site that can be accessed without incurring data charges.

A new U.S. law-enforcement tool: Facebook searches

2011-07-13T03:40:00.001-07:00

U.S. law-enforcement agencies are increasingly obtaining warrants to search Facebook, often gaining detailed access to users' accounts without their knowledge.
A Reuters review of the Westlaw legal database shows that since 2008, federal judges have authorized at least two dozen warrants to search individuals' Facebook accounts. Many of the warrants requested a laundry list of personal data such as messages, status updates, links to videos and photographs, calendars of future and past events, "Wall postings" and "rejected Friend requests."
Federal agencies seeking the warrants include the FBI, DEA and ICE, and the investigations range from arson to rape to terrorism.
The Facebook search warrants typically demand a user's "Neoprint" and "Photoprint" -- terms that Facebook has used to describe a detailed package of profile and photo information that is not even available to users themselves.
These terms appear in manuals for law enforcement agencies on how to request data from Facebook. The manuals, posted on various public-advocacy websites, appear to have been prepared by Facebook, although a spokesman for the company declined to confirm their authenticity.
The review of Westlaw data indicates that federal agencies were granted at least 11 warrants to search Facebook since the beginning of 2011, nearly double the number for all of 2010. The precise number of warrants served on Facebook is hard to determine, in part because some records are sealed, and warrant applications often involve unusual case names. (One example: "USA v. Facebook USER ID Associated with email address jimmie_white_trash@yahoo.com," a sealed case involving a drug sale.)
In a telephone interview, Facebook's Chief Security Officer, Joe Sullivan, declined to say how many warrants had been served on the company. He said Facebook is sensitive to user privacy and that it regularly pushes back against law-enforcement "fishing expeditions."
NOT CHALLENGED
None of the warrants discovered in the review have been challenged on the grounds that it violated a person's Fourth Amendment protection against unlawful search and seizure, according to a review of the cases.
Some constitutional-law experts said the Facebook searches may not have been challenged because the defendants - not to mention their "friends" or others whose pages might have been viewed as part of an investigation -- never knew about them.
By law, neither Facebook nor the government is obliged to inform a user when an account is subject to a search by law enforcement, though prosecutors are required to disclose material evidence to a defendant.
Twitter and several other social-media sites have formally adopted a policy to notify users when law enforcement asks to search their profile.
Last January, Twitter also successfully challenged a gag order imposed by a federal judge in Virginia that forbade the company from informing users that the government had demanded their data.
Twitter said in an email message that its policy was "to help users protect their rights." The Facebook spokesperson would not say whether the company had a similar policy to notify users or if it was considering adopting one.
THE CASE OF THE SATANISTS
In several recent cases, however, Facebook apparently did not inform account-holders or their lawyers about government snooping.
Last year, several weeks after police apprehended four young Satanists who burned down a church in Pomeroy, Ohio, an FBI agent executed a search warrant on Facebook seeking data about two of the suspects.
All four ultimately pleaded guilty and received sentences of eight to ten years in state prison (along with a message of forgiveness from a church official who called the sentence "God's time out," and presented them with a Bible). It is unclear if data obtained from the warrant was used in the investigation.
Lawyers for the two defendants were unaware of the searches until they were contacted by Reuters.
In another case, the DEA searched the account of Nathan Kuemmerle, a Hollywood psychiatrist who pleaded guilty in Los Angeles federal court after a joint operation last year by the DEA and local police revealed he had run a "pill mill" for celebrity customers.
Westlaw records show that that the DEA executed a warrant to search Kuemmerle's Facebook account weeks after his arrest.
At Kuemmerle's bail hearing, a Redondo Beach police detective pointed to comments Kuemmerle made on Facebook and in the site's popular game "Mafia Wars" to argue that he should be denied bail.
According to Kuemmerle's lawyer, John Littrell, the detective testified on cross-examination that the information was from "an undercover source." Littrell told Reuters that neither he nor his client was ever informed about the warrant, and that he only learned of its existence from Reuters.
The detective said in an e-mail message that he did not recall being asked about how he obtained the Facebook information. The DEA did not reply to requests for comment.
POTENTIAL FOR NEW LEGAL CHALLENGES
The Facebook searches potentially open up new legal challenges in an area that at one time seemed relatively settled: How much protection an individual has against government searches of personal information held by third parties. In a 1976 case, United States v. Miller, a divided U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a bank did not have to inform its customer when it turned over his financial records to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.
In doing so, the Supreme Court held that the customer could not invoke Fourth Amendment rights against illegal search and seizure because the records were bank property in which he had no legitimate "expectation of privacy."
Under this reasoning, a person would have no more expectation of privacy in Facebook content than in bank records. A key difference, however, is the scale of information that resides on social networking sites.
"It is something new," said Thomas Clancy, a constitutional-law professor at the University of Mississippi. "It's the amount of information and data being provided as a matter of course by third parties."
Eben Moglen, a cyberlaw professor at Columbia Law School, says the Facebook searches show that courts are ill-equipped to safeguard privacy rights in an age of digital media. In his view, "the solutions aren't legal, they're technical."
Clancy, the Mississippi professor, said that courts are divided over whether the unprecedented volume of digital records in the possession of third parties should give rise to special rules governing the search of electronic data.
He added that the Supreme Court had an opportunity to clarify the issue in a case called Ontario v. Quon, but that it decided to "punt."
The Quon case concerned a California policeman who claimed his employer violated his Fourth Amendment rights when it read sexually explicit messages that he had sent from a work pager.
The Court found that that the employer's search was not unreasonable, but declined to rule on the degree to which people have a privacy interest in electronic data controlled by others.
Explaining the court's caution, Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote, "The judiciary risks error by elaborating too fully on the Fourth Amendment implications of emerging technology before its role in society has become clear."

Nimbuzz Ping in India

2011-07-13T03:17:00.000-07:00

We have not had official confirmation of the news yet but it seems that Nimbuzz Ping – the feature that lets you get a notification from the IM via a text message even if the app is not running – is now working in India.

Nimbuzz’s official website lists Aircel and Idea as the networks in the country supporting Ping, and one of our friends who uses an Aircel handset says that the feature is working just dandy for him. For those who do not know, Nimbuzz Ping is a feature that lets Nimbuzz users get notifications via text messages when they are not logged into the messenger or when their handset is not capable of supporting push notifications.

In simple terms, you can find out that one of your friends has pinged you online via a text message – very handy for those who do not have smartphones. Nimbuzz Ping works on both Java and Symbian handsets as of now. We think it is pretty cool for those who do not have smartphones or heck, even just want to save battery by not having an app running in the background ALL the time. Now, we are waiting for that official confirmation! In the meantime, you can find out more about Nimbuzz Ping here.